6 Dec 2022
In episode 11 of the Professional Creative Podcast, host Bonnie Christine gives a candid, real‑time walkthrough of why she launched the show, who it’s for, and every step she took to bring it from idea to launch. She explains her mission to connect with a broader audience beyond her paid community, defines her Ideal Customer Avatar (creative entrepreneurs at various business stages), and shares the two‑year delay caused by a commitment to consistency and trust. Bonnie details the practical work of naming the podcast, designing its cover, recording and editing a trailer in iMovie, choosing a music track, and selecting the Arts & Design category for charting. She describes registering the show on Spotify, Apple, and Google via Kajabi (later moving to Libsyn), trademarking the name with a lawyer, buying the URL, and building a launch runway through email announcements and a survey that yielded 1,700 responses and 200 episode ideas. She outlines equipment upgrades (microphone, audio interface), recording in a closet, establishing a team workflow for raw and edited audio, show notes, transcripts, and hiring an external editor. Bonnie batch‑recorded six episodes to launch with five on November 15 and a sixth two days later, resulting in over 10,000 downloads in 48 hours and a top‑10 spot in the Art & Design chart. She reflects on the emotional impact of audience reviews, her sponsorship philosophy (only promoting products she loves), and offers a free checklist and survey template for listeners. Throughout, she emphasizes a mindset of attacking goals, asking the audience for input, and learning by doing.
This episode I thought it would be fun to kind of just share with you a in the moment snapshot what is I'm doing here now most comfortable sharing things that feel like have all figured out know there are I've been for years and can speak confidently about. However might interesting bring into real in. Behind the scenes in the real moment of me developing this podcast and why I'm doing it and what it looks like and what I don't know and how I'm doing it anyways. And so there are two types of people that are going to listen to this. Those of you who might be interested in doing a podcast one day and those of you who aren't. However, I'm hoping that this will be beneficial to you either way because if you are hoping to host your own podcast, I'll share with you kind of how I did it, how I outlined the steps and what we're doing for each episode right now. But even if you don't aspire to have your own podcast, what I hope that you glean from this episode is how to really attack a goal that you have. Really kind of formulate a plan of action in order to just get the thing off the ground. Okay, so that's where we're going is one of just inspiration for really no matter what it is that you want to get off of the ground. Because in reality I've been talking about this very podcast for about two years and I'll tell you why. It wasn't just just procrastination, even though there was a little bit of that. I'll tell you what I was looking for and really dive into what it took for me in order to just get this thing out into the world. Are you ready to dive in? Let's go. I'm Bonnie Christine and this is where all things creativity, design, business and marketing unite. I'm a mama living in a tiny town tucked right inside the Smoky Mountains, running a multi seven figure business, doing the most creative and impactful work of my life. But when I first set out to become an entrepreneur, I was struggling to make ends meet and wrestling with how to accomplish my biggest dream of becoming a fabric designer. Fast forward to today. I'm not only licensing my artwork all over the world, but also teaching others how to design their creative life and experience the same success. I'm here to help you spend your life doing something that lights you up. I'll help you build a creative business that also creates an impact, changes people's lives, gives you all of the freedom you want. And is wildly profitable. Welcome to the professional creative Podcast. We're going to first start with really, the mission of the podcast. Why am I doing a podcast? And the truth is it's to connect with you. But of course, there is more to it. I, for years, have felt very much like I didn't have a consistent way to reach out and connect with my audience that was free. So from the outside looking in, I actually think that it doesn't look like we do very much because 90% of everything that we do is behind a paid wall, which means that you have to be a student or a member in order to really get what we're doing. And we do so much. I have been delivering weekly content to my membership and every single week since 2012. And then of course, we also do a couple of these courses that are really, really high touch. However, if you're not on the inside of either of those, there's nothing that's consistently connecting you and I. And so to me, this has been the missing part for me for so long. And it really could have been anything. It could have been YouTube, it could have been blogging, it could have been, you know, anything that's really, really consistent. But a podcast really felt like such a way to connect with you. For one. I love podcasts. I am listening to a podcast of some type or another every single day. And so I love how mobile it is and how easy it is to just pop on when you're doing the dishes or going for a walk. And so I really wanted to be able to be in your ear in a very approach way. And then of course, I wanted to be able to have that weekly routine, consistent contact with my audience, regardless of whether they were in a paid program that I had or not. Now, let's talk about the ICA for this podcast. ICA stands for Ideal Customer Avatar. And so it's a little bit markety, that language. But it really is important, no matter what you're doing, to think about the ideal consumer of whatever