Right About Now with Ryan Alford - Earn It: Unconventional Strategies for Brave Marketers

Episode Date: February 18, 2025

 Right About Now with Ryan AlfordJoin media personality and marketing expert Ryan Alford as he dives into dynamic conversations with top entrepreneurs, marketers, and influencers. "Right About Now" brings you actionable insights on business, marketing, and personal branding, helping you stay ahead in today's fast-paced digital world. Whether it's exploring how character and charisma can make millions or unveiling the strategies behind viral success, Ryan delivers a fresh perspective with every episode. Perfect for anyone looking to elevate their business game and unlock their full potential.Resources:Right About Now NewsletterFree Podcast Monetization CourseJoin The NetworkFollow Us On InstagramSubscribe To Our Youtube ChannelVibe Science MediaSUMMARYIn this episode of "Right About Now," host Ryan Alford speaks with Steve Pratt, author of "Earn It: Unconventional Strategies for Brave Marketers." They discuss the critical need for brands to earn attention in a saturated content landscape. Pratt emphasizes the importance of creating valuable, engaging content that builds trust and long-term relationships with consumers. He advocates for "creative bravery" in marketing, urging brands to set high standards for their content. The conversation highlights the pitfalls of short-term marketing strategies and the necessity of understanding and genuinely connecting with the audience to achieve lasting business success.TAKEAWAYSImportance of earning attention in marketingChallenges of a saturated content landscapeEvolution of marketing strategies from interruptive advertising to content-driven approachesThe significance of authenticity and value in marketingBuilding trust and relationships with consumersThe pitfalls of short-term marketing strategiesThe concept of "sampling" in content engagementCreative bravery in content creationUnderstanding audience needs and preferencesDifferentiation through innovative content formats If you enjoyed this episode and want to learn more, join Ryan’s newsletter https://ryanalford.com/newsletter/ to get Ferrari level advice daily for FREE.  Learn how to build a 7 figure business from your personal brand by signing up for a FREE introduction to personal branding https://ryanalford.com/personalbranding.  Learn more by visiting our website at www.ryanisright.comSubscribe to our YouTube channel  www.youtube.com/@RightAboutNowwithRyanAlford. 

I start with attention because if you don't have any attention, you have nothing. You have no audience, you have no time, you have no engagement, you have no trust, no relationships, no one's even hearing you, no one's sampling. This is Right About Now with Ryan Alford, a Radcast Network production. We are the number one business show on the planet with over 1 million downloads a month. Taking the BS out of business for over six years and over 400 episodes. You ready to start snapping necks and cashing checks?

Well, it starts right about now. What's up guys? Welcome to Right About Now. We're always talking about now, not about yesterday, not about the future. Cause look, it's about what works today, in business, in marketing and in life. We cover the gamut and look, I get to choose who I want on this show. And

that's what I love. Steve and I were just talking about this and our next guest is someone that I've admired from afar. I don't know Steve, you're going to get to know Steve today, so am I. But I've been reading his book and going through it. And a lot of people I know pointed him my direction and I'm like, this guy knows his shit. And you know what? You're going to know his shit too, because he is Steve Pratt. He is the author of earn it unconventional strategies for brave marketers. I hope I'm brave. I'm going to learn today if I really am. Steve, welcome

to the show. Hey, thanks for having me. I feel like I'm going to be like a shit distributor today. This is good. We're all going to know where I stand. We're giving the shit to business. Wait, and look, we take the bullshit out of business. That's the that's our tagline. No BS. No, there you go.

I'm going to empty it all out today. It's great. Yes. No, it's not. This is the business you need to know. Steve is not going to drop anything but knowledge on us, but Steve, where are we today? I am in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, and I am super excited to talk to you in South Carolina.

I was saying earlier, I love South Carolina. I used to go there all the time, the best. So yeah, awesome to talk to you in South Carolina. I was saying earlier, I love South Carolina. I used to go there all the time. The best. So yeah, awesome to talk to you. I haven't been to Vancouver, but I need to. I I like the warm. It is not warm here now. It's come in the summer. It's like the nicest place on earth.

