Influential Introvert: Communication Coaching for Professionals with Performance Anxiety - Amplify the Voices of Women of Color Podcasters

Episode Date: June 25, 2020

My guest today is Danielle Desir, host of The Thought Card travel podcast and founder of WOC Podcasters — that’s Women of Color Podcasters.   Danielle actually started her podcasting community before she started her podcast, and she shares that brilliant story in today’s episode.   WOC Podcasters now has 3,000 people in its Facebook Group, and you’ll learn how Danielle is nurturing and growing this community.   Danielle’s mission with this group is to amplify the voices of women of color podcasters, and we talk about how you can get involved in this mission.   P.S. Did you know that getting on other people's podcasts is the best way to grow your own show? If you'd like my fluff-free success plan for getting on podcasts, I have a special offer for you at sarahmikutel.com/podcastpitchperfection    *** Hello. I’m Sarah, your host and founder of Podcast Launch Academy. Are you ready to launch a podcast that builds your brand and business, connects you to your global community, and grows your influence? Visit sarahmikutel.com to see how we can work together. Here’s a special treat for you: Use my Buzzsprout affiliate link to sign up for their podcast media hosting and get a $20 Amazon gift certificate. I’ve gotten to know the Buzzsprout team over this last year and love their customer service so much, I moved my shows over there. sarahmikutel.com/buzzsproutDo you ever go blank or start rambling when someone puts you on the spot? I created a free Conversation Cheat Sheet with simple formulas you can use so you can respond with clarity, whether you’re in a meeting or just talking with friends.Download it at sarahmikutel.com/blanknomore and start feeling more confident in your conversations today.

I started to feel anxiety and to the point where I was starting to cry and I called my mom and I was like, mom, I feel like I'm standing on a cliff and something really big in Monumentous is about to happen and I don't think I'm ready for it. Have you been wanting to start a podcast for a while now, but something's holding you back? Maybe it's fear of putting yourself out there or confusion about the technology. I'm Sarah Micatel and on podcasting step by step, I'll break. down how to podcast with a little loving motivation to give you the skills and the confidence you need to finally launch that show of your dreams. Let's get started. My guest today is Danielle Desir, host of the Thought Car Travel podcast and founder of WOC podcasters. That's Women of Color podcasters. Danielle actually started this podcast and community before she started her podcast,

and she shares her brilliant story in today's episode. WOC podcasters now has more than 3,000 people in its Facebook group, and it's growing and evolving, and you are going to learn how Danielle is nurturing and growing this community. I really love her mission with this group, and that is to amplify the voices of women of color podcasters, and we talk about how you can get involved in this mission. Let's dive in. Welcome, Danielle. Thank you so much for joining me today. Thank you so much for having me, Sarah. Really appreciate it. You are the founder of WOC podcasters. What is the origin story of this group? All right. So I think as with a lot of things that I do creatively, I'm always this reluctant person to get started. So I wanted to start a podcast since 2015, 2016, and I had the idea. I was really inspired by the Money Nerds podcast by Whitney Hansen. And I loved her show. I loved the show. I love the show. I love the show. stories that she was bringing to us on a weekly basis. And I wanted to do the same. However, I had a lot of reservations for podcasting solo. So I tried to enlist one of my really good friends and asked him,

would he want to do a podcast with me? And because we were both travel bloggers, we were trying to find a topic that we both are passionate about so that we could create this new brand, this new podcast. And he was excited. However, it just took us. a long time to get traction and eventually that idea sort of faded. Now, fast forward to April 2018, Spotify had released a unique opportunity looking specifically for aspiring women of color podcasters. And the opportunity is called Soundup Boot Camp and it's offered every single year. And that was actually the first time it was offered in May of 2018. And they were looking for aspiring women of color podcasters and all you had to do is have an idea. You didn't have to have

experience because what that opportunity was going to provide you with was they're going to fly you out to New York City, do a week-long training with you with the experts. And of the 10 winners, one winner could potentially win $10,000 startup cost. So when I saw that opportunity, I was like, whoa, this is like a gift from God. Like this is like the opportunity that has my name on it. I honestly thought that I was going to win. And I, laughed about like how many women of color podcasters are there really. And I think that's because when I looked at Apple Podcasts, which is a lot of people look at that to see, you know, what's up and coming and trending. I didn't really see many women of color or people of color on the top

