Congratulations on your completion of the first two chapters in this book. Why am I offering you a congratulatory comment when there is still a lot left to learn and master?
Because most people will stop reading a book—any book—somewhere in the middle of Chapter 2. But you didn’t stop! You are already ahead of the majority of your competitors. And if they stopped at Chapter 2, I can almost certainly guarantee they will not complete the work in the next chapters. You have already set yourself apart as a high achiever!
Now, are you ready to create, launch, promote, and monetize your very own podcast?
YOUR VITALS CHECKLIST
Identify the vital priorities for your business, and your podcast, over the next twelve months. Ideally, the two lists will intersect.
Identify your personal vital functions.
Identify the baselines for the six vital metrics in this chapter so you can measure your impact in each area going forward.
Complete the Evaluation of Predictive Success Metrics (EPSM) in this chapter to provide a snapshot view of the sales and marketing “vitals” in your business.
Score your results and review with your team.
Revise your list of vital priorities in order to immediately address each area highlighted from the EPSM.
CHAPTER 3
SYSTEM OVERVIEW—YOUR RECIPE FOR SUCCESS
Analysis of several hundred people who had accumulated fortunes well beyond the million dollar mark disclosed the fact that every one of them had the habit of reaching decisions promptly, and of changing these decisions slowly, if, and when they were changed. People who fail to accumulate money, without exception, have the habit of reaching decisions, if at all, very slowly and of changing these decisions quickly and often.
—NAPOLEON HILL1
Being successful at podcasting requires a variety of competencies and skills—all of which are covered in precise detail in this book. But the most important skills you must master in order to build a profitable podcast are making a decision, setting a course, and then remaining focused on moving toward your destination. Growing revenue, expanding your platform, and building a network of true fans through your podcast requires patience over a sustained period of time.
The Profitable Podcast System is not a get-rich-quick scheme. It’s going to take hundreds of hours of your time to perfect your podcasting skills. But, this comprehensive resource will shorten your learning curve because you will be able to avoid the mistakes and reach profitability faster.
Your opportunity for success will increase if you keep Napoleon Hill’s wise words front and center: Reach a decision quickly, be slow to change it, and relentlessly pursue your destination. Master this principle and you will create significant outcomes for your business as a result of the system offered in this book.
At a high level, the Profitable Podcast System includes twenty steps that stretch across multiple technical systems, software, and people, all of which must be properly coordinated and aligned with the desired outcomes. This chapter will provide you with a 30,000-foot view of the overall system before stepping deep into the weeds of strategy in the 7 Stages of Production. The stages in the book will provide you with access to a complete tool kit of templates, guides, email swipe files, spreadsheets, schedules, and checklists to guide you every step of the way.
A few words of caution: As we move deeper into the system, it may begin to feel too complicated to integrate into your business. Yes, the system is complex, with many moving parts. However, rest assured, all the parts are not moving at the same time. The Profitable Podcast System is just like any other business system. It starts off seeming complex and confusing, but as time goes by you will develop mastery and nimbleness in making it all work for you.
At first, the system will feel a bit like trying to fly the space shuttle. There will be lots of “switches,” “controls,” “gauges,” and “levers” inside the cockpit. But there is something very important to remember about flying the space shuttle. At any given time, there are only a couple of levers that need to be pulled—and a couple of buttons that need to be pushed. Everything else can be ignored.
The same principle applies here, too. Please don’t get overwhelmed—don’t get frustrated. Mastery will come.
I believe that the wise Archimedes had it right when he said, “Give me a lever and a place to stand and I will move the earth.”
So, what will be your lever as you work through implementation and mastery of this system? You guessed it: chocolate cake!
I know, chocolate cake sounds silly. But let me explain why this metaphor makes so much sense for what you are about to learn.
Let’s say that I happen to make the world’s best chocolate cake—the absolute best. I have spent the last twenty years perfecting my process. Then one day you ask me to teach you how to make my cake—the one that took me twenty years to master!
How could this be possible? How could someone other than me even come close to duplicating my chocolate cake? Especially if you haven’t dedicated yourself to mastering your baking skills as I have.
Is there something I could give you—to help prepare you—to help ensure your success? Well, I could give you my recipe, right?
If you have an opportunity to study and review my recipe, you’ll see my full process—the strategy behind the chocolate cake. You’ll begin to get the overall picture of what needs to happen.
But, what else do you need beyond the recipe? Exactly! You need the actual ingredients.
You can put it all together if you have access to the recipe (strategy) and the ingredients (tactics). You can see the entire project at a high level, especially if the recipe includes a photo of the finished cake. You have documentation regarding the right amount of each ingredient—at the right time—and how long to bake the cake at the right temperature.
If you follow the recipe—and if I didn’t accidentally leave any steps or ingredients out of the recipe—you now have a decent shot at replicating my success.