it is you're putting out there, whether it's artwork or music or pottery or whatever it is. What is your perfect person? Who are they? What are they like? And so I've thought about you a lot, and this is kind of my take on explaining you to yourself. I know that you are creative. I know that you may be an artist or a surface pattern designer, but you might be in another creative industry like pottery or music or something that's handmade or just something that requires you to be hands on. I know that many of you are busy. A lot of you are young mothers, or a lot of you may be working at a day job and having a side hustle, or some of you may be taking care of your aging parents, but most of you have something that squishes on your time. And efficiency is very, really important. I also like to think of my audience in terms of ones, twos, threes and fours. So we're not talking about the enneagram. We're talking about the level that you are in your business. And so ones, I think are those of you who are really just getting started, who are really needing the inspiration to just begin trying. Twos are those of you who are finding some success. So you may be even approaching the six figure mark in your business. Threes are those who are highly successful. I would consider myself a three. You know, someone who's really making an impact and making income that changes the lives of their family and their community. And then fours, I think are very rare. They're people who kind of own businesses. They don't work in businesses. Like we're talking about eight, four figure businesses here. Probably the majority of us maybe don't even aspire to get to the level of a four, but they earned a spot on the. They earned a spot on my scale. And so I spend a lot of time talking to ones. Very much of my kind of messaging and energy is spent on really getting people to the point where they're willing to try doing something that they love. And while I would actually guess that maybe 50% of you are ones right now, like really looking to get off the ground with an idea, when I write these episodes, I'm thinking about the twos and threes, knowing that the ones are taking notes voraciously. Am I right? I hope I'm right. I try to speak to twos and threes, knowing that the ones will learn more quickly and be more inspired than ever. Being able to listen into a conversation that another six or seven, seven figure business owner would also glean helpful information from. And so that's what I'm aspiring to do now. I don't really know why, because if I was really, really, really smart, I would be doing this and have something to offer you one day for sale, right? Like if we're doing this for business, then it would be really smart to have like a plan, but I really don't. I actually just find this really fun. I develop creatives. It's what I do. It's in my bones. I love creative entrepreneurship with everything in my being. And I do teach, right? I teach surface pattern design, and some of that will apply to some of you, but the rest of this is just really capturing what I'm doing in my business and what I'm nerding out over and what I'm finding success at, and also what failures I'm having as well. And I really just am having so much fun sharing that with you. So that's just kind of an in the moment feedback on why I'm doing it. Probably the smartest thing for me to do would have been to make a very surface pattern design specific podcast. But I talk about it so much inside my course and my membership that I really just got excited about talking about this thing that I don't actually get to talk about that much creative entrepreneurship. So here we are, and that's what we're doing. We'll see where it takes us. So the reason that it took me two years to get this podcast off of the ground is that I promised myself that I wouldn't do it until I knew that I could be consistent in it. Meaning I value trust in people very much. And I know that what we do online is how we build trust with people just very naturally, because we're not sitting down face to face. We are interacting on the Internet. And unfortunately, so many of us have, you know, been a little broken hearted by other people on the Internet or we've been sold something that wasn't very good, or we've been lied to, or we've been scammed or whatever, right? And so I value building trust with my audience to such a degree that I would never start this podcast and then kind of fall off the bandwagon. And I knew that about myself. And I also knew my current bandwidth wouldn't let me add this on and maintain consistency with it. And so I waited. I promised myself that I would wait until I had a day where I thought, hmm, what am I going to do today? Until I would start the podcast. And about six months ago, I had that day, which really means that the interior of my business is running smoothly and I have the right people and the right amount of people on my team, which allows me to have some creative fun again. And for so many years, I was the one pushing all of the buttons, which just meant that I didn't necessarily have time to have creative, you know, ideas or fun. I really just needed to keep everything running. And so it's an incredible place in my business now where I get to exercise a little bit new ideas and have fun playing with some different approaches to different things. And so I knew that the podcast was what I would do as soon as I was able to say that I could consistently approach it and, and be there twice a week, every single week for you. So that time has come and then it was time to actually start figuring it out. And this is a whole new world to me which inevitably feels overwhelming. I don't know what I don't know and I don't know where to start. And I don't know how to start. This episode is sponsored by my all new free mini class called Start simple in Surface Design. You will never forget the moment you feel your