How To Market Your Podcast With Jeremy Enns

TRANSCRIPT AUTOMATICALLY GENERATED Diane: Hey, Hey, I met today's guest Jeremy Enns when we were both newbie, nomads and newbie entrepreneurs. I've seen him take his love of podcasting and turn it into a successful marketing agency and educational platform for scrappy podcast creators, looking to grow a raving fan base. While there are lots of people talking about how to start a podcast. I wanted to have a conversation about maintaining and growing a podcast. And i knew there was no one better to chat to hey jeremy welcome to the show [00:00:52] Jeremy: Hey, Diane. Thank you so much for having. [00:00:54] Diane: I'm excited for this conversation. but before we dive into it all, let's just do a quick intro to you and your business February listing. [00:01:02] Jeremy: Yeah. So, my name is Jeremy NS and I am the founder of counterweight creative and also of podcast marketing academy. And so counterweight creative is the business I started. Actually the six year anniversary was three days ago. On Monday we're recording on a Thursday. It was on this past Monday. So, that's a kind of exciting milestone. Last year's five-year was maybe more exciting, kind of a round number and isn't that the one, all the statistics are around like most businesses fail within five years or whatever. So kind of cool to be passing the milestones here. And that is a podcast production and marketing agency. And so that started out as me as a freelancer and then ended up growing a team around myself. And then on the other side, the education side, a podcast marketing academy is more of a, it kind of grew out of the agency. And like I mentioned, as an education business designed to help podcast creators actually learn about the marketing side of things, which is something that most people who start a podcast, they go into thinking like, I just need to produce content and people will find it. And that's kind of the way it used to work five years ago. Now there's just way too much competition. And so, you know, all of us as creators have to, you know, actually learn what we're doing when it comes to marketing and getting more exposure for our shows. So that's kind of a, my business backstory. And the other bit of that, that kind of goes along with both of these is I've been traveling full time for the past almost six years as well, kind of the business and travel actually kind of went hand in hand. And the reason I started an online business was so that I could travel full time. And the peak experience probably of the traveling was staying with you in Dublin, where we were both trying to work. And it would be like, one of us would like walk to the bathroom or the kitchen or something like past each other. And then it would be like an hour and a half conversation. And we'd be like, okay, no, no, no, no, no, we can't talk anymore. We got to get back to work. And that was like the, the two or three or four days that I spent staying with you. better watch out. We might go on for five hours here. [00:02:44] Diane: Yeah. I wonder like how many parts show are we going to need to do? And I think it's true. Like I think we started our businesses at kind of the same time. So we've definitely been talking about this for a long time and I feel like in the entrepreneur land, there's a lot of advice about how to start a podcast, how to launch a podcast, how to not be scared of hearing your own voice on a podcast. And there's not a lot of advice or guidance. Once you get into that kind of establish, like this is up and running, this is now a machine.. you get to see behind the scenes a lot of shows . other challenges that you see once we get past that beginner phase one thing's up and running. [00:03:21] Jeremy: Yeah, I mean, I think the first thing is kind of like you mentioned that just lack of resources and education around it, and there's most of the content like I've, you know, I've read almost every article out there on podcasts, marketing advice. Most of it is written by podcasters who have become successful in some way and are kind of diagnosing their own success, which there's a lot of helpful stuff there, but it's not, it doesn't usually come from a high level strategic perspective. it's like, Hey, this thing happened to work for me. And the problem with a lot of like tactics and strategies is sometimes they will only work for like one person for who knows why. And the other thing, like I was actually having a conversation with my mastermind group last night. And we were talking about a few people who we admire as creators. And so one of them was Allie Abdol that the YouTuber and another one was a guy named Jay Klaus who has a fantastic podcast called creative elements. And he's got tons of great, great content as well. And we were kind of talking about both these guys where there's something about them that they've grown these like amazing platforms and alley of Dell's. This is much bigger than J closes at this point, but there's just something about them that they're like inherently likable. That's really hard. That's who they are. And you can't really say like, oh, just be likable. Like that's your strategy. And I think that can help, but that might not be the thing that for you is going to help grow your show. And so I think like for some people they're going to grow their show by being abrasive and being kind of like a loud mouth. And like, that's, they're kind of like archetype as a creator. And so I think when you start looking at just like each individual person. I think I heard that, that vice from Tim Paris one time, like, all advices, autobiographical, and it's like, this is what worked for me, but that doesn't mean it's going to work for anyone else at all. And so I think that that's where some of these resources, when it comes to you like, oh, this podcast has said this worked for them. Some of those might work for some people, but there's really no guarantee. And so I think one of the things with launching a show is there's many people who've helped people launch a lot of shows and so they can have this high level view of like, okay, I've helped 50 podcasters launch shows. And so this is what I've seen work. And you have this kind of larger view, whereas when it comes to the marketing advice that doesn't really exist that much. And it's interesting that like I have conversations with people in the podcast. Especially after I've leaned into the marketing side more in the past two years. And it's like, every person I've talked to at big agencies and networks, they're like, oh, you're, you're like one of like literally five people who knows anything about podcast marketing. And at first I was like, well, I mean, I know I haven't seen a lot of content out there on podcast marketing, but that just can't be true. And then I keep hearing this thing again and again, and again and again, and I had a similar conversation last week and whenever I asked them, I'm like, so like, who are these other five people? And it's the same five names every time. And they all work in-house at big agencies or networks and things like that. And so it's, it's just interesting how. Little information there is, and people are just kind of like left to figure it out on their own. And I think that, like so many people who have podcasts are kind of just, you know, the creative types, they like creating the shows. They're not necessarily interested in marketing and they might have negative connotations about marketing. So