RPF0300-Podcasting

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00:00:29.960 | Today on Radical Personal Finance we celebrate 300 episodes of the show.

00:00:38.160 | And last week we hit a pretty cool milestone, over 2 million total downloads of Radical

00:00:44.040 | Personal Finance in the time that we've been doing this show.

00:00:47.380 | Almost two years, about a year and, what are we at, a year and 10 months or so.

00:00:51.420 | And so today we're going to set aside the normal financial content and we're going to

00:00:55.600 | talk podcasting.

00:00:56.600 | I'm going to talk to you about the business of podcasting, the technology of podcasting

00:01:00.800 | and the opportunity of podcasting because it's my hope that each and every one of you

00:01:06.040 | listening to this voice will start a podcast.

00:01:26.480 | Welcome to the Radical Personal Finance podcast.

00:01:28.160 | My name is Joshua Sheets and I'm your host.

00:01:30.640 | Broadcasting on location today.

00:01:31.880 | I guess podcasting on location.

00:01:33.680 | I am in Nashville, Tennessee attending a conference and I've pulled myself aside into a side room,

00:01:38.680 | found a table to sit at, got my iPhone on the table and I'm going to share with you

00:01:43.000 | over 30 lessons on podcasting.

00:01:46.000 | Things that I've learned the hard way and I'd like to save you some time.

00:01:58.600 | Normally on Radical Personal Finance we talk day in and out about how to live a rich life

00:02:02.160 | now while building a plan for financial freedom in 10 years or less.

00:02:07.160 | That is the theme of this show.

00:02:09.880 | And although today we're not going to be talking about IRAs or investments or stocks or real

00:02:14.200 | estate or any of that stuff, we're going to talk about podcasting.

00:02:16.680 | This may serve you toward that goal.

00:02:19.000 | I probably shouldn't have scared you away in the beginning by saying no financial content

00:02:23.080 | today.

00:02:24.640 | Podcasting has been the cornerstone of my financial freedom plan.

00:02:27.680 | That was a major part of it.

00:02:29.360 | Not the only thing, but a major thing because when I set out to do this show, I did it very

00:02:33.960 | intentionally while building a plan for financial freedom.

00:02:37.560 | And frankly, I have, thankfully, thank you to every, thankfully to every one of you who

00:02:42.080 | have been a part of this.

00:02:43.080 | I've been able to achieve some very satisfying initial measures of financial freedom based

00:02:48.640 | upon this podcast.

00:02:50.760 | I'm able to support my family and meet the needs of my family based upon income from

00:02:56.200 | you, my listening audience.

00:02:59.200 | And I'm able to do it in a way that is very gratifying for me.

00:03:02.360 | It's very enjoyable for me.

00:03:04.040 | I get to talk about things that I love to talk about and it provides a lifestyle that

00:03:08.040 | is just really, really cool.

00:03:09.840 | And so I owe a debt of gratitude to those who've gone before me and I want to pay that

00:03:13.800 | forward and just share all the lessons I've learned about podcasting.

00:03:17.960 | And I don't want you to think that I think I'm not the world's greatest podcaster.

00:03:21.280 | I'm learning.

00:03:22.280 | I don't know all there is to know about podcasting.

00:03:24.240 | Many of you listening perhaps know far more about the techie side, but I know something

00:03:29.520 | about the business side and I know something about building an audience because this show

00:03:37.240 | has not happened by accident and you'll hear that in today's show.

00:03:41.720 | I have many listeners who have listened to all 300 episodes of the show and you can ask

00:03:46.600 | anyone in that situation and they will attest to you that this has not happened by accident.

00:03:51.760 | So I do feel confident that I've got some lessons that I want to share with you and

00:03:55.440 | I hope these will help many of you do things a little faster and better than I have.

00:04:02.680 | So let's start with lesson number one and it's really this.

00:04:05.640 | I want each and every one of you listening to this show to start a podcast.

00:04:12.400 | And the most important reason for you starting a podcast is not so that you will be able

00:04:18.320 | to say like Joshua, "Hey, I'm on 300 episodes and I can make my living from a podcast."

00:04:23.480 | It's not so that you can make lots of money on a show.

00:04:25.840 | It's so that you can transform yourself from a consumer to a producer.

00:04:32.980 | We are in this fascinating time in the world that we live in of a complete transformation

00:04:37.520 | of society where many of the means of production, the methods of production that have happened

00:04:42.340 | in the past, the way that people have shared their content, these are radically changing.

00:04:47.960 | And the most important thing for you, for your career success, for your business success

00:04:53.080 | is for you to transform yourself from a mere consumer of content, consumer of information,

00:04:58.520 | consumer of entertainment into a producer.

00:05:01.160 | And I know of very few ways that are better to do that than a podcast.

00:05:08.040 | We're in this wild and woolly frontier of podcasting right now where there's tremendous

00:05:13.480 | opportunity, which means there's a lot of things that won't work and a lot of things

00:05:18.000 | that will work.

00:05:19.060 | But if you get started now on building and developing a podcast, you'll start the process

00:05:23.320 | of transforming yourself from a consumer of content to a producer of content.

00:05:28.040 | And if you'll transform yourself in that manner, I promise you it will have a measurable impact

00:05:34.600 | on your life.

00:05:36.000 | Now, it doesn't have to be a podcast.

00:05:39.500 | It could be written content.

00:05:41.320 | You could submit articles to the publications and journals that are influential in your

00:05:46.920 | industry.

00:05:47.920 | You could write a column for your local newspaper.

00:05:50.060 | You can write a blog and publish it online.

00:05:52.040 | You can write inspirational and thought-provoking posts on your Facebook page.

00:05:55.900 | You can also create YouTube videos.

00:05:57.620 | You can create Vine.

00:05:58.620 | You can do something, but you've got to transform yourself from a consumer to a producer because

00:06:03.160 | the future belongs to those who are producers.

00:06:08.640 | Podcasting is a really great way to do it.

00:06:10.480 | The fundamentally most valuable thing that has happened for me with podcasting is I've

00:06:14.700 | been able to make that transformation.

00:06:17.860 | And sitting here from almost two years after, I spent, for those of you who are just tuning

00:06:21.920 | into the podcast for the first time just because of the title about podcasting advice, I spent

00:06:26.680 | six years working as a financial advisor.

00:06:28.160 | And as a financial advisor, I was barred from being able to create public-facing media based

00:06:33.380 | upon the industry regulations.

00:06:35.120 | Now, at the time, I submitted myself to that voluntarily.

00:06:39.440 | In retrospect, I don't know if I could ever go back behind that curtain simply because

00:06:43.880 | it's too damaging to your career.

00:06:45.920 | It's too damaging to your brand, to your business, to your job prospects, or to your just enjoyment

00:06:51.320 | and entertainment prospects to be stuck in a place where you can't produce interesting,

00:06:55.760 | compelling content because the future belongs in many ways to those who are producers.

00:07:02.080 | So my challenge to you is today, first and foremost, are you doing something that is

00:07:10.600 | transforming you from a consumer to a producer and that is enabling you to help some other

00:07:18.080 | people with your content?

00:07:19.840 | That's lesson number one.

00:07:21.240 | Number two, there's a lot of talk in podcasting about finance and about making money.

00:07:28.480 | And I hope that that talk about finance and making money can have a positive influence.

00:07:36.020 | Even I led and I said, "Hey, I make a living on my podcast."

00:07:40.220 | But I want to be clear.

00:07:41.220 | I am not today going to talk about the financial opportunities of podcasts.

00:07:44.840 | I'll talk a little bit of the business of podcasting, but I don't have any reason to

00:07:48.280 | tell you about all the financial opportunities of podcasting because I don't have anything

00:07:51.760 | to sell you.

00:07:52.760 | And I'm going to tell you straight up, the biggest benefit that I have received from

00:07:57.580 | podcasting is not financial, although I'm very thankful for the financial benefits,

00:08:05.440 | but it's rather the people that I've been connected with.

00:08:08.640 | I have built from podcasting relationships with many of you who are listening to this

00:08:14.900 | show right now that I hope will continue for the rest of my life.

00:08:19.900 | And those are relationships that would not have been forged if I was not creating some

00:08:25.000 | form of public content.

00:08:27.600 | So we've got to consider the finances.

00:08:29.240 | I'll give you more lessons on finance, but recognize that the biggest benefit you will

00:08:35.600 | receive from podcasting is probably not going to be financial, but rather the people that

00:08:41.920 | you will be able to connect with.

00:08:44.320 | Next lesson, if you are interested in getting into podcasting, do not get bogged down in

00:08:52.560 | the tech.

00:08:54.300 | The tech of podcasting is the easiest thing for you to solve.

00:08:59.960 | And I'm going to tell you in just a couple of minutes how to solve it.

00:09:03.320 | But the biggest problem that I see in talking about new podcasters is that they are incredibly

00:09:08.660 | focused on the tech.

00:09:10.500 | They focus on what microphone do I buy and what software do I use and what mixer do I

00:09:14.440 | need and where do I host my audio files and all of that stuff.

00:09:18.620 | Don't get bogged down in the tech.

00:09:20.480 | That is the easiest thing to solve.

00:09:21.840 | And it has gotten immeasurably easier in the last couple of years since I've been doing

00:09:27.280 | this than it was two years ago.

00:09:28.520 | And in a year from now, it'll be easier and easier and easier.

00:09:32.660 | Don't get bogged down in the tech.

00:09:34.180 | The tech is not your ticket to success in this business or industry or endeavor.

00:09:41.000 | Spend 80% of your time focused on your editorial plan and 20% of the time focusing on your

00:09:48.360 | tech plan.

00:09:49.780 | Because if you are a podcaster or aspiring to become one, your audience does not care

00:09:55.600 | what microphone you're recording on.

00:09:57.920 | They don't care how you process your audio file.

00:10:01.000 | They don't even particularly care about the quality of your ums and ahs removal.

00:10:05.480 | They care about your content.

00:10:08.280 | So spend the majority of your time focusing on your content.

00:10:13.680 | Don't try to copy somebody's ideas about their format.

00:10:18.680 | Focus on your content and fit your format to your content.

00:10:24.120 | Get very clear on what you're trying to do and why you're doing it.

00:10:29.000 | And then plan your podcast around that.

00:10:32.320 | When I started Radical Personal Finance, I sat down in the middle of my guest bedroom

00:10:37.320 | with a, I don't know, I keep saying $10, $15, with a cheap audio recorder, a $10 or $15

00:10:42.640 | audio recorder.

00:10:43.640 | It was a handheld MP3 recorder that came with my Dragon Naturally Speaking software.

00:10:49.160 | I held it in my hand, I hit record, and I started talking for 45, and it was for about

00:10:54.080 | 40 minutes, 30 minutes, something like that.

00:10:55.880 | And I laid out what I thought the vision of my show would be.

00:10:59.720 | If you are interested, go back and listen to it.

00:11:01.520 | It's episode one of the show.

00:11:02.520 | You can find it in the archives, radicalpersonalfinance.com/archives, or it'll be archived in the feed.

00:11:07.840 | So you can go back and listen to it today.

00:11:10.760 | And to this day, there have been times I've gone back and listened to it, the vision of

00:11:14.160 | what I am still building with Radical Personal Finance, it has not changed.

00:11:18.800 | And I have fit everything that I've done based upon that vision.

00:11:23.440 | And I've had all kinds of people come to me and say, "Well, you should do this and you

00:11:26.240 | should do that."

00:11:27.240 | And my response has been, "This is my vision."

00:11:30.120 | Now I have changed many things that I've done.

00:11:32.400 | I've realized many mistakes that I have made, but I have been single-minded and focused

00:11:36.840 | on here is the vision of what I'm going to create.

00:11:40.680 | So don't worry about tech and don't get bogged down in some kind of magical format.

00:11:47.160 | Focus first on your content and your vision, and then ask yourself what would be the most

00:11:52.280 | effective way for me to accomplish this vision?

00:11:57.720 | What format fits this content, fits what I'm trying to do?

00:12:02.000 | Now let's talk a little bit about podcast formats.

00:12:04.280 | There are a few major, very popular podcast formats in today's market.

00:12:09.320 | That's number one, interview shows.

00:12:11.240 | There is a massive proliferation of interview shows.

00:12:13.960 | The way this works is you're the show host, you find someone to interview, you sit down

00:12:17.360 | with them in person or virtually, and you record an interview.

00:12:21.600 | So let's call that an interview show.

00:12:23.480 | Another podcast format would be a co-hosted show.

00:12:26.960 | You and a co-host or multiple co-hosts sit down together, you have a conversation, a

00:12:31.040 | recorded conversation, and talk about those things.

00:12:33.640 | Another format would be solo shows where you just sit down with a microphone and you talk.

00:12:38.720 | And then another format would be what I'll call the carefully edited NPR-type shows,

00:12:43.880 | the things like the—I'm blanking on all the—but the big This American Life type

00:12:50.240 | of shows, just these beautiful masterpieces of audio engineering where there's interviews

00:12:54.760 | and there's story and everything's woven together.

00:12:58.040 | Now the natural inclination of many people is to jump onto one of those formats.

00:13:06.240 | I've done three of them.

00:13:07.720 | I have done interview shows, I've done co-hosted shows, and I have solo shows.

00:13:12.480 | So Radical Personal Finance is a combination of a solo show, me speaking directly to you,

00:13:17.080 | it's just me on the microphone, and interview shows.

00:13:19.120 | I usually do about two interviews a week.

00:13:21.000 | I also have an additional podcast called Encouraging Christian Fathers that is a co-hosted show

00:13:26.520 | with—I actually do it with me and my dad.

00:13:28.560 | So I have experience in those three formats.

00:13:30.440 | I have zero experience in the carefully edited NPR-type shows.

00:13:34.760 | But what I would encourage you is to ignore what's working for someone else and focus

00:13:40.240 | on what will work for you.

00:13:43.000 | Don't worry about what other people are doing.

00:13:45.300 | Do your thing and create the show that will best fit your vision.

00:13:49.400 | I have seen shows be successful in every format, almost every format imaginable.

00:13:55.840 | I'll just name a few podcasts that I'm aware of or that I like or that I think are cool.

