Influential Introvert: Communication Coaching for Professionals with Performance Anxiety - What Most Podcasters Get Wrong About Marketing

Episode Date: March 11, 2021

Why do some podcasts grow while others do not? My guest today, Jeremy Enns, asked himself that question and is in a unique position to get an answer. He’s CEO & Storyteller In Chief of Counterweight Creative, a podcast strategy and marketing agency.Jeremy looked into the data of what was and wasn’t working for his clients. Today, he's sharing what he’s learned. Jeremy and I are discussing: How Your Podcast's Positioning Can (And Will) Make Or Break Your ShowWhat Most Podcasters Get Wrong About The Role Their Podcast Is Best Suited To Play In Their Marketing SystemHow A 200 Download/Ep Podcast Pulled Off A $300K LaunchAnd if you’re interested in podcast sponsorships, Jeremy is holding a free 5-day workshop on how small shows can land big sponsors. If you’d like to sign up for that, you can do so using my partner link sarahfmikutel.com/jeremy This workshop is happening March 29-April 2 2021, after which I’ll link to something else cool Jeremy has going on.Jeremy is a fellow world wanderer and you can hear more of his story on my other podcast, LIVE Without Borders. Enjoy the show!***Hiya, I'm your host Sarah Mikutel, podcast launch consultant at your service.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 here. 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.

Welcome to podcasting step by step, where you will learn how to create a podcast that's irresistible. I'm Sarah Mikital, a podcast launch consultant and an American who has been permanently based in Europe for more than 10 years. I especially love helping fellow expats and location independent entrepreneurs build their online brands and businesses through the magic of podcasting. Looking for one-on-one support, visit sarahmicatel.com to book a podcast launch BIP day with me or to check out one of my online courses. and make sure that you grab my five-step formula for getting on podcasts at sarahmicatel.com slash pitch formula. Why do some podcasts grow? Well, others do not.

My guest today, Jeremy Enz, asked himself that question and he's in a very unique position to get some answers because he is CEO and storyteller-in-chief of counterweight creative, a podcast strategy and marketing agency. And he looked into the data of the shows he works on. and to see what was working and what wasn't for his clients. Jeremy is sharing what he's learned in his new course podcast marketing academy, but we are getting a very nice flavor of it here today. Jeremy and I are discussing how your podcast positioning can and will make or break your show, what most podcasters get wrong about the role their podcast is best suited to play in their

whole marketing system, and how one of his clients who had 200 downloads per episode on her podcast ended up with a $300,000 launch of her program. And if you are interested in podcast sponsorships, Jeremy is holding a free five-day workshop on how small shows can land big sponsors. So if you would like to sign up for that, you can use my partner link, sarah micotel.com slash Jeremy. And this is happening March 29th to April 2nd, 2021, after which I'll link to something other cool, some other cool thing that Jeremy has going on. Jeremy is a fellow world wander and you can hear more about his story on my other podcast, Live Without Borders, but we do get into how he got into podcasting in the first place here on

this episode. It's such an interesting story. Jeremy's a good storyteller and so I had a really fun time talking to him. So enjoy the show. Welcome Jeremy. Thank you so much for joining me. Hey, Sarah. I am so excited to be here with you today.

I would really like to hear you talk about your. career path because it's such an interesting one. I was really fortunate that my parents, there wasn't a lot of pressure to immediately jump into university after high school. And so I took one year off and then two years off. And I think it was even three years off before I had been really into music. I played in bands and as a guitarist. And of all things, a flyer in the mail one day from a recording school, basically.

So like music production and sound engineering. and for some reason, I don't know how that managed to make its way to me. I was living in the prairies, which is the middle of Canada, where there's not that many people, lots of farmland, and the school was in Vancouver. And so I saw this flyer and started getting interesting of like, oh, yeah, I've always been into music. I also like the technical. I've been excited of things.

I've been experimenting with recording. And so I started looking into these schools. And they were basically Vancouver, Toronto, or Montreal, and maybe one way out on the East Coast in Halifax. So a long way from home, whichever way I was deciding to go. And so this was the first thing that actually felt right to me, though, like, oh, yeah, this would be something that I could, like, really sink my teeth into and would have a lot of fun doing. And so I ended up moving to Vancouver, going to school for that. After I finished school, I got a internship at a big studio that was fairly well known with a lot of producers who had won Grammys and things like that.