In fact, replicating my success becomes easy if you are willing to make the effort and to put in the hard work. The cake won’t bake itself. But you now have a clear path to follow. Just like this book will do for your podcast.
The system contains twenty core and interdependent steps:
Ingredient 1: Internal Kickoff Meeting. You meet with your team to discuss production strategy, roles, prioritization, monetization goals, and vital metrics.
The kickoff meeting is where you and your team will get specific about your goals, vital metrics, discussing the avatar of your ideal prospect and customer, as well as the avatar of your prospective listener. This is where you will name your show, crystalize how the show will drive leads and revenue for your business, and assemble your Dream 50 list of prospects, which represents the clients you would most like to serve in your industry.
Your list of Dream 50 prospects will serve as the guest list for your podcast along with subject matter experts from a variety of relevant and complementary fields such as C-suite executives, business leaders, and other noncompetitive thought leaders.
You will want to prioritize the selection of guests so your podcast can achieve the shortest path to revenue.
Ingredient 2: Question Flow. This is where you and your team will collaborate to prepare the preliminary question set for review and critique. Then create the final version, which will become the Question Flow used with guests on the show.
Ingredient 3: Guest Advocacy System. This is where you will implement our top-rated Guest Advocacy System, which includes setting up an online scheduling system, calendar integration, creation of interview reminders to guests, and the preparation of equipment recommendations for guests. All of the templates and resources you need for Guest Advocacy have been included in the book.
Ingredient 4: Guest Invitations. This is where you and your team will collaborate to create and finalize a guest invitation email with links to the online scheduling system. Again, a template has been pr
ovided.
Ingredient 5: Invite Distribution. This is where you, as the host of the podcast, will send the invitation emails to prospective guests and answer questions if necessary (this step initiates high-level dialogue with your Dream 50).
Ingredient 6: Intro/Outro Scripted. This is where you and your team will want to collaborate to create the script for your show’s recorded intro and outro. Organizing your thoughts, and being organized, will save you time and money when it comes time to work with a producer on recording your intro and outro.
Ingredient 7: Audio Production. This is where you will want to connect with an audio producer to create the intro and outro for your show.
Ingredient 8: Show Artwork. This is where you will want to connect with a graphic designer, either on your team or a freelancer, to create your show artwork/thumbnail images for iTunes, Stitcher, website assets, etc. All design guidelines have been included in the book.
Ingredient 9: Podcast Website. You and your team should consider creating a website for your show. The website will serve as the podcast’s headquarters complete with podcast player, social media plug-ins, and hosting (www.onwardnation.com as example).
Ingredient 10: Podcast Hosting. There are a number of providers to choose from with respect to hosting the audio files for your show. However, Libsyn is an industry leader and my Predictive ROI team has never experienced a problem with the company. This is where you will create your hosting account, including show description, details for iTunes, Stitcher, Google Play, and RSS feed.
Ingredient 11: Show Notes. This is where you will create your Show Notes template for your podcast so that each episode will have its own blog post with the embedded audio file ready for your website visitors.
Ingredient 12: iTunes. This is where you will set up your podcast in iTunes.
Ingredient 13: Stitcher. This is where you will set up your podcast in Stitcher.
Ingredient 14: Google Play. This is where you will set up your podcast in Google Play.
Ingredient 15: Airing Schedule. Following the template in the book, you will be able to create and maintain your own Show Airing Schedule complete with show titles, production schedule, airing dates, Show Notes links, and other logistics.
Ingredient 16: Audio Editing and Episode Airing. This is where learning all things audio will pay off—editing your actual episodes. This book includes a complete audio production guide. You will likely want to air at least one new episode per week so your audience can see that you are serious and you can begin to build your nation of true fans. You will want to provide your guests with email reminders, social media distribution, and promotional links so they can help spread the word of your great show.
Ingredient 17: Launch Day. This is where you and your team will want to follow our launch recipe so you can dominate iTunes in your respective categories immediately upon launch of the podcast. For example, we recently assisted one of our Predictive ROI clients in reaching the top of iTunes. The show was ranked the number 1 podcast in Management and Marketing, number 2 in Education, number 2 in Careers, number 3 in Business, and the number 10 podcast in all of iTunes.
Ingredient 18: Social Engagement with Guests. This is where you will want to follow our recipe for creating Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter posts to promote each episode. We have a unique social media recipe that will warm up your guests for your sales opportunity that systematically shares their expertise from the episode. For example, you will learn how to create a library of ten tweets per episode. Each tweet will share valuable highlights from the episode and include the Twitter handle of the guest who contributed the highlight. The library of tweets will be auto-distributed at random on a regular schedule. This encourages guests to re-tweet their episode to their respective followers. Examples of social media posts have been provided in Chapter 4, “Grow Your Revenue.”
Ingredient 19: iTunes What’s Hot Rank Continuity. After eight weeks, your podcast will fall out of iTunes’ New and Noteworthy rankings and move into What’s Hot. You should follow our recipe for keeping a steady stream of ratings and reviews flowing into iTunes. This will keep your organic downloads as high as possible.
