Are You Treating Podcast Guesting Like a Hobby Instead of Marketing? - Tom Schwab

Nobody wants to be a podcast guest. That's an activity. It's a hobby. What they want is the results that come from that. Anybody that says it's easy has never done it or never done it well. Right. It's the great ones that make it look easy. Well, your time is valuable. You don't want to look like this desperate, thirsty guest that will talk anywhere. Have meaningful conversations in places that raise your profile and talk about different things. I believe we're one conversation away. The best things in my life has come through conversations.

Tom, we're back for round number two. It's only been, what, five, six years? Something like that?

Well, I was going to say it was before COVID Right. It was just before COVID And the world has changed so much since then. And while there's a lot of problems today, I still say there is no better time to be alive.

Oh, I. I couldn't agree more. I mean, it's interesting times. It's uncharted territory with everything that's happening in the world. I feel like I don't need to label all the stuff, but we're all feeling it. I wouldn't. Yeah, I want to be in it. You know, like, it's great to be here, but it's.

If we went back and listened to what we were talking about last time, right? We would. If we. If at that time, we would have known the world we live in, what we have here, right, we would have thought, oh, my gosh, we won't have a care in the world. Right? Of all, with AI and everything else, the tools that we have, we got to remind ourselves just how lucky we are here. And like I said, there is no better time to be a business owner.

That's right. Absolutely. And what's really cool is I feel like the two of us have done similar things for a long time and, you know, been in media, podcasting has been this thing in our hearts and everything we've done in business, I feel like over well over a decade, and I mean just to your horn a little bit, what you're just telling me now you're over seven. You've helped booked over 75,000 interviews for other people, and that's over a decade. You've done a thousand of your own. I've not done that many. I've done, what, 700 some odd shows here episodes, and I've definitely been a guest, but, like, that's incredible.

Being a host is so much harder. Right. Anybody that says it's easy has never done it or never Done it well, right. It's the great ones that make it look easy. But when we both started out, you know, we'd say, we've got a podcast or dimension podcast. And people say, what's that? Yeah, right. We started in 2015, and for the first three years, I give my elevator pitch and people would shake their head and say, what's a podcast? Well, then about 2018, 2000. Yeah, about 2018, when all of a sudden you could just download podcasts to your phone, right. It took off. And then in 2020, when Covid hit, right, just after we had seen ourselves, seen each other for the. In person, right. All of a sudden, big business figured it out because they'd come to us and say, you know, we've got a travel budget, we've got a conference budget, and we still have to get to people, our clients. How do we do that? So podcast interview marketing worked there. And fast forward to about the end of 2023, there was no doubt that podcasts were starting to get indexed by AI. And, you know, today, if you want to get recommended by the, the AI engines out there, the large language models, they're indexing podcast interviews and that's the content they're drawing on. So it's interesting, while the, the theme of what we're doing is the same, the power of it is so much greater. Right. Today we're not only talking to our ideal clients, we're talking to the AI that's referring them also.

That's absolutely true. It's. It's interesting because yes, you've done the consistent thing of getting people booked on shows. I mean, really, your company, Interview Valet, has done that for a decade. I mean, you are literally, you were the goat, the greatest of all time in this whole thing. And I say that in complete sincerity because whenever I hear people like, oh, I use, you know, like, oh, here's the service that I use for, you know, getting booked. And, you know, I'm talking to some of the biggest coaches and all that stuff. It's your name I hear. I'm like, oh, yeah, I know, Tom. So when it comes to, yeah, guesting on shows, like, I would love to hear, I guess.

How so?

I almost have like a definition in my mind of how I see it and the value prop and all that. It's interesting that, like, you know, the value or the benefits kind of change over time because of the world. But I guess, like, how would you define what podcast guesting is? You know, what you guys help people do? And then also, yeah, I Guess the power of that over maybe some other types of marketing.

Yeah. And I'm going to push back a little bit on that because you say podcast guesting.

Yeah.

