7 Lessons Learned At Social Media Marketing World 2015 - The Podcast Report Episode #39

Seven Lessons Learned from Social Media Marketing World 2015. This is the podcast report episode 39. Show notes, links, conversation and more@thepodcastreport.com 39. It's the podcast Report with Paul Colligan. And here's Paul I just got back from Social Media Marketing World and I have a question for you, my audience. Are you responding to what podcasting is or. Or what you hope it will become? My name is Paul Colligan. I am, well, obviously podcaster, author of a number of books, including the number one top selling how to podcast 2015. The podcast report is the show where we look at what's happening in the podcasting space. We go past the microphones and hosting shootout and go to the stuff that. Well, at least the stuff that I think matters. The audience, my audience. You are a podcaster looking to take podcasting seriously, or someone who's about to dip their toes in the podcasting water and knows that it is more than browser shootouts and that type of thing. This is not a massive play. You'll never see this on the top 10 podcast list anywhere. But it's a deep one. It's my passion. Welcome to the Podcast Report. Now, a number of you I know are listening to this for the first time because we met at Social Media Marketing World 2015 in San Diego, California. What an event. What a great time. For those of you straight podcasters that I met, welcome. Thanks for listening to the show. For those of you who maybe are now pondering podcasting because you picked up the book or conversation we had or one of the whatever reason you're pondering podcasting, welcome as one to the show. Why this topic? Well, I'm back and this show is fresh in my mind. A lot of thoughts and a lot of ideas. I will be honest with you. The results, what I learned, what I saw, wasn't entirely what I expected. This show, some things happened, some things are going on that I kind of knew, but, well, I want to speak to them. We need to learn from these events. When a bunch of podcasters get together and spend some time and spend some cash to figure out what's next, that's always good. And then the other thing is, I'm in podcasting for the long term and I know you are too. So as a result, figuring out our next steps based on what happens is really, really important. So why does this whole topic matter? Why does this show matter? Well, first of all, it's an amazing show. Mike Stelzner does an amazing job. Social Media examiner is a Great entity. What they've done has been really good for the space. And it's always fun to see what Mike is doing, where Mike is going. It's an show in terms of numbers attended and money spent. The ticket price, close to $1,000 to attend, let alone the price of the hotel, let alone the price of getting to San Diego. Everyone there is invested in social media marketing and that's always good. I've enjoyed the hobbyist events, I've enjoyed the enthusiast events, but I want to go to a place where people are invested in the process and you get that at Mike's events and then the attendees are great. Really good indicator the people that are there doing well. Podcasting is an industry. Social media marketing is an industry. We had an event. That's why this matters. So, seven things that I learned. Number one, not necessarily specifically about podcasting, but funny enough with last week's episode and if you didn't catch the podcastreport.com 38, go ahead and catch that YouTube live versus Hangouts. That whole thing is as messy as I thought. If you know me, I've done some work in the YouTube space and live streaming space and I've always felt that the YouTube Hangouts thing was messy. Well, I didn't have permission to share who I spoke with and what I spoke about, so I won't here. But it is as messy as I thought it was. It was as messy as it feels. It's as messy as probably you feel it was. If you are looking to make any sort of long term investment in this space now, be careful. It's changing a lot. I've got, you know, I've been waiting on YouTube strategies 2015 because I wanted to hit this topic dead on and I'm a little bit closer and the book's going to be coming soon, but man, it is messy. And you want to go into this strategically and you want to go in carefully. And it's funny because podcasting is not messy. Podcasting, we know what the formats are, we know who the players are, we know that things aren't going to change. So it was an interesting contrast, if you will. Number two, and this one's interesting. And I want to be careful the way I say this because it could sound like a negative, but it goes back to sort of the big idea that I spoke to. To Are you responding to what podcasting is or what you hope it would become? And here's the deal. The interview format. I've joked. I don't know if I've joked on this show or not. But, you know, I've had people come to me who say one of their biggest obstacles in podcasting is that they can't get interviewees or they can't get interviewed on other shows. As if interviews required in podcasting now. Some people have made it famous. It was great to catch up with John Lee Dumas. John Lee, I know you're listening. Thank you, buddy. It was great hanging out with you, great seeing your work. But interview is not the golden egg. Interview is not the only thing that we could do in podcasting. John's made it popular. A lot of John's students have made it popular. But it's not the only thing that's out there. But what's amazing is there are people who really define podcasting as interviews. And I met this gal named Jessica Rhodes. And Jessica, welcome. I know you're listening here as well. We're gonna have Jessica on a future episode. Jessica runs an organization that actually gets audience or gets interviewees for your show. And