00:14:02.080 | So the most popular podcasts seem to be these carefully edited, beautifully produced masterpieces

00:14:08.600 | of audio engineering.

00:14:10.320 | This would be a show like Dan Carlin's Hardcore History, where it's just an incredible story

00:14:15.240 | built together, or the shows like This American Life, things like that, with these just masterpieces.

00:14:20.500 | Those are extremely popular because they're extremely accessible to many people.

00:14:25.460 | You may or may not be able to create that kind of show.

00:14:27.460 | I have zero ability to create that kind of show when I started, so I just completely

00:14:31.920 | ignore that segment of the market.

00:14:33.500 | I don't ever think my show will be as popular as those types of shows, but that's okay.

00:14:37.320 | I don't have the ability currently of doing that type of show, and I don't particularly

00:14:41.600 | care to develop that ability.

00:14:43.120 | That's not what I want to do.

00:14:44.480 | So I kind of write those things off.

00:14:47.360 | There are interview shows that are short.

00:14:49.360 | There are interview shows that are long that are popular.

00:14:51.960 | There are solo shows that are short.

00:14:53.420 | There are solo shows that are long.

00:14:54.560 | There are co-hosted shows that are short.

00:14:55.840 | There are shows that are long.

00:14:56.840 | One of my favorite podcasts is a show called Peace Revolution.

00:15:00.520 | It's very popular.

00:15:02.600 | You'll find it very thought-provoking if you ever listen to it.

00:15:05.120 | The longest episode I've ever listened to on that show was a 19-hour podcast episode.

00:15:10.120 | So those of you who are regular listeners of Radical Personal Finance, if you think

00:15:13.000 | I do long shows, the longest show I listened to was 19 hours.

00:15:17.020 | But in that context, 19 hours was the amount of time that was required for that show to

00:15:23.400 | be successful with its purpose and its mission.

00:15:27.040 | And so 19 hours was appropriate.

00:15:29.740 | So focus on the format that will fit your content and it will accomplish the vision.

00:15:34.560 | Don't get bogged down in copying anybody else.

00:15:38.440 | Almost everything you do or almost everything you're told with creating a podcast is irrelevant.

00:15:45.280 | Your intro music is not very relevant.

00:15:47.640 | Is it a little bit relevant?

00:15:49.920 | Sure.

00:15:50.920 | But that's not going to make the difference necessarily.

00:15:53.320 | The logo, is that important?

00:15:54.800 | Sure.

00:15:55.800 | You need a logo that's going to show up in iTunes.

00:15:57.260 | But beyond that, you don't need a lot of that stuff.

00:16:00.100 | What matters is the fact that you're creating a piece of audio content or video, if that's

00:16:04.660 | your thing, but you're creating content that's appropriate to your objective.

00:16:08.340 | And if your vision is being fulfilled by the content that you're creating, then you'll

00:16:12.300 | know that you are being successful.

00:16:15.660 | Next lesson, let's talk about frequency.

00:16:17.460 | I am convinced that quality trumps frequency.

00:16:21.960 | Better to create higher quality content than more frequent content.

00:16:27.860 | But the problem with this is frequency is probably more likely to lead to quality because

00:16:38.340 | you may or may not be able to control quality.

00:16:42.180 | Realistically, probably most of our productive work is driven by a Pareto distribution.

00:16:47.020 | I have not gone through my content archives and checked to see, but if I did, I would

00:16:51.900 | guess that 20% of my shows are covering 80% of the downloads or 80% of the popularity.

00:16:58.100 | We can't produce all of our stuff as being hits.

00:17:02.220 | But what we can do is focus on producing.

00:17:04.340 | So here's how I have handled this in the history of my show, Radical Personal Finance.

00:17:08.800 | In the beginning, I committed wholeheartedly to frequency.

00:17:12.820 | And I did that intentionally, knowing that I couldn't control quality.

00:17:17.220 | I would do my best, but I didn't have any former podcasting, broadcast skills.

00:17:21.260 | I didn't have a lot of practice.

00:17:23.060 | I never did know what I was doing.

00:17:24.700 | And I knew I would need to do a lot of something in order to learn those basic skills.

00:17:28.780 | If you're interested, there's a show in the archives of Radical Personal Finance called

00:17:31.700 | Why I Do a Daily Podcast and Why You Should Model but Not Necessarily Copy Me.

00:17:36.340 | And that lays out that whole argument of why I was focused on doing a frequent show, trying

00:17:40.840 | to do a five-day-a-week show.

00:17:43.140 | At this point in time, I'm convinced it's more important for me to do a show that's

00:17:46.940 | quality than necessarily a frequent show.

00:17:52.120 | So I'm still trying to do frequent shows.

00:17:54.900 | I probably at this point am averaging about three to four per week.

00:17:58.380 | But quality is my number one goal, trying to create higher quality.

00:18:03.600 | So quality will trump frequency, but you've got to balance that with the fact that frequency

00:18:07.100 | is probably how you're going to learn to do quality.

00:18:09.780 | So commit yourself to lots of production.

00:18:13.340 | Next lesson, enjoy the journey as you get started because as you get bigger and bigger,

00:18:18.220 | the stress is just going to grow.

00:18:20.740 | So focus on enjoying the steps.

00:18:22.740 | I thought when I started, I remember the first day I had 100 downloads and the first day

00:18:26.660 | I had 500 downloads and the first day I had 1,000 downloads and those things.

00:18:29.100 | I thought, "Oh man, it's going to be awesome when I get to a day when I have 10,000 downloads."

00:18:32.860 | Well, I've gotten days where I've gotten over 10,000 downloads.

00:18:37.440 | It doesn't feel any different.

00:18:38.440 | In fact, it was probably more exciting in the beginning.

00:18:40.540 | Now I'm thankful for the downloads.

00:18:42.140 | You hear that by any means.

00:18:43.820 | It's an honor for people to pay attention to your content and to your message.

00:18:47.540 | But I also have so much work associated with it now that often a little bit of the joy

00:18:53.060 | has gone out.

00:18:54.060 | I host these two shows, Radical Personal Finance, but my best guest probably has somewhere between

00:18:59.100 | 8,000 to 10,000 regular daily subscribers.

00:19:03.760 | Some shows have gotten far more downloads than that.

00:19:05.840 | That seems to be the regular base of shows a couple of weeks in the background.

00:19:10.100 | We'll talk about stats in a minute so that you can interpret stats because you need to

00:19:13.420 | do that.

00:19:14.420 | You need to learn how to interpret stats.

00:19:15.420 | So, 8,000 to 10,000 listeners per show.

00:19:18.460 | I have another show, Encouraging Christian Fathers.

00:19:20.260 | That one gets, most of those episodes now are about 700 to 800 downloads on that show.

00:19:25.820 | I often get more joy out of seeing the nice little spikes on Encouraging Christian Fathers

00:19:30.040 | than I do from Radical Personal Finance simply because I've gotten a little bit immune to

00:19:34.700 | the large downloads.

00:19:35.700 | So, my point is to simply say, focus on enjoying the journey and the process rather than focusing

00:19:44.100 | on the hard numbers.

00:19:47.060 | Next lesson, a podcast is not a business.

00:19:53.620 | A podcast is not a business.

00:19:57.980 | A podcast might be a great marketing tool for your business.

00:20:02.380 | A podcast might form the foundation of a business.

00:20:05.540 | A podcast might be a useful component of your business, but a podcast is not a business.

00:20:12.260 | So, give careful time and attention to the purpose of your podcast.

00:20:18.140 | A podcast could be an awesome hobby.

00:20:21.740 | It could be an important occupation.

00:20:24.380 | It could be important ministry.

00:20:25.500 | It can be something that you're doing for reasons that are important to you.

00:20:28.320 | But if you desire to use a podcast as a component of your financial endeavors, recognize that

00:20:34.940 | a podcast is not a business.

00:20:38.980 | You need to recognize that the vast majority of shows are not going to be numerically successful.

00:20:47.700 | Most shows get perhaps a couple of hundred people who will listen to each show.

00:20:52.300 | The median number, I don't have the stats in front of me, but it's something like 400

00:20:55.860 | to 500 downloads per episode is the median.

00:20:58.580 | 50% of shows have less than that.

00:21:00.540 | 50% of shows have more than that.

00:21:02.660 | So, recognizing that's the reality, you're going to be fighting and building a show.

00:21:06.340 | You're going to be fighting against that large marketplace.

00:21:09.940 | So in order for you to be successful, I'm convinced you need to want to do your show

00:21:14.740 | even if nobody listens.

00:21:20.060 | You should want to do your show even if nobody listens.

00:21:22.580 | So here's my advice.

00:21:24.080 | Create the show you want to do and listen to even if nobody listens.

00:21:29.680 | When I began Radical Personal Finance, I made an intentional commitment.

00:21:32.620 | It's written down.

00:21:33.620 | I make very few commitments, but this was an intentional commitment.

00:21:38.340 | I said, "I will do 1,000 episodes of Radical Personal Finance even if nobody listens because

00:21:43.700 | by doing the episodes, I'm building something that I want to do.

00:21:48.060 | I'm creating something that I think should exist.

00:21:50.500 | If nobody listens, I'm okay with that."

00:21:52.580 | Now, I would certainly not have as much energy behind it.

00:21:54.940 | I certainly would not be as excited about doing it.

00:21:56.980 | I'm not saying that.

00:21:58.140 | Of course, numbers matter and I'm much more excited to do the show if people are listening,

00:22:02.700 | but that was my personal commitment.

00:22:05.300 | So create the show that you want to do even if nobody listens.

00:22:09.720 | Next lesson, don't worry about your brand if you don't yet have one.

00:22:13.540 | One of the major things I see people falling apart on is spending so much time on the things

00:22:17.180 | that are difficult, building a beautiful brand, a beautiful website, a great world-class logo,

00:22:22.580 | building a brand when they don't have anything that exists in the first place.

00:22:25.680 | So just get something to the marketplace as quickly as possible and your brand will grow

00:22:29.940 | as you go on.

00:22:31.500 | I've never figured out up until the last month or so, I've never really figured out what

00:22:36.480 | is the tagline of my show.

00:22:37.820 | I didn't have that perfect, succinct synopsis of what is the tagline of my show.

00:22:42.580 | So therefore, my branding efforts and marketing efforts have been inferior, but I didn't know

00:22:47.640 | what it was.

00:22:48.640 | I had a lot of things I wanted to talk about.

00:22:49.900 | Now I'm more and more conscious of exactly what it is and I know why I have chosen it.

00:22:54.480 | But if you don't have a brand, don't worry about that.

00:22:58.140 | There is, of course, for some of you, a corollary to that.

00:23:01.940 | If you have an established brand, you need to worry about and protect that brand.

00:23:07.500 | So not everybody should just go out and start a fly-by-night podcast on a cheap budget,

00:23:11.180 | on a shoestring budget that doesn't sound very good.

00:23:14.180 | The other day, an example of this, this can really reflect poorly on you.

00:23:19.320 | Best example, there's a book, a popular book called The E-Myth.

00:23:23.420 | The author's name is Michael Gerber.

00:23:24.900 | It's an excellent book.

00:23:26.380 | If you've not read it or you're not familiar with it, I recommend it.

00:23:28.780 | It's an excellent book.

00:23:29.780 | Well, I went to see if he had a podcast.

00:23:31.980 | And he does really high-quality work in his writing.

00:23:34.500 | He's got all these great books.

00:23:35.500 | I went to see if he has a podcast and downloaded the podcast, and the podcast was terrible.

00:23:39.300 | It was hosted on BlogTalk Radio.

00:23:41.100 | It was totally informal.

00:23:42.100 | He's calling in from a cell phone, and it just really reflected poorly on his brand,

00:23:46.720 | in my opinion.

00:23:48.140 | And I didn't stick around as long as I would have to see if the content was good, just

00:23:52.100 | simply because the whole formatting of it was so terrible.

00:23:55.140 | So if you do have a brand, then you should make sure that you are protecting that brand.

00:23:59.300 | But if you don't have a brand, just get busy and get started.

00:24:03.660 | Next, you've got to be confident.

00:24:05.980 | If you've got a vision, and the reason that's so important is you've got to be confident

00:24:09.260 | in what you're doing because there will probably come a point in time where you've got to ignore

00:24:13.700 | the advice of other people.

00:24:15.860 | And I have had to intentionally ignore personally many pieces of advice that well-meaning, knowledgeable

00:24:21.940 | experts have given me because I was convinced that there was a different opportunity, that

00:24:27.860 | I had a vision of something that I could do.

00:24:31.780 | I believe it's valuable to listen to experts.

00:24:34.660 | Experts probably know what they're talking about.

00:24:36.860 | I will never be able to prove that I would have done better off if I had followed...

00:24:41.780 | If I had...

00:24:42.780 | Let me figure out how to phrase this.

00:24:46.100 | There are pieces of advice that I ignored, and I can't prove that I should have ignored

00:24:49.580 | them.

00:24:50.580 | What I know is that I had reasons for ignoring them, and I focused on my reason of what I

00:24:56.100 | was going to do, and I have built more success than many other people.

00:25:03.220 | Would I have been more successful if I followed the expert's advice?

00:25:05.900 | I don't know.

00:25:06.900 | Time will tell.

00:25:07.900 | But I've built more success, and I knew the reasons that I ignored those.

00:25:11.940 | Let me give you an example.

00:25:15.500 | Figure out which example to give here.

00:25:17.820 | The best example would probably be, should I focus on marketing a show or should I focus

00:25:21.980 | on creating a show?

00:25:23.580 | The general advice is, in media creation, is to spend a small amount of your time producing

00:25:28.940 | and a large amount of your time marketing.

00:25:31.780 | You should spend 20% of your time producing and 80% of your time marketing that content,

00:25:35.700 | or 10 or 90, whatever.

00:25:36.700 | It doesn't matter.

00:25:37.700 | The point is, spend more time marketing than producing.

00:25:39.740 | When I sat down and built Radical Personal Finance, I had never actually done online

00:25:46.220 | marketing.

00:25:47.220 | I'd studied it, but I was never actually able to do it.

00:25:50.940 | And I decided that my unique selling proposition, the differentiating factor that I could bring

00:25:55.860 | to the marketplace, was I had a depth of knowledge and ideas that many people didn't have.