More and more, I see what most people are doing with podcast guesting. It's a expensive hobby. That's called marketing, Right. It's. It's just activity, Right. And it's this idea of nobody wants to be a podcast guest. That's an activity. It's a hobby. What they want is the results that come from that. And so we really look at it as podcast interview marketing. And, you know, with any company, it's like, what problem do you solve? Let's start with that. And today, I think, you know, the world has changed, but it's still the same. In order for somebody to work with you, they have to know, like, and trust you. Right. And especially the bigger the ticket, the sale, the more it's a service where people are betting on the jockey. They have to know, like, and trust you. And for the longest time, people were talking about, well, how do you break through the noise? And so many people now are adding to the noise, saying, well, I'll get noticed. Well, you might get that. No, you might even get that. Like, but if you don't have that trust, you're not going to get the conversions. So the idea behind podcast interview marketing is that you get to get introduced by the authority, right? No one jumped on this podcast today and said, wow, I can't wait to listen to Tom Schwab. They're like, no, I like Joe. I like Hustle and Flowcharts. Right? I'm going to go there. And when you introduce me, there's that transfer of authority, right? You vouched for me. Just in case. Just like if we were at a event and it was your stage and you invited me to be there, there's that transfer of authority. So instantly you get that authority and that trust. Then you get to talk with people for an extended period of time. And I always say people should do one of two things. Turn you up or turn you off. Either one is fine. Because at the end of the day, we don't need more leads. Right. Leads cost you money to work, Right. You want to be optimizing for value, for impact, because that's what drives profits. So you want somebody to say, oh, yes, this is the person for me, and come and, you know, better leads to close faster for a higher initial amount. If you're not for them, well, let them know that early on, because that way they don't waste their time or your time. So ultimately, the big goal is better leads the close faster for a higher initial amount. But there's so many spinoffs from it, right? Social media, followers, content to repurpose. It opens up speaking opportunities. Right. You can launch books, launch podcasts through podcast interviews. The brand authority, the thought leadership. And then what we talked about before, you know, you get SEO value from the backlinks, right. If, if anybody, if your clients are still using SEO. But the big thing also is AI, right? AI is listening to this, indexing it, so you're getting heard by your ideal clients and the people and the AI that refers them. So that's the problem we're trying to solve. And more and more every year that goes on, it becomes more powerful.

Well, that's what I'm feeling now is, you know, it's. Podcasting has had so many different flavors over the years now, you know, and you see it showing up on different platforms and in different ways. You know, you have, you know, Apple, Apple podcasts, or before that was, you know, itunes and all that stuff and Spotify. Now YouTube is taking a big charge in podcasting, and who knows where it's going to go from there. But it seems like the, that the power of being a guest and being a guest on someone else's platform, I've always seen it as like, all right, this is someone else's stage, and I get to go in these virtual stages. If you're doing it that way or in person. And now, like you said, you're edified. You're having them now present you as the authority for whatever reason why you're there, they blow you up. And then even if someone ever knew of you, they're just like, oh, wow, okay, if, if it's the right thing for them, they're going to lock in. And the no like and trust factor, being the human, you know, I feel like being an actual human, not a cloned human. We'll talk about kind of the tech and the AI stuff, but I'm kind of curious of. Yeah. Your thoughts on how maybe it's even all these other benefits that happen on the human side of things. Like when you're doing, like you said, you get to have a conversation with someone. Yeah. The host. So, like, what are some other things that we might not be thinking about today?

Every time I see something, my first thought is, is this AI generated? Right. And if it is, that's fine, just let me know. But if it is it, if you make. Make me believe that it's not AI And I find out it is. It destroys all trust. And I think we all look at emails and go, oh, this is AI generated. Right. Joe would never call me Thomas. Right. So if an email comes and says, dear Thomas, well, that was scraped from somewhere, right. Or I pick up my phone now and there's that just, is this a real person or is this AI? And I think it can destroy trust very, very quickly. And so I think it's important to acknowledge what's AI and what isn't. And people gravitate towards long form collaborative content. Right. Listening in on a conversation. Right. I, I don't know that I want to listen to a blog that has been made. Right. And the thing is today is that something scale and some things don't. Right. And I can, I can send a million emails in the time we've been talking up to this point. Very efficient, but not very effective. Right. The same way I could probably write a million blogs in the time we've been talking.

Absolutely.

