Start Your Ruby Podcast Today! No Experience Required

Ruby

Jason Charnes

Start Your Ruby Podcast Today! No Experience Required

by Jason Charnes

In the talk "Start Your Ruby Podcast Today! No Experience Required" at RailsConf 2022, Jason Charnes shares valuable insights into launching and maintaining a podcast, particularly for those interested in Ruby. Drawing on experiences from their podcast, Remote Ruby, which has produced 170 episodes, Jason emphasizes that potential podcasters do not need prior experience to succeed. The discussion revolves around:

Starting Simple: Jason and his co-hosts began with minimal equipment and complexity, highlighting that starting with what you have—like a simple microphone or even just a phone—can lead to success without overwhelming technical hurdles.
Content Generation: Initially, they opted for informal discussions about Ruby, progressing to include guests after realizing that this enriched content engagement. They learned that inviting recognizable figures in the community significantly boosts listener interest.
Maintaining Consistency: Jason stresses the importance of regularity in podcasting. They managed to maintain a consistent release schedule, which helped improve their audience reach.
Audience Engagement and Analytics: By monitoring episode downloads, they recognized trends (like the popularity of episodes with guest appearances), which guided their content strategy. They noted that good titles significantly correlate with higher download numbers.
Evolution and Tools: As their podcast grew, they upgraded their recording methods to ensure better audio quality and integrated professional help for sound editing. Tools like Zencaster became useful for recording high-quality audio while managing the complexities of virtual interviews.

The talk concludes with a call to action for attendees to consider podcasting, stressing the need for diverse voices in the Ruby community and encouraging aspiring podcasters to seek guidance from experienced hosts. The organizers express enthusiastic support for community-driven content creation in Ruby, emphasizing that everyone has a potential story or experience worth sharing.

00:00:00.900 Hello everyone.

00:00:15.199 That's pretty good for Thursday! Welcome to the shortest talk title at the conference: Start Your Ruby Podcast Today! No Experience Required. This is the first time I've given a talk with more than one person, let alone three people.

00:00:27.480 This is also the first time Andrew's giving a talk. Is this your first in-person talk, Chris?

00:00:33.239 Would you believe that Chris has given hundreds of talks?

00:00:41.100 Thank you all for being here. As I said, it’s Thursday afternoon of a three-day conference, and I’m surprised anyone is here who isn't Chris's wife.

00:00:56.460 Today we're going to talk about podcasting. The goal is that if you've ever thought about podcasting or if you're not quite sure you could do it, hopefully we can change your mind and inspire you to start.

00:01:08.220 Before we get started, let me introduce myself. I’m Jason, this is Andrew, and this is Chris. Andrew and I both work at a company called Podia, which is an all-in-one platform for creators. We help people create courses, digital downloads, and more. I like to say we’re a Ruby on Rails palace. If you want to learn more about Podia, you can just add a .com to that.

00:01:34.799 I'd also like to talk on Chris’s behalf about GoRails, which Chris started. GoRails provided Chris the opportunity to be here today. Also, thank you to Hatchbox and all the other community resources that Chris has dedicated time to.

00:02:05.579 The three of us are excited to be here. Chris and his wife, Brooke, came to Portland a few days early; they were so excited. I was excited too! When I landed on Monday, I downloaded the Hilton app to look for my stay at the DoubleTree that I booked two months ago.

00:02:39.300 Unfortunately, I realized I had booked for the 2020 conference instead of 2022. I ended up at the DoubleTree, suitcase in hand, worried that I was going to have to sleep at the convention center.

00:02:52.140 Thank you to the couple of people who helped me find a room. If it weren’t for my friend Andrea, who had a place to stay, I might have had some troubles. The real hero of my story is my wife, Shannon, who found me a hotel in ten minutes.

00:03:09.720 Anyway, enough about my travel woes. Let's talk about Remote Ruby. Tomorrow will mark our 180th episode of Remote Ruby, and over the last three years, we've learned a lot.

00:03:50.400 Is anyone here familiar with Remote Ruby? That’s still pretty wild!

00:04:07.140 I wanted to quickly share how this talk came about. On February 28th of this year, which may have been the last day to submit proposals, I saw this track and mentioned to Chris that I had this talk idea. I asked him, 'Do you want to do a multi-speaker talk?'

00:04:48.540 He thought that was a good idea, and we figured it would be cool to talk about podcasting. Not because we think we know what we're doing, but because we want to show that anyone can do it.

00:05:00.840 There was one issue, though: there are three of us, and I had only spoken to Chris. I thought, 'It’s cool; I don’t have to tell Andrew about it because surely, the talk won’t be accepted.' Then I got the email saying we were approved, and I thought, 'Well, this is uncomfortable.'

00:05:41.220 So I waited for the right moment, which happened to be during a Zoom call at work. I casually mentioned to Andrew that he was giving a talk at RailsConf. So, as I said earlier, we’re a podcast that talks about Ruby on Rails, and now Elixir. We used to talk about JavaScript, but with Rails 7, that kind of faded away.

00:06:11.820 Let me share how the podcast came to be. In 2017, Chris and I chatted every week. We mostly talked about Ruby, Rails, and building products because that was what we were doing.