I think like that's, and this is the same for small business owners too. Like it it's the exact same thing where it's like, I want to do the work. I don't like the idea of marketing. So when it comes to, I think initial hurdles, it's the lack of information, but I think there's also the internal resistance to even wanting to have anything to do with marketing or wanting to believe that that's a necessary thing. And so I think that's the first thing to overcome. And the thing that I would just always say to that is I have the same resistance to marketing until was able to kind of reframe it for myself. And I heard somebody say this it's like really what marketing is, is just building relationships with people who, you know, you actually want. You know, just chat with, and work with and, you know, whatever comes out of that. But it's like having conversations about the thing that you're talking about. Like that's, that's marketing and building a relationship around that. And once I kind of reframe that, I was like, oh, if that's what marketing, if I can approach marketing that way, I'm excited to do it. Cause like that's what we all want to do. We all want to talk with people who are interested in our stuff more and it just turns out that like, that is kind of at its core. What great marketing is. [00:07:07] Diane: It's an interesting parallel with business. They, because you have the big podcasting names and the big kind of business names and what worked for them, like you said, it's not necessarily going to work for you, but also when it worked for them, [00:07:21] Jeremy: Yes. [00:07:21] Diane: if you came in today and tried to do entrepreneur on fire and [00:07:26] Jeremy: Yeah. [00:07:26] Diane: a show every single day, you don't stand out in the same way that John Lee do mastered when he did it in the same way. Like you, aren't going to stand out with the membership like Stu McLaren stood out when he did it back in the day. So I think a lot of the advice doesn't take into account how the podcost market and industry has changed some ways has taken off, but because it's taken off, you've also got more people in there. There's more people fighting for those things. [00:07:54] Jeremy: Yeah, I, this, that reminds me, I heard this story maybe a year or two ago. And so it was about somebody who would they're being interviewed on a podcast. And they had had someone come to them where they were like in the sports coaching kind of world, something like that. And they had this young college student like that they were talking to and telling the story about who was doing all this research into LeBron, James diet and exercise workout at the time. This was just like a few years ago. And the point of the story was kind of like, this is actually the wrong way to go about this. And I think we do this so often when it comes to studying the top people in our field. And what this guy was saying is like, as a 19 or 20 year old college kid, you should not be studying. 36 year old, LeBron James is doing at the end of his career. When all of this stuff is built around preserving his body that has been beaten down over a 20 year career. That like that is a vastly different scenario to someone who is young and up and coming their body probably hasn't even fully developed yet. Like, it's just, you can't even compare them and it's not going to get you the results you want. And I think that where I most often see this in content creation and podcasting is people looking at people like Gary B who put out a bazillion pieces of content every day. And they're like, oh, that's the way to do it. Because look at Gary B success, look at his system and his process, that system must be what works for him. And it just doesn't like, you can't sustain that for one. Cause he's got a team of people falling around, filming him, like doing all the editing. Like you cannot do the important work you need to do. And also do all of that. But also I would say like that's a really wild. Inefficient way to grow your audience. And it's also not the stage that you're at. Like, I think early on as podcasters, we want to jump to these like big, scalable marketing tactics, which is what Gary V is that he's got millions of people who follow them. He's trying to get to in front of millions more. And so he needs a different type of marketing strategy than someone who's starting out and needs to get their first 10 fans. And those 10 super fans, like even a hundred, you can go one to one to get all of those. And that's what I often argue that like podcasts or should be doing is really identifying like, okay, where is there a community of a hundred people who this show is the perfect fit for that? If I put it in front of them, they are all going to be like, yes, that's the thing I've been looking. And if you can't find that those group of people there's a problem with your show that it actually isn't inherently compelling to anyone enough that they see it. And they're like, yes, this is what I've been waiting for. Or you need to look harder and find those people. But I think that these marketing tactics that are going to help you grow, like get from like 10,000 to 20,000 people. not actually effective when you're just trying to get from like zero to one and one to 10, 10 to a hundred. And that's very different tactics when it comes to starting out. [00:10:30] Diane: So people talk a lot about pod fade, right? Because we always talking about the beginning of podcasting and anyone listening pod fade is when you basically record like two to three episodes and then your podcast just quietly fades [00:10:42] Jeremy: Yeah. [00:10:42] Diane: background, right? It's still active. You can find it on apple or wherever, it's not actually live. for me, fade was pretty easy to get past, for me, it's more like pod fatigue. So I'm on like 150 plus episodes because I was doing two a week for the first year. It's like it's a lot, right? [00:11:01] Jeremy: Yeah. [00:11:01] Diane: finding the guests, you're prepping for the guests, you're doing production staff promotion stuff. Like there's a really long list that goes with it. so I'm listening to you and I'm going, yes. I can see that marketing is thing that, that I need to add, but I'm also going, that just feels like one more thing. So this finding the group of a hundred, how do we do that in a efficient manner so that it doesn't become this? one more thing to add to my to-do list of podcasting. [00:11:29] Jeremy: I think it depends where you want to be active on social media. I find like Twitter is absolutely fantastic for this and this kind of, one of the ways that I grow my newsletter consistently is it's just like, it's not even. Creating micro content and repurposing your podcast and getting in front of people like that may have its place. But I think it's much more just being involved in a conversation that's happening around your niche. And so a lot of people, I think they want. Gate off their own private community of people too early. Whereas I think you stand to grow way more by just participating in a broader, larger industry conversation or community that either is like managed by somebody else. Like it's their private community, or it's like an open kind of just like people come and go like on Twitter where you kind of get the same people. If you follow, like you have your, your hub of 10 people in for me, you know, it's, it's like marketing and I follow a lot of people in marketing or the creator economy. And so