But it's efficient, but is it effective? And so I think podcasts and especially podcast interviews is that nice way that it's effective, but it's also efficient because this is the same conversation you and I would be having one on one, if we were talking on, you know, zoom, if we were having a beer, if we were having a cup of coffee. And this is this way that we can capture it and share it with the world and throughout time. Right. I've. In 2024, I had a new client that came from an interview that I did in 2018. And what was so amazing is the first question that they had was, hey, when did you grow the beard? And I was thinking December of 2019. But they had listened to the podcast, they had actually was Jamie Masters eventual millionaire. And they'd watch the video and so when they jumped on with me, they didn't know when it was recorded. It was evergreen. And so they were just shocked by, hey, you grew a beard.

Yeah, just overnight.

That's right.

Yeah, that's. It's incredible. And that's the beauty of podcasts. Like, that's why like even have my library of episodes I save still. Like, there's some that really take off still. And they're consistently listened. And that's I'm sure from all the referral traffic and SEO and maybe AEO now. But to your point, like you're so actually I'm going to ask you about something that you brought up prior to us chatting here is you've done like a thousand of these so you have a lot of just you personally, thousand different guest interviews, you on other people's shows and other media, and you were kind of basically saying more is not the answer. Right? So what's the thinking that we need to shift here?

Early on I was almost embarrassed now that my thought was we'll just do more, right? It's a numbers game. Just get out there and keep talking about the same thing. And it makes no sense from an efficiency or an effective standpoint. You know, if you believe that, just go to Times Square and talk to start talking to people. Sooner or later you're going to find your ideal customer. And that sounds ridiculous. So you've got to be much, much more targeted. And now I'm trying to do more with every interview instead of just doing more interviews. It's something that we, we've been preaching for years while the market is just saying it's a numbers game. Just, just do more interviews. It's like, no, your time is valuable. You don't want to look like this desperate, thirsty guest that will talk anywhere, have the meaningful conversations in places that raise your profile and talk about different things. And what always used to frustrate me is that there's great conversations that have been had over the years. I don't go back and index them. I don't think people are going back and indexing them. And while there was that content that somebody may, may stumble across, heck, my team is not even going back and finding those, right? And it was just, that's the way it is. And now through the, the wonders of technology, you can go back and you can pull that up, right? I can. We did a search one time, we were trying to do a clip. And so we said, Tom, you know, routinely says my microphone makes me sound good, my team makes me look good, right? And we went in there and said, what podcast did he say that on? What time? Right? And within five, 10 minutes, it pills picked up probably 30 different podcasts and said, here's where you can get all the clips, right? That would have taken an intern, a mind numbing months to do. And so that exists. And now even with a platform like Delphi AI, that blows my mind that you could take all of that content, put it in there and you don't have to listen to all the interviews. Just ask my, you know, AI clone a question and it'll go back and you know, after that thousand hours of me talking, somewhere in there is your answer.

That's it. I mean, that's a little plug. Yeah. Your, your Clone is living on your website somewhere right now. We'll put links to it because like you said, there's all this content that you personally have made, and now the fact that you've kind of done the work to publish all this material, it's out there. And you've said probably a lot of the same stuff, but there's unique things everywhere as well. And to uncover that manually would be almost impossible if you're looking for. But now, like you mentioned, Delphi, since you brought it up, we did recently clone you, and it's freaking awesome. I mean, it's what, almost 2 million words in there? And we've just started two days ago.

It is amazing. And it's. We do a lot with category design, right? And once you see what the world could be, it's hard to ever go back and say, why would we ever go back? Right? Once you see the problem and that idea of me telling someone, oh, yeah, I've done a thousand interviews. Just. Just listen to them. It's like, what ideal client is going to say, oh, I. I am so interested that I'm going to spend a thousand hours, right? I'm going to spend the next six months of my life just listening to your podcast interviews. It's like, no, just let me ask the question and you give me the answer. And I love it, too, because just the same way podcast interviews are scalable, this search is scalable, too. And, you know, one of the things you've heard me preach for years is I reject this idea that we're all one funnel away, right? I'm an engineer, I'm a big fan of automation. But this idea that we're all going to be put through funnel is. Is dehumanizing, right? I believe we're one conversation away. The best things in my life has come through conversations. Now, this is a way that allows people to have conversations with me at mass, right? It's like, well, it's not actually you, but I'll give you an example. And I don't want to keep rambling on here. Over Thanksgiving weekend, I found out that one of my favorite authors, great guy by the name of Al Ramadan, had an AI clone, right? I've talked with Al before, had him on my podcast. And, you know, if I had a quarter of a million dollars, I could hire his agency. But I was able to, in an hour on a walk on vacation, have a conversation with this AI clone. And, you know, he asked me the questions. It was in his voice with the Australian accent. And we had this Great conversation. And at the end I get a transcript of it and you look at that and say, that is amazing. And I talked with them afterwards and said, you know, well, what's the monetization? And some people monetize it, some people don't. And like he pointed out, here's a way that he can help people doesn't cost them any time or money. And, you know, not every entrepreneur helps a quarter of a million dollars to talk with them.

