WebProNews has been covering the Podcast and New Media Expo taking place in Ontario, California.  You can catch our conference interviews at the WebProNews Video Blog right now.

The first part of getting started, according to Schwartzman, is imagining your objectives and setting your benchmarks.  A hazy goal of “let’s get more attention” won’t work – you’ll need concrete targets and measurable metrics that can be shown to advertisers, accountants, or whoever else is interested.  “It’s not just about getting the word out,” said the iPressroom exec.  “It’s about making a transaction on your website.”

As part of this process, Schwartzman believes you’ll need to identify an area of expertise in which you can offer a unique podcast.  There are lots of shows that imitate each other, and they can’t all be successful.  Whatever you wind up with, be sure to integrate it into your brand; Schwartzman recommends emailing out part of your podcast and then drawing viewers into your site with the rest.

He also suggests adding transcripts for SEO purposes, and it’s hard to go wrong with RSS and social networking.

As a final tip, don’t let all of this overwhelm you.  Schwartzman advocates creating a large number of shows in a short period of time, and then offering the podcasts over an extended period.

WebProNews anchor Kara Ratliff contributed to this story.