either you, if you want to get on somebody else's show, or if you need people for your show. This is what Jennifer does. She's sort of a interview matchmaker, and she's dynamic and she's fun, and I can't wait to have her. But the fact that there's an industry, the fact that people are paying to get positioned on shows, people are paying to get positioned on other shows. And we're not talking, you know, the CBS Evening News or anything like that. You know, we're talking podcasts. And this. This whole interview thing is. Is huge. And I did speak earlier, previous episode, to. To Tim Ferriss and, and Alex Bloomberg from. From Startup and, And how, you know, Bloomberg was kind of realizing that the interview process might be a great format for podcasting. Well, it's huge. It's bigger than I thought. It's become an expectation, and it's just interesting. It's something to continue to follow. I really want to bring Jessica on the show. We're going to try to go deep here. She's making some money on it. Let's probe and figure out what's going on. The next thing I learned, and this one, again, is not a negative, it's just a thing. But podcasting isn't as big in the social media space as I thought I would hoped. I expected more podcasters, and I think a lot of people did. I talked to Mike Stelzer a little bit. I think he expected more. I think other podcasters expected more. A couple of things that were really interesting. John Lee Dumas superstar San Diego local entrepreneur on fire. John Lee his presentation, which was brand new stuff, which was great content. John does that. John brings the goods. John had less people attending his event than Amy from Savvy Sexy Social, which is a YouTube play. And Amy had almost twice as many people now. Amy was great too. I loved having her there. But I don't know, I expected John's one of the biggest, if not the biggest, in podcasting. He brought half of somebody from YouTube when I went to bring my books to the bookstore. The bookstore gal had remembered me from past events and she said, oh, is this all you have of the books? And she said, I could sell hundreds of these because I think she really believed that she could. Now John ended up giving his book away for free. So that probably played with it. But we didn't sell hundreds. We sold about four dozen of the books and not a big deal. I'm not there to sell the books and there's a lot of opportunities to buy the books, but the expectation for who was going to be there versus who was was just kind of different. So there we go. Podcasting isn't as big in the social media space as I would have hoped. Now I think it's going to be bigger at podcast exp. Sorry, at podcast movement. Right now. My current plan is not to attend new media Expo, and that's not any sort of social statement. It's just a logistics issue. So I'm not gonna be able there to speak with others. But podcast movement should be fun. Okay. The next thing, people still don't know why they're in podcasting, and people don't know why they want to be in podcasting. I spoke to people who are podcasting. I asked them what are they expecting to get, and I sort of got the shrug. I thought it would be fun. I talked to people who said I really want to start podcasting. I asked them what do they want to do, and I got the shrug. And there are a lot of people doing this and they don't know why. And we've got to figure that out as an industry, because whenever you don't know why you're doing what you're doing, it doesn't work. Well, that hasn't changed. We got to fix that. One in the says assumptions are strong. There are some real assumptions about podcasting that are not standard, are not gospel, are not doctrine. But there are so many people who believe and interviewing is one of them. But there's just these ideas that are going out and they're so strong that at some point they're just going to become reality. I've kind of tried to fight them in the past, but I'm almost wondering if we should just embrace them and deal with them and refine them. A lot of the breakout sessions, a lot of the people I spoke with, it was just interesting to realize how strong certain assumptions are about podcasting. Interviewing is definitely one of them, but there were others and I just wanted to share that with you. Now, with that said and done, the industry is maturing. The guys from Copyblogger just launched the Rainmaker Network and they have their professional hosting platform. I spoke with Brian a lot. I spoke with Chris a little bit. I think I said hi to Darren. They have launched their network, they have launched their platform. They have done it right. They're doing it intelligently. Hats off. I'll definitely put a link to that in, in the show notes. It's maturing, it's doing well. The other thing that was interesting was there was a panel on the future of podcasting and the I was involved a little bit with a launch of a podcast project for a well known media entity, shall we say, and it did not go well. And I've been kind of a bit of down on where professionals are entering into podcasting and you know, the podcast one guys, I was curious to hear what they had to say and man, top of it, doing incredibly well, doing things right on. The industry is maturing, the industry is getting better. And then the last thing I learned, and this one's really interesting, money spent does not equal business focus. And I think this is one train for me. Just because somebody spends a lot of money on a microphone or somebody spends a lot of money on a training program or somebody spends a lot of money doesn't necessarily mean that they're in it for the business reasons. They're in it for focus. One of the things that was most interesting was I spoke with a lot of people who'd attended Podcast Movement, which I did not attend last year, and I