And I want to kind of double click on the whole conversation. You know, you're one conversation away because even prior to me, I've heard you say that before, but I've been. The way I think about cloning is that it's like a conversation funnel. So I'm kind of like actually molding the two in a way. But you're absolutely right. It's. It's to increase the engagement. It doesn't take away the human side because I think, you know, as automation, all this stuff happens with AI and all this tech, the, the most valuable thing of everything that's left are the humans. It's human connection. It's this, it's the experience virtually that we can have like you and I here right now, but also through podcasts, through people listening and watching, but also in person. And then, you know, the tech can help us create the. Almost like the engagement so more of the right people find the real us. I mean, there's so many other nuances here, but that's where I like to lean into the human side of all this tech. It's like, I'm happy about the tech. I'm really more happy about how do we have more of these valuable or like really rich conversations, not surface level stuff. And it's with the right people.

Yeah. And I really believe we're going into a conversation economy for, for a brief period of time, we were forced to type. Right. So the only way I could send you an email was to type you an email. The only way that I could communicate with the computer was to type. Right. Typing was one of those skills that you could not get through life with. And I think you're going to look back in, in history and go, what is that? Well, that's a keyboard. Why would you use that? Right now I have found myself that I have the computer read stuff to me because it's so much easier. Whisper flow. I started to use that a few months ago and it's so much easier just for me to do a random rant and communicate that way. And so I think all of a sudden we're going back to conversations just like we used to be. Because technology would slow us down, right in the days of the telegraph. Well, you better know Morse code in order to communicate and you better make it very, very brief and correct and precise because it's so expensive. And it was the same thing with typing and all the rest of this. And so I see it more going to a conversation economy and you know, science fiction often tells us what the future looks like. And I think of no one on Star Trek was ever typing. You know, they actually talked to the computer which was a hologram or what was the, the. My God, that the. The movie HAL was the computer. Now HAL took over. It was not a good thing. But everybody just talked to Halloween, right? And it was Space Odyssey, that same thing. And to me it's like we used to talk to each other all the time before computers and before technology. And now we get to go back to that.

We get. I feel like there's. You're spot on top. I couldn't agree more with the whole everything. I feel like there is going to be this almost transition period where people are trying to figure it out, right. Like maybe over index on the automation side of things. If you're a business owner, if you're someone like that, super interested in it. And there's probably going to be some pushback I would imagine from people who are not so keen on automations. So there's going to be kind of like this little. Who knows what happens in the in between. But overall I feel like, yeah, the human connection, I bet my money there. That's where I feel like the true wealth is going to be in the long run, you know.

And I think the people that are honest and transparent about it are the ones that it builds trust. And great example here, Eddie Yoon. He's one of the category pirates, great author. I listened to all of his things, right, and it's his voice reading it. But at the very beginning he's like, this is Eddie Yoon's AI voice. He doesn't try to pass it off. And if he didn't I would never know the difference. Until he got to that point where he started talking about lead generation in marketing. And I'm like oh, lead generation. And I just sort of had to laugh at it. And it's like okay, AI is close. But if, if he would have put it out that this is really me, I would have thrown the BS flag and lost trust. Instead it was like, it was really neat and it made me Smile. It's like, it's close to Eddie, but it's not Eddie.