100 list. So I didn't really think that there were, there were much interest in podcasting in, you know, my, my community. So I applied. May 1st was the day that Spotify was supposed to announce the winners. And I woke up super early because, again, I thought I was really confident. I thought I was going to win. It was like, how many women of color are there who's applying for this thing? And just to preface this, the application wasn't like on Spotify's main homepage or on their social media feeds. It was like underground blogs and just like a friend of a friend who recommended, you know, who recommended this one particular URL. So I didn't see it as something that was like super publicized as well. So I went on to,

Twitter that morning. I looked in my email like crazy looking to see that Spotify email us or did they announce the winners on Twitter or something like that. And I did not see anything. However, I did see using the search function that there were other women of color who had applied for the opportunity and they were using this new hashtag, hashtag sound at boot camp. So I started following the hashtag and I started connecting with a bunch of these women and we were all saying the same thing. Like we were running like when is Spotify going to tell us who won and we're just all excited and getting to know each other so i created a twitter list based off you know just the volume of people i saw but i realized that twitter lists are great for like if you're like want to keep in touch with someone or see what

they're tweeting but it's not really a a place for you to form relationships and to really have like in-depth conversations so i figured let me just create a facebook group for and i called it woman of color podcast. There's like, let me just create this Facebook group. I created the Facebook group. And as I was creating a graphic for the cover art, I started to feel anxiety. And to the point where I was started to cry and I called my mom and I was like, mom, I feel like I'm standing on a cliff and something really big and Monumentous is about to happen. And I don't think I'm ready for it. Like, I don't even know how to run a Facebook group. I don't know how to start a podcast. And I'm really. And I'm really nervous. And my mom is great. She just reassured me and said, you know, have fun. You're creating a

space. And don't put so much pressure on yourself to be like this perfect, you know, this perfect admin. So I opened up the Facebook group and I started promoting it to all the people I met on Twitter. And that's really how the Facebook group started. It started from an opportunity that we saw on Spotify, not hearing from Spotify that first on May 1st. that first day, creating a Twitter list, moving on to the Facebook platform. And interestingly, enough, Spotify did not actually get back to us until a couple of weeks. I think they did announce it maybe like a day or two that they were running late. But at that point, we were like, you know, a week or two into our Facebook group. So we were all like bouncing ideas off of each other,

like starting and learning and growing. But what's really, really interesting about all of this is that Spotify received 18,000 applications that day for that opportunity. Oh, that's incredible. Yeah, 18,000. And for me, it's funny because I was just laughing like, oh, how many women of color podcasters are there really, you know? And there's just so, so, so, so many. And I always think as like a community leader, like I would love to capture that initial

18,000 that Spotify found in 2018. And here we are, you know, two years later. and our community is growing exponentially. We're at 3,000 Facebook members, but I'm always looking at 18,000 as like that first phase. Like, let's get what Spotify was able to capture in that one opportunity.

Way for you to take initiative. So that was like on that May 1st day when you were supposed to get the announcements. Is that when you created the group? Yeah, yep, yep. Oh my gosh. I'm so impressed, Danielle. We're not waiting for you, Spotify.

It's so, funny. It's just so interesting the way things happened. Because again, like I mentioned, like, I wasn't, when I was applying for this, like I didn't, I knew the idea. I saw the gap, right? I saw a gap in the industry. And I was like, I would love to have this for myself. But I wasn't ready to actually get started and commit to creating a community. But after seeing all the magic happening on Twitter and just seeing that there's more than just a handful of people who have interest in this, that really inspired me and sparked. me. And then now that I'm actually in the podcasting industry, I see more and more needs,

you know? Like, I think the longer you're in the industry, the longer you are aware and you see things, you're like, okay, there's a need for this and a space for this. And we're continuously growing every day. So I'm really excited about that. So I heard that you mentioned before that you didn't get one of the Spotify spaces. How many of the spaces were there? There were only 10. There were 10 spaces. That's crazy. So it's like 17,990 rejection. It's crazy. Yeah. And like good on Spotify for starting this program.