Right now, there's it's cold and dark. And this is unless you're a skier. Don't come right now there's it's cold and dark and this is unless you're a skier Don't come right now. Yeah, we're like 78 today. Uh, it's actually warm for us for february We have the four seasons, but uh, uh, it's a beautiful day at south carolina But it's a beautiful day for everybody listening wherever you are whenever you are. However, you're listening I'm pumped because we call it my favorite subject. You know, like having a business show that is marketing centered. I don't always talk about marketing, but now I get to geek out a little bit.

Steve, I mean, let's set the table for everybody. You wrote the book. You've got opinions on marketing. Where, what the hell formed Steve Pratt's opinion on marketing and what's been the lineage here for you, Steve? I'll give you the short version is I come at it from a little bit of an unusual place is I come at it from the media background. So I did about 10 years of television. I worked in music television and children's television and

journalism and things for about 10 years of television, I worked in music television and children's television and journalism and things for about 10 years. And then I went and ran a digital music service for about 10 years at Canada's public broadcasters, kind of like NPR Music, but in Canada. And started podcasting in 2005, which is super early in this innovation lab thing. in 2005, which is super early in this innovation lab thing.

And I guess around like 2014 I left, and it was a mix of different reasons, but part of it was because the media business model seemed pretty broken where so many advertisers were leaving for the digital space, and so many audiences had tools to just bypass interruptive things that they didn't want. And I saw all these companies like Red Bull, who were acting like their own media companies, that they realized pretty early on,

we don't need a media company, we don't need broadcast towers or licenses with the internet, we could just decide to make awesome stuff and build our own audiences. And I had this moment where I was like, you know what? I know how to do that. My whole career in media is I know how to make great shows and engage audiences. What if we went and helped teach a bunch of marketers how to do that and help companies build their own audiences and turn this into a business. And so I left and then very shortly after, Serial, this huge podcast came out and

podcasts were big in 2005, 2006 and they kind of dipped as YouTube and Facebook came up and then they came roaring back with Serial. And we're like, let's make the weirdest business ever and double down on helping brands learn how to make podcasts. And we were the first people on the planet to I think to actually have a company that only did that and a bunch of people almost had interventions with us because they thought it was we were gonna go bankrupt and lose our houses and stuff. I think we got really lucky. We picked something at the right time and it turned into a really, really good but also just really enjoyable and fascinating business helping figure out this whole space. So yeah, I did that for about eight or nine years. And then the last three years, I've kind of been on my own writing this book and going on, you know, helping companies do it

Not just in podcasting but figure out kind of broader content strategies for doing this stuff. Yeah, man, it's a It's like the most used word, but the most appropriate word in marketing content, you know It's like we all we all hear it I think and it but it's but it is what it is. It's a podcast, whether it's social media, whether it's, I don't know, video, audio. I mean, it's all content. Some good, some bad, some brave, some not, some safe. And I think that's what it's about. It's a hard business, right? You think about how many messages we all get fired at us every single day as audience members and how picky we can be now compared to where we used to be 20 years ago.

If you want to be one of the few things that people actually pay attention to, no matter what platform you choose, no matter what kind of content you make, it's hard. It's a really hard deal, but that's also kind of the fun of it. And it's figuring how to make things that are actually valuable for people that they want to spend their time with. Because I feel like people don't suffer through mediocrity anymore. They don't have to, which is nice. Yeah.

I mean, choice is amazing. And back 15, 20 years ago, maybe even 25 years. I'm starting to age, Steve. I don't know about you, but my years are still ticking. I can't seem to keep it in pause. But you know, you had so many channels to watch on TV. You know, being a guy, it's sports for me for the most part, but then you have your other cable channels and smart phones barely existed and

Definitely didn't have the video and data bandwidth that we have now that enables all of these things I tell people time I was a pioneer of enablement. You know working on smartphones in 2007 and 8 But in the but the throughput, and now, like you said, you've got so many choices. You can, you either, I've been playing with this notion, Steve, and I think you'll get it. It's somewhat yours. It's kind of like either you're getting turned on or you're turned off as a brand and as content. Because people get to choose. And that's really what you're talking about, isn't it? I think it's a great way of phrasing it.