Yeah. And that's the best way to do it. It's like you're not duping to anybody. And that's the problem with, you know, you go to TikTok, Instagram, all these other socials. Yeah. Like you said earlier, you have to decipher what's real, what's not. And I'm sure we'll see a crackdown on, you know, or tightening up labels of this stuff. And you kind of starting to see it already. But that's where. Yeah, that's. That's the. I don't know, it's tricky. You know, we're in this, like, murky phase right now where everybody's experimenting and throwing stuff out there. So it's just so much noise. Yeah. I genuinely think, like, what you're doing with Interview Valet and getting folks to not only see it as a hobby to go on other shows and. But you're actually using it for a purpose. There is marketing, whatever agenda it is, but with intention behind it as well.

Now I'm gonna. I'm gonna do a plug for our podcast.

Please check.

Check out the episode with Joe Fear. And because he did something that has never been done on our podcast or I've never seen done. Right. We always teach people at the end of the podcast, you know, give them one place to go, give them, you know, multiple ways to. To connect with you, and it's always go to this page, download this, jump on my calendar, get a free copy of my book. But it was almost like the conversation stopped at the end of the podcast and it didn't start again until there was a discovery call. And Joe, you were able to go there and say, listen, if you want to talk to me, talk to my AI clone. Come here. No matter what day of the week it is, what. What time of day, you can talk to me, and it's my AI. And you were very clear about that. Or, you know, if you want to talk to me or my team, one on one, real people go here and we'll schedule a time. And going back to what I preached of, we're one conversation away. We were never able to do that before. It was, well, we're a conversation and then a PDF and a form, and then we'll get back to a conversation. Right. But now what you're able to do is like, let's keep this conversation going.

I'm happy you said that because you've obviously seen a lot of these. You Literally do it for over the last decade is get folks geared up and ready to be their best self on other people's platforms. Right. So part of that whole thing is to have, have a place we could direct people to after the conversation ends. I mean, that's marketing one on one or, you know, direct response, you know, So I, when you said that, I was like, really? Like no one else has ever done this. Like, that's wild to me.

What. And even that somebody's going to listen to this five years from now and say, why would the conversation end?

Right, right.

I always think, you know, I went back later in life and got my MBA and, and I spent way too much time, way too much money. My grandfather, God rest his soul, could have told me what marketing was. Right. Marketing was starting a conversation with somebody that could be an ideal client or ideal customer. Right. That's what marketing is. And there's this idea of, well, we'll start the conversation, then we're going to end it, then we're going to nurture them and do this and send them in a follow up sequence and then all our whole goal is to get them on a call so we can talk with them. And it's like from a 30,000 foot view. Why would you stop it? Why don't you just continue the conversation?

That's right, yeah. And make it easy. The whole thing is to try to reduce friction across the board through life and engage with people where they want to chat with you. You know, like, try to make it there. Text, video, audio, whatever it might be. You know, just try to figure out how to mold that to keep the friction away because that's where things fall apart. And I mean, your grandfather's absolutely right. And Tom, I was thinking, okay, so to kind of wrap this up, I want to make it super actionable with like how you would. So let's say someone wants to like. All right, all right. I really want to get on other podcasts and other media to, to their stages, if you will. What's like a quick do this? Make sure to maybe start with like the don'ts. Like absolutely don't do these things. But what are the key things you would recommend folks to do to best make the time, the most time of that experience on.