00:26:02.780 | And I saw a marketplace that was hungry for deeper content, more content, and across a

00:26:08.140 | broader range of topics.

00:26:10.220 | So I single-mindedly focused not on marketing, but I single-mindedly focused on creating

00:26:16.000 | more content, deeper content, and trying to do better content.

00:26:21.180 | That was my decision.

00:26:22.500 | And I felt that if I focused simply on what I could do well, my hope was that the internet

00:26:28.020 | would work and that you all who are listeners of the show would help me with advertising

00:26:32.820 | the show.

00:26:33.820 | If I could create something that was useful, a piece of content that solved an important

00:26:37.540 | problem or presented an important idea, my theory was that you would be able to find

00:26:42.760 | that useful and you would share it, and that that would lead to a better outcome rather

00:26:48.120 | than me buying ads or guest posting somewhere or something like that.

00:26:52.060 | So I focused single-mindedly on creating more content, better content, and broader content,

00:26:59.360 | and I intentionally ignored marketing for the first year of the show.

00:27:05.040 | I didn't have the capacity at that point in time to do both.

00:27:09.160 | That doesn't mean that marketing is not important.

00:27:11.660 | At this point in time, I am working intentionally on doing more and better marketing because

00:27:16.200 | now I've built a little bit more capacity than I had before.

00:27:20.480 | But I had to have the confidence in my vision, and I had to have the confidence of creating

00:27:25.400 | what I wanted to see exist, creating what I would have wished existed, and ignore a

00:27:29.800 | lot of the advice because I wasn't able to put it into practice.

00:27:33.880 | So be confident in what you're doing, and if you have that vision and you're consistent

00:27:38.640 | with building something toward that vision, you will likely have more success than if

00:27:42.920 | you just follow what everyone else is telling you to do.

00:27:46.640 | Next lesson, your website is really not very important in the beginning.

00:27:51.200 | In the beginning of a show's creation, your website is not important.

00:27:54.720 | For over the first year of Radical Personal Finance, I had the basic theme of WordPress,

00:28:00.600 | whatever that was installed.

00:28:01.760 | I had a cheap logo at the top of the page, and I didn't put any pictures.

00:28:05.960 | I just put text on there.

00:28:08.200 | Just a little bit of text.

00:28:09.200 | It was boring.

00:28:10.200 | But the reality is, a podcast, people connect with you through audio.

00:28:15.240 | So I tried to focus on creating good audio, and I ignored the website.

00:28:19.240 | I didn't have the capacity to build a world-class website at that point in time.

00:28:23.240 | The show succeeded in spite of the website.

00:28:27.260 | On the back end, your website is very important in the long run.

00:28:32.640 | So since that point in time, as I was able to build the capacity, once I had traction,

00:28:36.920 | I've since substantially upgraded the website, tried to make it much more beautiful.

00:28:41.200 | I'm still working on trying to make it work better, make it better, make it more beautiful.

00:28:48.160 | And before I say the but, it is important.

00:28:51.440 | I have gotten many great opportunities that I can specifically trace toward having a good

00:28:56.320 | website.

00:28:57.400 | But in the beginning, it was not so.

00:29:00.100 | So website is not all that important in the beginning.

00:29:02.640 | Frankly, in a moment I'll tell you how I do the shows and what I would suggest to you.

00:29:06.900 | Don't even set up a WordPress site, because it's just a hassle.

00:29:10.640 | We'll get to that in just a moment.

00:29:12.920 | The best thing that you can focus on, and here's the next lesson, best thing for you

00:29:15.720 | to focus on is focus on improving your broadcast skills first, foremost, and always.

00:29:24.360 | Focus on improving your broadcast skills first, foremost, and always.

00:29:33.400 | Because the tech will come and it will go.

00:29:37.740 | Five years from now, we will not even recognize what we're doing today.

00:29:41.660 | But if you've built skills, you'll be able to adjust to the technology that is changing

00:29:47.860 | and apply those skills.

00:29:50.740 | Tech comes and goes.

00:29:52.340 | Skills, talent, and knowledge don't come and go.

00:29:56.300 | This is a major mistake.

00:29:57.860 | I hear so many people talking about, "Oh, how can I improve my podcast?

00:30:02.180 | Is there a way that I can market it more?

00:30:04.140 | Is there a way that I can get a better microphone, a better audio quality?"

00:30:06.980 | Frankly, for many people who are asking those questions, the key thing to focus on is to

00:30:11.940 | say, "You're not a very good broadcaster."

00:30:16.740 | I'm not saying this to you as someone who has arrived.

00:30:20.180 | Some of my early episodes were painful, are painful for me to go back and listen to.

00:30:26.020 | I would love nothing more than just to strip them off the website.

00:30:28.420 | I refuse to do that because I want to have them there as a light post that somebody can

00:30:32.820 | go and listen to my old episode and say, "Wow, Joshua was bad, and hopefully I'm a lot better

00:30:39.120 | now than I was then."

00:30:41.100 | And they'll say, "Wow, if Joshua was that bad and he's gotten this good, then that means

00:30:47.180 | that I can start something bad and become good," because the key is to start and to

00:30:53.100 | improve.

00:30:54.680 | Focus on the most important things, which are your broadcast skills.

00:30:58.420 | I am still—I'm not satisfied with my own broadcast skills.

00:31:01.860 | I'm working hard to try to say, "How can I get better?"

00:31:04.740 | I go back and listen to my shows sometimes and I get upset with myself.

00:31:07.780 | "Joshua, why did you go down that tangent?

00:31:09.980 | Why did you not make that point more concise?

00:31:12.140 | Why did you not hammer that emotional point home?

00:31:14.680 | Why did you not build more enthusiasm?

00:31:16.440 | Why didn't you tell a better story?

00:31:17.780 | Why didn't you get a better hook?"

00:31:18.980 | I'm still working on those things, and I will be working on those things for the rest of

00:31:22.660 | my career.

00:31:25.060 | I'm not working on the tech so much anymore.

00:31:27.660 | The tech is easy to hire.

00:31:28.760 | You can hire the tech, Don.

00:31:30.080 | You can't hire the skills.

00:31:32.020 | So focus on the broadcast skills.

00:31:34.460 | So tired of reading tutorials and whatnot of how to plug in a microphone and how to

00:31:40.940 | set up an RSS feed when that stuff is so easily solved today.

00:31:44.940 | And when I started, I couldn't find a good instruction on how to do great interviews.

00:31:51.540 | That was the thing I was struggling with, was how do I create great interviews?

00:31:54.660 | I'll talk about some interview tips in a moment, but I didn't know how to...

00:31:58.540 | Why aren't people writing articles about how to be a great interviewer?

00:32:03.760 | All this stuff about the tech and no one's about how to create great content.

00:32:07.840 | Focus on your broadcast skills.

00:32:09.660 | The digital media that we have is amazing, and the opportunity for podcasting is incredible,

00:32:15.220 | and we're just getting started.

00:32:17.140 | I very seriously pursued and investigated the idea of taking radical personal finance

00:32:22.180 | to the radio waves at the end of last year.

00:32:24.660 | I may do it in the future.

00:32:26.380 | I still think there's an opportunity.

00:32:27.820 | I still think I could do it.

00:32:28.820 | I still think I would do well at it.

00:32:30.700 | I'm convinced the timing is not right.

00:32:33.500 | If it ever is, I don't know, but it's not right now.

00:32:36.740 | But I seriously consider it.

00:32:37.940 | Let me give you the finances though.

00:32:39.620 | In radio, I don't want to go into all the business models, but you can buy airtime.

00:32:43.100 | It's possible to get airtime without paying for it.

00:32:46.340 | Some of you can even possibly get your podcast content distributed to the radio for free.

00:32:51.100 | But many times, the way that much of radio is moving is towards the buying of airtime.

00:32:56.840 | This will depend on the market, depend on the station, depend on the signal.

00:32:59.620 | But I looked into starting a two-hour-a-day show in a local market on an AM station.

00:33:06.180 | Basically, the net cost for a station with a decent footprint would have been about $6,000

00:33:11.140 | a month here in my local market.

00:33:13.220 | One radio station, $6,000 a month.

00:33:16.260 | My podcast hosting fees for just my podcast hosted with Libsyn total for a show that gets

00:33:23.900 | – I don't know.

00:33:24.900 | I can't remember what it last month was, but somewhere in the north, almost about 200,000

00:33:28.780 | downloads a month, $60.

00:33:33.660 | That is incredible when you compare $6,000 to $60, and I could probably reach about the

00:33:39.340 | same amount of people.

00:33:41.180 | That's why digital media is transforming the world.

00:33:44.920 | Because when people can create content with a cost of $60 for hosting fees versus $6,000,

00:33:51.400 | it opens up the world.

00:33:53.360 | So recognize that medium, jump into it, enjoy the low risk and the low financial risk of

00:33:59.260 | it, and get busy.

00:34:01.620 | Next, advice for you.

00:34:03.460 | Don't follow – when you're setting up a podcast, do me a favor.

00:34:06.620 | Do not follow the free tutorials that you see online.

00:34:11.060 | Do not follow the free tutorials on YouTube.

00:34:13.900 | My opinion, they are wrong.

00:34:16.260 | It's not that they can't work.

00:34:18.180 | It's that they're going to not be ideal.

00:34:20.960 | Very simplistically, I won't hammer this point.

00:34:22.740 | It's a very unpopular point in the podcasting space.

00:34:24.980 | But when I set up Radical Personal Finance, I set up the show with a – get a little

00:34:30.540 | geeky.

00:34:31.540 | If you're not a techie, just tune out for about three minutes and we'll be done with

00:34:34.300 | this.

00:34:35.300 | But what I did was I set up a WordPress site and I signed up with Libsyn for my podcast

00:34:40.580 | hosting service, set up a WordPress site, set up my RSS feed through the site, was hosting

00:34:45.620 | the files on the site.

00:34:48.020 | Everything broke.

00:34:49.020 | One of the most difficult days in podcasting for me was in November of 2014.

00:34:53.540 | I think it was episode 96 to 97, 98, something like that, right before I was getting ready

00:34:57.580 | to launch a membership site.

00:35:02.140 | I wound up making my WordPress site broke because a WordPress plugin broke my feed,

00:35:10.380 | took the podcast down, and then I went through the process of trying to adjust that.

00:35:14.180 | I made a mistake in fixing it and I wound up deleting all of my iTunes subscribers.

00:35:19.100 | I sent all of my iTunes subscribers right before I'm launching my big membership site

00:35:22.780 | to an empty dead feed.

00:35:24.540 | That problem plagued me still to this day.

00:35:27.140 | There's still today two listings in Stitcher for Radical Personal Finance because of my

00:35:32.220 | mistake that I had made.

00:35:34.060 | My tech guy is taking care of that at this point.

00:35:35.940 | I'm going to delete the old listing.

00:35:37.660 | But I've had immeasurable problems.

00:35:40.540 | In fact, it hasn't even stopped there.

00:35:42.620 | I watched the free tutorials online.

00:35:44.940 | I signed up with a Bluehost WordPress thing.

00:35:48.860 | For a while, Bluehost was terrible.

00:35:50.460 | I finally switched away from Bluehost.

00:35:52.060 | I use WP Engine now for my website hosting.

00:35:55.060 | But even still, for the last four or five months, we've thought that we had a new website

00:36:00.620 | built and I built a contact form on the site.

00:36:02.820 | Finally, I was like, "What is wrong?

00:36:04.700 | There's something wrong."

00:36:05.700 | We had tested the contact form.

00:36:06.740 | It was working.

00:36:07.740 | I just figured out this week with my tech guy that for the last four months, I have

00:36:12.300 | not received a single contact through that contact form as far as listeners, you who

00:36:19.860 | are listeners have been putting in messages.

00:36:22.300 | That is extremely upsetting to me because I've worked really hard over the years of

00:36:26.500 | giving a personal reply to every single note or email that I've gotten.

00:36:30.700 | I've tried really hard to respond to all the feedback.

00:36:34.580 | Sometimes I've been weeks and months behind, but I've tried really hard.

00:36:37.460 | Well, it's an issue with Bluehost.

00:36:39.500 | So finally, we're fixing it.

00:36:42.160 | It has been fixed now.

00:36:43.160 | The contact form is working.

00:36:44.760 | Since then, all of a sudden, we went from sparse communication, a few emails here and

00:36:48.900 | there, to all of a sudden now about five messages a day consistently in the last few days since

00:36:53.180 | it's been working, messages that are important.

00:36:55.340 | Listeners, you who are listening, sending me feedback.

00:36:59.500 | That's so important to me.

00:37:01.120 | So it's incredibly frustrating.

00:37:02.120 | I'm a little bitter about how bad the advice I got watching the free tutorials online was.

00:37:09.540 | I really wish some of the people who've created those would pull them or adjust them and update

00:37:14.140 | them.

00:37:15.140 | It's frustrating to me, but ignore that.

00:37:18.700 | So here's the deal.

00:37:20.820 | I'll do it at some point.

00:37:21.820 | I'll do a new thing.

00:37:23.260 | If you want to start a podcast, here's what you do.

00:37:25.740 | Go to Libsyn.com, L-I-B-S-Y-N, stands for Liberate a Syndication.

00:37:30.900 | Contact them, follow all their free tutorials, and do exactly what they say.

00:37:34.460 | I got in touch with them, and I got them to set up, I asked them to be a part of their

00:37:41.100 | affiliate program.

00:37:42.640 | So they're setting up an affiliate code.

00:37:43.780 | Just use the affiliate code Radical, and they'll give me a commission, and they'll give you

00:37:48.340 | a month and a half free basically.

00:37:50.380 | I'll detail that at another time.

00:37:52.840 | But just don't follow the free stuff online.

00:37:55.060 | It has taken me two years to finally get all of that stuff out of my issues.

00:37:59.740 | So contact the people at Libsyn and just do what they say.

00:38:02.860 | Next, listenership matters, but the size of the listenership is far less important than

00:38:08.740 | the right person listening.

00:38:11.660 | Always remember that.

00:38:13.500 | The size of the listenership matters, but it's not as important as the right person

00:38:18.340 | listening.