I think that's excellent. But what you're doing has, I mean, the momentum is just so much huger, right? Like you're reaching 3,000 plus women. And it's growing, as you said, which, yeah, wow, I'm just so proud of the work that you're doing. Thank you. Thank you. And I think the difference between what Spotify is doing. Spotify is, it's a contest, right?

Mm-hmm. And personally, I always feel that contests are appropriate sometimes, but it puts a lot of pressure on folks to feel that, you know, they have to be the best and they have to beat everyone else compared to the Facebook group that we're forming and we have. It's like an open resource. So anyone and everyone, regardless of if you have an idea or not, you can come in and grow. So I see the work that we're doing as like an ongoing basis. And Spotify does have the sound of boot camp every year. So that's, that's an opportunity. I think it's out right now, actually, at the time of the recording in June. So folks can definitely check that out to see if it's a good opportunity for them. So you touched on this, but can you tell me more about the mission of WOC podcasters? Yes. So our mission is to amplify the voices of women of color podcasters. And we're actually the first community of its kind. and we focus primarily on connecting and providing resources for our community. And for me, as I'm really passionate about the resource sharing aspect, because I know as a podcaster,

you just have to Google everything or YouTube everything to piece together your podcasting strategy, your marketing strategy, your monetization strategy. And sometimes the folks who are on the big stages and who are sharing with you their tactics and tips are so, you know, they're so more advanced than you that those strategies might not be applicable. So for me, the resource sharing aspect is critical and super key. However, the community has also been a really great place to collaborate as well. So with the connection piece, you're also collaborating, which I feel like is very, very important to amplify all of our voices. If we're collaborating with each other, this is just a great opportunity to continue our

mission. What are the conversations that are happening in the group now? Like this is a very intense time, especially in the United States with George Floyd and Black Lives Matter. And you actually started the podcast or it's for justice campaign. Can you talk more about the activities that's happening right now? Yeah. So I would say on a daily basis, the activities in the group are primarily like a lot of questions being asked or for feedback, celebratory wins and challenges. and really just being a place to, instead of Googling,

or if you're having a hard time Googling, you go into the community and ask question and you get real-time answers. However, it's interesting because during the pandemic, we sort of like did not really see the effects of it as much. Like there were some people who struggled with their downloads, but it wasn't like something that was really readily talked about within the Facebook group.

However, with the protest and since the George Floyd, situation. And there were actually other situations prior to George Floyd's as well. I just felt that there needed to be a space within the Facebook community for us to talk about the challenges that a lot of us are feeling. And a large percentage of our women of color members are a black or African American. So while other Facebook groups shied away from having that difficult conversation, I embraced it and I tried to offer a specific thread where the first thread that we offered was if you have any episodes related to racial issues, social inequalities, please drop it here. So that was for me important because I'm creating a space within the

Facebook group for people to be able to share their content and have somewhere else where they can see what other podcasts are doing. So from that thread, one of my members, her name is Tangia, Eschanada, and she approached me and she said to me, hey, like, I think that there's a lot more that we can do as podcasters to really stand up and to really, you know, proclaim and exclaim like how we feel and to speak against police brutality, to speak against this racial injustices that's happening across the country. And she created the podcasters for justice script. And I loved that script because if I'm on Twitter, I can tweet all day, but what else am I doing to help advance this cause? So Tangio was amazing because she provided a script that perfectly touched how so many people were feeling.

and it allowed people to use their voices to express, like, you know, express how they felt and to inspire their audience members to take action as well. So we provided that as a script. Hundreds of podcasters joined in and read the script on their podcast and participated in the campaign. It's an ongoing campaign. So that was another conversation, another thread that we had in the Facebook group. And then another thread, lastly, the other thread that we had in the Facebook group was also self-care and wellness. Like if you had any episodes that you created because you understand how exhausting and how mentally draining all of this is to people of color, like share that.