first pattern design in your very own hands. From concept to design to finished product, the process is nothing short of magical. Surface pattern design is the craft of creating artwork for things like fabric, gift wrap, wallpaper, and so much more. It has brought me so much joy over the last decade and I want you to experience the same because getting started with a new skill can feel a little overwhelming. I've broken down everything you need to know in order to get started as simply as possible. In just five lessons that are under 20 minutes each, you're going to learn how to design your own repeating pattern. Ready for fabric, gift wrap or wallpaper, you'll create a repeating pattern. You'll use simple techniques in Adobe Illustrator, and you'll know how to order your very own product today. Now, don't worry. Even if you've never used this program. I'll teach you everything you need to know to get up and running. I'll even show you how to use found objects like leaves or strings so you don't even have to draw if you don't want to. I'll teach you how to create a custom color palette, design your very own pattern, and export your file like a pro. If you have an hour to learn a brand new skill, all for free, then let's get started. Head over to bonniecristine.com start simple to sign up today. Again, that's bonniechristine.com forward/startsimple it's B O N N I E C h r I s t-I n e.com forward/startsimple I'll meet you there. I cannot wait to see what you make in class. But I had this date on the calendar of November 15, and I hadn't shared it publicly yet. I had shared it with my team and about three weeks before that I was like, I think I can do it. I just, I really need to do this, this and this and Lisa, my integrator, who you're going to be able to meet on an upcoming episode, I'm so excited about. She said, you know what? You have everything that you need. You need to just do it this weekend, record the trailer. And I'm like, you know what? You're right. And so this was the weekend before Immersion Live, our big online conference that I shared about in episode number 10. And I spent the weekend working on the podcast rather than what I really needed to be doing for Immersion Live in order to get it out in time to announce at the conference, which ended up being just the best thing. So kind of in order, this is what I did. The first thing I did was figure out a name. And my goodness, I think it was easier to name my children. There are, like, every good idea that I had was taken. I landed on something that I love. I hope that you love it as well. But it was the hardest part of this whole thing was just figuring out a name that I thought was memorable but also descriptive, and, oh, my goodness, it was just a whole thing. So we decided on a name, and because I'm a designer, I went directly to designing the podcast cover. This was productive procrastination for me, but it was the thing that I wanted to play with the most. And so I just went, I dove in headfirst into designing the COVID and then I had my lead designer, Rebecca, help me kind of tweak it at the very end. Then it was time to record the trailer. So I knew that I needed to get a trailer up because I had heard that it can take a little while to get approved by, like, Apple Podcasts. And so I wanted to submit the trailer and get my show really checked out and public in advance. And so we did that. About three weeks before we went live with the first episode, we published the trailer. Now I also edited the trailer. I did this in imovie. I don't know. That sounds like a horrible idea, but I asked what I did, and it worked. It worked just fine. I used what I knew, and I recorded with the equipment that I had, and I made the trailer. And I didn't overthink it. I purchased some music. I buy my music from a place called premiumbeats.com. we'll link that in the show notes. And so that was also a really tricky part because I wanted something that would get you excited but also not annoyed you. Please don't tell me if it annoys you. I like it. I still like it. I hope that we like it in A couple of years. But picking out the trailer music was a big deal to me as well. And so I edited all of the audio and applied the music in imovie. Okay. That's what I did. If you don't want to edit your own, I would highly suggest outsourcing this. And a great place to start looking for that is a place like Upwork, where you can hire professionals to do work for you. Now the next thing I needed to do was research and choose categories. There are a bunch of categories that you can put your podcast under. And I knew that I wanted to be in something that I thought we could chart in. And so if you look at something like entrepreneurship, maybe it would be at the top charts, but likely it's much more difficult. And so we are in the arts and design category, which I feel very comfortable in. And we have been in the top 10 chart ever since this podcast launched, which is incredible. We'll talk about how the podcast has been doing before I wrap up this episode. The next thing that I needed to do was register the podcast with everyone who distributes it. So this was with Spotify, Apple, and Google. Now I use Kajabi for the bulk of my business, for my course, my membership, all of these things. My website, I use Kajabi. And they actually just launched a podcast platform. And so I started there, even though I ended up moving everything over to Libsyn, just for some extra capabilities that Libsyn had that I wanted. But that's how I got started, and that's how I registered it as well. This was a big question mark for me. And honestly, as soon as I dove in, it took like 60 seconds. It was not as hard as I had built it up to be in my head. The next thing I did was I had my lawyer trademark, the name of the podcast. I don't always do this, but I think it's important when you're really, like, diving deep into something and buying the