00:38:19.340 | I would rather have 100 people who are the exact appropriate fit for the purpose and

00:38:24.580 | the vision of my podcast than 100,000 who are not a good fit.

00:38:30.060 | All goes back to the vision.

00:38:31.980 | Ignore listenership size.

00:38:33.540 | I'm sorry that I did a little bit of a marketing hook myself of, "Hey, Radical Personal Finance

00:38:38.900 | has 2 million downloads and 300 episodes."

00:38:40.900 | I'm sorry.

00:38:41.900 | In our modern society, we're doing that because we have to do that.

00:38:45.460 | It's good marketing to kind of get people to pay attention.

00:38:47.540 | My hope is that you'll pay attention to the title, but focus in on connecting with the

00:38:52.420 | right listenership, keeping your message exactly on your purpose.

00:38:59.340 | Next, you are going to have to learn to develop in media a thick skin.

00:39:05.740 | Media, if you're going to create media, is not like personal interaction.

00:39:12.660 | In media, you need to stand for something.

00:39:15.060 | There's a reason you're creating the content you're creating, and you're going to have

00:39:20.340 | unpleasant interactions with people because of it.

00:39:23.380 | You're going to get haters.

00:39:25.460 | Anybody who stands for something, anybody who dares to have an opinion on the subject

00:39:29.220 | is going to get haters.

00:39:30.820 | You need to commit right now, especially if you're at the beginning stage, you're going

00:39:35.420 | to develop a thick skin.

00:39:37.380 | You have to recognize there's something that happens in interpersonal media.

00:39:42.780 | I can't remember somebody ever walking up to my face, putting their finger in my face,

00:39:47.700 | getting angry at me and just telling me off.

00:39:49.840 | Part of it is I get the advantage.

00:39:50.840 | I'm a big guy.

00:39:52.840 | Most people don't mess with me, so I get that advantage.

00:39:55.980 | Maybe some of you don't have that advantage, but people in real life, they don't do that.

00:40:00.700 | I don't walk into your house, walk into your living room and just say nasty things to you

00:40:05.940 | and about you.

00:40:06.940 | In media, it's going to happen, so you've got to prepare for it because when it happens,

00:40:11.100 | it won't be pleasant, but you'll have to build new skills, and you're going to have to adjust.

00:40:15.300 | Recognize that the relationships that you have with a small minority of people in your

00:40:20.580 | audience are not going to be the same as normal relationships in real life.

00:40:24.300 | People on the internet, for some reason, get a strange joy out of telling you you're stupid.

00:40:29.660 | Just deal with it.

00:40:30.660 | That's life.

00:40:31.780 | Don't let that dissuade you from impacting the people who care about your message because

00:40:37.660 | what happens is sometimes you'll get some communication.

00:40:41.980 | Good people, generally, it seems like people that want to say unpleasant things are far

00:40:44.920 | more willing to say unpleasant things than the people who want to say positive things,

00:40:48.740 | but then you'll start to receive positive interaction.

00:40:50.940 | You'll say, "Wow, I had no idea that somebody's out there listening to your stuff and their

00:40:54.980 | life is being improved from it."

00:40:58.060 | Develop a thick skin and plan for that now.

00:41:03.780 | Next, people have asked me, "What's the best means of promotion?"

00:41:07.260 | My best and really only means of promotion that I've used has been focusing very, very

00:41:12.180 | hard on trying to create great content.

00:41:15.580 | That's been what I've done up till now.

00:41:17.380 | That was intentional and it was purposeful, but that doesn't mean that other means of

00:41:22.540 | promotion aren't important.

00:41:26.180 | I am working on additional means of marketing.

00:41:28.740 | I'm going to answer some interview, some listener questions at the end, and I'll talk more about

00:41:34.060 | that during one of those questions.

00:41:37.780 | Don't worry about podcaster bragging metrics.

00:41:42.540 | iTunes is important, but it's not as important in real life as it is for impressing your

00:41:47.660 | podcasting friends.

00:41:49.340 | Your iTunes ranking is not an indicator of how large your audience is.

00:41:56.480 | Don't worry about iTunes.

00:41:57.900 | Now, I recognize that it will be tempting and you will do whatever you want to do to

00:42:03.140 | check your ranking.

00:42:04.140 | I can give you the reasons of how iTunes formulas work.

00:42:07.100 | I've researched it.

00:42:08.180 | It doesn't matter.

00:42:09.380 | It's not important.

00:42:10.380 | Basically, at this point, I check iTunes rankings once a month, and if somebody tells me about

00:42:15.300 | something I try to go and snag a screenshot in case I ever need it.

00:42:18.860 | But once a month, I check iTunes rankings.

00:42:21.300 | iTunes rankings are not a reliable indicator of how popular your show is or how impactful

00:42:28.260 | your show is.

00:42:29.260 | You should be going for impact, not popularity.

00:42:32.380 | You're not going to be as popular as the Kardashians, but you can have a way bigger impact than

00:42:39.740 | they get to have.

00:42:41.220 | Next, new and noteworthy does not matter.

00:42:44.700 | There has not been in the history of radical personal finance, we hit all the stuff.

00:42:48.100 | We hit new and noteworthy, all that stuff.

00:42:50.820 | There's never been a significant spike from anything, including new and noteworthy, including

00:42:58.460 | being featured on top lists and all those things.

00:43:01.260 | I've had one listener who, when I've inquired, "How did you find me?"

00:43:04.780 | I had one listener who's ever corresponded with me and said, "Oh, I saw your show in

00:43:08.220 | new and noteworthy."

00:43:09.220 | One.

00:43:10.220 | Now, I'm sure there's more than that, but only one person has ever told me that.

00:43:14.780 | Don't worry about new and noteworthy.

00:43:16.380 | Focus on content.

00:43:18.420 | Another little just thing, iTunes reviews don't really matter.

00:43:22.620 | They don't affect the rankings.

00:43:24.660 | They just don't really matter all that much.

00:43:26.780 | In the beginning on radical personal finance, I've tried to focus on asking people for

00:43:31.900 | reviews, asking people for reviews.

00:43:33.220 | I thought it was important.

00:43:34.220 | That's what I thought at the time.

00:43:35.500 | In retrospect, it really doesn't matter that much.

00:43:37.900 | They do matter a little bit in that when somebody's looking at your show, if they can see that

00:43:42.060 | you have more reviews, they're likely to say, "Okay, let me check this out."

00:43:45.980 | So they matter a little bit, but they don't matter that much.

00:43:49.580 | That said, of course, any listeners who want to review the show, I'm happy to review it,

00:43:52.940 | be happy to have it.

00:43:53.940 | It's fine.

00:43:54.940 | I'm thankful to have it.

00:43:55.940 | But they don't matter that much.

00:43:56.940 | So don't worry about that.

00:43:58.540 | I'm trying to stress, sorry, for new podcasters.

00:44:01.100 | Focus on creating great stuff.

00:44:03.360 | What I love about iTunes reviews is I love that it gives the audience a voice.

00:44:07.380 | For that reason, you should support iTunes reviews.

00:44:10.860 | One of the most incredible things we have is we have the ability, people have the ability

00:44:14.260 | to exercise their rights of free speech and make public commentary on what you're doing.

00:44:19.620 | I love that.

00:44:20.620 | I love that people have the opportunity.

00:44:22.420 | I love that my listeners can go into iTunes and they can say they love my show, and I

00:44:27.060 | love that they can go in and say that they hate it.

00:44:29.460 | Now, of course, it's not particularly pleasant to read the negative iTunes reviews, but how

00:44:34.900 | wonderful that they have the opportunity to do that.

00:44:37.740 | This is what's so amazing about 2016, that people can do that.

00:44:42.820 | It's awesome.

00:44:44.660 | So don't worry about all the podcaster bragging metrics.

00:44:48.900 | Focus on meeting the needs of your audience.

00:44:53.260 | You will not please everyone.

00:44:56.820 | So make sure that you're first pleasing yourself in the sense that you are focused on delivering

00:45:03.400 | the content that you want to deliver for the reasons you want to deliver it, and decide

00:45:07.260 | now to be content with the process of letting people self-select.

00:45:12.780 | You have to be content for your audience to self-select.

00:45:17.680 | You have to have a message that's important to you for reasons that you care about, and

00:45:23.180 | then sit back and wait and let the appropriate audience find you.

00:45:28.300 | Not everybody is going to like you.

00:45:30.220 | Remember that the most popular people are also the most hated people.

00:45:34.020 | How many enemies does President Barack Obama have?

00:45:37.860 | How many friends does he have?

00:45:39.720 | So recognize that you will not please everyone, but you will over time attract to your content,

00:45:47.660 | the audience that most benefits from it.

00:45:51.640 | So decide now to not let yourself be dissuaded from your message and your content simply

00:45:59.200 | because your audience is going through a process of self-selection.

00:46:02.900 | You will not win the popularity contest.

00:46:05.640 | When Shaquille O'Neal can start a podcast, you don't have any possibility of competing

00:46:10.380 | in that market.

00:46:11.380 | So don't worry about popularity.

00:46:14.260 | Worry about impact, worry about reasons, and choose an area where you can compete.

00:46:19.940 | Choose to compete on content.

00:46:22.260 | Choose to compete on knowledge.

00:46:24.320 | Choose to compete on your style, on your voice, or on a niche.

00:46:29.580 | But don't worry about popularity.

00:46:33.780 | Little tip, I think interview shows are becoming oversaturated.

00:46:36.780 | So if you are running an interview show or if you want to start an interview show, handle

00:46:41.260 | them carefully.

00:46:43.780 | I'll just say handle them carefully.

00:46:46.900 | But if you're going to do interviews, choose them carefully.

00:46:50.020 | And this is one of the most challenging things that I face with radical personal finances,

00:46:54.180 | trying to figure out how to select the interviews.

00:46:56.900 | I have things I'm trying to accomplish, but I don't want to just have interviews that

00:47:00.700 | I agree with.

00:47:01.700 | I don't want to just have interviews that I disagree with.

00:47:03.300 | It's really, really challenging.

00:47:04.880 | But recognize that you are the editor of your interviews.

00:47:07.740 | You are the gatekeeper.

00:47:09.500 | So the question that I try to ask myself, and this is one of the things I'm personally

00:47:13.220 | struggling with the most in radical personal finances, does this interview serve the needs

00:47:18.180 | of my audience?

00:47:19.300 | Does this interview fulfill the vision of my show?

00:47:23.340 | Very difficult to know if it does or not.

00:47:26.540 | So be careful doing interview shows.

00:47:29.180 | Interview shows are the easiest show to do, in my opinion.

00:47:34.140 | Easiest shows to do in order of, remember I talked about the four types of shows?

00:47:38.040 | The easiest one is an interview show.

00:47:40.300 | Second easiest is a co-hosted show.

00:47:42.460 | Third easiest is a solo show.

00:47:43.900 | And the fourth, like the most difficult, is these audio works of art.

00:47:51.980 | And also in range of popularity, I'm convinced the audio works of art are probably the most

00:47:54.940 | popular than the solo shows, than co-hosted shows.

00:47:58.660 | I can't prove that.

00:48:00.060 | But the audio works of art certainly are the most popular.

00:48:02.980 | Interview shows, be careful.

00:48:04.340 | Don't just try to do an interview show unless that specifically fulfills the purpose that

00:48:08.300 | you've selected for your show.

00:48:10.940 | Couple of ideas on interviewing.

00:48:12.020 | Here's what I've learned.

00:48:13.780 | Interview skills are difficult to learn.

00:48:15.800 | And the best way I've been trying to learn them is simply through practice.

00:48:19.620 | And I try to practice the interview and then go and listen to it and see how did I do.

00:48:24.060 | Would I have been interested in that?

00:48:26.860 | At this point, what I have learned to do is to interview people that I'm interested in,

00:48:32.100 | interview people who have a story that I'm interested in.

00:48:34.540 | And simply look for the story that I care about.

00:48:37.220 | I've learned to just focus on listening and just trying to follow my interests.

00:48:42.740 | I have an advantage in that I'm naturally interested in many subjects.

00:48:46.060 | There's almost nothing you can talk to me about that I can't find an interest in.

00:48:49.740 | So I have that advantage from an interview perspective that I'm going to be interested

00:48:53.320 | in that.

00:48:54.320 | But I just try to listen and I try to follow the interesting story.

00:48:58.540 | That's the best thing I've come up with.

00:49:00.620 | I've found personally interviewing authors of books is very difficult for me.

00:49:04.580 | And what I more and more am trying to do is just simply if I'm going to interview an author,

00:49:09.460 | I try not to read the book first.

00:49:12.020 | Because often when I read the book, I want to get the author to go through the book.

00:49:17.260 | And authors just don't seem to want to talk about their books in the sense that they want

00:49:20.660 | to hold things back.

00:49:22.220 | So what I've learned to do is not read someone's book if I want to interview them.

00:49:28.260 | That's hard because every time I do it, I always regret it.

00:49:31.020 | I think, "Oh, that's not very interesting."

00:49:34.260 | Next interview tip for you is listen carefully to the other person.

00:49:38.180 | So easy to let our minds wander.

00:49:40.260 | It's so easy to focus on where you're trying to take them.

00:49:43.820 | And you miss out if you're not listening to them.

00:49:46.180 | You miss out on the little gems.

00:49:47.560 | So I try to listen carefully to the other person and actually respond to what they're

00:49:51.180 | saying and not just ask the next question.

00:49:53.740 | And then again, go and listen to your interviews.

00:49:55.900 | Let's talk a little bit about numbers.

00:49:58.740 | Understand how to interpret the numbers of podcasts.

00:50:01.740 | For example, when I say I've had 2 million downloads, you should recognize first, I haven't

00:50:08.180 | necessarily had somebody listen to 2 million episodes or to somebody listen to...

00:50:14.180 | I haven't had 2 million people listen to the show.

00:50:16.060 | What 2 million downloads means is that 2 million times my audio file has been played from some

00:50:22.020 | source.

00:50:23.020 | But that doesn't know whether it's been played for five seconds or for somebody listened

00:50:26.940 | to a three-hour show that I made.

00:50:29.060 | So you should first be suspicious of big numbers.

