Episode 31: What's keeping you OUT of your sweet spot as a podcast host: How to leverage a VA

Hello. Hello, everyone. Welcome back to Healthy Profits Podcast. I'm your host, Ray Ireland, and today we're going to be diving into an incredible strategy that every entrepreneur should be using if they have a podcast. If you're not using this strategy, I can guarantee that you are losing hours upon hours each week. And more importantly, you're losing the impact that you could be having on thousands of people, especially if you were utilizing the strategic tool of a podcast within your business. So I'm going to be talking about the elements that are needed to bring together a powerful team that is not only supporting in the all the pieces of running a business in having that come together, but is truly standing to be someone that's holding your hand on the mission that you're on and really walking forward with you so you don't have to do it alone as a leader. So what I found is many thought leaders and entrepreneurs end up feeling overwhelmed because they take on way more tasks than what they should be doing. Right? Am I right? And this usually comes out of just this, like, heartfelt sense of having this big vision, having a mission and wanting it to get done and wanting it to get done fast, but also with this very high quality. And so what can happen is when you're running your business, you have all these different pieces, and so, say you add in the podcasting piece, this can become actually more of a daunting situation where it's more tasks that you have to manage, it's more things that you have to get done, it's more time away from your family, away from your health, away from the hobbies and things that you love. And this can become a real tough spot because entrepreneurs feel like, well, I want to make this legacy piece. I want to be making more of an impact in the world and reaching thousands of people using my podcast. But now I'm just exhausted and overwhelmed and I don't know where to go from here. I've even seen a lot of entrepreneurs have this dream of having this incredible show or podcast, and unfortunately, they don't even ever end up starting it. And this is because they go into the whole spiral of what it would take to and they just feel completely daunted by it. So, you know what? I understand this. I was once there. And I think one of the most important things that you can do as a thought leader and as a business owner is to make sure that you are staying in your lanes of genius. And you put up those bumpers so that way you don't get outside of them. And the Fortunate thing is, yes, you have a draw to creating a epic podcast, an incredible show for people to listen to. And that is there for a reason, that pull, that intrigue, it's because there's an element of that where you do get to stay in your genius. But please know that when you are doing a podcast or anything similar to production, there are so many little steps and nuances that you have to know. And so caveat there, when I say you, I mean your team. So that's what we're going to look at today. So I remember when I first started thinking about doing a podcast and I just got into that paralyzed state. I just couldn't even imagine doing it all. And there were so many other things I wanted to focus on. My business was scaling and growing, and I loved it, and I wanted that to keep happening. But I couldn't imagine really taking my eye off the ball of what was most important, which was client delivery and also sales and systems. And so adding in a whole new element just felt really out of place. And I got to say, I tried a few different ways to kind of reason with myself, like, do I go at this alone? Do I do it sporadically? Do I have a team that I invest in? Do I have a production team? Do I have VAs? Like, all of these questions come up, and most of our clients do come to us at the beginning with all these questions and wondering, like, where do I start? Where. Where's a good entry point into the podcast? And we were just talking to a friend earlier today, and we were talking about how sometimes it might feel like the podcast is gonna be the last thing, you know, that I do. That's gonna be my legacy piece. That's gonna be the thing that I play around with and create once my business gets to X, Y, Z. And what I wanna share with you is, actually, I feel like that's a very limiting way to look at things because I think you can actually do so much when you do say, okay, I'm going to start my podcast. And you see that that is actually step zero. That is step zero to this entire line of business, relationships, networking, promotion, support, that you get to give not only people that you know love and trust, but also you get to give this to the world. It's such a large scale. So to do this properly, I just so highly suggest that you make sure that you do have at least one VA in place. And this is something that I got right. I did this right from the start. And I look back and I think to myself, I'm so glad I made that decision. And there's a lot of things that I'm made decisions on in business that I look back and I get to learn from doing it the wrong way. This was one that I really decided from the start and it worked. And I've seen now having our podcast production agency, I see almost all of our clients have at least a VA in place, if not a more robust team, and it works for them. We actually had to create curvetail are what we needed for a client to enter into our network. And we noticed that