Four Ways To Save Your Podcast Before It's Too Late!

[00:00:00] Tim: Hey everyone, my name is Tim and this episode is brought to you by our sponsor, Riverside FM. And in today's episode, I'm going to show you how I'm using some of Riverside's latest features to produce this episode and what for me is going to be record time. So Riverside recently added projects to its editing studio.

[00:00:15] Which allows you to add multiple clips to the same studio. And those can be clips you record within Riverside or upload from outside the Riverside studio. So what I'm going to do is record segments of this episode using my regular video equipment. And then I could polish those up in the studio using pacing, smooth speech, magic audio, or even text based transcript editing.

[00:00:38] What this allows me to do is to keep the camera rolling throughout each segment. I don't have to worry if I make a mistake or not knowing that I can easily go back and edit these out in the Riverside Studio later on. If you want to try this out to expedite your next podcast production, check the link in my description and use the code MYTOGBLOG for a 15 percent discount.

[00:00:57] And now, on to the show.

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[00:01:03] Tim: Did you know that 70 percent of active podcasts on major audio platforms have less than 10 episodes? And that's partly because most podcasts will quit before they reach episode 10. That's why in this episode, after producing 25 shows over 2 years, I want to share with you my best tips for podcast survival.

[00:01:22] You know, podcasting is one of the hardest platforms on which to grow an audience. Not only is it challenging to produce high quality content. You're also largely on your own when it comes to promoting your show and getting it discovered so it can be seen and actually have a chance to be enjoyed by an audience.

[00:01:40] However, if you can be successful, podcasting offers significant rewards as a content creator. Podcasting is a great long form form of content where you have an opportunity to build significant connection and trust with your audience. You can do much deeper dives on topics and share more about your personality and perspectives.

[00:02:01] In addition, people often listen to podcasts while doing other things like driving, exercising, cleaning up around the house, you name it. So it's like you become part of their daily routine, something that they trust, enjoy, and look forward to. And that kind of trust and connection is highly valuable for things like sponsorships, affiliate sales, or even sales of your own products and services.

[00:02:23] Secondly, podcasting is also an excellent vehicle for collaborating with other content creators. It's largely because of my podcasts that I've been able to have conversations with experts in digital marketing.

[00:02:35] Video production and platforms such as Instagram. And not only have I learned a lot through these conversations myself, I've also been able to share that knowledge with a broader audience, and that's allowed me to help build my own online presence. But it's only because I've had the podcast to begin with that I was able to create that win win collaboration where a creator or an expert in a topic could come on to my show And create this piece of content with me, which will get shared not only with my audience, but is something that they can also share more broadly with their own audience.

[00:03:07] Okay, one last thought before we get into my tips here. Having a podcast is going to help you create a library of evergreen content that you can direct people to via your social media or other marketing channels. And that library of content is going to be like a digital asset that's going to help your business or career as a content creator gain more and more momentum. I mean, have you ever had that experience where you go to someone's podcast or YouTube channel and they just have tons of content there that's super helpful? and you start watching it and you go through and you binge their content, then what are you going to do next?

[00:03:43] You're probably going to subscribe, you're going to tell people about it, you're going to be more likely to take that creator's recommendations for products or services, and you might even want to start To find ways to buy their stuff or work with that creator. But in order to get to all that, first you got to survive your first ten episodes as a podcast.

[00:04:02] And that's why I put together my best tips spread across the four main pillars of a successful podcast. And that's what I want to talk to you about in the rest of this episode.

[00:04:11] Okay, so the very first category we're going to start with is ideas. Like me, you've probably heard some version of the following two recommendations for how to come up with ideas for your show. Make shows that your audience will love, and make shows that you love to make as a creator. I actually think it's a lot more complicated than either of these two extremes suggest.

[00:04:36] So the process I've taken to using in coming up with ideas, and figuring out which ideas I'm actually going to greenlight to produce, involves asking a series of questions, and so I do look at things like, what am I excited about making, what is there an audience for, but I also think about other things, like what's the potential impact of this topic, what can it, how can, this topic make a difference in the lives of other people who might be watching this show and might be wanting to, learn more about how to be an effective part time content creator.

[00:05:14] What show is going to make the biggest difference for them in moving the needle on that? And then at the same time, it's obviously going to make the biggest difference for me as a creator to learn these things and share them with a wider audience. So those are a couple of the things, but that's not the end of it.

[00:05:30] You also have to think about things like packaging. Do I know how I'm going to package this idea? to promote it and get it out there and actually have it have a chance to get seen. Do I know what the thumbnail, what the title, what the hook of the video is going to be? All those things are also very important.