URL and really going to, like, make it with a name, go ahead and do the trademark. I suggest using a lawyer for this. I will link my lawyer. Her name is Annette Stepanian, and she works with creatives a lot. And so she just kind of understands what we're doing and the language that we speak. But I do suggest getting help with this, unless you're very familiar with it, because there's kind of a lot to it. So highly recommend that. Then I purchased the URL. We are@Propriecreative.com that was a big part of all of this, setting up and then I designed the website. So I love designing my own website. This is something that I probably have no business doing. Like, I'm not that efficient at it, but I enjoy it, so I do it anyways. And I used Kajabi actually to build this website, which I think is pretty impressive. Impressive. You can go check it out@PropriationalCreative.com now. The next thing that I did was start to build anticipation. I had mentioned the podcast to my audience for about a year, but I had not put a date on paper. Now it's time to put a date on paper. Mark your calendars. It's coming November 15th. Whether I'm ready or not, it's coming. And so this kind of anticipation building is really important to anything that you want to launch into the world. You need to start telling people about it ahead of time. We call this a Runway. And the longer your Runway, the more successful your launch will be. And so we started talking about it really like a lot about three or four weeks before we launched. And I was able to announce it, build anticipation, tell everyone I had a secret, and announce it at our live event called Immersion Live. So the next step from here was to announce it to my email list. It is a big audience and I wanted them to not only know about it, but really become co creators with me. So many times we depend on ourselves for good ideas and trying to figure out what our audience wants, when in reality, all we have to do is ask. So what I did was email my audience and I said, I've got a fun announcement and a favor and this is coming. It's something that I've been wanting to do for years. The date is finally on the calendar, but I need your help. Would you please, you know, fill out this survey? So I surveyed them and really many of you got this survey and filled it out. We had maybe 15, 1700 responses of this survey of people sharing with me the questions that they had and the topics that they wanted me to cover. And this for me was just did so many things. Not only did it help me build anticipation, but it also really helped me with idea validation. I was able to sit down and I read personally every single response. And I just started pulling over ideas. Like anytime I read something and I was like, oh, I could talk about that. I would pull it over to a spreadsheet and just make a list of episode ideas. And I walked away from that session with 200 episode titles ready to go. Like, on topics that I'm so excited to talk to you about. And if you can imagine coming into a new platform like this and you just kind of worry like, am I going to be able to do it? Am I going to run out of ideas? Do I have enough to say? Who do I think I am to even do this in the first place? Then walking away from a survey from your audience with 200 episode ideas, I mean, that's almost two years worth of content. It gave me so much validation for just the idea alone. It gave me so much confidence in what we're doing here and why we're doing it. And it got me so excited. And it also, just, side note, just saved me so much mental bandwidth because I wasn't having to sit down and come up with 200 ideas. I was letting you all tell me what you wanted to begin with. And so no matter what your audience size is, the next time that you need the infusion of ideas, you don't know what your next big thing is. You don't know what you're going to teach next. You don't know what you're going to do next. Just ask. Just ask your audience, get them involved. They will feel like a co creator with you and we are truly better together. Okay, so at this point, we're about two weeks out from launch and I am researching my brains out. I'm listening to every podcast on how to launch a podcast that ever was. Shout out to my mentors, Amy Porterfield and Jenna Kutcher, for all of the podcast episodes they've done on how to launch a podcast. And so I've put in hours and hours of research on how to get this thing off of the ground and what I should be even doing in the first place. And so at this point, I've already recorded my trailer, but I knew that I wanted to upgrade my equipment, so I bought a new mic and something called an audio interface. Actually bought this without even knowing why I needed it. Turns out it's what helps your computer, like, read the audio that comes in from your mic. So it's essential. But I've never used any of this stuff before. So in the show notes of today's episode, I'm going to link all of the equipment that I'm using. And just because I've heard other people do this, I decided to record in my closet because I don't have a proper recording studio. And so your closet, if you think about it, full of clothes, is such a great sound barrier. And also it's just weirdly cozy and private and you don't feel like you're Talking into a mic by yourself so much. So far, every episode I've recorded sitting in the floor of my tiny closet, and I just really love that, and I think that it helps the sound quality so much. Okay. The next thing we did was really figure out a flow to the team and a filing system for the raw audio and the edited audio and everything that goes along with an episode, like show notes and transcripts and downloads and imagery and things like that. Now I'm starting this podcast with a team. If I had started this podcast, you know, even five years ago, it would have been just me. And so I might not have had things like show notes and transcripts. I