anyone that didn't have a VA or at least a small team in place, their show would not have the success that they were hoping and dreaming for. Eventually it would be pod fade, where the show would close, it would end. And it just was heartbreaking because we knew that it wasn't about the host, it wasn't about the mission, it actually wasn't even about the strategy. It was purely about the levels of capacity that one person can have. And so if you're taking on a show, if you have this really good idea and you're so excited for it and you're just like dreaming about the concepts and the people that you could bring on, well, I just urge you to really take this episode into account and learn from us in the way where like it's. We're not learning from our mistakes, but I'm learning from seeing people over and over again and seeing what does work, what can happen. When you do bring in a VA and you get clear SOPs, systems of, of operations and playbooks in place, the creative genius within you can get unlocked. And that's such an incredibly exciting place to be because once it's unlocked, your ability to think more robust about the concepts that you're possibly teaching, your ability to create even deeper client satisfaction because you're taking the care and the time to regurgitate what you're learning. Right when we are teaching something, you're learning it again and again and again. And so a podcast is such an incredible place for anyone that is a thought leader to really continue to sharpen their, sharpen their tools as well. And I just know there is some levels of skepticism right where it's like, well, will VA be able to do everything that I'm hoping she could do?

Will I be able to trust this person? These are the problems actually that you want to really be addressing as an entrepreneur, because the main issue is that without the support of a VA and well defined SOPs, there is going to be just so much more weeds that you have to move through and get through to actually put your message out there and make that next step in terms of the presence and the positioning that you have. Your business will grow faster than ever once you start implementing this stuff. So, of course, the solution is to just step over that finish line, right, and say, okay, I'm done with living in this old reality where I have to do everything and be so deeply in control. And I get it, it's so hard, but I'm going to step on the other side, right? And I'm going to delegate, delegate all of the pieces that happen. So one of the cool things that you can do is I think sometimes people think, oh, if I have a production team, then they're going to be doing it all. But there are still some things that you are going to have to do before you take it to the production team. And this is where I learned right from the start, because the first production team that I worked with for my podcast, they didn't tell me I had to have a VA or anything like that, but they did tell me, okay, after you record, you need to drop it here, and you need to let us know if there's any show notes or editing. Da, da, da, da, da. All these different things. And I just thought to myself, what if I don't have to do that? What if I can just very simply share all that information with a VA right after I record the episode while it's fresh in my mind and then have her send everything over? And it's such a release, right? It's a release of control. But when you have a clear system that gets put in place. And of course, the system can change depending on what kind of production agency you're working with, or if you have your own team that's doing the production or whatever that looks like. If you're doing the production, I highly suggest outsourcing that again so you can stay in your lane of genius and writing out just the clear details and the definitions and why it's important, why it needs to be done with a certain level of care and intentionality. And then you get to trust. Right? Of course, I think we're skipping a few steps around, like making a good hire and all of that stuff. I'm going to just trust that we're beyond that. And now we're just in the implementation phase and really finding this beautiful merge and partnership with your va. So some action steps that I believe you can take to get clear in implementing this entire strategy of having a va Having an SOP in place for you, no matter what kind of production you have for your podcast, number one is just to identify the tasks that are needed to be delegated. So like I shared, when the production agency I was working with said, okay, I needed to do these certain steps, I immediately thought, okay, I want to just be the creator. I want to show up and I want to create and talk and be in flow and share my story. And that's about it. So I took all those other tasks and they can become routine if you start doing them, but you don't know how much time is just slipping through your fingertips while you're doing them. These time consuming tasks, even if they're small, add up and so you can determine between those, okay, what actually brings me joy versus what feels like, oh, that's like an extra thing I need to do. Number two is then create SOPs. Of course, if you have an incredible DA or EA that you've been working with, they most likely can just create these themselves as well and then you can follow along. But creating and documenting the step by step process for each task makes it incredibly clear and easy to follow. And the best part is that if that VA or EA ever