Like, it was quite high profile. But the way that internships work still is kind of like an old. school industry in recording studios is that you basically show up at eight or nine in the morning and this is all unpaid work and you're there until whenever the sessions end at the end of the day, which, you know, if you're lucky, you might be eight or nine p.m. more often it was midnight, 2 a.m., 4 a.m., super long hours. And I was just doing this like one, two days a week at most. I had a day job. I needed to support myself. But there were people who were like living in their cars and were just like there every single day. So after doing that, you know, once, twice a week for

about a year, I was like, okay, I'm not moving up the ladder here. There are people who just have way more passion for this than I do. So I ended up leaving that internship and kind of putting the sound engineering record producer dream behind me. And I started just working other odd jobs, landscaping, doing kind of manual labor type work. I did tree planting for a couple summers, which is one of the, I think often ranked as one of the most difficult jobs in the world, both physically and mentally, emotionally are pretty isolated with a small group of people out in northern Canada in the forest and living out of a tent for months at a time. So definitely something that is a fun experience to look back on, but I would not wish on anyone. We all knew those humbling experiences, I think.

We do, yeah. And I definitely look back on it fondly and some of my favorite memories and like the relationships you build with people going through those experiences are, definitely lasting and valuable. But I kind of got the travel bug around this time. And I had always wanted to travel, but had never really found a similar to the career path side of things, never found like a itinerary or country or anything like that. That was just, I had to go there. And there was just like, I wanted to go everywhere. So one, one day, I remember a friend of mine, we'd been talking about traveling together for probably four or five years. We went to high school together and we'd always talked about like going on some trip but always this big idea.

And so he emailed me and the email said something like the first line was like, don't laugh at this. I'm serious. Just hear me out. But I thought of a way that we can go to all these countries we've talked about and more cycle tour. And I was like, oh. And again, it was like the same thing as with the sound engineering where I was like, oh,

this is the thing. Like riding through Europe on a bicycle going through all these countries over the course of three months like, this is the thing I've been waiting for. And so we ended up going on this trip, spending three months cycling from, well, we did two weeks in Iceland, and then we flew to Norway and cycled from Oslo to Zagreb, Croatia. And then I spent another month backpacking through the Balkans. And then another four months I met up in Southeast Asia with my girlfriend at the time. And we had started dating well after the plans for the cycle tour were already in motion. And so ended up having this year of travel. And by the end, far from having that,

kind of thirst or desire for travel being quenched. It was, of course, only, I only wanted to travel more. And so at this point, like, I started getting really interested in, I started hearing about this whole location independent digital nomad thing and started actually looking into that. I didn't know that existed beforehand, had met maybe a couple people on the trip. And everybody that I'd met was like a software engineer or something, not something that I had the skills for. But I started getting curious about it and doing more research into, I'm I mean, the whole digital nomad lifestyle, travel, podcasts, and these things. And I really discovered both podcasting and location independence or that term at the same time.

And so that was kind of my entry point into both of those things, which have now kind of defined my life for the past five years or so. Now, you are launching something soon called Podcast Marketing Academy. Tell us what that is. Yeah. So I have been working with podcasters, business owners and podcasters for the past four or five years at this point. And I realized that as a podcast production agency, like a lot of our clients, they were coming to us to strictly produce their podcasts. And, you know, that's a fairly time intensive and oftentimes expensive proposition to outsource that. And there were some of our clients who were, you know, seeing incredible results for their business, growing their audiences and growing their shows really fast. And then there was all these other, this other group maybe like they was almost split maybe 50, 50. Some of them were doing really well. And some of them were really struggling. And so about. a year ago, a little over a year ago, I got really curious about like, okay, like, what's really going on here? What are these podcasters over here doing that they're seeing all

these great results versus these ones over here that are putting out like actually really great content? Like, they were great shows, but they weren't actually growing. They either weren't growing the audience or they were having a hard time getting their audience to take them up on their offers. And so I got really curious and started interviewing all of my clients and interviewing other people in the podcast space and just doing research from the outside of looking at like, okay, how do the top podcasters, you know, use their marketing channels to grow their shows? And by the end of this, I basically come up with this curriculum of content around not how to launch or kind of cover the technical production aspects of a podcast, but like once you've

already got that, like, how can you actually get it in front of more people? And so this podcast marketing academy is basically the, uh, the end result of that question of like, why are some people able to grow their shows so consistently and some people struggle? And it ended up being a much larger undertaking than I think I initially thought it would be. It's right now at this point. It is a like 20 plus hour course. We cover a lot of content from kind of marketing foundation stuff all the way to traffic strategies of like how to actually get more exposure.