00:50:31.500 | Second, you should recognize that many podcasters artificially inflate their numbers through

00:50:36.660 | some different means that are available.

00:50:39.820 | You can do all kinds of things.

00:50:41.980 | You can buy...

00:50:42.980 | I mean, the one that's all the big scandal that many shows do is they call Twitter bombing.

00:50:48.100 | You put your episode out there and you just try to get people to click the link, click

00:50:51.940 | the play, and that adds to your download numbers.

00:50:54.180 | So you should be suspicious of numbers when people share numbers.

00:50:57.140 | Don't trust anybody with their numbers.

00:50:58.900 | Just assume everyone's always lying.

00:51:01.300 | That'll help you to feel a little bit better by recognizing that.

00:51:05.420 | So first, recognize that when I say a big number, like a total downloads, that just

00:51:09.420 | means 2 million times an audio file was played.

00:51:12.140 | Next, you should divide the number of audio files based upon the number of episodes.

00:51:17.280 | So this is the 300th episode.

00:51:18.860 | If I say 2 million, you should divide 2 million by 299.

00:51:24.180 | And all of a sudden now, you recognize, "Oh, well, this is..."

00:51:27.260 | I don't remember what that number is, but this is not so many.

00:51:30.160 | That's not 100,000 people listening to Joshua's show.

00:51:32.620 | That is a few thousand.

00:51:33.740 | That's a number, and you can divide that very carefully, and that'll help you.

00:51:37.780 | So understand how to interpret the numbers of podcasting, and if you're intimidated or

00:51:41.580 | attracted by big numbers, recognize that you need to filter those through some knowledge.

00:51:47.820 | The biggest mistakes that I've made in my podcasting journey are with my marketing,

00:51:52.100 | my back-end marketing.

00:51:54.300 | And this is the major focus for me at this point in time, is to improve the marketing

00:52:00.640 | of my show.

00:52:01.640 | Now, in the beginning, I made a specific...

00:52:04.120 | I'm not angry at myself for making those mistakes, because I made a conscious decision, "Joshua,

00:52:09.160 | you don't have the capacity for that right now.

00:52:11.840 | Focus on your plan.

00:52:13.120 | Focus on building good content, and then as you build more capacity, you'll be able to

00:52:16.440 | go back and fix those things."

00:52:18.840 | So building the back-end business is my number one thing right now.

00:52:23.120 | That's one thing that, as soon as possible, you should be focusing on building the back-end

00:52:26.800 | of the business.

00:52:27.800 | If you're not familiar with those terms, every business has a front-end and a back-end.

00:52:31.620 | The front-end is the product that you buy up front.

00:52:34.100 | The back-end is all the products that you buy after the initial sale.

00:52:38.260 | So if you look at... and this is where many people fall apart, is many businesses are

00:52:43.820 | broken because they only offer front-end products.

00:52:45.580 | This is where Radical Personal Finance is.

00:52:47.140 | I only have two front-end products at the moment.

00:52:49.020 | I have a Patreon campaign, where listeners support my show.

00:52:52.960 | Thank you to those of you who do.

00:52:54.620 | And number two is I have advertising.

00:52:56.160 | Those are my only two aspects of my front-end business.

00:52:58.780 | Those are the least profitable parts of the business, and I need to focus on the back-end

00:53:03.020 | business, which is building more products, building books, building courses, building

00:53:06.340 | videos, building seminars, building all these products.

00:53:09.060 | That's where all the profit is.

00:53:11.220 | And so that's where I'm 100% focused now, and you should apply the same thing to your

00:53:15.300 | business.

00:53:16.360 | Get the front-end good, and then get the back-end great.

00:53:21.820 | Big lesson, do not betray your trust or your integrity in the process of building your

00:53:28.340 | show.

00:53:29.340 | I don't think it's...

00:53:30.340 | I was going to make a definite statement.

00:53:32.820 | I'll just say it.

00:53:33.820 | You can't lie to your audience.

00:53:36.020 | You've got to be you through and through, because when you're on a microphone, you can't

00:53:39.780 | remember what you said 100 episodes ago.

00:53:41.500 | So if you're lying, you're making stuff up, if you're inconsistent with your personality,

00:53:45.700 | you're trying to be somebody that you're not, you're not going to remember who you were

00:53:48.340 | 100 episodes ago.

00:53:49.340 | I can't remember yesterday's show.

00:53:51.520 | So you've got to decide that you're okay with being you.

00:53:56.260 | That's scary, because people might not accept you.

00:53:59.300 | It hurts when people don't accept you for being you, but you've got to do that.

00:54:04.160 | Don't lie to your audience, and don't ever betray your integrity, because if you do,

00:54:08.420 | you'll never get it back.

00:54:09.420 | I'm going to skip ways to monetize the podcast right now.

00:54:13.460 | That was probably the most biggest question.

00:54:16.140 | That was the next lesson here, but let's talk about my production flow.

00:54:18.980 | So at this point in time, I do a podcast in two different ways.

00:54:23.600 | Number one, at home, I record.

00:54:25.420 | I have a mixer.

00:54:26.420 | I have a microphone, and I record into a hard disk audio recorder.

00:54:33.540 | So I use an old iPhone with Boss Jock on it for my audio carts.

00:54:38.700 | That's where I play the show music and things like that.

00:54:41.880 | So I play that.

00:54:42.880 | I have plugged that into the mixer.

00:54:43.920 | I have Skype set up with a mix minus on my PC.

00:54:48.300 | I have a laptop.

00:54:49.300 | I use a USB iMic thing that gives me the outputs from my laptop that makes it possible for

00:54:54.880 | me to do my mix minus pretty easily.

00:54:57.340 | And then I put that onto an audio SD card.

00:54:59.980 | I record all of my solo shows in one take with no editing.

00:55:04.420 | I made the decision early on that I wasn't going to edit, simply because I wanted my

00:55:09.300 | point of differentiation, my unique selling proposition.

00:55:12.440 | My point of differentiation was more content and deeper content.

00:55:17.060 | Now that has hurt me.

00:55:18.440 | The biggest theme of my iTunes reviews, if you go read my iTunes reviews, the constant

00:55:24.520 | theme "Joshua rambles and his shows are too long."

00:55:30.200 | Those reviews are accurate.

00:55:31.800 | I rambled and my shows are too long.

00:55:35.160 | I was not unaware of that.

00:55:37.300 | I didn't have the ability to do it better.

00:55:40.200 | And so people would say, "Well, it's better if you edit."

00:55:42.200 | Well, maybe so.

00:55:43.680 | But what I was looking for at that time was I was looking for more content and I could

00:55:47.520 | deal with bad editing.

00:55:49.380 | If the content was good, I could just listen to a show at 2x or just skip forward when

00:55:52.720 | I was ready.

00:55:53.720 | And so I figured, well, my audio has to do the same thing.

00:55:55.620 | So I made a decision.

00:55:56.620 | I'm not going to edit.

00:55:58.120 | What I'm going to focus on doing is trying to create more content.

00:56:01.600 | And I'm going to build the skills.

00:56:03.280 | So I made that decision.

00:56:04.520 | That was why I bought the mixer and did all of that.

00:56:06.520 | That I just go straight to the hard drive and it's done.

00:56:08.760 | When it's done, it's done.

00:56:09.760 | So I do hit pause on my little recorder sometimes, gather my thoughts.

00:56:13.680 | I do restart.

00:56:16.560 | Sometimes I'll have to give two or three starts to the show to get the intros how I want them.

00:56:20.160 | I make them up off the top of my head.

00:56:23.360 | Everything is off the top of my head except for my outline.

00:56:26.360 | So I record directly into the hard disk.

00:56:31.000 | I edit it.

00:56:32.000 | I export it.

00:56:33.000 | At this point in time, I don't know how to run audio editing software.

00:56:36.820 | The only thing I know to do, I use Audacity.

00:56:38.520 | The only thing I know how to do is to cut out a slice out a section.

00:56:41.880 | And I use that for splicing together interview shows with an intro and an outro.

00:56:47.120 | And then if somebody curses on my show, I try to go and snip that out.

00:56:50.480 | I try to keep it obvious.

00:56:51.960 | I don't play a beat, but I try to keep it obvious that they cursed on my show.

00:56:55.240 | But I try to pull out the actual profanity.

00:56:58.320 | I don't want profanity on my show.

00:57:01.360 | So I do try to do that.

00:57:02.920 | So that's the only thing I know how to do is to cut out things and then to cut together

00:57:06.120 | a lot of times when Skype misses up.

00:57:07.920 | The rest of it, I use a service called Auphonic.

00:57:09.920 | I just upload my WAV file into Auphonic.

00:57:12.960 | Auphonic processes my file.

00:57:14.640 | It exports it as an MP3.

00:57:16.120 | I take that MP3, I upload it in Ellipson, and I publish it.

00:57:19.320 | I'll talk about my publishing process in a moment.

00:57:22.080 | So that's the way I record when I'm at home.

00:57:24.440 | The other way I record is right now I'm sitting here with my iPhone.

00:57:27.560 | I use BossJock.

00:57:29.640 | I have learned to do things on my iPhone.

00:57:32.680 | My podcast, Encouraging Christian Fathers, every single episode is recorded, edited,

00:57:37.800 | and published exclusively from my iPhone.

00:57:41.560 | I don't ever put those files onto a computer.

00:57:44.080 | And I do that because it's a lot easier.

00:57:45.240 | If I had known about the workflow that I have there before, I never would have bought the

00:57:49.720 | mixer.

00:57:50.720 | I never would have done that stuff.

00:57:51.720 | I would have just done it on my phone the whole way through.

00:57:53.440 | It works really, really well.

00:57:55.360 | I'll give you a resource for that in a moment.

00:57:57.480 | So I have two different setups that I do.

00:57:59.840 | Let's talk about my publishing process for shows at home.

00:58:02.960 | In the past, I've done all this myself.

00:58:05.380 | But at this point with Radical Personal Finance, the thing that drains me personally, drains

00:58:11.720 | my creativity and sucks all my energy is doing tech stuff.

00:58:15.000 | I'm a creative person when it comes to creating content, and I can't stand doing the tech

00:58:19.440 | stuff.

00:58:20.440 | So at this point, I've built a workflow where I take my audio file.

00:58:23.680 | I work in Libsyn.

00:58:24.680 | I publish to Libsyn my audio file.

00:58:29.120 | I write the headline.

00:58:30.120 | Excuse me, I write the title of the show, and I write a little blurb for it.

00:58:35.400 | Show notes.

00:58:36.400 | People have a lot of opinions on show notes.

00:58:37.920 | They say, "Oh, you should have lots of show notes."

00:58:40.280 | Show notes drain me.

00:58:42.080 | Usually when I finish writing a show, I am absolutely physically exhausted.

00:58:47.440 | And so I just put a lot of energy into the show, and I want to publish it, and I can't

00:58:52.360 | face the thought of writing show notes.

00:58:54.460 | So what I have chosen to do is to write show notes in the form of just a short little teaser,

00:58:58.760 | basically the equivalent of a Facebook post.

00:59:00.120 | They're usually about 700 words, and here's a little teaser.

00:59:02.960 | Here's why you should listen to it, because I'm just so drained I can't face it.

00:59:05.920 | And if I spend more time doing show notes, it would take me an entire day to do show

00:59:09.280 | notes the way I'd like to do them, and there'd be one less episode that I could do.

00:59:12.580 | And I think my audience wants more episodes and fewer show notes.

00:59:16.820 | So that's the decision that I have made.

00:59:18.680 | So I write the show notes in Libsyn.

00:59:19.920 | I click publish.

00:59:21.160 | What happens when I do that is the way Libsyn publishing works is it goes to all my different

00:59:26.720 | destinations.

00:59:27.720 | It goes to my RSS feed, which goes into iTunes.

00:59:30.080 | That goes into, it gets published to my apps.

00:59:32.800 | It gets published everywhere to all these different destinations all at one shot.

00:59:37.720 | Then that file, I have a, the file's published to the RSS feed.

00:59:42.800 | I have a graphic designer who I've hired who does all of my show artwork.

00:59:48.000 | So that file goes into the RSS feed.

00:59:50.320 | When the RSS feed picks it up, I have an IFTTT formula where once the RSS feed picks it up,

00:59:56.760 | it sends it into a service I use called Glip, G-L-I-P.

01:00:02.040 | And that's where I connect with my web developer and my graphic designer.

01:00:05.720 | And so it goes into the, it goes right into the Glip channel that we use to interact on

01:00:12.120 | that.

01:00:13.120 | Once it goes there, we create a task.

01:00:15.960 | The graphic designer goes ahead and creates an image.

01:00:21.420 | Usually takes her, because she works on it just part time, it usually takes a couple

01:00:24.420 | days for the image to be created.

01:00:26.700 | And then once that image is created, we go back in.

01:00:29.280 | My web developer uploads that, a square image into Libsyn.

01:00:33.520 | And that's the image that gets shared through to my social channels from the Libsyn social

01:00:37.460 | sharing functions.

01:00:39.000 | And then we create a banner for the website.

01:00:41.180 | And then my web developer takes the file, puts it onto the website with the banner.

01:00:46.120 | And at that point in time, then it goes out into the email distribution list.

01:00:49.400 | Now that's a little bit techie geeky complicated, but what that does, and I've worked hard to

01:00:53.140 | get myself out of that process, even especially recently, is now I'm out of that process.

01:00:58.200 | And that helps me to retain my sanity so I can reserve my creative energy for writing

01:01:03.320 | or for creating the products and the seminars and the things that I'm working on.

01:01:07.340 | So that's been a big help to me.

01:01:09.280 | What it naturally results in is there's always about a two to four day delay of publishing

01:01:13.940 | of shows on the website.

01:01:15.320 | So if you're a normal listener to the show and you're not interested in all this podcast

01:01:18.360 | stuff, what I would recommend is make sure you're subscribed to the show, either in iTunes

01:01:23.560 | or on my app, and you'll always get the show the fastest that way.

01:01:27.000 | It won't show up on the website until a couple days later.

01:01:30.100 | But a little trick, if you ever want to listen to it on the website, go to the archives page

01:01:34.120 | and that player that's at the top of the archives page, that player will have the show because

01:01:38.080 | it picks it up from the RSS feed.

