PREMIER WORKSHOP

Podcasting to Platform: Creating Your Own Online Audiobook with Seth Harwood

In today’s publishing world, debut authors not only have to write well, they also have to help sell their work. Many agents and editors are looking for writers who bring an existing audience to the table. There’s no better way to attract readers and fans to your fiction or nonfiction than by giving them the actual book’s content. Learn how to do this in an easy-to-distribute, easy-to-consume manner: free serialized audiobooks. You’ll learn best practices for recording and editing your own reading of your work so that it sounds professionally produced—all on a shoestring budget.

In part one of this two-part course, students will learn how to create their own audiobook podcasts, the most successful and accessible way to promote their writing via the web. By creating a series of audio installments, students will have premier content that readers and listeners—potential book-buying fans—desire. Instead of toiling to figure out what to write on your blog, now you can let people hear you reading your own work.

Writing Level: Advanced (participants should have a completed manuscript in-hand)

Computer Skill Level: Beginner / Intermediate

Required Book: Podcasting for Dummies by Tee Morris and Evo Terra

Recommended Hardware: Zoom H2 Handy Portable Stereo Recorder

Recommended Software:

• For MAC: Do you already have GarageBand installed on your Mac? If so, you’re set.  If you do not, you can download a free version of Audacity at: http://audacity.sourceforge.net/download/ Another option is to go to your local Apple Store or the Apple Online Store and buy iLife.
• For PC: Download a free version of Audacity at: http://audacity.sourceforge.net/download/

Workshop Length: 4 weeks

Tuition: $299.00

Special Guest Instructor: Seth Harwood (click to read his bio)

Start Date: September 9th (Register Now)

Course Structure
This workshop will consist of four one-week sessions. Each session will include an online lecture (text based), along with an assignment that will be submitted to the instructor for private review. Student work will also be posted for group review and feedback. Throughout the workshop you will be able to participate in asynchronous lecture discussion and encouraged to take advantage of ongoing informal discussions and any self-directed exercises.

In this course you will learn:

• How to create your own audiobook to sell or give away using online distribution and promotion
• Successful strategies for creating a network of online fans who will want to buy your book
• The tools you should use to record your reading and how to use them
• Tips for creating the best sound quality
• How to edit your flubs and flips to create careful, quality chapters and…
• How to combine chapters with intros, outros and promotion to create fun weekly episodes that will get listeners involved

Who should take this course:

• Debut authors
• Published authors who want to increase sales
• Self-published authors
• Authors trying to break through and find an agent
• Publishers looking for new, affordable, effective online marketing and promotion strategies

Workshop Outline

Session One: Introduction

• The state of publishing
• Why serialized audiobooks?
• Using the equipment: which recorder to get and how it works
• Tips for where to record and how to avoid excess noise

Assignment: With your recorder, produce three to four thirty-second sound checks to share on the class site for troubleshooting and optimizing sound.

Session Two: Recording and Editing

• Straightforward methodology for recording by the chapter
• Editing in GarageBand and Audacity: Practice, practice, practice!
• Sound effects, character voices and added music: A few notes on what to do and what not to do

Assignment: Record and edit a complete chapter of your book to share on the class site and receive peer feedback.

Session Three: Creating the Episodes

• Creating your intro and outro with bed music and static greeting
• Varying sound levels: balancing content with music
• Modular example of putting the pieces together in Audacity or GarageBand

Assignment: Create your intro and outro files and build your first audiobook episode consisting of one to three chapters. Experiment with adding promotional content. Share intro and outro to the class site for feedback.

Session Four: Mixing, Exporting and Creating MP3s

• Improving sound quality through normalization
• Turning your hard work into an MP3 that sounds great
• Tagging and other essential brass tacks
• Adding timely promotion content along the way

Assignment: Take one episode from session three, turn it into an MP3 and go forward from there. Record your whole book and turn it into different episodes.