So it is a deep dive on all things marketing. Well, can you give us a flavor on some of the exposure? stuff. I know lots of people find that quite juicy. Yes. And I do want to caveat this with saying that exposure without having a solid foundation is not going to do much. And I think that it can help sometimes. But I think this is why sometimes you see people will go viral and they're like a one hit wonder and they don't retain any of that traffic because there wasn't that foundation in place to actually capitalize on it. And so the first whole module of the course is really like foundations of your show's premise that it's based on the concept that it's around.

Like, is it something that's actually compelling that when somebody sees it, they're actually going to want to listen to more than just, you know, maybe that one episode that they were interested in. And how can you kind of create that experience that when you get exposure, people are actually not just going to like come for one episode. They're going to stick around because they're so like hooked by what you're doing. So. Yeah.

Well, I 100% agree. And so before we get to the juicy, like exposure growth stuff, why don't we take a step? Why don't we take a step back and talk about how your podcast positioning can make or break your show? Because I know that's something you talk about a lot. Yeah. This is something I started thinking more and more about positioning probably a year ago. And I don't know what initially turned me on to it. And I think it's something that, especially as like solo printers or indie podcasters or content creators, we like hear the word positioning.

And it sounds so like corporate and like big businessy. And I think I kind of dismissed it before that. But really what positioning is about is differentiation. And I think the thing that we as content creators, like if there's one thing we need to realize is that there is so much content out there today and there is so much of it that is almost exactly the same. And so more than just like the actual content that we're putting out, we need to think about like how is that content, not just is it good, is it different and how is it different from what

else is already on offer? And so that is really where the positioning comes in. And you can do that. Maybe that's like the actual content that you approach and cover as well in your podcast. So maybe your content is different from other similar shows that are addressing the same niche. Or maybe it's the way that you explore that content. Maybe it's the tone around how you explore it. Like you can think about a, you know, there could be two shows on the same topic. One is intended for, you know, moms to be able to listen to with their kids in their cars or dads to be able to listen to with their kids in their car. And the other is like a vulgar like you would not want your kids in the car. And they're the, the exact same content, but they're positioned very differently for different audiences, depending on the tone and the presentation. And so there are all these different ways that you can position yourself. And I think the easiest way to visualize this is to basically take two sets of variables and position them on an X, Y, axis. And you can start, if you have like five shows that are all in your niche, you can like plot those on your little graph there. And you can

kind of see how everything lines up. And so the example that I like to use a lot of times is around like news related shows. And there are so many news podcasts and kind of current events podcasts. And this is a really easy one to visualize because you have some shows that are like every hour they release a new news update. So it's like timely on the one axis versus not timely. On the other hand, you have shows that might release one episode a week. So that's like one form of positioning. And then on the other axis, you could think about in depth versus very like surface level. And so a lot of times the less timely episodes, the one, this maybe once a week is also very in depth.

And so that's going to be kind of up in one quadrant versus another one that is very shallow, but it's released like every hour. And so you can kind of plot all these different shows on the graph and see where they line up. And sometimes when you're doing this, and you can do this for any, you know, you can substitute in different variables and run it multiple times. But you'll see that clusters start to emerge where there's like all these shows are all presenting the content in the same way. They're all like talking about the same content, presenting it in the same way.

It's aimed at the same audience. And so it's really hard to differentiate yourself if you're going to go create another show that is approaching the topic from that same way. And so maybe you want to say like, well, maybe I'm not going to do that. Maybe I see this big open area over here where nobody's really doing it this way. And you can kind of visually see where there's an opportunity to basically differentiate yourself through your positioning. I loved the examples that you gave because I think we hear a lot about niching and like speaking to your ideal, like listener and different things like that. But there's many ways to do this. And I was just, when you were talking about tone, I was thinking of like, yeah, I've definitely unsubscribed from like a news show because it was too snarky and I just was not into that vibe.

