Humo(u)r in podcasting with James Cridland

True or false: to be a respected podcaster, you must always be serious on the mic?

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And if you don't believe it, have a listen to what James Cridland has to say about it. Because in podcasting MANY people listen to him and he's hilarious (in his podcast and newsletter). 

Podnews: https://podnews.net/
James: https://james.cridland.net/

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Transcript

Steph

Welcome to Podcast To Connect. If you are using a podcast or want to use a podcast to find your people and make connections with them, whether it be for business or community purpose, then this is the place for you. Hi, I'm Steph from Coffeelike Media, and I've been podcasting for quite a while, and I have definitely grown my community and my business, both from podcasting as well as supporting mediums like newsletters and YouTube channels. And we'll talk all about that, don't worry. But I wanted to share some of the things that I have learned throughout the years, as well as some of the conversations I'm having with people about the different things we're doing to connect to folks in the podcasting space and what glorious things come out of those connections.

 In this first season, I'm repurposing episodes from earlier versions of Podcast To Connect, one of which was a 30 day experience called National Podcast post month, where a bunch of editors came on to the podcast and gave tips and advice on how to maneuver your podcast to sound good. And then it grew from there into more of the connective and outreach and community focus of podcasting. I've taken a smattering of both of those flavors, and here are a few of those that I think give you a variety, a bouquet, a rainbow, shall we say, of different tips that I think will help your business or community podcast. If you need help with your podcast, feel free to reach out to me@coffeelikemedia.com. Alright, let's get on with today's tip.

James

Today I'm so excited. We're talking about humor in business podcasts, and there is no one better to have this conversation with than James Kirdland. James Kirdland, editor of Pod News, a daily podcast newsletter, or I'd like to say, the daily podcast newsletter. A radio futurologist, a writer, consultant, advisor, and speaker. His quippy moments in pod news carefully nestled in the audio and text versions, and they often get me giggling. And I wanted to know how he got comfortable with having humor in them. So here we are. Thank you so much, James, for joining me today.

It's a great pleasure. Thank you so much for asking.

Steph:

All right, so did you always have humor in pod news?

James:

No. I think when Podnews first started, it was very, I mean, you can go back and see the first ones back in May of 2017. They were very straight laced, very straightforward. This has happened. This has happened and this has happened. That's your newsletter. And I think as I continued doing it, I thought, you know, there are human beings reading this and possibly I can, you know, make a, make an amusing quip towards the end where it's, where it's required. And I think that that's basically why I started putting these in. There are more universicommas, humorous quips in the podcast version of the newsletter, which is in your favorite podcast app as Pod news daily, and in quite a few non favorite podcast apps as well. And so there's a bit more sort of humor in there because actually the secret is that the podcast version is where I read it through to make sure that the newsletter makes sense. That's my final read through, and I just happen to record it because it's a good way of getting the best value out of the content there.

So, yeah, so the podcast is basically.

Steph:

Your edit for the newsletter.

James:
Yeah. So the podcast is basically, I finished writing the newsletter. I'm just about to send it, but firstly, I'll read it out loud to see if it makes sense. And so what you hear in the podcast is probably take four or five where I've read it out and I've gone, oh, that doesn't scan very well, or that doesn't sound very good. And sometimes, you know, I will read something out and then I'll go, and that was probably not quite right. I'll get rid of that for the newsletter version. So, yeah, so that's what I do.

Steph

Sure, sure.

James

And oftentimes when folks go from trying to be overly professional to letting themselves into their business creations, shall we say, whether it be podcast, newsletter, what have you, they might go a little too far and then have to readjust. Did you have that experience or did you just kind of go really slow with adding those humorous pieces of you in there?

I mean, I kind of wanted to make sure that pod news was, and pod news is still supposed to be opinion free. And I wanted to make sure that I wasn't necessarily putting too much of me in there, but I also wanted to make sure that it's not just a boring, you know, business read every single day. So I wanted to, you know, add a little bit of levity as an example. The, you know, the, the version that I'm writing today currently says, it's talking about Triton's australian podcast rancor for October, which has just been released. And I've got two press releases. And it says in the current newsletter, press releases tell us that Arn's I Heart podcast network is number one, while listener also is number one because they're both claiming that they're number one, a little bit of sort of, you know, knowing, you know. Yes, we understand the game that you're both playing here because they're both claiming to be number one of slightly different things. And I think, you know, people understand, hopefully, that I'm not being too sarcastic too many times.