I've got my like list of people who I just like always I participate in those conversations. I, I, and the same people show up. So there's like 10 thought leaders maybe who are really present in that conversation. But then there's like a thousand people who come and go and are all participating there. And if you just keep showing up there everyday 15 minutes, you know, chiming in here and there with your thoughts and whatever people follow that, you back to your profile and they see that you have a podcast and, or your email list or whatever it is that you're trying to grow. And you can kind of start finding those people. And even if they're not the ones. You know, finding their way organically back to your stuff, you can start to identify and be like, oh, these are all the people who I really like want to listen to my show where like, they're the perfect death. This is who it's for. And you talk to them more, you get to know them more and all of a sudden, like they become listeners or they become collaborators and help you get in front of, you know, maybe they have audiences or, or whatever it is as well, depending on the type of show you're doing. But that's one of the ways that I think early on it's like identifying those people and it doesn't need to be a big thing. And it serves multiple purposes as well. Like for me, I learn a ton through Twitter just by engaging in those communities. I get content ideas. And also it's, it's kind of this really passive form of marketing where it's all the stuff that I kind of just need to do in the background, education networking. And to some extent, marketing as well. And people see like, oh, he also has a newsletter about this. Like, I really liked what he said in these conversations. Like, I'm going to check that out. I think that that's like the lowest. Especially when you're, you're starting out, like you don't need to get a ton of people. You need to get the right people early on. And that kind of starts the flywheel going of like, when you get the right people, you get more content ideas, you get feedback easier because you kind of might have some kind of relationship with them already. So that helps your show get better. And if, especially when you have a relationship with them, they're way more likely to actually tell other people about it as well. And so I think like, that's, that's the big hurdle for people. Like, you know, everybody has this, this thing with podcasting. It's like, I don't know if anybody's listening. I don't know. Who's listening. I don't hear back from anyone. So I think it's kind of like building yourself into the community of people that you want to listen to it. so that you, you do have that relationship, even if they're not listeners, yet you already have the relationship and the feedback, and you're talking about the same kind of content and probably at some point down the line, they might become listeners then because they get to know you better. And kind of you you've shared your ideas in that kind of more public forum. [00:14:30] Diane: So other people's audiences basically [00:14:33] Jeremy: Yeah. [00:14:33] Diane: is out like first run on that letter. much do you care about discoverability? So more of that cold audience discoverability on an apple or a Spotify. So for me, starting my podcast, one of my, the hardest things for me to do was to name my podcast. it me, I would say, well, over a year, just being like, know what to call it, because what am I going to talk about? And so I finally, I went with the reason I podcasts is to have consistent content and the networking opportunities to meet my guests and to people who know me. It's like a warm traffic thing for me. So discoverability, wasn't really a huge deal for me. So we picked a name that fit with me and the people would get, if they knew me, do I now need to be like, okay, well I've been doing this for, yeah. got a pretty clear vision of where I want the show to go. I now renaming my show to be like, success strategies for lifestyle businesses. Let's [00:15:29] Jeremy: Yeah, right. [00:15:30] Diane: things in the intro that I've just grabbed out of the knee. Am I caring at all about cold or is that just a step too far? Yeah. [00:15:37] Jeremy: I think cold is, and discoverability is a longer term kind of game that you're playing there, which so like, it helps to optimize in the long-term, but in the short term, it's probably not going to do that much for you. And so it's one of those things that's like, yeah, it's worth thinking about, but you could grow, like, there are many shows that grow with nonsensical names or really like oblique names or puns that don't make sense to anyone who's not an insider. And so I think I usually focus on like doing podcast guesting or collaborations or these types of things that are really, those are the quick wins and they take some practice and they take some, I mean, bravery to put yourself out there and do those kinds of pitches. A lot of times that people are uncomfortable with. But I think if you have a show that you know, is a good fit for your audience as well, that's I think a lot of. When pitches are feel uncomfortable, it's because it's not actually a good fit. And we know it's like, we're kind of asking for too much and that they have no reason to actually say yes to us. And so if you know, like, oh, I can see how this is going to be a huge benefit to them. And a huge benefit to me, everybody wins. Both of our audiences are going to be into each other's shows. So really it's like, win-win, win-win a four ways all around both of you and your audiences. Like then that's an easy pitch to make. And if it's clear that that. How that's going to help them, then it's going to be a no-brainer. And so I think it's just writing a pitch to show that. And so those, I think are the shorter term strategies that are going to help grow your audience faster when it comes to discoverability. It used to, like, I had a client who her, I think she changed her show's name. I don't know what it was in the first place, but it, she changed it to women in business, blunt and like keyword, he, women business, and her downloads like doubled the next month. And she didn't have like a massive show at the time, but like a few thousand downloads a month, I think And then it was, you know, double that afterwards, but that was four or five years ago or something like that when there was just so much less competition, the keywords weren't as crowded That's just not going to happen unless you're in a really barren niche where there's like one other show or something like that, which that point it's a really small niche. And you know, probably there's not a ton of listeners even available there. So I don't really worry about titling so much anymore, at least not for keywords, but I would say for clarity so that you do want people, you think about somebody who doesn't know you, they don't know what the show is about. If they come across your show name in, let's say somebody features it in a newsletter or something like that. And it goes out and they say like, there's the show? By Diane, it's called coffee and converse. And you want people to be able to say like, oh, I get what the show is about, from the title and maybe any description that's around it. And. You know, you don't want to fit this whole long, super long title, but like hope ideally in some, in, in the best case scenario, people are able to get a sense of what the show is from the title and cover art