TRY THESE SOCIAL AUDIO PLATFORMS FOR BETTER ONLINE NETWORKING
A Guest Blog Post By Jerry Nolan
There are so many platforms now that it could take months to check them all.
At the last count, there were almost 100 different Social Audio apps to choose from.
For that reason, I am only going to concentrate on some of the main platforms.
Twitter Spaces
Clubhouse
LinkedIn Audio Events
Wisdom
Limor (My Personal Favourite)
TWITTER SPACES
“Spaces” are Twitter’s version of Social Audio.
This is a great platform for meeting people, the membership with audio here is huge and you will find they like to engage a lot.
It’s still in mono and the sound isn’t very good, along with the fact you can’t use a microphone that’s USB is annoying.
There is no desktop version you can chat in, however you can listen to spaces on the desktop and enjoy them as a listener only mode.
As you start a space you can record the room, start as host but you can only get 2 co-hosts , no more.
You can have up to 10 speakers in total as well as your team.
There’s a chat option in some spaces and a clips option in others and some even have both, but Twitter is selective of who gets theirs and every space is different.
The community is active and supportive for most and I find it’s the best option for having fun and enjoying some excellent chats in spaces.
It leads the way with so many involved here, this is the best part of Twitter and trolls are few and far between.
There’s an option to post stuff above the room like tweets and blogs, this leads to excellent conversations as a whole.
PROS;
The community is great and welcoming
Chat, although you have to leave the room to chat
Clips
The Nest
Replays
CONS;
Sound is not very good
(Compressed Mono)
Mobile Only
(For Now)
CLUBHOUSE
Clubhouse is considered by many to be the leader in the category.
They have so much to offer on the platform and it’s what gives us the good bits first, to try out.
The audio is excellent, the setup is simple and easy to use.
Rooms can be made instantly or put in your calendar for future dates and times.
You start off as a host or Moderator as it’s called on this platform.
You can have as many Moderators as you want, this helps run a good room for chat.
It makes it flow better than most other interactive social rooms or spaces.
To speak in a room you have to hit the Hand icon which lets the moderators know you’d like to talk, accept the invite and wait your turn to be called to talk by one of them.
It’s rude just to start talking and I’d recommend you join rooms first and just watch how it works to begin with.
After a while you will get used to talking in rooms and will hold your own, it’s good practice to have help the first few times from friends who know how to do this.
The rooms are full of people who want to get involved in conversations and let them up on the stage to talk.
It creates a full rounded conversation with different people interjecting with differing points of view.
You sign in on your phone, as it is sent a confirmation number to sign in every time, this does away with most of the trolls but they do exist.
The app can be on your computer with an app called clubdeck.
Clubdeck is not part of clubhouse officially but it’s the same thing to the user, but it is so much easier to use as everything is right in front of you.
The chat option and moderator chat option also can be used at the same time, there are lots of options in the options menu for you to check out.
PROS;
It can be great fun interacting with your new friends
All of it can be heard on your computer
USB mics work well here
You can form a club
You can form a house
Recording
Clips
Chat option
Emojis
CONS;
You will inevitably get trolls but boot them out and carry on
Rooms can be too big and you won’t get noticed
It’s hard to break into the clicks on clubhouse and
this will take time for people to get used to you
It takes a while to get used to
There are so many rooms selling you something to make you rich.
LINKEDIN AUDIO EVENTS
To be honest this is more business-like and marketers are at a loss as to what to do here with this opportunity.
You start the room and you run the room, which makes you very busy if the room fills up, you raise your hand to get on stage and there are some emojis to let the speakers know you agree with them.
No recording option here but it’s been said that can be rectified soon.
The computer option is excellent and switching between phone and computer in a room is seamless, one of the best in any app.
It’s all very business-like and I don’t think Tik Tok or Instagram creators will do anything here, I’ve seen some very detrimental comments in this app towards the influencer type of community.
PROS;
It’s very good for business type rooms, more like an audio zoom meeting.
It will get recorded but you can record on your computer anyway, with third party apps.
You can chat on the event room post which is where you will join in the first place
CONS;
No Recordings
No clips or easy chat
Nobody really knows how to use it yet or what to do with it.
WISDOM
Wisdom audio is a “ONE ON ONE” chat option.
More like two people having a chat.
It’s held by a host and you can join in for a set amount of time with them.
The audio is excellent, one of the best, and I think this is the only app that lets you download in MP4, a big plus for Podcasters and this is where this app wins.
Open a room and chat to your opposite in the room and download great quality audio for editing in your podcast.
The pros and cons were already mentioned so I’ll move on.
LIMOR
The Limor app is a direct to phone podcast app.
You sign in with your Twitter account or others if need be.
Once signed up you can do a cast.
Normally a short recording of what’s on your mind at the time, where this app works great is that anyone can leave a short recorded message as a comment back to you.
So while you don’t talk directly to people in a room like the other social audio apps, they interact with comments, under your cast.
This is a very active platform and I’m liking it more and more as the days go on.
You can listen to others on the platform and also leave them a comment.
It’s really interactive and everyone likes it a lot but where it wins is that the disabled community can interact if they need to, by talking and not typing.
It’s a really good option in social audio.
MEET JERRY NOLAN
Jerry Nolan who has worked in transport for over 30 years on the tech side.
Managing some of the first platforms in transport management.
An Angel investor since the DOTCOM days and enlightening businesses on how to increase traction and sales through firstly websites and with platforms on Social Media.
Lately can be found working and enjoying Social Audio on many platforms.
Gerry@lokwoodmedia.com