I would say start with the end in mind. Why are you doing this? Right. If it's for an ego or a hobby, that's fine. But most people are doing it because they want to use it to build their brand, build their business. Okay, so with that in mind, you can't say enough of the right things to the wrong people. So who are the right people? Right? So who do you want to talk to? And they're not all listening to the Joe Rogan podcast, right? So bigger is not better. Find the shows that they listen to. And sometimes you can do that by just asking AI. There's a lot of databases that we license that will tell us that information. But, you know, you just put yourself in the shoes of that, your ideal client. So think about that. The other thing is, we were talking before about if something's effective or efficient. So so many people will come back and say, well, here's my list of a thousand podcasts to go after. Well, why don't you pick five, right? Listen to them. Give the host a rating and review, right? I guarantee you, we're all vain. We all look for our name, right? So if you leave a rating and review, they'll know who you are. And then you reach out and you say, engage with them on social media. Share the content, give, give, give. Then reach out to them and say, hey, I've listened to the podcast. I love it. You know that guest you had, Tom Schwab? A little bit weird, but that's okay. Then give them value. You know, I would like to share this with your audience, or I think this would be helpful, right? If you keep giving, people will ask you to be on the show. So that's how you get your foot in the door, right? And you don't have to reach out to a thousand podcasts. Podcasters know podcasts, right? If you get on one show and do a good job, at the end, after they've stopped recording, just say, I really enjoyed this. You know, I'd like to do more of this. Do you know anyone else? If they introduce you to two more people, your dance card is going to get filled really quickly. So that's how to get on the show. Or you can hire an agency and just be the guest, right? Once you get on the show, start with the end in mind. Think about, what do you want people to know? What do you want them to feel? What do you want them to do afterwards, right? Just don't go on there and talk about my story, right? Nobody cares about your story. We're all selling Preparation H, right? Hemorrhoid cream. Nobody cares about our product or service. They care about the pain in the rear end. So think about that on what you share. And then at the end of the interview, most hosts are going to say something like, so, Joe, how do people get in touch with you or. So, Joe, any final words? Right. Make it easy for people, send them to one place, but give them multiple ways to say to. To opt in. Right? So when Joe said on the podcast interview marketing show, he's like, just go to the website and you can talk with me with my AI clone. Or if you'd like to have a discussion, right, you can find the time on the calendar, give them an either or. This shouldn't be a landing page, a squeeze page where it says, you know, either sign up or don't. Just move them along in that conversation. And, and, you know, if we can be any help with that, just there's. I was going to say there's lots of information out there. And by the time you hear this, you'll be able to talk with my AI clone thanks to Joe and his great team, and you'll just be able to ask the questions.

Love it. Love it. So, Tom, where's the place that people should go? And I'm going to ask you that question. Where should they go?

Yeah. And so if, if for no other reason, go here to see how you should build your welcome page, right? Send them to one place. So for us, it's Interview valet with a V.com forward slash hustle, right? For hustle and flow charts, interview valet.com forward slash hustle. When you get there, you're going to see Joe's picture. Joe's your friend. That's the transfer of authority. Everything we talk about is going to be there, and then there'll be the, you know, my social media. But most importantly, there's going to be my AI clone. If you would like to talk with me or my AI clone that will be there. I wrote a book. If you want a copy of the book that will be there, I'm happy to send it to you or same way Joe did it. If you'd like to talk with me, you know, one on one to see how we could work together on this, I'll put my calendar, scheduling link there. So tell them where to go, tell them what they find there, and then tell them where to go again. So all of that is@interview valet.com hustle.

Well, Tom. Yeah, just. This is. This is great. You always, I mean, I learned a few things that I should be doing better on guesting, but also just making the most of the stuff that we've already created. So, you know, when we follow your. Your path, like you just said there, I mean, it's literally creating the best type of content. So. And all this Stuff's evergreen. It's not going anywhere for a very long time. No matter what's happening with AI, it's still going to be around there.

Yeah.

Thank you very much. What is. I mean, you might. You might have already said what you're excited for, but sometimes I like to. I'm curious, like, in the next year or so, is there something that you're just super excited to. To put out into the world or something that you're paying attention to that's just top of mind?

I'm working on a manifesto called the Conversation Economy. And Christopher Lockhead did a post recently, and then he had a guest. The guest was Rick Bennett, who is like one of the great copywriters out there. And he said something that struck me. He said, God hates the coward and the market ignores them. I'm like, oh, what's worse? To be hated by God or to be ignored by man? Right. And so that. That really struck me. And then Christopher put something out that most companies don't have a marketing problem. They have a courage problem to say what they believe in, who. What they do, all the rest of that. So that's the thing that I'm really trying to get to do for next year. Right. Put it. Put it out there. If you don't like me, that's fine. My wife loves me, my grandkids love me. That's good enough for me. But just trying to be very bold in what I say. Not to. Not to be offensive, but to be clear.

I love it. Yeah. Because it's up to us, and that's the human side. You know, have the courage and get out there. I think that's how we make the biggest connections with the right people anyway, is when we're bold and courageous. So I can't wait to read it. Conversation Economy when it's out. So I'll be looking for that 2026.

The. The initial manifesto should be out in Q1, and then almost like the same way the category pirates are doing. I'm just going to keep releasing small portions of it and then someday put it together in a book.

Right on. Awesome. Well, it's very timely. Tom, I appreciate you a ton, man.

Sa.