leaves you, they should be able to train the next hire so easily that you actually don't even need to step in and do any onboarding. That's how clear we want it to be. So step three then would be hire that va, right? Find that reliable person that's going to be there with you. Make sure that they do have the necessary skills for those tasks. So if you do want them to be editing, or maybe you just want to help them manage the shows, make sure they're recorded on time. That's one of the biggest problems we see in our agency is just the presenter, the, the host just kind of missing deadlines because they're so busy doing other things. So just to have someone help follow up on the calendar is super helpful. So of course there are many different platforms and agencies that you can be using. But just remember and remind yourself as the host of your own show, not all of that is necessarily the best thing for you to be holding as your responsibility. So much better to have some other team members. And then number four is of course training your BA or ea. So the training part, I think can be pretty simplified, especially if you have somewhat of an SOP in place, somewhat of a regular system that you're using. One thing you can do is you can actually just do it, do the task that you want to be passing along and record it while you're doing it. You don't need to pretend to do it and then give them that direction. Just two birds with one stone. This is easy. So from there then they have the training videos. Then they can also adjust the SOPs to make sure it is super clear. And I always ask my VAs and EAs and I say, please write it out as if you're going to pass this along to someone else, even if they're not, even if there's no game plan for that, that will help give them the specificity to really write it out in such a clear way. And then lastly, this is where you get to just focus on your genius. So if you had less time doing the managing, doing the, the submitting of the episodes and this and that, and, you know, I really hope you guys aren't doing your own production, terms of editing and all that stuff. Imagine what you could spend your time on. Could you spend your time on researching, finding new incredible guests, pitching yourself to other episodes, other shows? What about really prepping a little bit more for your episodes that you're recording? There's so many other pieces that you can really utilize, not even to mention all of the marketing pieces that you can do outside, but in. In alignment with the episodes, your podcast, and your show. So there's just incredible openness that it creates in order to really give yourself the best leverage to have a truly successful podcast. So I hope you can see there's a little bit of a game plan here that I would love for you to try out, just to see if you can streamline some of your operations and to really keep your focus on what truly matters most, which is showing up, using your voice, telling your story, and getting it out there to the world. This is not only going to enhance your productivity, this is going to enhance your energy, your excitement, your joy in life, which as an entrepreneur is only going to be fueling the mission even more, bringing more joy, more connection to your relationships, possibly even yourself, your health. This is just such an incredible, exciting conversation to have. Truly. Of course, when you're thinking about this, if you're thinking about, okay, how do I do this? What do I do? Another option that I haven't yet mentioned is of course you can hire a whole team to do this, to have this sort of stuff in place. So, for instance, when we have a new client that comes in, like I said before, we suggest, and we actually make it mandatory now that they have at least one VA in place to support them on their podcast journey. Now, when they join, we not only have all the support for that host and the client, but we also have templates and SOPs and examples of all of these different processes and strategies and structures that your VA and EA can actually use, your team can implement. So you can truly stay out of the weeds and just really be in your lane of genius. So of course that's something that unique that we offer at Evolved Podcasting inside our production agency. But I just like really hope that if you are going to be outsourcing, you find someone that is able or company that is able to truly support you on this journey. Because I think there's nothing worse than having a host that is just bogged down by all of the different pieces of podcasting. That is not your job. Your job is to be good and knowledgeable at what you do and then to share it. So let others step in, let others support you, and this is going to guarantee some incredible success for your podcast journey. Thanks for joining and I'll talk soon. Now that was a great episode. Thanks for joining us and tuning in to show the Healthy Profits Podcast. Sammy and I are here to help you turn your health podcast into a treasure trove of opportunity for your listeners and your business. So join us twice a week as we unleash our favorite tips and strategies that have helped our clients at Evolve Podcasting turn their show into a thriving part of their business. And make sure you subscribe and listen in as each episode builds upon each other. And I know that you're a generous leader, so make sure you share this podcast with your fellow wellness entrepreneurs so we can all grow together. Until next time, stay healthy and keep thriving. Bye.