Ingredient 20: Continuous Review of Vital Metrics. Schedule a tactical Checkpoint Meeting with your team every fourteen days to ensure that the podcast is running smoothly and to review/revise/expand the Dream 50 list, review feedback from guests, etc. And schedule an ROI Scorecard Meeting every thirty days to evaluate vital metrics including lead gen success and to discuss adjustments.
Timing and Expectations
We went from zero to launch in thirty days when Onward Nation went live on June 15, 2015. It’s possible for you and your team to follow the recipe in this book and replicate our timeline. However, based on our experience in creating, launching, and producing more than fifty podcasts for Predictive ROI clients, I recommend you and your team give yourselves between seven and eight weeks to go from zero to launch.
CHAPTER 4
GROW YOUR REVENUE
When executed properly, your podcast will be uniquely suited to accomplish three vital priorities: grow revenue, expand your platform, and build a nation of true fans. The next three chapters will provide you with the specific recipes and ingredients you need to accomplish all three. The recipes build upon one another—but the recipes are also “interdependent.” As the late Stephen R. Covey wrote in The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, with interdependence, “you and I working together can accomplish far more than, even at my best, I could accomplish alone.” The next three chapters are interdependent because they work in unison, and together they create synergistic momentum for your business. As your platform grows, so will your nation of true fans, and as your nation grows, so will your opportunity to further grow the revenue of your business.
Your opportunity to grow revenue will likely fit into three primary categories:
Premium-priced services to the business owners who have appeared as guests on your show
Less expensive, entry-level programs to your concentric circles of lesser fans (see Chapter 6 for lesser fans)
Sponsorships to boost revenue and credibility with your listeners (see Chapter 16)
In my opinion, you will have a healthy core business if selling your services directly to your guests represents the majority of your podcast-related revenue. This sales strategy will ensure that there is ample revenue flowing into your core business to cover overhead, generate profit, provide ample funds to reinvest, and further expand by introducing new services to continue the life cycle of a balanced business. It is important for your podcast to feed your core business. It is also important for you not to become distracted with creating a passive revenue income as your first step. Passive revenue streams can be helpful and provide high-margin sources of revenue. However, it can sometimes be tempting to want to create a passive revenue stream first because it feels less like selling. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to wake up each morning and see all of the successful credit card transaction receipts in your in-box? Of course it would. But not at the expense of your core team not having enough work to do. If you pursue the goal of creating a passive revenue stream for your business—before you address the lead gen and revenue needs of your core business—you run the risk of losing valuable time and getting sidetracked. And that could be expensive.
Rather than devoting a section of this chapter to a passive revenue recipe, I have included our complete recipe including several promotional launch plans as a free download at http://PredictiveROI.com/Resources/Passive-Revenue.
Let’s focus our attention back to your guests. You will maximize your revenue opportunity, and ensure the health of your core business, if you quickly begin using your podcast as your Trojan horse of selling as we discussed in the Introduction of this book.
Selling directly to your guests represents your lowest hanging fruit, your shortest path to revenue, and it is not a complex sales strategy. It could be as simple as sharing ideas with a guest following your i
nterview, in an informal manner, looping back to the guest after you flesh out the ideas further, and then asking for permission to proceed. Lee Caraher, host of the Focus Is Your Friend podcast, shared her sales strategy with me.
Stephen, there’s usually fifteen minutes before we start the interview where I say, “Oh my gosh, hi. Blah, blah, blah.” Then afterwards, I am sharing with them, “I have an idea for you,” which is where I’m really good. That’s one of my strengths. “Oh, here’s an idea! Or, here’s a different idea!” I share the ideas after the interview is over. Depending on how my guest reacts, if they say, “Oh that’d be a great idea. How do I do that?” Then I say, “Let me think about it some more.”
A week or two later, I’ll noodle on the idea a little more. Then I’ll email them with, “You know, I thought about that idea. Here is how I think you could implement it. Here is what I think the lift will be. Here is what I think the cost will be. We can’t do that for you—or—we can do that for you.” Of that, 25 percent of the time the ideas are coming back to us in some sort of project. Our podcast been super helpful in growing revenue for Double Forte.
Ingredient #1: The Campfire Pitch
Lee has developed a straightforward sales strategy. Her podcast opened the door with the right decision-maker, she conducted a rock-solid interview, and then she enthusiastically shared ideas with her guest. I call this the Campfire Pitch.
When you were a kid, did you ever go camping with family or friends, or have a bonfire in your backyard? Maybe you sat around the fire, feeling warm, and sharing stories with your friends. The energy of the group was awesome. But then the party was over, it was time for bed, and when you woke up the next morning, the same people were with you but the energy of the moment was gone. That’s what entrepreneur and brand expert Chris Smith calls the Campfire Effect. It happens in business—after a great interview, for example—and it happens in social situations.
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