Steph:

Have you ever gotten any negative feedback on any of the humor that you've laced throughout the newsletter or podcast?

I don't think I've had too much negative feedback. Occasionally, I notice that I'm being a bit too sarcastic, and that's probably not a good thing. And so I reel myself back from that. I mean, I think the only bits of negativity that I do get are actually cultural problems rather than problems with humor, problems of, you know, using the wrong words that Americans don't understand. I'm a british, as you can tell, even though I'm talking to you from Brisbane in Australia. And so really, just making sure that I'm using the right phraseology for an american audience is something that I find perennially hard. And there are all kinds of tips and tricks that I have. For example, if you. If you write in British English, then you talk about companies as they, if you're writing American English, companies are always it. And so there is literally a piece of code which sits on pod news as I press the publish button that says, you've used the word they three times here. Did you mean it? And I then have to go back. It won't let me send it, and I have to go back and change it and get rid of the words if I've done it wrongly. So, you know, so I've had to do a lot of that kind of stuff, but not thankfully. You know, not too many people have taken umbrage at my vague attempts at humor. And I think probably 15 years of being behind a microphone doing radio has probably helped me understand what I can and can't get away with going back.

Steph

To the why of going back to the why, period.

James

Why do you think we get so professional that we feel like we can't have humor, even when it feels like such a natural fit at some specific moments in a business project like this?

Yeah, I think some people see humor or see knowing phrases as being unprofessional. And I think if. If the word professional means humourless and grim and boring. I worked at the BBC for two years. I know exactly what that's like. But most places are not like that. And most places are, you know, friendly, happy places that you enjoy working at. And I think that there is a time and a place for humour, particularly if you're writing a newsletter, which, you know, probably will start quite seriously, but actually towards the end of it, you can probably put a couple of knowing phrases in there and I think that that's probably acceptable. I think it's, you know, when it turns into just being a humor fest all the way through, then it just becomes a little bit annoying. So I think you just have to be a little bit careful.

James

Oh, yeah. I mean, you definitely don't want to like force humor or try to be a comedian and try to make the whole thing a giant stick. That's not really the purpose of, of what most folks are doing in these business podcasts, but, but definitely just kind of allowing yourself to come in like you said it early on, like you're talking to human beings. And we connect when we're ourselves, not.

Steph

When we're those kind of closed off.

James

Cleaned up versions of ourselves, so to speak.

Yeah, and there used to be a thing, you know, the evening news in the UK used to have at the end of it, the and finally story. And the and finally story was always a humorous story, and sometimes it was a, you know, a story about a skateboarding dog or something. So you'd seen lots about power outages and bad things happening across the world and plane crashes, and then there was a skateboarding dog and it was always a sort of a relaxing end of the news. You know, it's not all bad in the world and, you know, and there are some news bulletins that still do that sort of thing. I think one of the american networks has a feel good segment, and I think that there's something to be said for that actually, of just, you know, not necessarily being as serious as you. Completely serious all the time.

Steph

Very, very, very true.

James

Can you think of anything that might help someone when they're starting a business podcast to like, let their own humor come into the podcast, like something that might relax them and make them think, it's okay, I can do this.

I think certainly towards the end, once you're relaxed, once you're, you know, comfortable about what you're doing. And by the way, you know, being relaxed in front of a microphone can take many years. You know, I wasn't necessarily as relaxed in front of a microphone when I first started in radio in the late 1980s. Gosh, that makes me feel old. So I think, you know, you just get used to being a bit more relaxed. And with relaxation comes humour sort of pretty well, automatically. I do have the benefit that I have this ridiculous english accent. And anything said in a ridiculous english accent, everybody goes, oh, gee, that's Molly Python. And so, of course, that's what you end up with. But I think that, you know, anybody can look at being a bit more relaxed, a bit more, you know, unbuttoned, and therefore a little bit more full of humor as well.

James

Thank you so much for listening to.

Steph

This episode of podcast to connect. I'll have all of the information in the show, notes or video notes, depending on where you are consuming this. Again, podcast two connect is available in audio and video format. And if you need any help with your podcast, feel free to reach out@coffeeslikemedia.com.

James

Thanks so much. Bye.