The use of audio is also boosted by the increased adoption and use of audio mp3 players, especially Apple's iPod.

A check of Apple's second quarter earnings in 2006 showed that Apple has sold more than 8.5 million iPods. In fact, Apple has cumulatively sold more than 50 million iPods since the company first introduce the stylish model to the market.

It's no suprise then that there's a great demand for audio based products especially with millions of iPod owners out there. Most iPod owners use iTunes, a free software from Apple that most iPod owners use to search, organise and download music. Every day, millions of iPod owners use iTunes to search for the latest audio products be it music cds, videos or podcasts to download to their iPod or other mp3 player device to listen.

How then can business owners reach out to the tens of thousands, perhaps even millions of iTunes users to gain new subscribers and potential customers?

The answer lies in podcasting.

iTunes support the use of podcasting and allows anyone who has an iTunes account to submit their podcast to iTunes. What this essentially means, is that iTunes has given you permission to broadcast and advertise your message to your the millions of iTunes users, many of which will become your subscribers and customers if you provide good valuable content in your podcast.

Of course not everyone will download and subsribe to your podcast. Then again, even if you only have 0.1% of the total estimated iTune users downloading your podcast, we are talking easily at least a few thousand new subscribers and customers.

The secret to successful podcasting and serving your intended target market lies in podcasting's ability to service a niche market. Most people can find general information readily available quickly.

What people want is in-depth information, instruction, and entertainment specific to their area of interest. It is easy for them to find a web site that will post all the baseball scores in their

favorite division. What they might be looking for however, is information, instruction, and entertainment related to their baseball team, which might not be readily available at the click of a mouse.

People who want to find out more about the industry, do not want to scour the Internet for a couple hours each day looking for analysis and information and top experts.

Podcasting brings all of that to them.

If you are looking to break into the iTunes market through the use of podcast, but are not sure what to podcast about, this might be the place to start.

Don't worry right now about advertising, just look for a niche markets to serve.

The farther you drill down into the niche, the better chance you have of getting your podcast heard. So rather than podcasting on cars or books, drill down further.

Let's say you're a car enthusiast or a book enthusiast.

Here are a couple examples of drilling down to become more specific on your area of interest.

From the idea of cars, drill down for specific niche market ideas. For example, car to automobil car racing to stock car racing to nascar to nextel car series to current year's coverage to coverage of a specific race team or driver.

In the example above, I started with the broad category of cars and slowly drill down to more specific markets.

Using this strategy, business owners can take a look at the types of service and products they currently offer to come up with their own podcast to serve their intended target market.

Once they've identified their own niche, business owners can then create their podcasts and submit their podcast to iTunes. Starting a podcast is easier than what most people think.

In fact, using Google's AudioBlogger, you can just call a number and record your message. Your podcast will be automatically created and stored, ready for use.

However, for business purpose, it's critical to lay the foundation right the first time to ensure success when podcasting for business needs. Business owners need to consider other podcasting issues such as formats of podcasting, technical issues like bandwidth, developing the content for niche podcasting and more.

Once business owners have mastered the 'blueprint' for podcasting success, they can repeat the strategy again for other services and products they would like to market.

Now you can unlock the power of your voice and reach out to thousands of potential customers.

What are you waiting for? Start podcasting today!.