MBA1620 Q&A Wednesday: What’s the best mic for podcasting?

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Hey oh. Welcome to the $1 MBA Show Business Building goodness every single day with our daily 10 minute business lessons for the real world. I'm your host, your coach, your teacher Omar Zenholm. I'm also the co founder of the $100 MBA, a complete business training and community online and today's episode is a Q and a Wednesday episode. On our Q and a Wednesday episodes, I answer a question from one of you, one of our listeners. If you have a question you want to ask, just email me over@omar100mba.net Today's question is from Norman and Norman asks what's the best mic for podcasting? Hey Omar, I'm looking to start a podcast for myself. You've been an inspiration so I want to start my own, but I'm totally lost when it comes to choosing the right microphone. There's so many choices out there and I'm not really sure which one I actually need any help would be appreciated. Thanks a lot Omar. Love the show Norman. Great question Norman. And congratulations on starting your own podcast. I love it. So. So in today's Q and A Wednesday, I'll be answering Norman's question. I'll talk about what are your best options when it comes to microphones for podcasting. Now, like Norman mentioned, there's a Lot of options, There's a lot of choices. So I'm just going to give you a straight answer, the straight juice, on what you need to record your podcast with a great mic. And actually, I'm going to share with you something more than just your microphone, how to actually create the right environment so that with a good microphone, the quality of your recording will skyrocket even with a low cost microphone. I'll also talk about what are the differences between the more expensive microphones and a less expensive one, a more affordable one, and do you actually need to go that high market? We get into all that and more in today's episode. So let's get into it. Let's get down to business. To kick off today's answer to the Q and A Wednesday question, what is the best mic for podcasting? I want to start by saying that I've done a ton of research on this topic. I've done a incredible amount of experimentation. We've recorded over 1600 episodes of this podcast. And every single time we record an episode, we try so many different things to improve the quality of the audio, of the sound, of the edit, to continually be professional and compete with professional podcasts. So I'm not going to geek out on giving you all these different types of microphones you can buy. I'm going to give you the summation of what I've learned over the years, what you really need to know, what I would tell somebody if they're getting started with a podcast. I'm actually going to start somewhere completely different, somewhere that has nothing to do with microphones. Because you can have a state of the art microphone that costs $500 plus, but it will do you no good if your space is awful, if where you record is not a good space as conducive to recording, it doesn't matter what going to use to record. For example, if I record my podcast with a great quality mic, but there's construction going on, there's noise, there's a dog barking, I'm in a room with high ceilings and no insulation, that record is going to sound straight trash. Okay? It doesn't matter that you have a great mic because your environment is horrible. The good news is that you can easily manage your environment and make sure that wherever you record, it's actually conducive to a great recording. So the bare minimum is have your mic on a shelf in a closet and you record into that shelving into the closet. Why? Because your voice is being projected towards the mic into the closet. And because the Shelving is kind of confined, like into a box. Your voice is not going to be bouncing around a lot across the room. It's going to be confined to the closet. This is sort of creating a makeshift soundproofing or sound booth. This is gonna sound a whole lot better than you just having your mic at your desk in a big room. The next level up is to actually record in a soundproofing box. This is an actual foam box that has soundproofing that you place your mic inside and you place that box into a closet or a shelf. And this really makes everything sound like studio quality. It's incredible. And you're literally just using a port Soundproof box that you can buy off Amazon. It's about $200, but it's actually worth more than the actual mic. It's actually going to improve the quality of your audio more than the actual mic itself. I actually just looked it up on Amazon, and the one I was thinking of, a travel one, which is $200. There's actually an alternative one that isn't portable, but it's only 36 bucks. It's called the Troi Studio Sound Recording Vocal booth. It's $36. It's basically a box made out of foam where you can place your mic inside and talk right into it. That is going to make a tremendous difference. Now, let's talk about mics. There are a whole bunch of mics I can go through, but I'm going to give you two mics. One that I would say is absolutely amazing for the price, and you can actually use for all your podcasting with that soundproofing for as long as you like. And the second one is going to be, if you insist on buying something expensive, this is the one I recommend. So the first one is the Audio Technica ATR2100. It retails for about 100 bucks on Amazon. It's a USB and an XLR mic, which is great. That means if it's usb, it can plug right into your computer and record using your recording software right on your computer, whether you're using, you know, QuickTime or Audacity or GarageBand