I’ve recently gone on a new podcast bender in an attempt to spice up my morning commute. I’d venture to guess that I’ve subscribed to six or seven new podcasts within the past week. It’s been an interesting experiment…unfortunately mostly futile.

I’m surprised at how many podcasters seem to lack a feel for their own pace. A common mistake is what I like to call the “pre-content banter.” This is the portion where the host and his sidekick giggle back and forth with each other, usually about inside jokes, and often make reference to personal minutia having nothing to do with the topic of the show.

One thing to keep in mind is that a podcast listener has an unbelievable range of choice at his fingertips. In five seconds he can back out of your podcast and start up another one. In fact I do this all the time.

There is so much choice out there that you simply have to respect the listener at all times if you want to retain that listener. Keep this in mind the next time you want to chatter on-air about what you had for lunch before getting to your REAL message.