One of my favorite ones is like a global news podcast, but it's like their colleagues, but kind of friends. You know, they have like a friendly vibe, which and that's the type of thing that I'm attracted to. And it's also once a week. I would never subscribe to something that put out hourly shows. That's just a way too much. much for me. So I appreciate that excess of differentiation. And I think the other thing to keep in mind here when you're thinking about positioning is that the opposite sides of the spectrum of each of the axes, the two variables that you're looking at, if you're doing it well, neither one of those is

bad. They're both good options for different people. And so you end up with this graph of four options. All of them are good, but all of them appeal to different people. And so I think that's really important to keep in mind because it's not really much of a differentiation between like One thing's a good that everybody would want and the other's a bad thing that nobody would want. Yeah. And yeah, so I just gave examples of what I'm not into, but some people are into that type of stuff. And so, you know, what is your listener want? But also, what do you want yourself?

Like, what do you want to create? And what are you going to feel good about producing? Yeah, exactly. All right, Jeremy. So you have said that most podcasters get like something specific wrong when they're thinking about like the role that their podcast is plays in their marketing system. Could you talk to me a little bit about that? Yeah.

So I think this is one of the things that I realized with a lot of our clients who came to us who weren't seeing a lot of success is that they maybe didn't have that large an audience going in and they were starting the podcast to grow the audience themselves. So basically the podcast was fit into their kind of exposure system is how I like to think about it. And I think that this worked years ago in the past, like maybe five years ago, six years and there just weren't that many podcasts. If you had a great show on a fairly niche topic,

you could get a whole bunch of people who would discover that show and without really trying that hard. And I actually talked to someone yesterday who they had a show back in 2005. And it was just, I think it was called Business Essentials. So super generic, bland name. And they were getting like thousands of downloads per episode. They actually lost the RSS feed.

They stopped doing the show in between. And basically they rebooted the show in the past year or two. and now they're getting like one or 200 episodes or downloads an episode. Same show, nothing's different about it. But what used to work in terms of just putting out a good show and getting exposure in an audience does not work anymore. There are just way too many shows for that. And so I think thinking about your podcast as the way to grow your audience is not really effective. Because while podcasting is a marketing tool, you actually still need to market your podcast in order to get people to it.

And so I mentioned before that we need this exposure system for our content, our businesses, whatever we're looking to get attention for the ultimate goal, whether that's selling a product or service or being able to sell sponsorship spots or whatever that is, getting patrons on Patreon. We need that exposure system to get people aware of us. But in order to take action, in order to get people to convert into customers or clients or whatever that might be, we also need this trust system in our businesses. And so this is where podcasting like really shines unlike any other platform out there. I'm guessing for anybody who is a podcast listening to themselves, you have at least one show that you have like binged through the entire back catalog and spent like countless hours listening to the host with them in your ears.

And probably you really trust this person. And if they come out with an offer, you're like first in line to buy it. And so I think that this is, we need this reframe as podcasters of the podcast is not necessarily meant to grow our audience. it's meant to nurture them and build trust with them over time. And so I think once we're aware of that, then we can start to look elsewhere and be like, okay, well, if my podcast isn't the thing that's going to grow my audience, but it is this really, really valuable part of the marketing kind of system in order to build that trust, then how am I going to find, get exposure to these people?

What other systems can I implement in strategies and techniques in order to get exposure to the podcast where they'll then build that trust with me and then convert into clients or customers or whatever that might be for you. Great. So how do we do that? So I think the thing to, the one thing to think about, I think when it comes to this,

is that there are kind of your owned audiences or owned platforms. And so these are places like your newsletter, your podcast, your blog readers, people where like you own that audience and they are already in your ecosystem. And then there are other people's audiences. And a lot of the times with our owned audiences,

we can find people and get exposed. through things like SEO or word of mouth marketing from our existing audiences, which is still the number one way that people actually find out about podcasts is through word of mouth. And so I think like really with our owned audiences, our goal is to nurture our preexisting fans to the point that they become advocates for us and they become really like super fans. I think a lot of times people are so busy out like trying to find new listeners for their shows that they kind of neglect the people they already have when in fact, the fastest way to grow is often to nurture those people to let them do our marketing for us.