00:06:48.060 We’d often joke that we should start a podcast, but I thought, 'Nobody wants to listen to this; we’re just chatting!'

00:07:03.480 But in 2018, I started an online Meetup called Remote Ruby, where we would have virtual meetups once a month to discuss Ruby.

00:07:41.010 At the time, the local Ruby community in Memphis was fading away, and there were only a few of us left. Our first meetup occurred in February 2018. I opened a Slack group and even initiated a Google Hangout, inviting Chris to give a talk on building a hosting platform with Ruby.

00:08:07.740 If you're unfamiliar, that’s Hatchbox. The talk Chris gave was fantastic, and it gave me hope for building a real community. After that, I put out a call for more speakers, but no one responded. I thought maybe I was being too ambitious.

00:08:45.840 I decided to keep doing the Meetups. In the second event, I prepared a talk on calculations I did in a Ruby program to figure out the best way to get out of debt. I was happy with it, and once again I asked, 'Who wants to speak at the next one?' But again, no one volunteered.

00:09:27.960 At the next meetup, I decided to share my screen and we worked through Ruby Koans together. If you’re unfamiliar, Ruby Koans is a fun exercise where you download a repository, run the specs, and make the tests pass. It teaches a lot about the Ruby language.

00:09:53.760 Over the next few weeks, Chris and I kept discussing the discouraging lack of engagement, and we realized that we wanted community content. When I first got into Ruby in 2012, there were podcasts and blogs. Gradually, that has become less common.

00:10:59.760 Chris said, "Why don’t we just podcast ourselves?" I thought that was a fair idea. So we set out to record a podcast with one rule: to do it as simply as possible.

00:11:34.020 This rule kept us engaged beyond the first few episodes. We realized we needed good audio quality, but also that both Chris and I were not audio experts. We didn’t want that to become a massive burden, so we recorded on Google Hangouts at first. It may not have been the most professional approach, but it was simple.

00:12:40.380 We didn’t have an RSS feed either. Initially, all we did was update our website to link to our YouTube videos and see if anyone listened.

00:13:27.270 We realized that we could always improve but wanted to keep starting as low-maintenance as possible. We quickly focused on the most basic aspects: just talking about Ruby and Rails. We avoided fancy intros and sponsors.

00:14:40.800 If you want to start a podcast today, I suggest starting small. Find a topic that excites you, such as Ruby, and maybe partner with a friend or co-host. Use whatever microphone you have at first; modern smartphones can suffice.

00:15:49.299 If you have to record alone, opt for applications like QuickTime to keep it simple. When we record now, we typically use Zoom for our calls, as it benefits the overall audio quality a lot.

00:16:46.140 Focusing on good audio helps maintain engagement and will save you a lot of post-production headaches. Remember that editing takes a lot of time and should be done sparingly. This brings us to how we've adjusted our process to stay simple yet professional.

00:17:47.500 After recording a few episodes, we realized this podcast was something we wanted to continue. We began to take podcasting more seriously.

00:18:53.800 Now, we transitioned to using Transistor, a podcast hosting platform, which provided us with the necessary tools for organizing and sharing our podcast.

00:19:56.580 In general, our learning experience evolved. From working with Ryan, we also learned how vital audio quality is.

00:20:53.640 Finding ways to keep our production straightforward and avoiding overly complicated setups was key.

00:21:14.520 Also, bringing on guests was pivotal. Initially, we found it hard to come up with topics for regular episodes. So, to keep things fresh, we started inviting guests.

00:22:19.050 We'd send out a few invites, and to our surprise, guests like Richard Schneeman said yes.

00:22:55.980 That episode with Richard gave us a big boost in downloads compared to previous episodes, hitting a hundred more downloads in the first 30 days.

00:23:44.220 Inviting guests allowed us to have meaningful discussions and gain insights into important topics.

00:24:39.360 We realized that preparing for guests and holding engaging conversations requires practice and effort.

00:25:11.760 Over our journey, we maintained a balance of interviews and casual chats to keep our content engaging.

00:26:00.420 We continued to expand our guest list until we had over 16 episodes, many featuring people we admired.

00:26:50.560 Preparation, familiarity, and good questions made for dynamic conversations that kept the audience engaged.

00:27:45.640 As with any podcast, it’s important to know when to pass on guests who might not be a good fit. We’ve refined our skills along the way.

00:28:29.700 But the most vital advice we have for anyone thinking about podcasting is to stay consistent. It’s easy to get sidetracked, but sticking to a consistent schedule is the key.

00:29:19.470 To build an audience, focus on being reliable. You can adjust your schedule, whether it's weekly, biweekly, or monthly, but stick to it.

00:30:05.100 Having multiple hosts can help keep the podcast running when one is unavailable. It’s less stressful and keeps things moving even when life gets complicated.

00:30:48.760 As we wrap up, we want you to know this is your turn to join the Ruby podcast community. There’s room for more voices. We can share experiences on building businesses with Rails or learning something new.

00:31:44.340 If you’re considering starting a podcast, reach out to us. We’ll assist you in getting started. Just tweet us, and we’ll be happy to chat.

00:32:52.400 Thank you for your time, and as always, happy podcasting!

RailsConf 2022