I may have to borrow that. Mine is usually something like you're either earning attention or you're getting ignored. I'm a creative guy. I haven't sketched the on button for our relaunch of our company, Radical, on the brand, with an on play button. And you either get shoes, it's that simple, right? Well, we were talking earlier

about this idea of sampling, right? I think you brought up the goal of everybody is to get sampled, and then it's the job of the show to keep people listening afterwards, or the video, or the newsletter, or whatever it is. Just getting sampled is the on button, right? Like it has to be so interesting that out of all the different options, all the Netflix tiles, all the Spotify podcasts, all the TikTok creators, that they're even willing to give

you a shot to give you a second or two to get in there. That's a hard on button to get into, right? Yes. Oh, God, it's so hard. It's crazy how much competition there is. There's just unlimited content. And that's what I love about your book and the tenets of it. You got to earn it, baby. I mean, we all, it was, hey, back in the day, TV commercials, there's nothing else to watch. There's no phone distracting. Because now I make the joke, the TV, if in the day, TV commercials, there's nothing else to watch. There's no phone distracting. Because now I make the joke, the TV, if you have one, 18 to 34 year olds may not even fall in this.

We might be talking 35 to 55 or 35 up. The TV's the radio and the smartphone's the television. Like that's where I think audio is actually more important in TV now, like, because your head's down. You know, it's funny, even in podcasting now, the video stuff is fascinating. Like, I have a 22-year-old who loves podcasting, never listens. It's always on YouTube and she knows, it's like, it is like podcasting is like the new television on YouTube

where it's she knows exactly what shows she watches what days they drop what time they drop all of it it's uh it's amazing and to be able to get to that point where people know that about you and look forward to you like appointment viewing or listening, that's really hard. Also, you have to be pretty awesome or pretty valuable to a very specific group of people to get in there. I'm fascinated by all of it. 18 to 34 year olds listen and watch podcasts more than they do linear TV. Yeah, that checks. That checks. Yeah. I mean, they're choosing what they want when they want. Brands and people and anyone that's trying to market or get scale has to ultimately earn

it. Steve, talk to me about the book. Talk to me about the tenets of really the fundamentals that you put in this and what it takes to be brave. Well, I guess the premise of the book is that you have to earn attention, that if you actually want to get the business results you're looking for as a marketer, there are not any shortcuts that are going to deliver the real deal. Consumers have too many defense mechanisms to keep messages that they don't want out of their lives. And if you think like a consumer or like an audience member yourself,

you know how picky you are about the things that you actually give your attention to. Our level of time and attention that we have every day is finite. There's a maximum number of things that we can possibly give our attention to. And there's more and more and more things competing with it every day. So we can afford to be really picky.

And I think it just means that the quality bar is higher for everybody who's trying to earn someone's attention. And the things you were talking about before, in the past, we just kind of had this deal where we would suffer through things we didn't want in the middle of our shows, because that was the only way we could get them.

And that doesn't really apply anymore. And so I think, as marketers and brands thinking about how we want to connect with people, it puts us in a different mindset of having to make things that people genuinely want to spend time with and setting a really high bar for creating value first for the audience rather than things that are primarily about us. And I think that there's, you know, there's a nice intersection,

like there's a Venn diagram intersection between the job that we're hiring our marketing to do, like the business outcomes that we want to achieve and the value that we're creating for audiences, which I kind of like framing as a gift. Can you design gifts for the audience that they're really excited to spend time with on an ongoing basis that also accomplish

your business outcomes. That, to me, is where modern marketing sits, and where you can get marketing results and keep your job and build an audience of people that are happy to spend time with you. But the sad part is there's not really any super shortcuts and hacks to get there. You actually have to do good work,

and it's hard work to do it. It's fun, but it's hard work. Yeah. And you nailed it. The problem I see, and this is where the bravery comes in, outcomes, business outcomes versus entertainment, versus gifts, whatever that looks like that earns their attention. Because you got CMOs and CEOs under more pressure than they've ever been under.

So it takes real chutzpah, real bravery to put yourself out there and know that the outcome comes along if you get the right kind of attention. And I frame that specifically around the right kind of attention, Steve, because in one of my mentors in this, I wanted, you know, Christopher Lockhead, the godfather of category design. I believe in 80 percent of the what Chris believes in. He's a little bit stubborn and I love him

because I believe the category pirates guy, right? Yeah, category pirates. Yeah. Yeah, super, super smart. I love their stuff. He's been on two, I have had, I think two guests on twice out of 600 episodes. He's one of them.