definitely will be there this year. And what was funny was apparently there were a lot of people who were upset at the business focus and the business attention of the movement event and that they didn't have the hobbyist stuff, which I thought was interesting based on the price and the expenditure that people would have to spend to get out there. So the Podcast movement, interesting. And then some participants. There were a number of people who were just kind of podcasting for the heck of it, for the fun of it. And I love enthusiasts and I love people who want to do that kind of thing. I always say the best marinara sauce in the world is made by some grandma somewhere for her family of like 14. But you know, when I want a good pasta dish, I'm glad there are restaurants who are willing to do it for pay. And money spent doesn't equal business focus. A lot of people there just having fun. A lot of people there just having a good time. And that was interesting. That was eye opening for me. So again, what I learned really quickly, the YouTube Hangouts thing is as messy as I thought. The interview as format is bigger than I thought. Podcasting isn't the big social media space that I would have hoped. People don't know why they're podcasting. There are still some really, really strong assumptions. The industry is maturing, but money spent does not equal business focus. So what am I doing? Well, a couple things I'm doing, there's things in my own business which will hit on other episodes, but I'm really taking this to podcast movement. I'm really using this to kind of focus what I'm going to do with my presentation of podcast movement. I sketched a lot of ideas, had a lot of fun. I have a link up to a thread I started in Google groups about what? I'm sorry, I would say Google groups. That's old Google communities. I've got a link. So if you go to the podcastreport.com 39, you can link out there about what podcasters need. And I'm going to take these assumptions and these realizations and speak to that at my event. I'm certainly the business podcasting guy and I will certainly focus on that part of the world, but I'm going to take these things into account and should be good. And I'm still sketching things out, working on things. Some things you can do in this space. Number one, you know, are you responding to what podcasting is or what you hope it will become? You know, I never thought certain things would get big, but we've got people building businesses around them. You know, I've got people waiting for things to happen while other things are happening that are doing really, really, really well. You know, the podcasting space is what it is and I don't really care if you like that or if you don't like that. You have to play to it and you have to understand what it is and you need to be a student of this space. There's been some things that I just thought weren't as big as they are, and they are and assumptions that are becoming reality. And so are you working with what podcasting is or what you hope podcasting will become? Know why? And then one thing I would do is I would really encourage you to question your assumptions. If you're assuming certain things about the space. If you're assuming certain things about podcasting, that's fine and dandy. But ask why you're assuming. Is it because a lot of other people believe it's that way, or is it because it is that way? And then finally, I really encourage Please submit to my thread about the biggest need for podcasters, because I think this is a dialogue that will begin. I mean, who knows, maybe it is an international directory of people to interview for your podcast or that type of thing. But things you can do respond to what it is. Ask yourself, are you responding to what podcasting is or what it is you hope it will become? Question your assumptions, not just the monetization ones. Why do you assume certain things about podcasting? Where does that come from? Is that healthy? Is that a good space? And then finally, do submit to my thread about the biggest thing podcasters need, because I would love to do what I can to maybe do some connection. So that's this episode of the podcast report. Thank you so much. Social we are@the podcastreport.com Twitter thepodcastreport.com Facebook thepodcastreport.com all the old familiar suspects. If you'd like to get my mind map for today's episode, go ahead and text EP39 to the show hotline at 503-897-1290. The three links I have out at today's episode, it won. If you go to the podcastreport.com 39 that'll take you there. The three links I have is the link to the new book Doing well, Fun. We're getting some great reviews. So far, only five star reviews, which is a lot of fun. Number two, a link to the thread of the biggest thing the podcasters need. I would love you to submit to that. And then I've got a link to the Copy Blogger Podcast Network because what they're doing is really, really, really nice. Very cool. If you've not yet subscribed to the podcast report, please do so. Podcasting's power is in the ability to subscribe, the ability to click a button, get a new episode every time it comes out. Right now, my subscribers, this episode's coming out a little bit later today, they know to expect me they know it's coming. Spam doesn't get in the way and you can have the same thing. Subscribe to the show. We are@thepodcastreport.com iTunes if you're using one of those iOS devices. Stitcher, if you're in that world or maybe in the car. Pocketcast seems to be a very popular one for the Android community. TuneIn, Spreaker, iHeartRadio, Overcast. We are there. We are at all of those places. If you want to email me, it's the podcastreportoutlook.com if you want to review level one at iTunes or Stitcher, that's it. I've spoken enough. Thank you so much. Talk to you next week. Bye.