[00:05:47] In addition, how easy or hard is it to make this video? Is it going to require going to a specific location? Does it require me to do a lot of research that I haven't done yet? Is it something that I have personal experience with? And that, I think, is a very key thing that you want to think about in terms of what topics you actually prioritize for production.

[00:06:12] What is it that you're working on? And what is it that you actually have experience with? Obviously, if you have experience with a topic, it's going to allow you to talk about it in a lot more depth and provide a lot more value to your audience. But at the same time, it's actually also going to be easier to produce that show because you're just going to talk about what you're actually working on, what you're learning in real time.

[00:06:34] So you're researching and doing stuff, you know, for your own business or your own content, and then sharing that knowledge that you're gaining with your audience. And building on that experience that you're gaining as you're doing your own research, you know, to do the thing. And so that, to me, has been a really key, epiphany, I guess, about how to make content.

[00:06:58] You know, it goes back to what we've said on the show before, quoting, Gary V. "Document, don't create." Don't have, like, all the stuff that you're doing. And then on top of that, try to make content about something else. Thanks. Make content about what you're actually doing. It's going to be better quality content and it's going to be easier to produce as well.

[00:07:19] Okay so this brings us to area number two, which is production. So the thing I want to say about production is that production matters, but you shouldn't get so hung up on it that it prevents you from moving forward with your show. I mean you have to start at minimum. with an adequate mic, so a cheap, um, mic like this that you can use with your phone is a great start, and after that you can upgrade to something like the DJI wireless mic.

[00:07:47] Because sound quality is really important for a good podcast or a good YouTube video. People will tolerate bad video, but they'll quickly click away if the audio on your show is bad. So, work on the audio, but Don't get hung up, like I said, on the rest of this. There's so much to producing a podcast, especially if you're trying to produce a video first podcast.

[00:08:14] So you've got things like Lighting, you know, video production quality, you've got editing, you know, how you're going to splice and b roll transitions, color grading, all of these different things that you have to learn, and it's going to be really hard to learn them all at once. It's going to be very frustrating if you try to perfect everything.

[00:08:38] On day one. So like I said, focus on the sound quality, get started, and as you're progressing and continuing to produce the show, you will have opportunities to keep getting better and better, improving on what you're doing. Go back and watch some of my very first videos and compare it with the videos I'm making now.

[00:08:59] I think you'll see that there's been a significant improvement. But of course, all that improvement didn't come all at once. It's been gradual over the last two years. And so that's what's helped me get to this point, is just practice, practice, practice. And I'm sure, you know, I'm going to keep advancing.

[00:09:16] In the future, I'm not saying that there's not more room to grow. But, I think what's helped me at the beginning was just recognizing that I had to start where I was and that I was gonna improve and work towards improving over time. Now the next question that I wanted to cover here was YouTube, 'cause I mentioned about being a video first podcast, and I really think that it's worthwhile if you're a podcaster to produce a video first show.

[00:09:46] It's not 100 percent absolutely required, but if you're not doing this, you're missing out on a huge opportunity as a podcaster. Consider that for most of my shows, YouTube views exceed audio downloads across all audio platforms. So just the one platform of YouTube alone gets me more views per episode than all other, platforms audio. combined. 

[00:10:14] The other thing is that by producing a video first show, you're going to be able to have clips that you can share out afterwards as part of your social media promotional efforts, and clips shared to social media have been my most effective form of podcast promotion. More effective than Instagram stories, more effective than posts to Twitter, more effective than blog posts, The thing that has worked the best has been to share short form clips across all different kinds of social media platforms, TikTok, Instagram, YouTube Shorts, you name it.

[00:10:51] And every time that I do that, I get more downloads, more views to my podcast episodes. It's a very direct correlation, and it gives me a lot of confidence. But that's one strategy that works really well to promote your podcast, so that's why you want to produce your podcast video first, even though it is going to cost you more in terms of the production time and effort and money, it's worth it for what you get back from it.

[00:11:20] And that's my main tip for your podcast production.

[00:11:23] So now the third area we're going to cover is promotion. One of the nice things about YouTube is that you do get a little bit of organic reach. However, when it comes to audio podcasts, the organic reach is pretty much zero. You're largely on your own, and that means you've got to do your own efforts in promotion if you want to have your show seen.

[00:11:44] So if your show is new, and it's got zero track record, It's got no social proof and it's got no momentum. You're going to have very low downloads and over time that can become a little discouraging. So maybe one of the first things you need to do here is adjust your expectations accordingly. And just understand that most podcasts don't receive a ton of downloads, especially at first.