Cause talk about smart action, you know, just like you Steve. And I could see multiple with you cause you got you, you got it. The bravery is here. We're early. I mean, I, I mean, let you, let you decide. I love the book too much. I love the book too much. So, uh, but, but he, he, if I, you know, this fine line of business outcomes and getting attention, where, where do you fall on this? Because you know,

CMO CEOs are all this pressure. They got to be brave to grab that attention, but then they got to get a business outcome. Again, and I'm only bringing Chris up because we've had this argument, you know, like getting the attention doesn't necessarily generate the outcome. If I'm just getting attention, then I've just got attention and attention is fleeting. Where do you fall on this pendulum, Steve? Well, I guess I start with attention because if you don't have any attention, you have nothing. You have no audience, you have no time,

you have no engagement, you have no trust, no relationships, no one's even hearing you, no one's sampling. So without attention, you have nothing. And so I think you have to start by saying, are we going to make something that is worth people's attention? Because we all have these huge defenses set up. We have skip buttons, we have VPNs, we have ad blockers, we have subscription services. We can avoid all sorts of things we don't want.

The unpopular opinion that I strongly believe in and have had lots of great success with is make stuff people love as a starting point because it's the only way you can get in and actually get the attention. And, you know, if you have somebody come in and sample and it's mediocre or it feels salesy or whatever, they're gone and they're never going to come back. And the secret to building trust and relationships to get customers to get revenue is to spend time with people

on an ongoing basis and to have them come back. And if you won't be able to come back, it's got to be the real deal. It can't be some bait and switch Trojan horse thing where it looks like it's a gift, but it's actually like a bunch of salespeople pouring out of the Trojan horse thing where it looks like it's a gift, but it's actually like a bunch of salespeople pouring out of the Trojan horse and trying to close you.

I think that's where it falls apart, isn't it? The authenticity. It's like, okay, you can have this killer idea that grabs attention, but people can smell a trap from a mile away now. And if it's not, you know, it's not just taking suit off and putting on the polo, you know, you didn't fool me. Yeah, and it's like, this is where it is, this is where the piece is like,

it has to be a genuine gift. It has to be a really good show. And I think the part where you think about how do you tie that into a business outcome is it has to be a show that's from you. It has to be something that is a gift that only you can give that group that is somehow tied to the things that you want people to associate with your expertise or your brand or the things that you know that would be valuable for an audience that are going to

help your business. And I think, I was at a conference in Copenhagen earlier this month, and one of the speakers was from LinkedIn and she was talking about how 95% of the people that you're reaching with your marketing aren't actually in buying mode right now. That you may be like 5% are actually going to buy. And I was like, this is amazing because that means 95% of those people, you can just get to know them.

You can create value for them. They're going to know what you stand for, what your voice is, what your values are, the areas that you're an expert in. And if you can create value for them by sharing those sorts of things in a way that benefits them, they're going to spend lots of time with you and they will build up trust for you and have a relationship.

And when they hit that 5% that are actually in the buying window, if they spent hours and hours and hours with you and received a lot of value and benefit from spending time with you, are they going to choose you or are they going to choose the one that is like screaming out them and interrupting them and following them around the internet like a disease or something like that? So it feels pretty obvious to me, but it's not the way most people market. And if you actually commit to doing it and think about yourself as an audience member, it works. I get it really works to be generous first by giving people things that only you can give them.

Talking with Steve Pratt, he's the author of Earn It. Steve, I love the way you're teeing these things up. These are like all of my list of things that drive me crazy today. Short-termism is the greatest disease in marketing. It's the greatest disease. Performance marketing is the worst term and worst thing that ever happened to marketing. And look, I know that outcomes matter.

We got to make the cash register ring. Marketing has to generate revenue. No one knows that more than me. But not everybody's buying today. Most people aren't. And people want to scoop up the bottom and keep scooping up the bottom to go to the people they're buying today. They want, I got to have sales today. Sales today, sales today. And I know, I get it. I sell, I have five companies, Steve. I got to sell a lot of shit. But you got to build brand or resonance or top of mind awareness or top of mind attention

or to earn the repeat comeback to get that business when they are buying. This short-termism that we deal with today is the greatest disease in marketing. It's not because we don't understand that outcomes and sales matter. It's just, you got to understand the buying patterns. You got to understand the sales funnel. And there still is a funnel. Cycle, funnel, whatever you want to call it.