So I think as an admin really thinking about what your members need, again, some admins are going to be like, we don't want to talk about this. but I'm catering to women of color podcasters and women of color in general. So I need to be attuned to what they're dealing with and what they're facing and creating as much of a space where they can use their platforms as a creative outlet. And I can help amplify and share that. I love that. Now, what about people who are not women of color who support elevating diverse voices? is what advice can we give for those podcasters who want to elevate the voices of women of color as sort of like first steps? Yes, yes.

So I want to say the first thing is that one of the questions I get asked all the time wall is like, well, I'm not a woman of color. Can I still join the Facebook community? And my answer, since day one has always been yes. And if you take a look at our logo, I try to capture that by our. offering all different types of shades in our logo to really visually show that we are an inclusive community and we're not shunning people away because you're not a woman of color. So our community is inclusive. However, we do cater to women of color.

So the admins and the leadership are all women of color. Our mission is always to serve women of color, but we're not exclusive and we're not pushing or shunning anyone away. So I think that is really, really important. And I always, whenever I meet someone, I'm like, hey, join us. Like, join us. It's just a great resource. So when it comes to, if you're a podcaster and you're looking for first steps, I think

what's important is to stop saying that you can't find us because that is, it's, it's diminishes us a little bit. You know, like it just makes it seem like we're not there and we're invisible and that's not true. what it shows to me is that folks who say that are the ones who are not doing their research, they're not taking the time to look outside of their spheres. So just similarly to in the intro of the show, I talked about looking at Spotify's top 100 and not seeing representation, look beyond these top lists because there's so many, many,

many talented podcasters and creators who are not on these huge curated lists or small curated lists. So I would just say, number one, don't say that you can't find us. Put in the time to do the research to find communities like mine who are creating spaces for folks. But more practical, one of the things that I actually do is I listen to tons, maybe like over 70 podcasts at this And whenever I am listening to one of my favorite shows and there's a guest on who has a podcast and mentions that they have a podcast, I go and subscribe to their show. And that allows me to discover way more shows than I would have if I was just, you know, tweeting about it on Twitter randomly one day.

And it also allows me to connect with this host as well and learn from them and really absorb their story and then I move on to their platform. So really taking that step when you're listening to podcasts and if the person mentions that they have a podcast and their message resonated with you, go and subscribe to their shows. You also have lots of blogs, including our blog, wcpodcasters.com, that are doing a really great job at compiling lists. So we have currently two lists. So women of color travel podcasts or women of color podcasts for content creators. So there are lots of lists out there that are being compiled now that will give a lot more exposure to folks who may not be necessarily like super mainstream. So those are, I think, some tangible tips and

what I'm personally doing to make sure that more people hear about all the talented creators that we have. That is a great resource. And I will like to that in the show notes. Now, what if somebody has like a niche, say, chemistry podcast and they want to reach out to a university because they want to interview somebody and you didn't know anybody there? You know, I'm using chemistry as like in traditional like usually white male dominated field and you wanted to specifically ask, I would like if possible to hear from a person of color. Is it as simple as saying that? I know there's a lot of white people especially who feel awkward about saying anything about race and they don't want to be offensive so they just don't know what to do. What wording would you use in an invitation like that? I think that is totally fine, especially if you're like you mentioned, like you're approaching an organization and you might not have someone in mind that you want to fill the spot, but you are looking for a diverse perspective. So in that pitch, mention what you're looking at. for. You could say, ideally, I would love to interview a person of color, a person with this

background, with this type of experience. So be as specific as possible. And I think that would be very helpful. And on the reverse side, I actually get a lot of queries where organizations come to me and they're saying, hey, a woman of color podcasters, we notice that we don't have diversity in our panel. we don't have diversity in our whatever opportunity looking for, can you share this opportunity and see if there's any interest? So I think there's nothing wrong with being specific in your ask, especially if you don't have an understanding or grasp of who exactly you're looking for. So I don't think that's a bad thing.