01:01:40.200 | So that's my production flow, how I do it from my home office.

01:01:47.400 | When I'm away or if I'm using my iPhone, what I do is I record in BossJock, I record in

01:01:52.440 | one shot, that's what I'm doing right now.

01:01:54.360 | When I finish this show, I'll export a wave file, I use Auphonic, there's an Auphonic

01:02:00.760 | app on my phone, I move it to Auphonic, Auphonic processes it and then I use the Auphonic distribution

01:02:06.140 | feature to send the file over directly over to Libsyn.

01:02:09.920 | And there are three different options of ways to do it, but the file shows up on Libsyn

01:02:14.280 | and with that file there on Libsyn, I can go ahead and publish it, I write a quick thing

01:02:18.760 | on my phone and publish it just in the normal way.

01:02:22.460 | So that's the process there.

01:02:23.960 | The best resources for you on podcast publishing is go to Libsyn and get their tutorials, free

01:02:30.280 | tutorials, do what they say in their tutorials.

01:02:32.800 | If you want to sign up for a Libsyn account, use the coupon code Radical.

01:02:35.720 | I need to check with Robert Libsyn to make sure that was set up.

01:02:38.440 | I told him, I asked him for a coupon code.

01:02:41.680 | So I get a little commission for that, great, thank you, and it gets you a one month free

01:02:44.840 | offer.

01:02:45.840 | Use coupon code Radical and follow their stuff.

01:02:48.680 | The second one is the best resource for publishing, recording and publishing from your phone is

01:02:54.520 | a website called themobilepro.net.

01:02:57.200 | That's a guy named Sean Smith.

01:02:58.600 | I've become friends with him because you'll see an endorsement from me, a testimonial

01:03:03.240 | from me right on his site.

01:03:04.560 | I've become friends with him because once I saw his system, it convinced me how to do

01:03:08.440 | it.

01:03:09.440 | So I use his systems.

01:03:10.440 | I use the Fancy one when I'm doing interviews.

01:03:12.280 | The one I do with my dad, we sit down, we have two SM7, I have two SM7Bs that I sit

01:03:17.720 | down, we sit down across the table, put that stuff right through an ART Dual Pre into the

01:03:22.680 | iPhone and do the whole show together like that.

01:03:25.400 | Right now, this show, I travel with an ATR2100, sorry, it's actually an AT2005 because it

01:03:30.600 | was cheaper when I bought it, into a USB cable right into the phone and that's what I'm working

01:03:36.000 | with right now.

01:03:37.640 | And so he's the one who taught me that whole flow.

01:03:40.040 | I set up at some point in the past an affiliate thing.

01:03:42.400 | I'll go and find it when I get back to the office and I'll link it in the show notes

01:03:45.520 | today and if you want to buy his guide, his $97 video guide, you can get a free ebook

01:03:50.840 | showing you how to set up the systems.

01:03:52.740 | If you want to buy his guide, you can feel free to use my affiliate link and I'll get

01:03:56.160 | a commission for that.

01:03:57.160 | So cool.

01:03:58.160 | Awesome.

01:03:59.160 | All right.

01:04:00.160 | That's enough tech, man.

01:04:01.160 | I've never done that much tech.

01:04:02.160 | So I'm not stupid when it comes to tech.

01:04:03.160 | I do my homework on things.

01:04:04.160 | I just don't like talking about it.

01:04:07.240 | Two quick final lessons and I'm going to answer some questions from listeners and then we'll

01:04:11.400 | be done.

01:04:12.400 | And I know this is, I just wanted to get these lessons out.

01:04:14.200 | This is just Joshua's.

01:04:15.240 | If we were sitting down, I'm giving you podcasting advice.

01:04:17.720 | Here's what I've learned.

01:04:18.920 | I'm not trying to create a masterpiece here.

01:04:21.800 | You should look carefully, oh sorry, three things.

01:04:26.100 | You should look carefully at the negative feedback that you get.

01:04:32.740 | Be careful that you don't associate you with your work in a personal way.

01:04:39.120 | We all have a tendency to hold our creative work very close to our heart.

01:04:43.200 | It's an expression of us.

01:04:44.980 | And so what happens then is when you receive negative feedback on it or negative opinions

01:04:49.920 | of it, negative reviews, things like that, it's easy to hurt.

01:04:53.040 | I don't know how to make it not hurt at all.

01:04:55.440 | I certainly hurt a little bit when my stuff is criticized, but I'm convinced it's important

01:05:00.120 | to recognize that you shouldn't hold your work that way.

01:05:02.960 | Rather, you should hold your work at arm's length and say, "This is not me.

01:05:06.000 | This is just my work.

01:05:07.000 | I've created this piece of work," and hold it out there and try to get it away from you

01:05:10.760 | where you don't get so associated and wrapped up with it where you can't read the negative

01:05:14.240 | feedback.

01:05:15.280 | You should look for the negative feedback as if it's sincere, if it will help you get

01:05:19.520 | better.

01:05:20.520 | So read the negative reviews and try to get help, let them fuel you to help you get better.

01:05:27.000 | Now you're going to get people that are going to just say things about you.

01:05:30.840 | Our society, we have a disease of the ad hominem attack where people just feel better by attacking

01:05:36.840 | the person instead of attacking the person's ideas.

01:05:39.880 | Ignore all that stuff.

01:05:40.880 | Recognize it's a logical fallacy.

01:05:42.480 | Just ignore it.

01:05:43.480 | You can know if you get an email or a voicemail or a comment or whatever, or someone just

01:05:47.640 | says, "I can't believe you're so stupid, blah, blah, blah," just hit delete or hit approve.

01:05:52.120 | I approve them and I just move on with my day.

01:05:55.000 | But when you get someone who sincerely says, "I appreciate your message, but here's how

01:05:59.320 | it could get better," that's what you need to know what to work on.

01:06:02.780 | So I need my negative reviews.

01:06:04.640 | I need the views to say that I'm rambling.

01:06:07.720 | Those are the things that have fueled me to help me get better.

01:06:10.320 | So in the beginning, I didn't do extensive outlines.

01:06:12.320 | I got all these rambling reviews, rambling, rambling, rambling, blah, blah, blah.

01:06:15.720 | Okay, fine.

01:06:16.720 | I got the point loud and clear.

01:06:18.120 | So I said, "I got to fix this."

01:06:19.460 | So now I try to do more careful outlines.

01:06:22.760 | I use personally, I use a website called WorkFlowy, W-O-R-K-F-L-O-W-Y, WorkFlowy.

01:06:31.080 | It's an outlining program and I find it to be very intuitive for me.

01:06:34.720 | Works on my phone.

01:06:35.720 | As I do this right now, I'm literally reading.

01:06:38.280 | I have my WorkFlowy app open on my phone and I have Boss Jock running in the background

01:06:43.960 | recording this episode and it allows me to move things around, to try to get an order

01:06:48.680 | and just, it's an effective way for me to work in bullet points.

01:06:52.760 | And then once I have the bullet point, it reminds me of the thought and hopefully keeps

01:06:55.720 | me focused on I wanted to express this bullet point.

01:06:58.720 | So look for the negative feedback and just recognize you are not your work.

01:07:04.860 | You're going to hate your early work.

01:07:07.940 | So be strong and do it and recognize that anything worth doing well is worth doing poorly

01:07:14.540 | at first.

01:07:18.020 | How good of a walker and runner is your average one-year-old child?

01:07:23.320 | They're not very good.

01:07:25.820 | But that same one-year-old child with lots of practice and lots of falls is going to

01:07:31.620 | get better.

01:07:32.620 | They're going to become one day a smooth and elegant runner.

01:07:35.700 | So the key is for us to focus on just the process of improving and not so much on the

01:07:41.000 | early outcome.

01:07:42.380 | And if you get started as a producer, find a safe way to do it, you'll go through this

01:07:45.900 | process.

01:07:46.900 | And so I want you to go and read my negative reviews.

01:07:49.700 | I want you to go and see how difficult, how bad some of my early episodes were and then

01:07:56.500 | do that same thing because everything worth doing well, worth doing is worth doing poorly

01:08:01.260 | at first.

01:08:02.260 | One of the biggest lies that people swallow is that you have to be good at something in

01:08:12.100 | the beginning.

01:08:13.100 | You're not going to be good at something in the beginning.

01:08:14.100 | As long as you're improving, you can be satisfied with your work.

01:08:18.300 | Last bullet point, I missed this a little bit earlier.

01:08:21.060 | Transcripts.

01:08:22.140 | Everyone says they want transcripts.

01:08:23.280 | No one wants to pay for it.

01:08:24.280 | I'm in the process right now, if we're doing a test, 10 of my episodes are being transcribed

01:08:29.220 | and we're doing a little test.

01:08:30.220 | I'm not going to tell you which ones because we're doing an SEO test to see if they make

01:08:33.780 | an impact on transcriptions.

01:08:35.380 | I'll talk about that in the future.

01:08:39.300 | But transcripts are expensive and I just wasn't willing to spend the money on them.

01:08:43.940 | I have a couple of quick questions from listeners.

01:08:45.740 | I put this show topic out there in some social forums and I want to answer some questions.

01:08:49.780 | Number one, Joshua, what is your top way to promote your show?

01:08:52.100 | For me, the number one thing I've focused on in promoting my show has been trying to

01:08:56.340 | create the best content that I'm capable of doing it and hoping that it would be useful

01:09:01.860 | to people out there in my listening audience and hoping that my listening audience, out

01:09:06.020 | of appreciation for the good content, would share it with others.

01:09:10.020 | That's been what I focused on.

01:09:11.540 | That was my top, that has been and still is my top way.

01:09:15.200 | My favorite thing that I see is when I, if I go and look in a finance forum or something

01:09:20.160 | like that and somebody says, "Oh, Joshua Sheets at Radical Personal Finance created a show

01:09:24.900 | on this topic.

01:09:25.900 | You'll find it to be useful."

01:09:28.220 | That's what I want to see.

01:09:29.220 | That's what I love to see.

01:09:30.980 | The other useful way is I am very well located with, real quick, on the quality.

01:09:40.220 | If you focus on quality, your quality will be found out and then people will promote

01:09:44.580 | your stuff for you.

01:09:45.580 | They'll include you on the top 10 list.

01:09:47.820 | They'll include you on, hey, five great finance podcasts, things like that.

01:09:51.260 | If you don't focus on quality and you're always focused on promoting a bad product, you're

01:09:55.380 | never going to get included on that stuff.

01:09:57.740 | That stuff scales.

01:09:58.740 | You can't write a marketing blog post every day, but if you just focus on creating something

01:10:04.700 | good and be patient, then it's scalable when people promote your stuff for you.

01:10:10.340 | Let other people promote your stuff for you.

01:10:11.980 | Don't go necessarily focus first on promoting it yourself.

01:10:15.660 | That said, a couple of tips and things that have been helpful to me to promote the show.

01:10:20.580 | In addition to good content, I'm well positioned for the keyword personal finance.

01:10:26.060 | I chose only one keyword, iTunes personal finance.

01:10:30.140 | That's what I was looking for, radical personal finance.

01:10:33.660 | It's good SEO in the title of my website.

01:10:35.900 | It's good optimization in iTunes, personal finance.

01:10:40.940 | My show title is very descriptive.

01:10:43.020 | I didn't have a name brand.

01:10:44.500 | I didn't have a platform.

01:10:46.620 | I couldn't start the Joshua Sheets show and expect people to find it.

01:10:49.860 | No one knew who Joshua Sheets was, so I started the radical personal finance show.

01:10:55.820 | I'm going to do that likewise.

01:10:57.860 | Next thing of promotion is it is useful to do some interviews, interviews with authors.

01:11:03.460 | Also interview to review books.

01:11:05.340 | The third episode of the show, I reviewed early retirement extreme and that was the

01:11:08.460 | first bump.

01:11:09.460 | What happened was I reviewed early retirement extreme.

01:11:12.340 | I love that personal finance book.

01:11:14.540 | Then when I did the link back, I did a track back to Jacob Lundfisker's website and he

01:11:19.100 | put it on his website.

01:11:20.100 | All of a sudden, I opened up my stats one morning.

01:11:23.660 | This was back when I was checking them every day.

01:11:26.460 | I opened up the stats and all of a sudden, I saw, wow, I think it went from 30 downloads

01:11:31.820 | a day to 300 downloads a day.

01:11:34.180 | It's like, oh, wow.

01:11:36.100 | Even going forward in the future, one of the things that I am going to do with the radical

01:11:40.180 | personal finance content, I'm going to be reviewing a lot of books, partly because I

01:11:45.020 | am convinced it's an effective way for me to – no, mostly because I'm convinced it's

01:11:49.580 | an effective way for me to provide useful content to my audience.

01:11:53.480 | My audience is choosing to consume content in a verbal format where they often don't

01:11:57.500 | have the time to read.

01:11:58.820 | One way I can serve my audience is I can read the books.

01:12:01.260 | I can pull the key ideas and I can take what would take them hours to read and I can say,

01:12:05.740 | here are the key major aspects of this book that you need to find.

01:12:10.900 | However, that's the major reason.

01:12:13.740 | A minor reason is it will help me with the popularity of radical personal finance.

01:12:17.280 | By doing a book review, people who are searching for that book will find my book review.

01:12:22.220 | Those authors will be aware of me.

01:12:24.460 | They'll become aware of them.

01:12:25.460 | Some of them will listen to the show and they'll say, "Hey, I like this.

01:12:27.820 | This is good."

01:12:28.820 | They'll promote it, etc., etc., etc.

01:12:31.340 | Interacting with authors and people who have a platform, doing an interview is nice.

01:12:34.780 | Sometimes people will tweet out an interview and some of that person's fans will come and

01:12:38.320 | listen to your show, guest posting, all that stuff that you hear about in all the podcast

01:12:43.540 | forums.

01:12:44.540 | The key thing that I've just focused on is trying to create great stuff and letting other

01:12:48.140 | people promote it for me.

01:12:50.340 | Number two, do I monetize and if so, how?

01:12:52.700 | Yes, I have two ways.

01:12:53.940 | I have some ads.

01:12:55.300 | Some of those ads are affiliate links where I get a commission on them, on if somebody

01:13:01.300 | uses my referral link.