And not everybody's at the bottom. Why is that so hard to understand? I think everybody just wants to jump straight to the bottom, right? And it's like, your urgency is not my urgency as a consumer. The marketing is a race to the bottom. Of all things. My favorite thing is, I look at the, like, if you just Google, right now, you could go

in and Google, what are the conversion rates on digital advertising? They're almost all sub 1%. Right? Like, if, and I think about that, that is considered successful in marketing. And I kind of zoom out and I'm like, there's nothing else in the planet where 1% success would be considered awesome. And where you'd be like, hey, we're doing a great job

and we shouldn't explore any other alternatives to doing this. And I think about the 99% and I'm like, if your job is to make people like you so that they want to buy from you because you're interesting and you're annoying or irrelevant to 99% of the people you're reaching, why would you not be thinking about is there a better way to do this stuff? And I think it's because people are very happy to annoy 99% of the people in order to get that 1%

because they have short-term urgency. It's like we can get the 1% over and over and we don't really care how many of the 99% we annoy. I just think there's a better way to do it where you can target the people that you really want to reach and be valuable to them and know, like you said, when they're in market, if you've already built a great amount of trust and a relationship with them, they will convert and become long-time customers and it will pay for itself.

You just need to actually get away from the short-termism that you're talking about. Bingo. If, I say this a lot, if I was at a Southern Baptist Church, I'm the deacon in the back going, amen. Praise the Lord. When the pastor says something you agree with, that's amen, brother. That's the highest compliment I can give you. You need like a soundboard with the amen. I know. My team says, I don't know, but I, I want to, you know, I got to lean into my difference to you. That's what, that's what they say.

But Steve, how do we do this? So I think everybody's getting the premise. So how do we do this? What are the fundamentals? What, how do we be brave and how do we connect these dots? What, what drives attention? What, what, I mean, how do we, how do we connect these dots? What drives attention? What, I mean, how do we do it? I guess the, so the first thing is,

I think if you want to find success in marketing, like you act again, what does it look like to earn attention? You have to set a high quality bar for yourself. And so I use the term creative bravery is kind of my lingo for making something that's going to stand out and that is worth people's time. And you can kind of think of like, you know, on a scale of one to 100 or one to 10 or whatever it is, how creatively brave are we being with the podcast or the video

or the newsletter, whatever we're putting out? Is this a real show? Or is this something that feels like an infomercial for our products and services? And I think, you know, you can ask yourself some test questions to be like, are we making a real show? Are we making something that has a high level of creative bravery or not? Would you listen or watch or read this

if you didn't work here? Like if you had no tie to the company, is this worth telling other people about? Is it so good that you would tell other people about it? That's a really high bar. And, but to me that is what it takes to do that stuff. And I think most marketing wouldn't pass that test. Would you remember this in a week or or a month, or a year,

or five years if we changed the things that we were putting out? And think about how different the stuff that you would make would be if you designed something that people would remember it in five years, and how good that would have to be to do that stuff. And maybe one other one is, at the end of spending time with a thing you're putting out, would people say that was time well spent? If they had a chance to go back in a time machine and make the same choice again, knowing

what they were going to get, would they choose the same thing because it was a valuable use of their time? You kind of have to pass those bars these days and I think setting that bar appropriately High is a great starting point and there's a whole bunch of that we could dig into a whole bunch of nerdy stuff if you want around like how to think about differentiating shows and making things that stand out and and pop in there, but I think Hey go down That one a little bit I wanted you to go down that one a little bit because I think that's important detail.

