The making stage of my DA, sports podcast ‘Locals Only’, saw the refinement of the social media aspect of the project, as well as publishing an episode of the podcast in which I took on the advice that came from the previous stage of the DA. Locals Only is an interview podcast series in which I speak to high level Wollongong athletes. We talk about where they are up to in their sporting career, and how they got to that stage through their upbringing in Wollongong.
The fourth episode of Locals Only featured Wollongong AFLW player Kate Stanton, and was the first episode that did not feature the ‘questions from twitter’ segment that I had tried to implement in the previous episodes. By dropping this segment, the episode felt a lot more fluid and natural, as I was not trying to shoehorn in questions and disrupt the flow of the conversation.
Statistically, the episode performed just below average, but was still within the range of the other episodes already published. The average audience size sits at around 20 consistent listeners, and overall the podcast has amassed 230 total plays over the four episodes. I am more than pleased with this result, as a small but consistent fan base was what I had aimed to build all along, finding the niche of local sports fans to be limited but highly passionate still. I also believe that by covering a wide array of sports in the episodes so far that the content was fresh and engaging, and kept those listeners interested in upcoming episodes, rather than burning them out with the same repeated content.
I also aimed at using the Locals Only Twitter page to build and maintain engagement with my fan base, particularly around upcoming episodes, but also in bringing attention and views back to earlier episodes, to try and engage the audience to a greater degree.
By bringing attention to previous episodes I hope to both bring awareness to them, but also maintain the engagement of fans through a longer period without an episode, owing to technical difficulties and scheduling problems which I faced. However, by bringing attention to these earlier podcast episodes I was also able to see how my podcasting style had grown and develop over the course of this DA, and also showed the areas in which I can still improve or adjust.
While this is the last module of the DA process, there is still much room left for growth and development in the making of Locals Only. I hope to continue to create this podcast, and hone my interviewing, audio editing and general computer skills, as I create engaging content for both Illawarra sports fans, and hopefully down the track for sports fans in general.
All episodes of Locals Only can be found here, keep an eye out for more to come!
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