I probably spend about 1-2 hours each day driving and where I used to listen to music, then later switched to listening to news programs like the BBC, I’ve since switched to listening to podcasts a couple of months ago.

Why listen to podcasts? I personally would absorb more information out of a book, especially since I like to mark them up, but a podcast is a good way to multi-task, especially if you’re short on time and a great way to find something to do while you’re driving, exercising (I’m shooting for at least 2 hours of exercise a week to fight the flab), or while cleaning my desk or doing paperwork.

My personal preference is to go for programs with useful content, although I do like the occasional “talk radio” style podcast with hosts who are doing a “Seinfeld” (ie a podcast about nothing…) but generally that doesn’t take up more than 5% or 10% of my listening time.

If a podcast contains very good information, I’ll make a mental note to go through it again and take down notes.

Here’re some of the podcasts which I listen to and might be useful for you:

• Lisa Picarille and Shawn Collins’ “Affiliate Thing“: A great weekly topical podcast, Lisa and Shawn usually have a number of industry experts on their show and cover the latest shows.
• Sam Harrelson’s Affiliate Fortune Cookies: This is a new project which Sam has recently started up and it follows a “22 minute” (refering to the program length) daily podcast (5 days a week) format . It’ll be interesting to see Sam keep this up and perhaps make reference to it during the Social Marketing panel that he’ll be moderating at Affiliate Summit West. (Especially since the session synopsis reads “With almost 50% of Internet users now creating and sharing their own content, this new medium is changing how markets operate and how companies communicate with consumers.“
• Jeremy Schoemaker AKA Shoemoney’s Shoemoney Show: Jeremy hosted the Net Income show which featured interesting guests and where Pepperjam’s Kris Jones talked about doing seasonal PPC campaigns based on UGG boots and the American Idol television series to great effect. The latest show continues the tradition.

In addition to these, I buy quite a number of information products on CD or MP3, and also have utilities to rip DVD videos into MP3 tracks, so finding more audio material to listen to isn’t an issue.

If you’re looking for more audio podcasts, you might also like to check out the SEO podcasts on WebmasterRadio.fm. I spoke to WebmasterRadio founder Daron Babin (AKA SEGuru) last week and he mentioned that a number of new programs are in development.

Linda Woods’ (CEO and President of Partnercentric) new Affiliate Marketing Insider podcast looks interesting.

Shawn, Sam and Jim Kukral have recently launched/re-launched Geekcast.fm which will be a podcast aggregator of sorts.

For more podcasts, check out:

• Listing of podcasts on Shawn Collins’ iPod
• Carsten Cumbrowski’s Podcast Directory

Here’s a snapshot of some member avatars:

I guess one might ask, “How’s listing yourself in the directory help generate more income?”

While it might be a realistic expectation to want to see a tangible ROI on your time in BumpZee, it might not be so ready in coming.

BumpZee is a community of affiliate marketing peers, rather than consumers, and it serves as a hub for affiliate marketing content, aggregating blog content specifically.

You know the old marketing mantra where it generally takes 7 exposures before you commit to a buying decision?

I believe on the Internet it could be as little as 5 exposures, however, the one caveat is the sheer amount of information we’re constantly bombarded with.

This “info overload” syndrome means that we need to get our names out there, whether through publising a blog, expanding our MyBlogLog community, or by participating in forums and social networking sites (hence leading to my “social traffic generation” paradigm).
Through BumpZee, I’ve become a more regular reader of:

• Carsten Cumbrowski
• Nevada desert camper Sam Harrelson
• Jim Kukral
• Wayne Porter

Being “social” only makes sense because it’ll give you a leg up in:

• Tapping on the expertise of others by learning from their experience
• Branding yourself in your chosen niche
• Facilitating the search for joint venture partners for collaborative product development and marketing efforts

I’ve found these tips to be useful in establishing your “online turf”:

• Use your first and last name. There’s only one major “Gates”, “Dell”, “Branson”, “Trump” at any one time. Unless you’re confident of constantly dominating your chosen niche, it’s easier to identify yourself by your first and last name.
• Use your photo as your avatar. For branding purposes, I know using a bikini-clad model might help recruitments for your social network, but it will ultimately hurt you if you don’t build face-to-name recognition early on. My preference is for the slower-and-organic route.
• Participation in the community. The major problem with the Dotcom crash of 2000 was that most companies spent hundreds of thousands (and millions in some cases) on their websites and left them there in the virtual wilderness to rot. I believe one of the major developments in recent years has been the evolution of SEO and traffic generation strategies. Likewise for online branding purposes, we’d need to do the equivalent of “SEO and traffic generation” for our personal brands too. This may involve visiting blogs and leaving relevant and content-rich comments, participating in forums and doing likewise, and taking note, participating in and commenting on industry trends. The “blog in the wilderness” concept doesn’t fly anymore.

Are there other strategies you’re using?