Yes, I agree. But then there's also these other people's audiences. And so this, if we can tap into those, if we can get in front of people who have very similar audiences to ours, maybe they are operating in the same niche, but offering a different service or a different type of content, if we can partner with them to be able to kind of tap into this pre-made audience, that is going to be the best way to get a large amount of exposure to new people. And so advertising is one way to do this.

Of course, that is paid and we can't all afford that. But there are other ways to do that, too, that are completely free. They take a little bit of legwork, but that might be guesting on other podcasts or it might be doing, you know, collaborative kind of cross promotions where maybe you have another podcaster who does similar or complementary content to you and you each run an ad for each other. It's not a paid ad, but you both do a swap where you say, hey, you know, if you like my podcast, I think you're really going to like this other person's podcast as well. They talk about the stuff that, you know, we all need to know about, but we don't really talk about on this podcast that much.

So they're a good friend of mine. If you like this show, go check them out. And that is something that I've seen a few of our clients, like almost double their audiences with a really highly aligned cross-promotion like that. So I think that those are a few of the ways that you're going to get the most bang for your buck by looking to collaborate with other people who are kind of complimentary to your content or by guesting on other shows in a similar way. So you mentioned at the beginning of this episode that, you know, half your clients did quite well as far as growth in the other half were producing good content, but they weren't growing as much. What else were the people who were growing doing? So I think the one thing that really stands out to me is I kind of just mentioned it there was like they were so committed to their audiences. Like they were so engaged on social media through all of their different platforms where they engaged with their audience.

It was just clear that that was a focus of theirs. And I've seen this play out. Since I became aware of that, I've started to see it play out time and time and again, where people who are, you can tell that they're excited to engage with and talk with their audience. And it's really like this audience first mentality. Those are the people who end up growing. And I think a lot of podcasters, this is tough because like we want that engagement, but we might not be having it.

And so if you're in that situation, like that is a hard place to be in because sometimes you just need to keep finding those initial group of people, those first like five or 10 people, if you can build a super, super strong intimate community of 10 people who like you engage with super regularly, like those people are going to spread the word. So it's kind of a matter of just like waiting it out or seeking those people out actively and getting your show in front of them. I know that one of the things that I'd like to recommend people do is probably you might not know 10 people who are, you know, your ideal listener in real life. You might not know those people a lot of times we're so niche in our interests in our podcast that we don't actually know anyone who's into

that. But chances are you are a part of Facebook groups or you know people on Twitter who might be into that or maybe it's subreddits or there's all these places online where you can find those people. And what I would recommend doing is just going to those people, finding them and giving them a DM and saying, hey, I have this podcast. I think it is going like I'm creating it for people like you, would you mind like listening to like, you know, 10 minutes of it and just telling me like, is this any good? Is this something that you would be interested in? And if you reach out to 10 people and they're all like, you know, yeah, whatever, it's okay. Probably you need to like change something. If you're, if those are the people you're making it for and they don't really care,

probably your show's not good enough. But if those people are all like, whoa, this is exactly what I've been looking for. Like now you've just found that kind of core group and you can start nurturing that community. But sometimes it actually takes an active approach to it of like seeking out those people and just reaching out and saying like, hey, I think this is helpful for you, but I could use some feedback on it. You said two things that I think are just so important. Number one, that the people who are growing are having like the real passion for it. And I think most of us probably start out that way, or at least a lot of us start out that way. And then people quickly like, they care about their podcast so much and they want to grow it so fast and

like get the word out to other people that it can become a big. of an obsession and then you're just focused on growing and you forget about why you started this to begin with. And so if you can focus on that smaller like five or ten people, that's so much more doable. And if you can just stay in that mindset of like, yeah, I just want to feel like a ton of fun with these like five to ten people, it just takes the pressure off and like it keeps the magic in the show rather than that energetic scramble of like, oh my God, what am I going to do? I can't like, I'm just treading water here. I was really surprised when I, we've run through or the current cohort of podcast marketing

academy is into its final month now. And so this is the second one and the third one's going to be opening up soon. But I was really surprised. I thought that everybody, all they were going to want was the exposure strategies when, when we're going through the course and that the last module of the course of the four modules. And so I was kind of thinking I would need to like really work hard to keep people engaged and all the stuff leading up to it. And at the end of the course, almost everybody,