01:13:03.060 | Some of the ads are based upon CPM ads where I set out a flat contract with people.

01:13:10.380 | So I do monetize with ads.

01:13:12.420 | I didn't want to monetize with ads.

01:13:15.540 | I started focusing on Patreon, but I had real problems with, and I have about 200, I think

01:13:20.580 | 235, 240 people who support the show on Patreon.

01:13:24.660 | It comes out to the tune of about $2,000 a month right now.

01:13:28.820 | There's a whole story.

01:13:29.820 | I don't want to get into that.

01:13:30.820 | I've struggled with how to position that.

01:13:32.900 | I've even struggled in the last few months with Patreon, trying to figure out.

01:13:37.340 | I felt like I wasn't delivering everything that I wanted to deliver.

01:13:39.900 | That's been the story of my life, is not being able to deliver on the stuff I want to deliver.

01:13:43.460 | So even just in the last couple of days, we've radically simplified the Patreon campaign.

01:13:48.220 | And now I'm confident that I've got a much better fit of something I can deliver.

01:13:52.020 | And so I'm going to be working on that.

01:13:53.140 | And my hope is that the audience will step forward and many more will support the show

01:13:58.180 | on Patreon based upon the bonuses that I'm offering and the value that I'm offering.

01:14:01.780 | And that will allow me, my intention is I want to remove the advertising from the show.

01:14:05.620 | But at this point, I'm focused very much on creating backend products, products that are

01:14:10.820 | going to solve the problems that my audience is asking me.

01:14:14.500 | In the beginning, I thought I could give everything away on the show for free.

01:14:17.780 | And I still do.

01:14:18.780 | I give, and I intend, I'm going to do a thousand episodes.

01:14:20.900 | Whether I'll do it after a thousand, probably, but I'm not committed to it.

01:14:24.420 | But I'm still going to do a thousand episodes.

01:14:25.420 | And I think in a thousand episodes, I'm going to be able to articulate a pretty comprehensive

01:14:30.040 | curriculum that will help people for free.

01:14:32.540 | And I feel really, I love doing that.

01:14:33.860 | I really feel good about that.

01:14:35.380 | I've gotten a little bit lost over episodes, basically 200 or 300 of content.

01:14:40.180 | I've struggled a little bit now.

01:14:42.220 | I'm feeling much better.

01:14:43.580 | I've got a clearer outline of the topics I'm covering.

01:14:45.860 | I'm much more intentional about my content.

01:14:49.500 | So I know what I'm doing going forward, and I'm still going to deliver the content.

01:14:52.580 | But what I've realized though, is that the podcast is not the best format for me to answer

01:14:57.620 | somebody's specific question.

01:14:59.500 | And so I have to create products that are really, really valuable products, where when

01:15:04.380 | people have a specific question, my product is the perfect fit.

01:15:07.860 | And that's what I'm going to do in the future.

01:15:09.260 | And that's the way that you should monetize most shows.

01:15:12.340 | Not all shows, but most shows.

01:15:14.020 | Not every show has to be monetized directly.

01:15:16.660 | Next question.

01:15:17.660 | How do I flesh out a topic when I'm a little short on ideas?

01:15:21.380 | I'm not short on ideas.

01:15:23.420 | What I'm short on is the time to do an idea justice.

01:15:27.940 | I have hundreds of ideas.

01:15:30.620 | First, when I set out to do the show, I intentionally chose a format that would help me to be able

01:15:39.940 | to articulate, to have a plan.

01:15:42.260 | You have to have a game plan to run.

01:15:43.460 | If you just sit down and you don't have an outline to work with, it's really hard.

01:15:46.600 | So I decided on Mondays, I was going to do a personal finance show.

01:15:49.980 | On Tuesdays and Thursdays, I was going to do an interview show.

01:15:52.860 | On Wednesdays, I would do a deep dive of financial planning.

01:15:55.500 | On Fridays, I would do Q&A.

01:15:57.300 | So the only actual topics that I needed in that situation were Mondays and Wednesdays.

01:16:02.460 | But Wednesdays were easy because I set out to teach through the CFP curriculum.

01:16:07.060 | I just took the curriculum and that became my outline.

01:16:10.220 | Those are the most difficult shows for me to create because they're very time consuming,

01:16:14.900 | which is why they've been sparse recently.

01:16:16.340 | I've been busy and I haven't been able to get them done.

01:16:18.300 | I'm not giving up on them.

01:16:19.500 | I just haven't been able to get them done with the time that I have.

01:16:23.660 | They're very time consuming, but I don't struggle with ideas on them because I know the outline.

01:16:27.260 | The reason they're time consuming is I have to take the content, distill it from a textbook,

01:16:33.340 | which is very wordy, and distill it to the key points for someone who's not trying to

01:16:38.260 | sit for the CFP, but someone who just wants the knowledge, a layperson who wants the knowledge.

01:16:42.540 | I work very hard not to plagiarize the textbooks that I have and just read them.

01:16:48.300 | So I work and I say, "Okay, what's my spin on it?"

01:16:50.840 | So I can take their outline.

01:16:52.460 | I usually work from a couple of textbooks laid out and I try to take that and create

01:16:56.740 | my own outline so I'm not plagiarizing from the textbooks, but I'm getting the key points.

01:17:00.980 | So those are my Wednesday shows.

01:17:02.660 | My Monday shows are my personal finance shows and I keep lists of topics.

01:17:06.060 | I use Workflowy and I use Notebooks and I write all these things down.

01:17:09.940 | My Friday shows are Q&A's.

01:17:11.380 | So every question that I get from every listener goes into a Workflowy list that says Friday

01:17:15.500 | Q&A shows and it's the whole text of the question.

01:17:18.260 | And then I try to go through and answer those as best I can.

01:17:22.660 | A lot of times the answers require a lot of time and a lot of preparation and so those

01:17:27.060 | have been difficult to get done as well, but I'm not short on ideas.

01:17:30.700 | I would recommend to you if you're short on ideas for your podcast topic, it's probably

01:17:33.980 | not what you should podcast about.

01:17:36.140 | It's probably not.

01:17:38.180 | Next, how did you get to 2 million downloads?

01:17:41.140 | Techniques used to draw that many people?

01:17:42.780 | Good content.

01:17:43.780 | I like to believe good content.

01:17:45.500 | Good content, a little bit of optimization of personal finance, a little bit of popularity

01:17:49.780 | and hopefully it's gotten better.

01:17:51.740 | What is different now after getting 2 million downloads compared to when you were only getting

01:17:59.700 | a few hundred?

01:18:00.700 | What has changed?

01:18:01.700 | What has changed is that everything else in the business, when I began I had a single

01:18:06.040 | minded focus on content and I made a choice to ignore everything else.

01:18:10.420 | And so I was able to focus exclusively on creating content.

01:18:14.200 | Now 300 episodes later, I've had to build out all of those things that were ignored.

01:18:19.020 | I've had to build out the website.

01:18:20.100 | I've had to build out the marketing product and I've had to build that stuff out.

01:18:23.500 | And that stuff takes time and I had to build the business.

01:18:26.140 | So that time takes away from creating the content.

01:18:29.540 | And so I feel like the content I'm creating in some ways is not as good because I'm not

01:18:36.700 | able to put as much time into it as when I was getting a few hundred.

01:18:40.380 | So that has been a big change.

01:18:42.340 | The other major change is when I was only getting a few hundred downloads, I wasn't

01:18:46.060 | scared to do a show in the sense that if it wasn't very good, I would say, "Okay, I'm

01:18:51.020 | learning."

01:18:52.020 | But now 300 episodes in, speaking very frankly right now, I've worked on this outline and

01:18:57.180 | worked on this outline.

01:18:58.180 | I wrote down these lessons.

01:18:59.180 | I wrote down these lessons.

01:19:00.180 | I'm at a conference and I intended to record this yesterday rather than today.

01:19:04.660 | And I've worked on it, worked on it, worked on it.

01:19:06.140 | But still I got to the point where it's not quite right, but I've got to ship the show.

01:19:11.220 | And so I forced myself to do it.

01:19:12.420 | But as I've gone through this content, about every 10 minutes I've had to fight the urge

01:19:18.620 | of hitting stop and canceling this whole recording because I realized, "Oh, I should go back

01:19:22.500 | and adjust this flow a little bit earlier and this flow a little bit later."

01:19:26.580 | And that wasn't good.

01:19:27.580 | And I missed these two points and I feel like the flow wasn't quite right.

01:19:31.020 | I'm not satisfied with the show, but I know I've got to ship the show.

01:19:35.500 | And so I've just got to do it.

01:19:37.020 | And if it's not great, it's not great.

01:19:39.160 | But what's hard about a show attaining popularity is it's really hard to try to over deliver.

01:19:45.760 | It's really hard to try to beat what you've done before.

01:19:50.920 | And it's really intimidating knowing that many more people are going to hear that, and

01:19:55.320 | they don't get to hear your good shows.

01:19:56.680 | They got to hear this show.

01:19:58.140 | So that's what's the worst thing about starting to get popular is often it's much more intimidating.

01:20:06.460 | It's intimidating to hit publish.

01:20:08.760 | I'll be very frank, so I want to encourage you content producers.

01:20:11.560 | I generally am utterly terrified when I hit publish on a show because I'm convinced it's

01:20:18.040 | terrible and I really only get excited when I get to the next episode and I'm getting

01:20:24.040 | ready to do that outline.

01:20:25.720 | Then I get excited about that outline and that idea.

01:20:28.280 | But generally my mood goes from very excited to by the end of the show it goes down because

01:20:34.200 | I think that wasn't very good.

01:20:35.400 | That wasn't good.

01:20:36.400 | That wasn't good.

01:20:37.400 | That wasn't good.

01:20:38.400 | That wasn't good.

01:20:39.400 | But what I've chosen is podcasting format.

01:20:41.400 | It's one thing if I'm going to present a speech, I'm going to practice that speech multiple

01:20:45.160 | times.

01:20:46.160 | I'm going to deliver it.

01:20:48.160 | And so I can do those dress rehearsals, but with the podcast I can't justify the time

01:20:53.840 | of recording a show four times.

01:20:56.320 | That's not a good use of my time.

01:20:57.760 | And so I've got to force myself to publish it.

01:21:00.600 | And that's really hard.

01:21:01.680 | It's humbling because you know you're publishing something that you could do better if you

01:21:05.240 | did it four more times.

01:21:06.800 | But if you do it four more times, that was four other shows you could get done or four

01:21:10.480 | other things that you could do or more time I could spend playing in the park with my

01:21:13.760 | kids.

01:21:15.000 | So there's this balance and this tension there between doing your best versus making the

01:21:25.400 | product as good as you're capable of doing if you just kept doing it and doing it and

01:21:28.240 | doing it.

01:21:29.280 | Is there a right move?

01:21:30.400 | Should I do where I spend an entire week focusing on one episode and try to make it just a masterpiece?

01:21:36.440 | If I only did one episode a week, I'm sure I could do an amazing episode if I spent 40

01:21:41.000 | hours on it.

01:21:42.000 | But the time question of it is I don't think it's worth it.

01:21:47.040 | I think the plan I've taken is better.

01:21:49.080 | So it's very intimidating once your show gets bigger because you're trying to do better,

01:21:53.400 | but I feel worse in many ways.

01:21:55.760 | I know it sounds like an oxymoron because earlier I said I was getting better.

01:21:58.560 | I know that I am better now, but I don't feel better sometimes when I'm in the middle of

01:22:04.000 | the show.

01:22:05.000 | So now I'm thinking to myself, "Joshua, rambling, rambling, rambling.

01:22:07.920 | You just probably spent about three minutes answering this question, 'Was this valuable

01:22:11.520 | to the audience?'"

01:22:12.520 | And the temptation would be to go back and cut it out.

01:22:15.400 | That's the pressure that happens as you start to grow and start to change.

01:22:18.760 | What processes do you use now you wish you had implemented when you started?

01:22:22.800 | That's the next question.

01:22:24.420 | I wish when I started that Boss Jock was available and I wish I had known about Boss Jock and

01:22:34.640 | Audio Technica ATR2100 with a USB file into the Boss Jock.

01:22:39.200 | If I had known about this when I started, I never would have bought a mixer.

01:22:42.480 | I never would have bought all that gear.

01:22:44.000 | I would have just simply done it on the phone and I would have done this whole publishing

01:22:46.920 | process on the phone from the beginning.

01:22:48.640 | I publish more and more episodes of Radical Personal Finance just on the phone because

01:22:54.040 | I find it easier, simpler than doing all the nonsense on the computer.

01:22:58.680 | So that's the thing I would change in the process.

01:23:01.560 | That process would have been useful to me in the beginning.

01:23:05.520 | Knowing what you know now, what would you have done differently in the first 50 or 100

01:23:09.920 | episodes?

01:23:10.920 | The only thing I would have done differently in the first 50 or 100 episodes is worked

01:23:14.080 | harder on my outlines.

01:23:16.240 | And that was the change I made to try to become less rambly and to become more concise.

01:23:22.040 | I would have tried to focus on my outlines more.

01:23:26.400 | In the beginning, I wasn't outlining as carefully and I should have started in the beginning

01:23:30.480 | outlining more carefully.

01:23:31.600 | And at this point, I cannot justify the time that it takes me to outline a whole show exactly

01:23:37.320 | right so I forced myself to do less comprehensive outlines.

01:23:42.960 | But in order just to make the business work the way that I want it to work, I can't put

01:23:46.840 | seven hours into preparing a one-hour show every day because it eats up my whole day

01:23:50.360 | and I'll have nothing left.

01:23:51.900 | So if I would have done differently in the beginning, I would have made more comprehensive

01:23:57.440 | outlines in the beginning which would have helped me to be less rambly, cement those

01:24:02.120 | skills of staying focused, and then now I would have pulled back on the outlines.

01:24:08.040 | As it is, I feel like I'm 100 episodes behind where I should be.

01:24:12.160 | Another thing that is important to that point of what I would have done differently is in

01:24:17.280 | the beginning, I tried to fit too much into one show.

01:24:20.200 | And that is one thing that limits the benefit of my show.

01:24:23.920 | Still to this day, I try to fit too much.