[00:12:13] In fact, if your podcast gets more than 28 downloads within the first 7 days, that already puts it within the top 50 percent of all podcasts globally. Now still, most of us want to see some results. We want to know that someone out there is listening to our show. And that's where promotional efforts come in.

[00:12:31] So I already told you that short form video clips were the most effective means of promotion in terms of getting your show seen more and getting more traffic to your podcast page and more downloads. The next most effective thing is probably pinned tweets. So if you have an Xapp account, you pin that tweet at the top of your homepage and then as you're creating content.

[00:12:58] You're driving traffic back to that pinned tweet. And people, if they like what you're saying, if they like the profile page that you've got there, you make sure you have that optimized so it generates interest. And you're gonna get some click throughs on that pinned tweet back to your podcast episode. So that's the next most effective way to promote your show.

[00:13:20] Other effective methods that you can use are writing a blog post that relates to your show and posting that as an Xapp article or a LinkedIn article. And that way people, you know, read the blog, and they, you make reference to your show within the post.

[00:13:40] Maybe you, for example, produce like a segment of the show as the blog, but not the whole show. And then you say, if you want to learn more, you can go back to my podcast episode here. And that's going to drive some traffic back as well. Problem with blogs, of course, is that that's also a format where you need to drive your own traffic.

[00:14:00] So, unless you have a really active LinkedIn profile, or an active Xapp profile, it's going to be hard to get traction there, which is why you need a blog. Social media promotional channels to help you build your audience if you're building a newsletter that also helps You know when you send out a new edition of your newsletter, that's going to your warmest leads your biggest supporters So if you put in mentions of your podcast episode or latest You know, YouTube episodes into those vehicles, people are going to be more likely to click through there if they haven't already seen that episode, because they'll be interested in what you have to say.

[00:14:40] The thing I'll say about newsletters, though, is that you've got to build those up over time. You can't expect that, you know, you're going to show up and suddenly get tons of newsletter subscribers and therefore, you know, use that to be able to promote your podcast. It's a, it's a long run game. Um, you know, of course you can try and produce a really banger freebie and get people to sign up through your email list that way,

[00:15:09] and that's a decent strategy, you know, as long as you can come up with the right kind of idea that is get, going to get enough traction, but that's a whole other show. 

[00:15:17] And then lastly, just in general, as I would say, just having an active social media presence is a good way to, help get traffic to your podcast, as long as your podcast is prominently featured within your profile.

[00:15:32] The other thing I'll say is that you should try to spend at least as much time promoting your content as you spend producing it. So it takes so much effort to produce content with scripting, with filming, with editing, with all the steps that go into it and all the time and effort that goes into it. You want to make sure that you maximize the results of that effort.

[00:15:56] And the way to do that is by promoting your show and making sure that it actually. does get seen, does get downloaded, and, you know, you have, you know, the opportunity to share that message with your audience. 

[00:16:11] So if all you're doing is just producing, producing, producing shows, but you're not promoting them, you're really missing out on the opportunity that to maximize the value of that content.

[00:16:23] Okay, last main area here is monetization. So even if you're not planning to do this full time, I think there's three reasons why you want to care about monetization as a pillar for your podcast as a content creator. 

[00:16:36] The first is that podcasting can be a very expensive form of content creation. That's why there's less competition. You need editing software, you need a hosting service, you might want to have a podcast page. You're probably going to look at different, um, social media management tools if you want to really scale up your social media promotion, and all of that, of course, costs money. This is where things like sponsorships, affiliate sales, or sales of your own products and services come in handy. Come in. These are great ways to help offset the cost of doing your show. 

[00:17:10] Secondly, there's also a time component to doing a podcast. So, so when it comes to things like scripting, filming, editing, all of these things take time. And it certainly helps if you can bring in a little bit of help to assist you in the production process. This can be especially helpful if your life outside of podcasting gets super busy. So imagine that, suddenly, something happens and you don't have as much time to actually keep producing your shows. Your schedule starts to slow down, your audience growth momentum slows with it, and that's where people start to become more discouraged, right?

[00:17:51] So, you want to try and avoid that spiral. And, you know, one of the ways you can do it is by having contacts with, you know, people on Fiverr, people on Upwork, people on other platforms that you're used to working with and that can come in and help you get through. those periods. Um, but of course you need to have the money to be able to hire those people.

[00:18:14] And that's where the monetization aspect of your show comes in. Cause if you've got sponsorships, if you've got affiliate sales, if you've got sales of your own products or what have you that is helping to bring in a little income, that income in turn can be used to bring in help with a thumbnail design with editing.

