The ultimate in quick-turnaround IT projects thesedays has to be podcasting.

Heather Gorringe, managing director of garden supplies company Wiggly Wigglers, says that she is no techno whiz but she had her own internet-based audio programmes up on the web within ten days of attending a podcasting conference in October last year.

"We went to the conference on a Saturday, on Wednesday we recorded our first podcast and on the Monday we launched it on the web. It's completely quick and easy to get up and running. I'm not a technological person, I've got an iPod and I listen to it on my pushbike. I downloaded a BBC podcast and when I realised it was easy to do, then the impetus was there."

Her weekly programmes have proved popular, she says, reaching No 34 in the iTunes UK podcast rankings and No 3 in the science category.
"It's sort of the Archers, but real," she says of her podcasts on rural farm life. "The Darling Buds of May mixed with Haynes Motor Manual."

The 15-year-old company sells natural gardening products such as "cans" of worms for composting and mushroom logs for growing edible fungi at home. In her podcasts - downloadable audio broadcasts - Mrs Gorringe and two colleagues talk to listeners about planting, wildlife, wild flowers and countryside issues such as bovine tuberculosis.

The audio programmes, available on the company's web site or on Apple's iTunes, are Wiggly Wigglers' way of reaching out to customers beyond their local village - population just 63. "We're in rural Herefordshire, there's not too much passing trade," she says of the 14-strong company.

"It's a question of trying to communicate directly with customers. We are a direct business - mail order, website, phone. When you're on the radio you obviously get edited. Podcasting gives a voice to people who wouldn't otherwise have a voice."

She says that the exercise is economical. The three podcasters and the firm's IT contractor spend around two hours making a half-hour podcast and another few hours editing it. She estimates that each one costs £250. The company gained 1,000 subscribers in ten weeks.

They use a software programme available for download on Apple's website. "You then need a microphone and off you go," she says. The audio is recorded onto the computer and, after editing, is uploaded to the iTunes site - or to Yahoo or AOL's podcast services. "What makes it special is that people can subscribe, so each new podcast comes to them, they don't have to go and get it."

They can listen to the programme wherever and whenever they like, such as through an iPod in the garden. Mrs Gorringe says that listeners have e-mailed her saying they listen to her shows while on the Tube in London. "It's the only form of customer communication where you get to talk to them in their head," she says of the medium's portability via digital music players' headphones.

Although the recordings reach far and wide and might differentiate Wiggly Wigglers from their competition, Mrs Gorringe is under no illusion about what podcasts can do for her business. "There's a question about justifying it as a small business," she says. "I can't prove that we have directly won sales from the podcasts." But, she adds, the same is true for many forms of marketing and at least this way she knows she is reaching people who are interested in natural gardening.

"It can be completely specialist. I've heard of one in America for district nurses. It allows them to pick up information they need when driving from one patient to another. Listeners can now search on specific words to find relevant podcasts so anyone interested in barn owls will find our podcast on that subject."

She says the feedback she gets from listeners is encouraging. They like the humour that she and her colleagues use in the shows and the family atmosphere that is created by sharing experiences of growing plants, monitoring wildlife and of day-to-day life on her husband's farm.

Carl Gressum, analyst at mobile IT market research firm Canalys, agrees that podcasting can be a low-cost way of reaching customers but says that sponsorship on another company's podcast may be just as effective. "The question businesses have to ask is will clients be implementing iTunes on their computers? Will corporations allow people to download iTunes at work?

"I would not be surprised to see more people doing it. It is a way of differentiating your business. However, if everyone is doing the same thing, you're back to square one."

Other market watchers point out that podcasting is being integrated into all major media players, including Windows, and that iTunes alone lists 20,000 podcast programmes. According to JupiterResearch, 4.8 million people downloaded a podcast last year. Ian Fogg, a senior analyst at IT market researchers JupiterResearch, says that Mrs Gorringe is right to say that the technology is simple.

"We have our own podcast and the challenge is not the technology, the technology is incredibly simple," he says. "I think the challenge is to have good content, to have something interesting to say that works in what is effectively a radio medium."

He points out that most of the top ten UK podcasts, in the iTunes chart, are established professional radio shows - mostly from the BBC. "If Wiggly Wigglers are that high on the chart, that indicates that they have talented people and useful interesting content."

He points out that not everyone has a voice suitable for radio. Clear diction and an engaging personality are important. Mrs Gorringe says: "We have such a lot of fun making them. There is a lot of humour, we bounce ideas off each other and joke with each other. It's like we're just having a chat with them."

Read Times Online's guide to podcasting here