when I asked for feedback said it was actually the foundational and the audience like nurturing and how to turn people into super fans from their existing audience. Those were all the things that people took the most away from the program. And I was kind of like, oh, here, you know, I was, I was so grateful for that because I was like, oh, I believe that that's the stuff, that foundational stuff is the most important. And that pure exposure without anything else that it's resting on isn't really that useful. But I thought that I might have to convince people of that. And so hearing back from people that this was their experience too, that like, oh, now that I know this, I can see and feel in, you know, what I'm doing with my marketing now that this actually is the stuff that matters and that

that exposure stuff is nice. That's a way to introduce more people to the ecosystem. But it's really about turning them into super fans and that's through engagement and having, you know, authentic interaction with them and really like being a real human to them rather than always focusing on the people who are on the outside because you already have this attention of people. Like, these are the people that you're creating the show for like actually, you know, talk with them and engage with them. And the more you do that, the better the show is going to be for them. And the more the word is going to spread. I mean, just think about like, a hundred people can tell way more people than you can tell on your own. Exactly. And it goes back to that adage of

people what they want and give them what they need. Like, I 100% agree with you that it's all about foundation. But people don't really know that. A lot of people don't realize that at first. They do want, like, okay, how can I get more exposure? And then when they realize the important foundational piece, they're like, oh, yes, like this is so crucial. All right. Jeremy, I believe you had a client who, you know, their podcast is average or even like a little bit above average, 200 downloads per episode. And just had, and had a very successful launch. I would love to hear more about how podcasts can play into people's, you know,

launching of their products and services. Yeah, this is, so this was another thing that I think I took away from this, this kind of research into the whole marketing side of things was, obviously most of us are creating our podcasts for something. And a lot of times there is this underlying kind of just, you know, we love doing it itself, but it's a lot of time and emotional labor and investment into creating a podcast if there's no outcome for a lot of people. And obviously a lot of people are producing podcasts strictly for the business results that

they hope it will provide. And so kind of realizing like what people were doing in order to drive product launches and how to use their podcast in that way was something that really came out of the this research as well and is definitely a part of the program. But this client in particular, what was so fascinating to me, and I unfortunately can't give the niche because she's so niche that it would, she's probably pretty much one of like three shows operating in that. And so it would give it away. But she is a coach kind of, I don't know that I would say a health coach, but in the health coaching kind of realm. And but for a very niche audience of people in a

certain profession. And so she basically has like 200 listeners an episode. She's a little bit more now, but at the time of this launch, she's at 200 listeners an episode. And almost all of those were people who were like already within her existing ecosystem. They already knew about her before she launched the podcast. And a lot of them were already paying customers in her like maybe $50 a month membership program. And she had had trouble capitalizing on her like bigger product launches in the past. And she started the podcast. And what she found was that this was basically, she was creating the podcast just as supplementary content for the people who were already in her paid membership program. And so it's kind of this strange situation where they're paying her

for this exclusive content that they're getting through the membership. And then she's also putting out this free content that is so enhancing the experience for them that she ended up having this massive $300,000 launch. And this is, I will say, is a high ticket six month, I think, coaching program. And so she didn't need that many people, but she just got this. this insane conversion rate because the podcast had done such a good job of nurturing the people who were already nurtured to the point where they were like paying customers, but going further and offering further support to all these kind of topics that they were, you know, discussing at some level in in the coaching program and the membership community.

But the podcast was just this other value ad. And so this is almost another example of how the podcast just further nurtured the people who were already around her. It wasn't about getting new people. And after the launch, she emailed me and she's like, guess what? I just had this like amazing launch. And the whole strategy of just like nurturing the existing people, making the podcast for the people who already know me, I'm just going to like keep on going with that.

If new people find it, that's great. But it's going to be enough just to do this. And so I think that like I took a lot away from from that experience working with her and coming up with the strategy around it, but also hearing her results. That was so far beyond my expectations. But just seeing like she has such a disproportionate amount of superfever. fans. And I think that she is the perfect example of someone who has such singular focus on serving the people around her as deeply as possible and kind of ignoring everyone else who isn't already there,