So you let me know where I go too deep in this and we can we can pull out and go back to shallower waters. But so I think one you have to know your audience and choose a very specific audience. And the more you know about the audience, the better. And you need to look at who else is out there and where they're being served and whether they're being well-served in all the different areas. And then you need to look at yourself

and ask yourself who you are, what's your voice, what are your values, why do you exist? What are your superpowers or your weird areas of expertise relative to your competition. And you got to spend some time like, you know, in front of a whiteboard or whatever it is with a group of people in a room and figure out what are we going to be able to do

that is going to create huge value for that group of people that is not already being addressed by other competition that can only come from us. And generally speaking, that will come up with some sort of subject matter or approach that you can take for a, this is the sort of stuff we're gonna talk about. Once you know what you're gonna talk about,

I feel like there's a lot of opportunities to set yourself apart and make something that is differentiated. And it's not just the subject matter, but it's like, what's the format of the show or the newsletter or video or whatever it is? How are we going to present this information in a really interesting way?

And so when I think of, you know, when we're talking about that idea of a gift, how are you going to wrap the gift? You can take the same information and you can present it in 10 different ways. And some of them are going to be really boring and conventional, and some of them you can make really, really exciting and interesting. So I'll give you a weird example. We worked with a company called McAfee that you may know.

They're a software company that helps people avoid cybersecurity threats and viruses and things like that. Yeah, lots of it's shit documentary about their founder. Yeah, so this is not about the founder and that's a whole different kill a fish. It's been sold a few times I think since then. Yeah, he was there. He leaned into it. This is not the story of the McAfee founder. Yes, no, no. The business that's been now owned by who knows who. Yes.

So the business outcome they wanted was to, you know, kind of establish their brand positioning as cybersecurity experts and not just preventing viruses and to help consumers understand how to protect themselves about what they should worry about or not worry about from cybersecurity threats. And so the super obvious way to do it would be to like have some cybersecurity expert on the show every week and interview that person and they just tell you here's why you shouldn't use public wi-fi because you're going to get hacked and here's all the things they can get out of it if you go to a coffee shop and use public Wi-Fi or something like that, right?

That is not what they did. They, like, you could take that same information. They instead created a show called Hackable, and it's kind of a mix of two different formats. It's like part myth busters, so that, you know, the TV show where they look at urban myths and legends and being like, is this real? Like, we're going to investigate and find out whether

these urban legends are real or not. And then part Mr. Robot, which is the show about hacker culture. And they kind of took a different situation from pop culture, like the Wi-Fi and the coffee shop, for example, and said, should you be worried about it? We're going to actually put the host of the show in a coffee shop on public Wi-Fi, and then we're going to get a hacker to go in and see what they can find out. You're going to get the exact same information about how to protect yourself, but you're also going to have a fun

narrative watching this host get hacked by a hacker. And it's a bit of a spoiler, but the host almost always gets hacked by the hacker. So that you know, like the packaging and the wrapping that you put around shows is also a really big way to stand out and earn attention relative to other things that are that are out there. And then there's a whole other kettle of fish out there for like how you market it.

Because if you make a great show and you don't tell anybody about it, you'll have this little tiny pocket of people that love it. And if you have a crappy show that has no creative bravery and you market the hell out of it and a ton of people come in and sample it, they're going to be like,

this is horrible and I'm never coming back. You kind of need to have awesome creative bravery and you need to market it well to exactly the right people. That's where you find a lot of success with this stuff. There you go. So are the riches, are the riches in the niches? Is that what am I hearing that I know is much broader and deeper than that. But is that true the riches in the niches?

much broader and deeper than that, but is that true, the riches and the niches? I love the niches, honestly. I'll tell you two relatively short stories about how I learned this and then forgot it. So when I was working at that music service, the innovation lab at the public broadcaster, we made the worst radio station like in the history of radio stations. It broke every rule, it was so dumb. So the radio station was not on AMRFM, so it wasn't on radio. It eventually got on satellite radio, but so no radio, horrible.

It only played Canadian music. Like no one wants that, right? Like no one listens to music by nationality. That's just not a thing. You think about radio station formats, they're all by genre. This radio station, in an hour, you could hear rock, pop, hip hop, country, death metal, electronic, singer-songwriter, like, all mixed together. Horrifically dumb from from music programming standpoint.

It was only new music by new artists. So there were no hits and no big name artists. So again, that is not how people listen to music. We like familiar stuff with just tiny sprinkles of unfamiliar things in there. And then the dumbest thing is we decided to put out this thing called a podcast in 2005. And like the guy who was hosting the show is amazing. But he was like, I don't even know what a podcast is. This is such a waste of my time.