[00:18:35] And in fact, I think if I were to invest in anything, from a labor perspective, investing in an editor is a good investment, um, you know, because, uh, I, I know the time that I was, uh, using an editor to produce the show, it was kind of nice because I could just film what I needed to film, turn it all over, and then go right back to working on the ideas in the next show while the show, while the other original show was still being produced.

[00:19:05] And I mean, even as a part time creator, if you're looking at a way that you can really scale up your show, that's probably one of the keys to doing it, is to bring in outside help. Because there is that upper limit to how much time that you can invest in creating your show. And so if you have a little bit of income that can help bring in Help, that's going to be key to scaling it up.

[00:19:28] You've just increased your productive capacity without having to spend more time on your show or you're substituting capital for labor in that case. Which reminds me, another thing that you can invest in to help save time is different software editing tools. So we talked about the value that Riverside is creating for me in saving time and producing this show.

[00:19:53] That's an example of where, like, if you have a little bit of income, you can put it towards better software tools, which are gonna save you time and allow you to scale up your show more, or just allow you to do more stuff outside of content creation. So that's another reason why you want to be invested in monetization.

[00:20:13] Lastly, if your show is about content creation, I think that you need to be credible on all aspects of being a content creator. And so that's another reason why you might want to look at monetization. As part of the pillars of a successful podcast, because you want to be able to create credible content, not just about audience growth, but also about monetization.

[00:20:37] Because when we think about the people that come to watch shows about content creation, or even about art and design, they're looking for information about You know how to be a better designer or how to be an artist or a content creator what have you but they're also probably looking at ways that Your show or others can help them to earn money through their art through their content creation And if you haven't done any of that yourself, how can you speak about it credibly?

[00:21:08] So that's another reason why you want to look at monetization Even if you're a part time creator and you're not really super invested in the idea that you have to be full time.

[00:21:18] So to wrap this up, I tried to think about all the different kind of things that I could say. You know, what message could I share that kind of ties all of this together? And, you know, I went through some of the usual platitudes, like knowing your why. Other things that people talk about, and there's certainly, some legitimacy to that.

[00:21:38] But I wanted to go deeper. I wanted to give you something more. And so that's where I reached for my well worn copy of Sun Tzu's Art of War. And I know that's a little bit cliched itself. In the 80s it was big in business strategy circles. But it, it's a lot older than that, of course. This is a book that has endured for centuries, because it is timeless.

[00:22:01] And it has so many different lessons that it can share, not just about strategy, but really about life that you can apply if you dig deep and you think about, some of what it's saying. So I just want to read you this short passage here. Chang Yu. The nature of water is that it avoids heights and hastens to the lowlands.

[00:22:26] When a dam is broken, the water cascades with irresistible force. Now the shape of an army resembles water. Take advantage of the enemy's unpreparedness. Attack him where he does not expect it. Avoid his strength and strike his emptiness. And like water, nothing will be able to oppose you. And so how does this relate to podcasting and content creation?

[00:22:52] Well, one of the things I learned as I was going through the last two years was that I would get blocked if I would try to do things in a very linear fashion, and I'm a very process oriented person. So I like to do things in certain steps, but I ultimately found that that was self defeating for me as a content creator.

[00:23:14] Because I'd have something that I'd be working on, a video or a podcast episode, and, you know, something in life would happen, and it's like, okay, I gotta drop everything, and I can't work on that right now, can't film, so I can't move it forward, and that was really stalling, you know, the ability to produce shows, and so the fact that I couldn't film was holding everything else up.

[00:23:37] But I eventually came to realize, look, it doesn't have to be that way. You don't have to go in, like, a linear order if you plan things out. And you think about the broad spectrum of what you're working on as a content creator. You can really take your schedule and make your content creation efforts kind of like water and just flow through.

[00:24:00] The spaces in your schedule and find time to do different things. But the key is you got to be flexible. You can't be saying like, okay, I got today. I got a film or this week. I've got a film. No, if you can't film, then you work on a script. If you can't work on a script, then you're working on. A thumbnail design instead can't work on a thumbnail design.

[00:24:24] Well, you could promote the shows that you've already produced. You can always find something that you can do, even if it's a little thing, even if it's like 15-20 minutes in a day, you can do something to move things forward and keep your momentum going. And that's what I mean when I say, when I adapt that quote to say, be more like water and be adaptable.

[00:24:47] Be flexible. That's probably the key trait of a successful content creator is adaptability, and I wanna talk about that in a future show. But in the meantime, how about checking out one of these other videos? Thanks for watching. We'll see you in the next episode.

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