And being on the other side of it where I get pitches, I'm always happy to share that because, again, number one, it shows me that this organization is thoughtful. They're thinking through diversity and inclusion. And two, this is what my platform is built for. Like my platform is built to share opportunities, to share resources. So yeah, send things to me all day. That's totally fine. I would love to talk a little bit about why diversity and inclusion matters. And, you know, I think to a lot of us, it's obvious. And then other people are just sort of waking up to this now. But do you have any, like, personal stories or observations that would help, like,

just really bring this home to people? Thinking about, like, when I am looking at, let's say, an opportunity to speak on a stage, I wouldn't have felt inspired to actually apply if I don't see someone who looks like me. Like, you don't even know it's a possibility, right? I did a podcast episode on this a few weeks ago, I just shared about when it really clicked me why diversity wasn't. Like, I always knew diversity was important. But, like, for my own personal experience about, I talked about when I was working at Apple and Angela Arendt's became, was like the VP of retail. And until I saw her leadership style and just how warm she was and how everyone loved her, I never saw myself as potential like, you know, boss material, like, or mentor material.

I just kind of put that out of my mind because female CEOs had been just not portrayed in a very nice light for most of, you know, from what I had seen. And so I just like put that possibility out of my mind. And then when I saw her and got to meet her, I was like, oh, wow, actually, I could be my own boss and this is really cool. And previous to that, like, I thought nothing of having like most CEOs be white guys. And I just thought, oh, that's the word like, not a big deal until. And it really like had that click in my mind. And I was like, oh, this is why seeing people who are like you matters. And why I think podcasters have like such a huge role to play in elevating voices.

Because seeing people like you, it really makes a big difference. And I think that's why I had hesitations to start podcasting in the beginning because I didn't see many people of color who were doing it. So I was like, oh, is it really something that's worth our time or is that for other people, you know? So I definitely do think representation matters. And it's inspiring. It inspires folks to take action and inspires folks to the work to get there. It lets people know that there's a possibility to move into a different type of space. So I think that's why diversity and inclusion is very, very important.

Yeah, that was a great story, by the way. That's a great story. Well, I gave a poor re-telling of what I previously told. I didn't want to completely repeat myself. But anyway, thanks. But all right, Danielle, it has been fantastic talking to you and even hearing about how you're like started a group from scratch and how you're nurturing it.

and it's just going fantastic and I love your mission. So tell us where we can find out more about you and more about the group you created. Yes, absolutely. So you could head over to wcpodcasters.com to check us out. We have over 50 blogs at this time of this recording. So there's lots of resources, lots of inspiration. You could also check out a lot of our community members. These are all guest posts.

So it's great to see their voices and their ideas out there. You can also find us on social media. We are WC, podcasters on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter. And we actually have a brand new membership. So if you're looking for accountability, if you're looking for a resource library, so you don't have to Google everything when it comes to your podcasting strategy and additional trainings, that will be a great place. I mean, can you find all of our information on our website?

I don't know how you do it all, but that's fantastic. Thank you for sharing. All right. Thank you, Danielle. It was awesome. I'm so inspired by Danielle's ability to see an opportunity and just go for it. You will hear many more examples of this if you listen to my Postcard Academy podcast episode with Danielle, which will be coming out in a few weeks. And P.S. Remember how Danielle said that when she hears a guest on a podcast, she goes and subscribes to that show? Would you like that guest to be you? I designed an online course just for you called Podcast Pitch Perfection. and this is your full-off-free success plan for getting on podcasts so you can build your brand, grow your audience, and increase your impact. Want to learn more? Go to sarahmicatel.com

slash podcast pitch perfection. All right, that's all for now. Thank you so much for listening and have a beautiful week wherever you are. Thank you for listening to podcasting step by step. You are now one step closer to launching that podcast you've been dreaming about. But I want to get you even closer. I created a free guidebook for you with actionable worksheets called Eight Mistakes New Podcasters Make and How to Fix Them. To find that, head on over to sarah micahatel.com slash fix.

Do you ever go blank or start rambling when someone puts you on the spot? I created a free conversation cheat sheet with simple formulas that you can use so you can respond with clarity, whether you're in a meeting or just talking with friends. Download it at sarahmicatel.com slash blank no more.