I should be on radio. I don't get it. Why are you making me do this stupid thing called a podcast? So it turns out the podcast went to number one podcast in the country and ended up getting like 80 to a hundred thousand downloads a week in 2005, which is crazy. And like, how is this happening?

Why is this happening? It makes no sense. It's like it all is horrible. Like no radio station on earth would ever do any of those things that we did. And it turns out there is a group of people who love that thing. They're just not a giant audience that you would normally target with a radio station. They are music super fans who are omnivores for different genres of music.

And they like all the new stuff because they want to hear it first so that they can tell other people about it. And no one had made a show like that for them before. And so we were kind of the only gift that was out there for an underserved niche. And when you aggregate little pockets of music super fans all over the world, it turns into a really big audience.

So for me, that was like my giant first lesson in like super serving and underserved audience and the value of doing that. But then I forgot it when I was at this podcast company, we were working with Red Hat, which is headquartered in Raleigh, North Carolina, and they're a provider of open source software solutions. And they said, we want to make a podcast

only for open source enthusiasts. And I was like, that sounds like a bad idea. I don't know if there's enough people out there who care about open source software to make a show. And they're like, trust us. And of course they knew their stuff inside out. They knew, they knew their audience. They knew their subject matter. It was not incredibly hard to make a fantastic show

about open source for all the open source enthusiasts in the world because not a lot of people were serving that group. And you aggregate that thing, that show had a bigger audience than a lot of the shows that we made that were for a mainstream audience. It was ridiculous. A massive, massive success. And so for me, just to double down on it, I always look at how can I target a smaller

and more unique audience that is underserved and how can I create extreme value for those people Because they're gonna give you tons of time and attention They're gonna give you tons of trust and loyalty and passion and you end up with like a really amazing community out of it Yeah, so I'm here. Do you find the same thing by the way? Yeah, I'm trying to Both with things that we do for ourselves and with other clients leaning into that more and more and finding what are those pockets because I've fought it for a while and I've probably built the back of like this show on on bra, you know,

eight miles wide and an inch deep because I wanted to attract the mainstream to a marketing show and It took time. You've done it. Yeah You know, that's why because it takes a lot of time to do that to build a wide audience It's a little it's faster and probably maybe I don't know pretty profitable now, but you know, it's Probably more profitable. I love the pocket niches now. And I think, you know, as we...

And when I'm working with clients, I think finding those, I don't know, those diamond, I wouldn't even say diamond in the rough, but like just diamond pocket super consumers, whatever you want to call them, super fans and is where it's at because they're like you said they might seem niche and small but they can add up. You know the neat thing is too is when you're actually marketing you know the content or the show that you make for a niche is you can be really targeted with how you market it. Like you don't actually have to market everybody. It's much more obvious where to market those things

where you can be a lot more efficient and effective with your marketing for the content you're putting out. Yeah, that's right. For sure. That is for sure. Cause you go to where they are, you fish where the fish are, and you kind of know where, you know,

and you're not, what are they, spray and pray? Yeah, well, there's so many of those. Those are the 1% conversion things, right, is the spray and pray stuff. But when you know where your audience is, and you can go look at and find out who else is in that space that's talking to similar audiences or kind of adjacent subject matters, you can go advertise with those groups and have those groups talk about your show or go find out where the community gathers.

I remember we did a show with Ford for the relaunch of the Ford Bronco. And there is, and this is a kind of before video podcasts were so big, but our head of audience development was a guy named Dan Meisner, just incredibly smart guy, who's now at his own agency called Bumper. And he found a YouTube channel called Past Gas. And they went after this channel.

They're like, hey, would you do, we want to send you some shows of the you know, sample episodes of this Ford Bronco podcast. Because it feels like it would be a good fit for you and happy to pay you to listen to it and do an endorsement for it if you like it or whatever. And that thing converted like crazy. Because it they had exactly the right audiences and the hosts were trusted by the existing audience.