kind of combined because usually those are showing up together. And maybe then you've got a blurber as well, something like that, accompanying it. But that's, that's what I think when it comes to discoverability, it's more about like, do people get a sense? Like, is it compelling enough that if they're interested in your show, are they actually going to click into it? If they see the title, because they're like, oh, this might be something for me. And if not, that's when I think you start to have problems more than the keyword side of things. [00:18:46] Diane: Got you. The discoverability things never really made sense to me. Like how you just explained it. I'm like, oh, that's really interesting. I would consider it now, but I have never into apple searched for on X, Y, Z topic. if I find a new podcast, it's usually because somebody else has shared it, somebody else's recommended it. A friend's been a guest on it, so it's always been a bit to me, like is there much of a point to this, but I liked that explanation. So carrying on that theme of things that I don't do, so I assume have no value. What are your feelings on the video podcast? I know people are really big on it cause it allows you to like super repurpose in a multitude of different ways. I've played around with it more from a promotion perspective than from a full like YouTube channel of my podcast. But I think some of my decision-making is coming from the fact that I would never listen to a podcast on YouTube. The whole point of a podcast for me is that it's in my ear when I'm out and I'm doing something else that I'm not at my. [00:19:45] Jeremy: Yeah. It's becoming more popular. And I think it is, this is another one of those things that I think makes sense. If you are a big company who is basically running a media company at, within your marketing team. So like a startup or something like that, a big corporation, I think that makes a lot more sense where you want to have more of these touch points. I, the, extra work that is involved with that for an indie creator is I have just never seen it actually be worthwhile for anyone. And I read a blog post actually just last week. I think he wrote it a year ago, but by mark Asquith, who's the founder of captivate and a bunch of other kind of podcasting stuff at captivate is a, a podcast hosting platform. And so their team ran a test and they basically did this where they have this audio podcast and they were like, you know, should we do a YouTube version? Like everybody's talking about this, like, well, that actually help. And so they did three different versions. I think the first one was just like, basically put up the podcast as is with video on YouTube. And basically did nothing and they've got a pretty big audience to push out their content to as well, in terms of email list, user base, all that kind of stuff. I don't know what the podcast listener numbers are, but YouTube basically did nothing. It was not really worth the effort The second one, I think they like tightened up. They edited up the, the podcast video into a more YouTube friendly format. So they like made it quicker transitions and cut it down a bit, but it was still inherently like podcast episode. And that did like a little bit better than the first one, but it wasn't that great. the third one that they did was they created, just took the same topic, but just from scratch created a YouTube video that was the end result the whole time. And that one did really well. And that was their kind of conclusion is like, if you're going to do YouTube, like create a YouTube channel and focus on creating custom YouTube content, otherwise like you can put it up there and maybe you'll get, you know, 10 listeners here or there, but it, it doesn't really move the needle. And I think it's, it's again, one of those things where it's. A better strategy for someone further along where you're really looking to expand into a new audience. The only time that I would recommend putting the podcast video up as is, is if you started as a YouTuber and you have a YouTube channel and you've branched into podcasting, then you have a large YouTube audience who's accustomed to being on that platform. And so they're probably actually going to prefer to watch your podcasts on YouTube or at least like, listen on YouTube. Like they have the habit built of like, I get content through YouTube. So maybe they just listen to it. It's on in the background, they're in a different tab, but they're accessing it through YouTube. But for people who start out as podcasters, I think it's, unless you're creating custom content for YouTube, like YouTube algorithm is not going to promote you because it's not high quality video content necessarily. So I would ignore that and I would spend all my time focusing on like, okay, where are other people who are super aligned with what I'm doing, who we can partner in some way whether that's doing collaborations or cross promotions or podcast guesting or things like. [00:22:29] Diane: Yeah. I think the effort that it would take both me and my guests to be quote unquote, camera ready, isn't worth it. But the other thing that I noticed is when we did have the camera recording, people show up differently like you and I just casually chatting with each other. Right. We could be back in my living room in Ireland having one of our usual conversations. But as soon as it's like, the camera's on people are very conscious of their hair and their hand movements. and I'm not exempt. I found that it just, it took away some of the, intimacy of podcasting. When you do feel like you're just eavesdropping on someone else's constant. [00:23:05] Jeremy: Yeah. And I think like podcasting and video. Have very different purposes and like, or not even purposes, but like strengths to them. Like I think one of the great things about podcasting is that you can have a long, who's going to spend an hour reading a blog post, or, I mean, you might watch an hour long video, but that's half a movie. Like that's a serious time commitment. Whereas podcasting like th the great benefit of it is you can do it while you're doing other stuff. And I think that, like, YouTube content, you watch it. It's like fast cuts. And like, everything is just, the pacing is So fast for YouTube that there's nothing wrong with that. I think for some things that's. Kind of, taking some information if I want to learn something like I'd like it to be quick and to the point or for entertainment, things like that. Sometimes that's the best way to consume it. But I think if you want to have a long in-depth nuanced conversation and get into some of the nooks and crannies of a topic, kind of probably you're not going to do that on YouTube and podcasting is a way better venue to have that. And so I think when you're thinking about like, what platform should I be, I be creating on part of that equation is like, well, what kinds of conversations do I want to have? Or what's the point of this show? Do I want to explore topics in depth and be able to kind of take this meandering approach? And not that you should just have no kind of clear goal of your show and it's just all over the place, but it, podcasting is a much better fit for that type of content where you can get into more of that kind of breadth and depth of a topic than something like YouTube. And I think that's one of the reasons why it doesn't necessarily translate well when you, you migrate a podcast to YouTube because that's not what people are