that those people are spreading the word for her and her show has started to grow much more quickly. And she's almost in the position of like, well, I mean, that's great, but I'm just going to keep doing what I'm doing and keep my focus on the people who like, I know that I can serve better than anyone else. And so I think that that is just such a lesson and such a like stark example for all of us when it comes to, you know, focusing on the people who are in our inner circle already. I love that, how it goes back to what we were talking about before of instead of like just putting your focus everywhere and like how do I find like new people focusing on the people who are already in your circle. Can you talk a little bit more about the strategy you helped her with as far as either the launch or also like how her podcast that was open to everyone complimented the existing content that people liked? Yeah. So this is the really fascinating thing about this is that she had a whole launch strategy with like a five-day challenge leading into the launch. And she basically opened it up to her wait list of people in her existing community and filled up all the spots for her program before any of her launch. So she actually didn't really follow through with any of that launch strategy because she had no more spaces in the program. And so that even like further takes this to another level of like, whoa, what, what? Like no launch strategy. She didn't do the challenge. She didn't do any of the Facebook ads. She just canceled them all.

because she'd already filled the program. But our focus was on really like showcasing her as the expert in her community. And I think that especially leading up to launches, this is, you know, something good to do. Probably your episode topics are doing this anyway to some extent. But really using the podcast almost as like an FAQ. And so like on any sales page, you're going to have all these objections that people might have that you want to have those questions that give the response to that. And so one of the things that we did was kind of tease a lot of the stuff. that was going to be in this more in-depth coaching program.

And so there were some like the live workout element. We were able to craft some episodes that kind of around that experience. And we did some of that that was both on the podcast but also on, you know, interfaith Facebook group and things like that. But then also just using the podcast as a way to answer listener questions and objections, either directly related to the program, but more so around the mindsets of like, why wouldn't someone? What objection is someone who's going to come out to potentially enter this program?

why wouldn't they do that? What would they say like what excuses would they come up with? And then addressing those in like the four to six weeks leading into that launch so that anybody who's listening to the podcast, they've already been worked through all those objections. And so that when the time comes and the cart opens, she's been able to, you know, work them through those. And they're just like, oh, yep, I guess I'm ready for this. Like I have no more objections or no more kind of like excuses to hide behind. She had done such a good job of addressing each of those. So a lot of that comes down to like content planning and being strategic with like, okay, I know I'm launching here.

So where do I need to take people? Where are they starting from? Maybe six to eight weeks before that. And then what episode topics can I bring up there leading up to that launch that can kind of check off those boxes, those reasons why people might not want to take me up on the program. And then the other thing that I recommend, this is something that people work in, especially leading up to a launch, is kind of testimonial episodes where you're bringing on people who

you have worked with in the level of the program that you're launching or whatever that might be. and it's not like, you know, if you're not careful, it can become kind of a 40 minute long commercial for you. So you don't want that. What you want to do is make sure that these episodes like are sharing that person's experience. But it's more focused on their journey, their internal journey rather than their experience working with you. And so really digging into kind of the storytelling and the emotions of like, where were you before this? And then like, what did you do? What was the decision you made, the choice you made that changed things for you. And where are you now? And that's something that people can really relate to on a level that sometimes. expert interviews, they're like too far ahead of us as people who are still like in the thick of it all. Whereas someone who's like just been through that thing that we're struggling with, it can be really powerful and something that we really resonate with and relate to as listeners. We want to hear from somebody where we can see ourselves in them. Yeah. Well, Jeremy, you are launching or opening up, I guess, the next cohort of Podcast Marketing Academy soon. So how can

we get involved with that? I'm going to be doing a free workshop leading up to it. It's not kind of one of those like just funnels to get into the program. It's going to be an actual helpful workshop in its own right on sponsorships, which we've had some really great client success stories around that, you know, probably 95, 99% of the stuff I do is going to be free content just to help podcasters. So I would love to connect with anyone listening to the show and go deeper with you. Thank you so much, Jeremy. Yeah, thank you so much for having me, Sarah. Once again, if you want to join Jeremy's five-day workshop, your roadmap to a five-figure podcast sponsorships, sign up by visiting sarah migatel.com slash Jeremy.

That's all for now. To learn how you can sign up for a one-on-one podcast launch BAP day with me or to learn more about one of my online podcast courses, visit sarahmicatel.com and make sure that you grab my five-step formula for getting on podcasts at sarahigatel.com slash pitch formula. Do you ever go blank or start rambling when someone puts you on the spot? I created a free conversation sheet 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 sarah micotel.com slash blank no more.