or whatever you're using to record your audio. Now, I mentioned xlr. It also does xlr. XLR is an actual cable that needs to go into a sound recorder, like a zoom recorder. If you don't know what I'm talking about, then this is kind of technical and you may want to Google that. But if you're interested in recording around your laptop, then you have to get a Mic that's USB compatible, which is this one, the Audio Technica ATR2100. This is why I think is one of the best mics you can buy, period, for podcasting, for webinars, for calls. It's fantastic. It's really, really an amazing quality mic. It's omnidirectional, which means that when you speak into the mic, it picks up your voice and it does its best of not picking up anything that's around in the room. So even if somebody's shouting across the hallway, if you're in a different room, it won't pick up. Normally I would just end this episode right now and just say, hey, this is the mic you need. Go with the ATR 2100. It's a fantastic mic, great value, it's reliable, it's, you know, it lasts a pretty long time. I've had, I believe, four ATRs, maybe five. Not because they break, just because I've had one for travel, one for podcasting, one on my desk. Nicole's got one, my co founder and wife. So all that stuff, we like it so much, we keep behind it. It's a great mic. I would also recommend getting one of those foam covers on top of the mic. You can get like a bag of them, like I think a set of ten for like five bucks on Amazon. This will just allow you to have some protection from what's called plosives. This is when you use your P's and B's and you're really pushing a lot of air out of your mouth. This protects the mic from getting all sounding weird and windy. It's sort of a pop filter, so to speak. So I would recommend adding that to the mic as well. Now, if you insist on geeking out and spending a lot of money, then I Recommend the Shure SM7B. The Shure Mic is the mic you probably see in the very, very fancy studios on other big podcasts like the Joe Rogan Experience and Marc Maron's podcast. It's known as the Legend because it's been around for practically forever and because the mic is just great, great quality. They keep improving the technology, of course, but the core elements of this micro has been known for being amazing, not only for podcasting, but for music recording. It's well known because Michael Jackson's Thriller was actually recorded with this mic. Now, this mic is not a USB mic. It's an XLR mic, which means you can't just plug it right into your computer without a mixer. So you'll have to buy a mixer separately. The other option is to record your audio with a audio recorder. The one I recommend is the Zoom Recorders. This is like a handheld recorder that a lot of studios use film crews use, and you basically save the audio on SD cards and you plug an XLR cable to that recorder. My favorite Zoom recorder is the H4N. It's pretty good bang for your buck. It's about $270. It lasts a lifetime. We actually recorded the $100 NBA show's first, I would say 400 episodes with a Zoom Recorder with with XLR cables with our mic. But we actually didn't see too much of a big difference between using XLR and usb. So for convenience and for speed and for travel, we started using USB mics and straight to the computer connection just using QuickTime. I do want to say the SHURE mic is fantastic, but for the vast majority of the world's population, they will not know the difference between you using the ATR 2100 or the Shure because it's just a subtle difference in terms of quality. It's just a different kind of sound. And even if you're listening to it side by side, like one clip from this one, one clip from that one, it's really hard to really know the difference unless you're an audiophile and you really know your stuff. But for the vast majority of listeners of podcasts, if it just sounds clean and crisp and good, they're happy.

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So I gave you the breakdown, your environment and two mic options depending on what you want. So which mic do I use to record the podcast? Well, believe it or not, I use the Audio Technica ATR 2100. That's what you're listening to right now. It's so, so good if you put it in a great environment. I have a dedicated recording booth in my home. I have a lot of padding. It's very quiet here. My environment is on point. So the mic sounds incredible. So there you have it. There's the reveal. And if you love the sound of this podcast, if you record in a great environment, you can use the ATR 2100. Make it sound super professional. And what's great about it is it's great for travel. You can really travel with this mic. You can replicate the environment. Just food for thought. Whenever we can travel again. Alright, guys, thank you so much for listening to the 100 MBA show. I love the fact that Norman asked this question today. If you have a question you want to ask about anything when it comes to business, go ahead and submit your question. Email me@omar mba.net and I'll make sure to answer it right here on Q and A Wednesday. Before I go, I want to leave you with this. Podcasting is an incredible experience. It's one of the best things I ever decided to do. But my advice to you is to stay consistent, get ahead, make sure there is no way you miss your publishing schedule because your listeners are going to be depending on the next episode they're going to be looking for. So make sure you serve them right and you stay consistent. Thank you so much for listening and I'll check you in tomorrow's episode. I'll see you then. Take care.

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