looking for. [00:24:33] Diane: Yeah. you mentioned blogging there as well. So for me, I podcost, because blogging cannot be consistent on, I could talk every day, all day, no problem. Right. And Jeremy's like nodding, like, yes, I've experienced that. But for me, podcasting having that external kind of deadline makes me very consistent. Like I don't ever not hit my podcast deadline when I was starting. I can remember having a conversation with a friend who works in one of the, like really big podcasting production houses saying, well, when you're learning about blogging, you're taught like have a different download for every single episode. how you grow your list and that's how you bring people. And I remember at the time said to me, don't even think about that. So when you've been doing it for a year, he was like, you [00:25:14] Jeremy: yeah. [00:25:15] Diane: much going on. it's going to be overload. And I can remember trying it a few times and just being exhausted, trying to think of, okay, what is the download that goes with this episode? And I'd be like, oh, I can't talk about this on this episode, even though it'd be really, really good. Cause I don't have a download. [00:25:29] Jeremy: Yeah. [00:25:30] Diane: as we're now at this like one year ish mark now we're thinking about marketing. Where do you stand on that conversation of moving people from your podcast to an email list? [00:25:41] Jeremy: it's interesting, depending on, I think your audience is probably a bit more business savvy, so like, is aware of. Benefits of having a list. I think a lot of people come in from like just the indie creator side. Don't really have a strong entrepreneurial background or an online business backgrounds. So don't even thinking about the list, which I think is a real shame, because I think that like, podcasting is great for some things, but when it comes to calls for action, terrible, like people, and I'm sure I've experienced this, if you've made calls to action for anything, whether it's like leave a rating and review or like sign up for the email list or buy a product or whatever, like, it just doesn't really happen through podcasting because like it's too much work to go find the link in the show notes, even if it's not that much work, but you know, it, it is, there's like enough friction and people are like out doing things they're driving or whatever. And so they're like, oh, I'm going to remember that. And then they forget. And so I think like to really have your marketing work using a podcast, like you also need people to have to be on that email list. And so I think the. For me when I think about an email list and podcasting is that they can kind of like work as a circle where you can get people onto the email list from some venues and push them to the podcast. But you can also have people come into the podcast and push them to the email list and that the real power is when people are on both. So they can really get to know you and develop that know like, and trust factor through the podcast where they're spending just hours of you or with you in their ears. And then you can make those pushes. You can mention something on the podcast, but then there's a direct call to action through an email that they're at a place they've got their phone in their hand, or they're at their computer where they can just, you know, click that button, go to the sales page and, you know, go sign up for your course or whatever it is or for the, the I guess if they're on your list already, they're not signing up for a lead magnet, but I think that that's, it should be a huge focus of every podcast is getting people onto the email list? some way. I think over time it can be valuable to have usually. A podcast is having content buckets. And so that's maybe, you know, four to six different broad topics that you talk about and cycle through and all of your episodes fit into one of those kinds of four to six buckets. And so over time, it's helpful to build up, you know, one lead magnet for each of those. But I would say at the start, like focus on just one, like have one really high value, either lead magnet, or just like your newsletter itself. This is less common with podcasters because it takes time to create a great newsletter similar to podcasting. So like I have two newsletters and those are my primary content kind of creative right now. I don't have a podcast currently, but I probably spend eight hours a week creating my newsletter every week. And like, so probably similar to what, you know, what people would spend on a podcast. And so like that, it's hard to do both of those, but I know a lot of people, if you are thinking about your, your overall content in a certain way, it can be somewhat easy enough to say like, okay, how can I create. A suite of content each week. And you know, that is all kind of the same things. So I can kind of repurpose itself, but not just in, I like cut and paste like, oh, here's this quote, that's going in the newsletter, but I can explore different this, this topic in different ways where it's like, the idea is being repurposed, not necessarily the podcast itself. And so part of that goes in the newsletter and that might be maybe there's a way to make it so that it takes only 30 minutes a week it's something entirely unique, but it's also really valid. It's not just a, Hey on the podcast this week, we talked about this, go click. It. It's something that expands on the topic or offers a different side of it, a different way to consume it because some people want to read newsletters more than they want to listen to podcasts. there's some way to make short thought. Maybe it's like just writing a 250 word little thing about it. That's entirely unique, but it's, you already have the idea mapped out based on your conversation in the podcast or something like that. I was just reading something. James Clear's Instagram strategy. And it was talking about this idea of focus about how, if you look at James Clear's Instagram profile, he basically has everything leads back either to his newsletter, his book, or his planner. And so he's got his like real highlights and there's one for each of those. Every one of his posts leads back to either his newsletter, his book, or the planner. And so it's like having just that relentless focus, kind of like, okay, I'm not going to spread myself too thin and make, you know, 10 different kinds of mediocre lead magnets. Like what if you have one, one lead magnet or one newsletter that's inherently valuable in and of itself and just everything you do points back to one of those. And you can kind of, if you, if you actually just go look at his Instagram account, you'll start to see all his Instagram content is repurposed from either his newsletter, his book and not the planner. So it's really just those two things he's already created that content elsewhere. It becomes a social content, which then points back. You know, any one of those three pieces of content or offers that he has. So I think that's one of the things, when I think about repurposing, it's less about like the actual, not physical, but like audio, but it's about the ideas and like, how can I repurpose this idea? Because really that's probably actually the harder part is coming up with a good idea and exploring that, how can I take a piece of that and put that into these different areas so that everything kind of is working together at the same time and pushing people around the content ecosystem. [00:30:27] Diane: Now I changed up my format at about a year, so I started off. For anyone who's new five minute mini episodes on a Tuesday and then guest interviews on a Thursday because I wanted people to be able to try out the podcast right now. They were all like 50 mini episodes. If anyone wants to try it out. And so I've moved to once a week and it's a mix of me and guests, so slightly longer ones for me. However, you do get to a point where things start to feel a little. I don't want to say stale, but we're creative people. We always want to try something new. And so every now and then I think, Ooh, what if like there was like a, pod podcost right. Cause once you've got one podcast, it's easy to think of an idea for [00:31:09] Jeremy: Yes, [00:31:10] Diane: or what if I changed the format completely? should I go seasonal? Or what if I just wanted to take a complete break? And as we're starting to talk about this marketing piece of it there's a part of me that wants to retreat from that, kind of like if you don't post on Instagram for three months, no, one's going to see your stuff. So what if I vanish I change everything up? Do I lose all that flow? And that traction that I've already created? do I need to be like, this is it I'm in this forever in this format I then add marketing to attract all the people to this. [00:31:42] Jeremy: I think there's so much room to play with it. I think when it comes to something like Instagram or YouTube, their algorithm. Part of the value of the consistency is feeding the algorithm. And so that by doing that, people are going to, they're going to keep showing your stuff to people podcasting, as we've kind of discussed, doesn't really have that, which is one of the big drawbacks of podcasting currently is that it's, it's hard for organic discoverability to happen. And so you're not really actually risking losing that side of it. But what I would say you are risking in some ways. Is you're breaking the habit that people have of spending time with you. And so it's easy for them just on a personal level to fall off or for you to fall off of their radar because there's no new episodes. And so they just kind of get out of the habit and three months later, they stop. They don't even look anymore at checking your feed to see if there's something, a new show. And obviously people have different habits of how they engage with podcasts. Like I go into each show to look for new episodes where some people are on apps that just have a feed. So new episodes just show up at the top. And so they would see yours when you came back, but you do risk losing people like me, who like go into each show to check when there's a new episodes and don't have notifications turned on. So that is where I would say, like taking a break can be detrimental, but if you're going to take a break or if you're gonna change things up, I always say like, communicate with people, tell them I'm taking a break for this long. I'll be back on this. date. If you I'll be active over here in the meantime, if you want to keep in touch. So I'm going to be on Instagram still. So like, come hang out there, please. Like, and you know, let's, let's continue the conversation in between the seasons of the podcast or whatever, or even talking about, I'm thinking about changing up the format. Oftentimes I would release, you know, one episode or even like a bonus episode in the new format and say like, this is an experiment I'm trying this out. Please, please, please let me know, like, did you like this? Was this something I should do more of? Or did you hate this? You like the old format, and so I think that just communicating with people, it helps you get feedback, but also keeps them in the loop if you think of your, your marketing as the goal of building a relationship with your listeners, that's like just doing right by that relationship. In communicating with them. So that's where I would kind of say, like, if you're going to take a break, like fill that void with, like, when you think about your feed of content, like get them somewhere else. Like you're still producing content somewhere. You're still engaging with people somewhere. And so just say like, Hey, I'm going to be taking a break from the podcast, but I'm still going to be sending out a weekly newsletter. Please come hang out there. You'll be, you'll be able to get the prompt. When I come back with new episodes, the breaks is going to be this long and, you know, come hang out on Instagram and we can chat there. And so like, they can still maintain that habit of engaging with you. And then there's like a venue to get that prompt when you come back for new episode, whenever that is. But the, the other side of that too, I would say like with the, the staleness, I think that's something that I feel like is actually really important pay attention to that. The second, you start falling out of love with your show. that's just like when things kind of start to disintegrate and it's like, you put in a little bit less effort and that comes through in some way. so I think that you're feeling bored or maybe not even bored as is the wrong word, but like, if you're just not [00:34:40] Diane: Okay. [00:34:41] Jeremy: like excited or energized by any part of the podcast process anymore, that might be a sign that's like either time to quit the podcast and move to something else or change up the podcast or change up the focus or the format or the types of guests, or like something to find out like, you know, what am I actually excited about right now? Like what do I want to be doing? following that. Cause I think a lot of times there's just, this is, I don't, it's kind of like a morphous thing to talk about, but there's some kind of alignment that I think needs to happen with like the right person with the right topic, with the right content and also like the right audience. And if, if one of those is out of alignment, then it's just like, it's, you're just not going to succeed. Or it's going to be a much tougher slog than. Like I started a podcast a year and a half ago that I think it was a great concept for a show, but I was not the right person to host it. And so six months in, I was kind of like, ah, this is just, I am pushing a Boulder up a hill doing this. And so I ended up quitting it and it was kind of juxtaposed against my newsletter, which I was like, I feel like I'm the only person who could possibly write that newsletter. The podcast was like for health and wellness professionals who are most of our client base at the agency, like how to run a better online business. And so it's very like actionable tactical stuff like that. Whereas my newsletter is much more like thoughtful and like exploring ideas that aren't don't have names and are out in the world. And it's just my musings on things that happened to be about creative work. And so the audience is like creators who are looking to make a living off their creative work, kind of like, you know, podcasters, YouTubers, newsletter, writers, small business owners, all, all of that kind of thing, but it's hard to put in a box because it's so much a part of me and like nobody else could possibly create it. As I look back on it and I connect all these dots to these things throughout my whole life, I'm like, oh, wow, this is so interesting. How all this stuff is coming out, kind of in the Subutex. It's not explicit. I don't market it in a lot of these ways, but it's interesting looking back, I'm like, wow, this is like, this is a