might have just had the audio, and I might have been editing it all by myself. And that would have been okay. It would have been a lot, but it would have been okay. So almost everyone on the team touches something with the podcast at this point. And I also reached out to a podcast editor who's doing all of our editing as well. I'll share their information in the show notes as well. The next thing I did was really outline the first six episodes. So I knew that we wanted to drop five episodes on Tuesday, November 15th, and a sixth episode just two days later. So I needed to batch record all six of them at once. And I wanted to do this to allow you all to have enough quality content to really dive into and figure out whether you liked what I was doing or not. You know, if I had launched with only one episode, it would have taken you a lot longer to figure out whether you wanted to stay tuning in or if you really liked where we were headed. So I decided to launch with five, with a sixth one just two days later. And that gave you enough to really binge, if you will. And that's personally what I love. When someone who I follow announces a podcast, I like to really dig in and listen to several episodes and see what they're all about. Then I recorded some ads. You've probably heard one in this very episode by now. And so we will likely start running ads on the podcast eventually for products that I think you're going to be truthfully, honestly, so excited about hearing about. But for now, I just wanted to share some of the things that I'm doing with you. So you've probably heard me say the podcast is sponsored by me, and I'm just using that as an opportunity to practice sharing with you something that we have going on, a freebie that we've got, a class that we've got, or something like that. And we will probably work on partnering with some of the companies who I love and I recommend all of the time. Anyways, on coming in and being able to share more with you all, you have my word that I will never have an ad on this podcast that I don't personally love and adore. There are so many apps and companies that we work with on a day to day in my business that I'm so passionate about and I can't wait to share more of them with you. Once all of the first six episodes were recorded, I had a meeting with my team. We really ironed out who was going to do what and on what time frame, like how far in advance we needed to have everything turned in. And then it was time to announce this podcast to the world on November 15th. And can I just say, you all showed up. I don't think that I've ever done anything that has been more well received in my life, which makes me think that I wish I would have started this a long time ago. But you know, somewhere in my gut I know that this is the perfect timing because I'm ready for it and you're ready for it right now in this moment. We had over 10,000 downloads of the first drop of episodes in the first 48 hours, which again, it's like I really don't know what I don't know, but that is substantial. That put us ranking at number nine in the charts for art and design. And I just announced to everybody that my goal is to get this podcast on Apple Podcasts new and noteworthy feature. Now I don't know if we'll make it, but that's the goal. And so I've really been blown away. You all have not only shown up, but you've really showed me what this means to you. I have shed tears over the reviews that you all have left on Apple podcast reviews. I've shed tears over emails that you've sent me, over DMs on Instagram, on comments on Instagram posts. I. I honestly can't believe how you have received this show so far and I don't know where we're headed, but I know that it's going to be good. I know that it's going to be so worth it and I'm so grateful to be on this journey with you. I can't even tell you how much I am enjoying this entire process and I'm just so glad that you're here with me now for this episode. I thought you might like a couple of the things that we've done so far. So over on the show Notes Notes. I'm going to share with you what questions I asked my audience in the survey that I sent them. I think regardless of whether you're launching a podcast or not, you might be able to take the questions that I asked my audience and use them, tweak them for your own purpose. Because at the end of the day, surveying your audience, polling them, asking them what they want from you, is the best way to take the next step in the right direction. The next thing I'm going to share with you in our freebie is our episode checklist. So we have a pretty robust episode checklist and everyone on the team I have identified, like who does what and when we do it. So you're going to get our episode checklist and then I'm also going to just include an overview of the steps I've outlined here. Now, don't forget that I am not speaking to you as an expert. I'm speaking to you in very much real time. This is episode number 11, which means that I am only about two weeks into this whole thing. And so the way that I've done it might not be the best way, it might not be the most efficient or smartest way, but it is the way that I got a dream from over two years into action and off of the ground. And so I'm going to outline the steps that I took, knowing that some of them may very well be out of order, but also knowing that some of you will be able to use them for yourself. Head on over to the Show Notes to grab all of that. That URL is professionalcreative.com blog11 and you'll be able to get all of that. Thank you for listening to my very much real time what's going on, what I'm doing, what I know and what I don't know about this whole world of podcasting. And most importantly, thank you for being here. Thank you for showing up. I am truly honored to have you on this journey with me and I will see you next time on the next episode of the Professional Creative Podcast. Sam.