July 23, 2010

Top 5 Podcasts for Marketers

I spend a lot of time listening to podcasts at the gym, in the car, and while doing busy work.  Podcasts are a great resource to keep on top of the news; stay current on new technologies, applications, and business best practices; and, of course, be entertained.

Here are my favorite podcasts for marketers:

1.  Marketing Over Coffee: Hosted by John Wall and Christopher Penn, this podcast is jam packed with tips and tricks regarding SEO/SEM, email marketing, inbound marketing, and social media.  It helps to be a bit techy but this is a must listen for marketers.

2. For Immediate Release: Hosted by Shel Holtz and Neville Hobson, this podcast covers all the hot topics in PR including best practices, PR-related market research, social media, and discussions and analysis of PR missteps.  The discussion between the hosts, segments from contributors, and listener comments all keep the content fresh and interesting.

3. Six Pixels of Separation: Hosted by Mitch Joel, Six Pixels covers marketing, social media, and interviews with authors and industry luminaries.  I particularly enjoy Mitch’s Media Hacks podcast, which is a frank discussion between some really smart and fun guys in social media including: Christopher Penn, Julien Smith, Chris Brogan, C.C. Chapman, and Hugh McGuire. The Jaffe & Joel series also has some interesting and sometimes controversial conversations between Mitch and Joseph Jaffe from Powered.

4.  Small Business Marketing Blog: Hosted by John Jantsch of Duct Tape Marketing, this podcast is a series of interviews with authors, entrepreneurs, and small business marketing experts.  They offer great food-for-thought on building and marketing your business that can apply not just to small, local businesses, but start ups and tech companies as well.

5.  The BeanCast: Hosted by Bob Knorpp, this podcast gathers together a panel of interesting people in the marketing, advertising, PR, and social media space to cover hot topics in the marketing space.

Some of the other podcasts that are on my weekly listening list are:

1.  This Week in Google & This Week in Tech (TWiG & TWiT):  If you don’t have time to read all the tech blogs, these podcasts offer good summary & discussion on the hot topics.  Expect an inordinate amount of coverage of Apple, Google, Facebook, and Twitter.

2.  Books on the Nightstand: Hosted by Ann Kingman and Michael Kindness, both who work in the book publishing industry but produce the podcast as a personal project.  I’ve gotten a ton of great book recommendations and expanded my horizons in terms of the types of books I would typically read.

3.  Manic Mommies:  Hosted by Erin Kane and Kristin Brandt, this is my very favorite podcast and makes me realize I am not alone in trying to balance a career and family.  These ladies are funny, honest, smart, and so fun to listen to.  While part bitch session (my fav part), they also interview people and companies of interest to working moms.

4.  Cooking with the Moms:  From Meal Makeover Moms Liz Weiss and Janice Bissex, this podcast offer nutrition discussion and recipes that are family friendly, healthy, and taste good.  This podcast has given me plenty of ideas on meals to make for my family.

5.  IM-Mobile: Hosted by Brian Prows, this podcast features interview from mobile industry executives and is a great way to stay on top of emerging companies in different sectors of the mobile industry.

I’m trying very hard to get to the gym more so I’m (hopefully) going to need even more podcasts to listen to.  So what are your favorites? Any suggestions on marketing, business, tech, mobile or parenting podcasts?