part of me. And I think that's when you find that expression that like ties into an audience desire as well. Something they're interested in. I think those are the people, like, that's the thing that's going to succeed when people find that for themselves. And I think we all have that, but it often takes years of like experimenting with different content formats and different topics. And like all of these things to find the thing that like clicks into place and all of a sudden, just like everything starts working so much easier than it has been. [00:36:53] Diane: Yeah, I think for me, what me out of feeling things had got really stale, was taking a mini break from [00:37:00] Jeremy: Um, [00:37:00] Diane: guest interviews and changing how I sourced my guest interviews. When you're starting, you're trying to pull in content. You're asking all your friends, you're looking for interesting things, but once you've talked about the basics, suddenly. okay. What's an interesting episode. And so I changed how I sourced it. I started sliding onto people's DMS on Instagram going that, that you just spoke about in your stories. Do you want to come talk about it any reference to whether it was the thing they sold or the framework that they taught? I went off to the interesting conversation. I want to be excited to get the episode out for people to listen to in order for me to be excited to do all the stuff, to get the episode out. [00:37:42] Jeremy: Yeah. I, yeah, I think there's, there's this, I think this is, this is kind of what I would say. My newsletter is about. It's kind of this like underlayer. So I think about my newsletter is the. Really like explicitly put this anywhere. But I think about as a creator or as a business owner or as a human, I think like a lot of the stuff I talk about is like how our like, lives as humans intersect with all of our creative ambitions and business ambitions, but there's these like two parallel journeys. And so I think about, there's like the one, the above ground and the subterranean one, and there's this, the above-ground stuff has all the, like the tactics and the stuff on the surface, that's the audience counts and all the subscribers and all those things that are like seeing from the surface. And then there's this subterranean one that's about like our internal, know, journeys as humans at becoming like wiser and more well-rounded and like, you know, better people and all this stuff. And that these there's these two kind of like, I don't know how to describe this over audio, but like on each side, the journey can progress to a certain extent, but there's like an elastic band tying these two different, like pegs together, one above ground, one below ground. And the one above ground or below ground can only get so far. Before that tension is too much and the other one needs to catch up. And so I think that's where this, I bring this up because it makes me think of with podcasts that succeed. I think a lot of times, almost everybody goes through this. I think when you start, you come up with your like 25 episode topics and they're all the, like, they're the same 25 episode topics that every single show in your niche has done at the start. And they're like the basic tactics and the things like that. And I think one of the reasons that shows people get all those episodes out and they're like, these are great episodes. They're like necessary listening for everybody. But the reason that they don't build a following is because they're generic. They're like, yeah, you have your own take on them and you bring on these guests or whatever, but people can find those dozens or hundreds of places online. And it's like, once you exhaust those ideas and you still addressing the same audience and you're still operating in the same context of this topic, but then you say. You bring in these people that you see on Instagram and you're like, oh, this doesn't actually make sense for my topic or people won't see, but I see how this makes sense. And you're kind of like the visionary here and you know how to tie this like weird topic that shouldn't really fit with your show back in a way that all of a sudden makes perfect sense. And that's where you start to actually develop. I think as a thought leader is that it's not just interviewing somebody else. Who's an expert in online marketing or click up or whatever it is. It's starting to bring this unique perspective of like tying these dots together and being like, oh, all of these things are actually really important and nobody's really explored this yet. And so I'm going to be the person to say, like, actually this thing over here is necessary information for anyone who's looking to grow a business, even though they don't think it is. And then, you know, people listen to that episode Wow. I have never heard anything like that before. Like that was such a brilliant interview. I'd never thought about that before and all of a sudden that's what gets people coming back for you and not for the guest or for the topic. And that's, I think where shows really start to grow by a word of mouth, but you kind of have to like flush out. the pipes of all the generic content first. And I don't think that's something you can skip that step. You just need to get through it and get like, okay, get it all out. We'll do all those foundational episodes. And then, you know, because people do ask you those questions and so you just send them back, say, Hey, yeah, go back to episode one, listen through the first 20, but then you get into the meaty stuff and the interesting stuff after you've exhausted. All of those. [00:40:47] Diane: and those first few episodes are SEO friendly as [00:40:49] Jeremy: Yeah. [00:40:50] Diane: I also think there's almost a scarcity to. When you start, especially when you're getting pitched, like once you get over a certain number of episodes and suddenly people are pitching you [00:40:59] Jeremy: Yup. [00:41:00] Diane: well, I need guests. What if I say no to this person that I never find a guest [00:41:04] Jeremy: Yup. [00:41:04] Diane: but the minute you stop that and start looking at the expanded topic range, the people who pitch you changed completely [00:41:13] Jeremy: Yeah, I think there's just a big hurdle to get over that. I think, yeah, it is that like 25 to 50 episodes, probably you kind of are just finding your feet and you're getting through all the generic stuff. And then like the real you, the show that like only you can really create, like, you're not going to start off with that if you're like a first time podcaster. And so I think it is like that's the first year is just like, okay, let's get all this out of the way. And then you're going to start to get more clarity about like, okay, we've done that. I've done the prerequisite stuff. Like now, where am I curious to take this? Where do I really want to go? What am I curious about? And that's when the more authentic stuff actually starts coming out and more unique and differentiated type of content. I think. [00:41:48] Diane: love that. I feel newly inspired from my podcast. I'm going to assume that people in the audience are listening or listening to their friends. Talk about having a podcast that feeling kind of tired on that isn't lighting them up anymore. What's the best thing that they can do to get a refresh, to take a step back, to kind of change their perspective. [00:42:08] Jeremy: So I think to kind of bring back. Some of the joy of podcasting is I think that so often