And when the host says, I listened to this Ford Bronco show, it's awesome. If you like this show, you're going to love it. Go check it out. That converts like crazy and it's worth paying, you know, kind of higher rates to get a more effective conversion. I think in some ways, one of the things Dan taught me was

you might not want to think about traditional ad metrics when you're thinking about content promotion. You may not want to think about CPMs. You may want to think about cost per sample. How many people are actually coming in and clicking play on your podcast, or how many people are coming in and clicking play on your podcast or how many people are coming in and clicking play on your video that if you can you

know think about it in those terms it might actually make more sense to target a smaller group and pay more to have a much more effective ad that your acquisition cost is going to go way down compared to the spray and praise. Bingo. That's in the Radcast Network playbook, that one. There you go. Yes. You hit that Amen button on your soundboard. My team will add it in.

We do add some sound effects here and there. We know old school. Look, I grew up with talk radio. So part of my stick is stick is probably something like, you know being influenced by that You know the sound effects and the the overall I don't know banter that happens. I'll talk radio. I love it my dad listened to Shit everything from Rush Limbaugh to I don't know what you know, like he was even a little political guy But I just remember hearing it on the radio,

you know, the gregarious nature that it has. I love audio. Yeah, me too. It's amazing, right? I think it's really engaging when it's done well. It is. It's really engaging when you've got great guests like Steve Pratt. He's the author of Earn It. Steve, who's this book for? So it's interesting, the book is for brave marketers. Like it, I very, you know, when we're talking about being very specific in who you choose for your audience, it's in the subtitle of the book. It's unconventional strategies for brave marketers.

So it is for people who want to question the status quo because they know it's not working and they want to find some different ways of doing things and think differently. But I think it is actually also relevant to a broader audience too. and they want to find some different ways of doing things and think differently. But I think it is actually also relevant to a broader audience too. Like I think when you do a good job, I mean, I hope the book is doing a good job of this,

but like in general, when you do a good job of picking a very specific audience, there are adjacent audiences, they're going to find it and they will find it relevant and interesting because the strategies can apply to almost anybody. If you're a content creator and you're making content for a living, the book will totally apply to all of that sort of stuff. If you're somebody who just posts on LinkedIn or Instagram or TikTok, just socially, you could get a lot of figuring out how to make better stuff

that people pay more attention to. I feel like, honestly, anybody that is putting something out in the world where you want people's time and attention, and you want to figure out ways to differentiate yourself and be special or be memorable, you'd probably find some value in it. Steve, I want to find a way to send a copy to every single show that comes on our network because they need to read it. And so I'll get someone on my team. We're going to figure out like a pipeline to automatically when we get to do shows that

join I'm going to pay for it and I want it set. I want some automation set up here. AI and everything. When show joins, earn it from Steve frat goes to them. So you going to help me set that up? I'm down for it. That is very generous of you and I'm like honored even to hear you say something like that. That's awesome. Right.

And if you're listening, we're going to have the links to all Steve stuff his book. You're going to see this on my social media feed. You'll see the highlight clips from the show, but I'm telling you, this is the modern playbook for how to think about your content, your brand, everything. If you're in, look, if you're in the business of getting attention because you need to motivate to sell, if you need an outcome, then you need to earn it. And that's why I really appreciate you coming on, Steve. There's been a real blast. Thank you so much for having me. It's a real treat.

Yeah, man. I mean it. I want to do it again. I want to be on the list for future books releases. I want to be on the press, the media trail. Gary Vee called me. I need Steve Bratt to call me. Gary Vee called me, I need Steve Pratt to call me. You know? So, but for now, Earn It is where it's at. And where can everybody find more about you, where to get the book, all those things, Steve? You just go to my website, stevepratt.com. Super easy.

Hey, that's easy to remember. We'll have that in the show notes too. P-R-A-T-T, Steve Pratt, author of Earn It. Steve, it's been a pleasure getting to meet you officially and I'm a big fan. Hey, you too, man. Let's do it again soon. Yeah, for sure. Hey guys, you're defined us.

Ryan is right.com. That's where you find all the highlight clips, the full episode links to Steve's book and where to learn all about what we're up to. Hey, we're brave, baby. We're going all in because we're keeping you up to date on what is now. We'll see you next time on Right About Now. This has been Right About Now with Ryan Ulford,

a Radcast Network production. Visit Ryanisright.com for full audio and video versions of the show or to inquire about sponsorship opportunities. Thanks for listening!