Powered by Personal Life Media

Between watching podcasting plateau, radio sounding as generically corporate as ever, and the impending impotence and ironic hypocrisy of MTVs Video Music Awards, Susan Bratton’s Personal Life Media Widget system looks a lot like the future of successful audio distribution.

I’m not usually this gushy guy. I’m usually the “let’s see how it gets adopted” guy. But honestly, this is the first time I have seen someone take the basic principles of the brand as facilitator, learn from what other platforms have done successfully, and apply them so convincingly, so simply, on a first go.

So here’s a quick rundown on why you need to see what’s happening for radio, podcasters, marketers, widgets, listeners and creators at Personal Life Media:

Putting Podcasts in Easy Reach: Where you are right now

My in-laws are a perfect case study for what’s wrong with podcasting right now. They are a great audience for podcasts, as many of their favorite shows are also repurposed as podcasts. They have time to listen to the podcasts. They’re affluent, and want to be able to listen to a radio show they liked, or listen to a part of a show they missed. They even have iTunes installed.

Yet podcasting is a difficult barrier for them to break. First, perceptually, podcasting sounds like you need an iPod to listen to it. So they never got past that point. Once we got beyond the perceptual barrier, things were okay.

Even for me, someone who already knows and is generally predisposed to listening to podcasts, and has subscribed to more than my fair share — I don’t know, there’s some reason why I just don’t ever make the time to go check into iTunes and catch up on my subscriptions.

Not having to go to a podcast player, podcast site, or any other perceptually separated process to eventually listen to the audio is a tremendous game changer. And it’s not all that revolutionary: just check out any band’s MySpace page. But it is big for podcasts. Now fans of shows, or show creators can give the audience the show they want, right where they are. No clicking away to other sites, pages, or subscriptions.

Your brand is my brand

From California to the New York Islands, people in meeting rooms call this “loss of brand control.” In the most basic sense, the easy-to-use Personal Life Media widget configurator allows anyone to customize the logo image, colors, and even the podcasts that are played through the widget. Got a podcast? Add it, and this widget will play it. There is a pay wall for really real co-branding and ad placement, which is a complete no brainer, win-win again.

Outside of the irrational fears of many corporate meeting rooms, it’s brilliant branding. Providing these functional capabilities along with the design customization is branding. It’s a brand that says, “We’re here to be useful and help you on your own terms.” Personal Life Media is the context within which all this interaction takes place. If this isn’t awesome branding, someone should let YouTube and Google, iTunes and Nike+ know right away.

It’s not completely perfect

Just to round it out, as I’m sure you’re seeing as you play with this: the UI controls aren’t blowing anyone away. There’s a bit of confusion between how a user navigates between podcast series, text messages, and podcast episodes. The active podcast play controls are too small. The labels on the buttons at the bottom are not self-evident. What do I get? What am I creating? These can only be answered with a leap-of-faith click: my least favorite click in the world.

Having said all that, there’s enough UI convention here, especially for iTunes users to quickly muddle their way into an enjoyable experience. I got sucked into a Dishy Mix episode just making my example widget for this article.

What widgets are meant to be

All in all, if you want an example for how widgets and portable technology are changing the way brands communicate tangible value to their audience, and how audiences in turn drive value for brands by creating a network of loyal consumers, the Personal Life Media podcast widget is it.

Only two weeks old, I’m already eager to see how the adoption of the Widget tracks, as it employes the Gigya wrapper for installation across platforms like facebook, Hi5, etc. I just can’t believe that anyone who’s serious about podcasting as a creator, or trying out a podcast as a listener wouldn’t be drawn to this model like a bug light.

Related posts:

1. Video Podcasts
2. Microblogging: Digital CB Radio
3. The Unabellavista Diretto Widget Brings Italy To You
4. Be a Widgeteer! What You Need to Know About Widgets.