we, we just measure the one, the one big number downloads, and it's like, that's what we're measuring. And like, if that's not going up, we're not going up as fast as we would. Like, we kind of think, well, the podcast is stalled or it's failing or, or whatever. When really there are probably a ton of like at least a half dozen different ways that you could measure success, whether that's your network growing, whether that's like, maybe it is financial, maybe people, you have a small audience that isn't growing, but they're actually turning into customers. And like, is that a problem? If your audience isn't growing, then if, if it actually is generating revenue there could be, you know, your, how you're exploring topics or are you like getting smarter and learning things that are, you're able to apply elsewhere in your business? Like, there's all these other things. Can it create a successful quote-unquote podcast from downloads. And I think sometimes it's just looking away from the download number and starting to look at these other things and being like, okay, while I wait for the money to roll in and the downloads to grow, here's all these other ways that I can feel like I'm making forward progress that are much more immediate. [00:43:05] Diane: Yeah, I think that's a really hard lesson that you have to learn in the beginning. And I think that's also why you need those first 25 episodes that are fairly generic so that you become kind of numb to like, no one is listening to me until, until you take your downloads number and imagine that many people in a room with you or that many people in a stadium or whatever it is, [00:43:27] Jeremy: Yeah. [00:43:27] Diane: So if people are like, okay, I'm ready to do the marketing piece, I've got everything else down. How can they start to do that with. [00:43:35] Jeremy: Yeah. So I'm running a free workshop called the podcast traction playbook. If you are feeling stuck, this workshop is designed to look at the , three reasons. I find most podcasts there's get stuck. Any one of those could be a problem. And often it's all three. So it's going to be a three-day free workshop, live, you can also get the recordings. So you can start building momentum. And so, you can find information about both of those I've set up a page for everyone. Who's listening to this and you can find all that. [00:43:58] Diane: Awesome. I'll be sure to link that all in the show notes for the episode. I think everybody who's listened to this who's resonated with any of my problems. This is the workshop that we all need. So to finish up, I always ask my guests the same couple of questions. First of all, what is your number one lifestyle boundary for your business? I think you'll also be super interesting because you're completely nomadic pretty much on top of running your business. [00:44:23] Jeremy: Lifestyle boundary. Oh, that's probably, I am probably not great there. That's probably actually an area where I need to work on a lot more. And I think it's been interesting as I've been like, I think it was actually much better probably two years ago before I started the education business kind of branch as well, where it was like the production agency was very heavily systematized and I had a lot better boundaries. And now there's this element of kind of running two separate businesses, almost where the lines have blurred a lot more. now being back in Europe, it's also been challenging with of my clients are in the U S and so I tend to work later, but I've actually, it has been or something that they're not entirely non-negotiable especially around launches, but that used to be something that I just worked in some capacity every weekend that over the past year has, or, or two years maybe has become more of a rarity. And so I would say that's one that, especially with traveling have certainly been times where. Yeah, I would be in a place for a month and kind of feel like didn't see anything. Like I just worked all day every day. The weekends maybe had like one day off to like, go do something. I remember I spent, I spent two months in Brazil and felt that way that was at like peak burnout time in, in my business. And like literally I took one day off and it was like the last Saturday before I left. And it felt like there was no other option, but that was kind of the, the turning point where I was like, okay, I gotta get my shit together here. [00:45:41] Diane: Okay. Finally, what is the worst piece of cookie cutter advice you have been given as an entree? [00:45:48] Jeremy: Ooh, that's a good one. Worst piece of cookie cutter advice, man. I feel like there are many of them. So this one relates specifically to podcasting actually, and it's, it's annoying. It's like a marketing, just buzzwordy stuff. It's like how feel like every podcast launch course has this on their sales page. It's like, there's all these podcasts listeners and they're waiting to hear from you. And I think that is. Bullshit. Like nobody is waiting to hear from you. Like our job as creators is to like, make people want to pay attention to us. Like we, I think that sets people up with this expectation of like create and people are like, and I don't know that anybody really believes into that, but we want to believe that. And I think it's just like setting expectations of like, this is going to be, you're going to have to create the work and then market that work that is supposed to be marketing. Like the podcast is supposed to be marketing for your business, but you're gonna need to market the podcast as well, or your newsletter or your blog or whatever. And so I think like that expectation that like, oh, there's just people waiting to hear from you. You need to develop a really unique point of view and you need to hone that and practice that and go through hundreds of like revisions of, of content related to that. And like, get your reps in before people are going to be wanting to hear from you. And at that point you probably have already had a ton of success. And so when you're just starting out, like, I just don't think that's true. And I just hate that every time I come across that, and I'm like, Nope, that's like, that is setting up people to, to fail, I think, and have this expectation that like all these people are waiting and they're going to listen to your show as soon as you publish it. And Nope, it does not happen. [00:47:23] Diane: and I think you can't see it when you're launching, but that anonymity, that fact that no one is listening to you at the beginning helps you to get through it. [00:47:33] Jeremy: Yes. [00:47:34] Diane: Oh, awesome. This has been so fun as I knew it would be. Where is the best place for people to carry on the conversation with you? [00:47:40] Jeremy: Yeah, Twitter's the best place. That's where I'm most active. So I'm at, I M Jeremy ends on Twitter. So you can find me there. And that link is also@counterweightcreative.co slash converse. And so all the places to connect with me, email different kinds of offerings, newsletters, and the free workshop that's coming up that I mentioned all of that is there [00:47:58] Diane: Awesome. Thank you very much. I feel like I just got a private coaching session, which I feel like all my best episodes are private coaching sessions that my audience gets to eavesdrop on. So thank you for sharing. So openly [00:48:10] Jeremy: Yeah. Well, thank you so much for having me on this. Like we said, at the start, I'm sure we could go on for many more hours, maybe one day.