01:24:25.840 | I fit 30 things.

01:24:27.920 | This would have been a better show if I had chosen five instead of 30.

01:24:31.680 | But as it is, it's 30 and I've done questions and now here I am an hour and something into

01:24:35.560 | it.

01:24:36.560 | It's still something I'm trying to simplify, simplify, simplify because I've realized I

01:24:40.120 | like long and complex, but the majority of people cannot process as much information

01:24:46.640 | as I want to get across.

01:24:48.320 | And so I've got to be aware of that and keep things more concise.

01:24:54.480 | That is still my biggest challenge.

01:24:56.440 | If I had to pick one single thing to focus on above all else over for your first 300

01:25:00.920 | episodes, what would it be?

01:25:02.040 | It would be this.

01:25:03.960 | Ignore the vanity metrics and focus on trying to continue to improve your competence, your

01:25:11.760 | skill and your quality as a broadcaster.

01:25:15.520 | If you can deliver content and focus on just becoming a better broadcaster, focus on the

01:25:20.280 | hooks on that.

01:25:21.600 | I'm studying radio.

01:25:22.600 | I don't spend any time, I don't read any podcasting blogs, I don't listen to any podcasts about

01:25:27.920 | podcasting.

01:25:28.920 | I'm in the radio world trying to say what do the radio people do?

01:25:31.680 | They're the people that we should be studying, not necessarily podcasting.

01:25:36.000 | Next question.

01:25:37.000 | I'd love to know what metrics you track to know if your podcast is truly effective as

01:25:39.920 | a content marketing tool.

01:25:41.920 | The answer to that question is Patreon.

01:25:46.920 | Patreon and ad responses.

01:25:49.600 | That's it.

01:25:50.800 | If you're doing this as a business, which was my intention from the beginning, then

01:25:54.520 | it's a matter of what revenue.

01:25:57.080 | I don't care at this point.

01:26:01.800 | iTunes reviews don't pay my rent.

01:26:06.000 | It's about am I serving people with high quality content and useful things that are impactful

01:26:11.960 | in their life such that I can earn their money.

01:26:15.520 | That's how I view my Patreon campaign.

01:26:17.160 | I'm trying to earn my listeners' support of me financially based upon how effective and

01:26:23.260 | helpful am I as that.

01:26:25.420 | How do you convert listeners to email subscribers?

01:26:27.760 | I am terrible at that.

01:26:29.040 | It is one of the biggest weaknesses on my business.

01:26:33.400 | I'm trying to change it.

01:26:36.080 | I am changing that.

01:26:37.280 | It's the biggest weaknesses.

01:26:38.280 | I'm very bad at converting email subscribers and I've known it's a weakness and for various

01:26:42.680 | reasons I've ignored it.

01:26:43.920 | How do you get useful constructive feedback on your podcast?

01:26:46.760 | I just listen and sometimes I just read what people say.

01:26:50.920 | You always have to online.

01:26:52.320 | It's very easy to track the stuff.

01:26:54.680 | People talking about you on Reddit or talking about you on forums.

01:26:59.960 | The transparency of information is so great because I can read what people are saying

01:27:03.440 | when they're not filtered by me.

01:27:05.980 | You have to filter that back through your image and through your perception.

01:27:09.540 | For example, the number one piece of feedback that people talk about on my show, there are

01:27:15.720 | probably three major themes that hurt me.

01:27:18.360 | Number one, too long.

01:27:20.320 | This is four.

01:27:21.320 | Too long, too rambly, too much religion, too much politics.

01:27:25.920 | If you were to go and read what I read about the show, you would find those four things

01:27:29.520 | are constant themes.

01:27:31.480 | The problem is how do you balance that with your vision?

01:27:34.320 | I'll tell you how I balance it.

01:27:35.840 | Too long.

01:27:36.840 | Yes, I agree.

01:27:37.840 | I'm working to make it shorter but I try to make the content fit it.

01:27:41.320 | Sometimes like this one, this episode is too long.

01:27:45.640 | Would it have been better if two?

01:27:46.640 | Well, whatever.

01:27:47.640 | I'm going to try to help people and I just say, "I'm not going to reach the people who

01:27:51.280 | are looking for something short but I'm doing my best to help people."

01:27:54.080 | As the old song goes, "If you need a speech, an hour speech today, I'm ready right now.

01:27:59.320 | If you need a five-minute speech, I need a few weeks to prepare."

01:28:01.600 | That's the reality of it.

01:28:03.640 | I've worked and worked and worked on this outline but I probably should have cut it

01:28:07.280 | down.

01:28:08.280 | I need to ship the show.

01:28:10.200 | Too long, agree.

01:28:11.200 | Too rambly was accurate.

01:28:13.440 | My intention was not to make a show rambly but that wasn't accurate and that was due

01:28:18.080 | to my own lack of skill.

01:28:20.320 | What a commenter doesn't understand in that situation is that I'm not capable of doing

01:28:26.640 | a show that's less rambly.

01:28:27.800 | I have to learn that skill set.

01:28:30.320 | It's easy for me to criticize a runner for not being fast enough but they're running

01:28:35.960 | as fast as they're capable of.

01:28:38.100 | As a broadcaster, I'm being as concise as I'm capable of based upon the time that I've

01:28:44.440 | allotted, etc.

01:28:46.080 | Those are accurate pieces of feedback.

01:28:47.840 | The feedback about religion and politics, now that's feedback that filters back through

01:28:52.160 | my vision.

01:28:53.520 | I talk about religion.

01:28:54.920 | I talk about politics because I am flat out convinced that those are two of the most important

01:29:01.120 | things that affect our lives.

01:29:03.160 | But in our modern society, we've decided that it's unpolite somehow to talk about religion

01:29:07.360 | and politics.

01:29:08.360 | I don't think there's anything more important to talk about.

01:29:10.520 | With regard to money, your religion and politics will affect what you do and how you do it

01:29:15.400 | with money more than just about anything else.

01:29:18.280 | It'll affect everything.

01:29:19.640 | It'll affect how much income you earn.

01:29:21.040 | It'll affect everything related to money.

01:29:23.400 | Now I don't lead with that because I don't think it's a particularly great lead to say,

01:29:27.600 | "Let me do this," but I see the themes.

01:29:31.000 | For me, I'm not willing to sacrifice my integrity to have a popular show.

01:29:40.560 | If I dropped those things, I could have a more popular show, but I don't want that show

01:29:46.420 | because I wouldn't be able to look myself in the mirror.

01:29:49.640 | As far as handling constructive feedback, that's what you have to look at.

01:29:53.160 | You have to look and say, "Is this feedback something that I'm willing to do something

01:29:56.760 | about or is this feedback not something that I'm willing to do something about and does

01:30:01.160 | this fit my vision?"

01:30:04.960 | Those would be my pieces of advice of how to address constructive feedback.

01:30:10.060 | Read what people say about your show in any format.

01:30:12.680 | Read the emails that you get and then filter it back through what are you trying to do

01:30:17.080 | and what are your opinions.

01:30:18.720 | How should you handle potential sponsor partners or affiliate relationships?

01:30:23.000 | I've never negotiated a business partnership.

01:30:24.940 | You should handle them the way that you would want them to be handled if somebody were handling

01:30:28.880 | it with you.

01:30:30.040 | Make a partnership deal win-win and practice making a deal.

01:30:34.520 | The most important words in your vocabulary should be, "Let's make a deal," and you should

01:30:38.640 | look for making a deal.

01:30:40.540 | Every single deal has to have both people coming away feeling like they benefited more.

01:30:46.480 | In your employment situation, if you're employed, your employer must feel that they are getting

01:30:52.540 | more value from you than the cost that you are costing them.

01:30:57.780 | They must feel like they are winning.

01:31:01.080 | If they don't, you're out of a job.

01:31:03.080 | Now, you on the other hand, you must feel like you're getting more benefit from your

01:31:07.380 | employer than you're costing them, than it's costing you.

01:31:10.720 | You've got to feel like you've got to get the better of a deal.

01:31:13.480 | The way I go to a business deal is try to find something who is going to, how can we

01:31:17.480 | make a deal where we both win?

01:31:20.080 | In my selections for sponsors, what I have said is I will only do a deal that is a win-win-win.

01:31:27.320 | I'll only do a deal, number one, where my audience wins.

01:31:30.640 | I will not bring irrelevant advertising onto my show.

01:31:35.200 | It's got to be relevant.

01:31:36.200 | It's got to be useful because if I'm going to take a minute of my listeners' valuable

01:31:40.780 | time in order to do an ad for them, then it's got to be at least useful.

01:31:46.320 | I'm working hard to make it even more relevant.

01:31:49.060 | But they've got to win.

01:31:50.060 | The product has to be good and they've got to win by buying it.

01:31:52.600 | Number two, it's got to work for me and it's got to work for the other person.

01:31:56.320 | So it's got to be a win-win-win deal.

01:31:58.720 | The business negotiation should be very simple.

01:32:01.840 | And I'll tell you, my contracts for my ad deals, I wrote them myself.

01:32:06.800 | They're like three paragraphs.

01:32:08.800 | I wrote them myself.

01:32:09.800 | I sat down in a word process and here's what I commit to do.

01:32:12.400 | Here's what I expect from you.

01:32:13.800 | Sent it over to them and signed it.

01:32:15.360 | And the people I've dealt with, big teams of attorneys, et cetera, I've signed a couple

01:32:19.800 | of contracts.

01:32:20.800 | It's not always my contract.

01:32:22.420 | My contracts that I've done are three paragraphs, one side of a page.

01:32:27.000 | Contracts that I get back from other companies, 32 pages.

01:32:29.400 | It's stupid.

01:32:30.400 | So make a deal, a win-win, and just make things simple.

01:32:33.660 | How do you go about sourcing new guests?

01:32:35.480 | I choose people that I think have a message or an idea or an experience or a philosophy

01:32:41.860 | or a story or something that will challenge or will educate or will inspire my audience.

01:32:50.700 | I don't think so much about entertainment.

01:32:52.760 | I probably should think more.

01:32:54.300 | The most popular forms of media are always going to be entertainment.

01:32:58.180 | But I'm looking through people who are going to challenge or educate or inspire my audience.

01:33:04.260 | That's what I'm looking for.

01:33:05.620 | So I'm always looking for guests.

01:33:07.140 | I ignore some expert credentials.

01:33:10.340 | I turn more experts down than I accept as far as on the show, and I look for normal

01:33:14.980 | people.

01:33:15.980 | So with my vision of the show, I'm wanting my show, my stuff to be accessible.

01:33:22.220 | I'm wanting it to be accessible to people.

01:33:24.220 | So I try to bring on normal everyday people and experts.

01:33:27.740 | So that's been my philosophy along the way.

01:33:30.140 | Is it right?

01:33:31.140 | Is it wrong?

01:33:32.140 | I have no idea.

01:33:33.140 | It's working so far.

01:33:34.140 | And so because I'm fulfilling my vision and I'm happy with the show, I continue to do

01:33:39.220 | what I think is right.

01:33:40.820 | So those are my lessons learned.

01:33:43.300 | Those are my tips.

01:33:44.300 | I hope this is useful to you.

01:33:46.180 | Radical Personal Finance is not about podcasting, but I do want to help because I was looking

01:33:50.460 | for information from people who were experienced and I just struggled to find it a couple years

01:33:55.460 | ago.

01:33:56.460 | So I'm trying to pay back.

01:33:58.180 | Many people have been hugely helpful to me, and I want to thank so many people who have

01:34:01.660 | been helpful.

01:34:03.860 | Those are my philosophies.

01:34:05.780 | I don't claim they're right, but they are my philosophies.

01:34:08.580 | And you can judge for yourself whether they work or not.

01:34:11.900 | I am thankful that I have been able to build really great relationships with many people

01:34:16.260 | in my audience.

01:34:17.860 | It's really encouraging to me.

01:34:22.460 | And I know because I get the emails that I've been able to impact some lives positively,

01:34:29.220 | which is what I'm able to do.

01:34:30.780 | And I've been able to build a business that sustains my household, which is a location

01:34:36.660 | dependent, which was my definition of financial freedom.

01:34:40.020 | So I've hit my goals with Radical Personal Finance.

01:34:43.100 | Now my goals are changing.

01:34:45.060 | They're getting bigger, they're getting more.

01:34:46.060 | I'm going to keep on working.

01:34:47.060 | I'm going to keep getting better.

01:34:48.740 | And I will be very disappointed if 300 episodes from now, they're not way better.

01:34:55.220 | I'll be very disappointed with myself.

01:34:56.660 | But they're going to get better because this is just a process.

01:35:00.820 | So enjoy the process.

01:35:01.820 | I love doing this.

01:35:03.060 | It's hard work.

01:35:04.500 | You will go through the honeymoon phase of your business.

01:35:07.700 | For two days, I've been trying to get this show out and I've had to force myself to sit

01:35:10.660 | down and get it done.

01:35:12.260 | So it's seven o'clock at night here at a conference.

01:35:14.180 | I haven't eaten since breakfast because I've been in meetings and in sessions and whatnot.

01:35:19.380 | But it's a job.

01:35:20.540 | This is my job and I've got to do my best to get my job done.

01:35:23.980 | So you're going to do those things.

01:35:25.980 | But still, I wouldn't trade it.

01:35:27.180 | I love what I'm doing.

01:35:28.180 | And I really, really, really want every member of this audience to at least consider starting

01:35:33.260 | a podcast because, friends, we live in a time where the freedom of communication is fantastic.

01:35:40.220 | But in order for us to continue to grow and improve our lives, we need to grasp it and

01:35:45.100 | use it as a force for good.

01:35:48.020 | Thank you all for listening.

01:35:49.220 | If you would like to support my work on Patreon, go to radicalpersonalfinance.com/patreon.

01:35:53.980 | I would be indebted to you for your financial support.

01:35:56.580 | And I hope this content was useful.

01:35:58.460 | Thank you so much.

01:35:59.460 | I haven't said thank you so much to finish a podcast and hundreds of episodes.

01:36:08.860 | That's the worst ending ever.

01:36:10.940 | But yet still, I'm learning.

01:36:13.980 | Peace out.

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RPF0300-Podcasting_Lessons