Tracy Hazzard (host of The Binge Factor and Feed Your Brand) gives advice on how podcasters should listen to success interviews and podcast-for-podcaster shows to improve their own shows. Key points: prioritize podcasts whose perspective matches your goals (these shows focus on business/monetization), research a host’s core business and links to understand their agenda, beware of hidden advantages (large platform, email lists, paid promotion) that make some success tactics non-transferable, listen to episode closes for cautions and implementation tips, and use the episode blog and site search (bingefactor.com, potatoes.com) to find and apply concrete tactics.
Chapters
Wish you were one of those influencers with raving fans who binge on your every word, consume all your content, buy everything you have to sell, and demand even more. Then stay tuned while Authority magazine columnist and buzzfeed contributor Tracy Hazzard shares strategies, tips and tactics from top videocasters, podcasters, authors and social influencers on creating that bingeable factor. Now let's join Tracy as she explores how to rise above all noise with the binge factor.
Hey, everyone, Tracy Hazard here from the Binge Factor and Feed your brand. This is going to be a crossover episode amongst both. It's just me going solo today to talk to you quickly about ways in which you can learn more from the podcast and improve your show. Right. We want to learn on a podcast about podcasters or a podcast for podcasters, right? We want to maximize what we can learn and what we should apply from there. But we also need to filter some of that. So I really want to talk about that because this is things I hear again and again from my clients and I hear it again and again from you guys in the audience that I'm hearing this sort of trying to decide whether or not this applies to my show. And so I really think that that's important to put everything into context. So if you're listening to Feed your Brand, that is Tom Hazard and my podcast about tactics and strategies for business podcasters. So if you've got a entertainment style show, our advice may not always be right for you. Now, there's some advice that's universal, like how to fix your description on itunes and Apple podcasts, Spotify and all those places. That's a universal bit of advice, right? But when we talk about show structure, that probably doesn't apply to you. So really think about the context of how we're whoever's podcast you're listening to, right? What their driver is for you. So we are really focused on business podcasters, people who want to make money off their podcast. Now, they're not necessarily making money solely in the advertising way, which is also something you need to construct and put into context. Because a lot of times we're advising people to not advertise too soon, to not do this in. But if it's solely your model, you may not want to listen to that, right? That may not be the way you want to go. So we have just a different perspective and our show is set in that perspective. So keep that in mind when you're listening to shows out there, what is their perspective? And so often I get it where I Have somebody who comes on the binge factor or I have somebody who, who listens to feed your brand, who reaches out to me and doesn't understand that I have the core business that we, Tom and I are the founders of Potatoes. Right. So if you don't understand what their core business is, you don't understand what's driving the purpose of the podcast. Right? So put that into context, do a little research, check out their website, simply click through they everything should be in their profile for their podcast. If it's not, then they're not doing a very good job of setting up their podcast. And that may be a sign that you don't want to work with them. Right? Because if they can't properly link through, let's say you're going to get a coach who's advising you on marketing and yet they don't have a proper link through from their podcast on the app to their website, then they don't truly understand podcast marketing. Right? They don't truly understand one section of the media. And that's a red flag right there. They don't get it. They're not following their own advice to other people. They're not paying attention to this. This isn't important to them. And if these details aren't important to them, then maybe they're not going to take good care of you. And so this is something I would push back and I'd ask questions, especially if you think you do want to work with someone. So looking through these things and getting that perspective is essential in the process of sort of evaluating like, am I getting an agenda that doesn't match my goals, doesn't match what I want to do. I say that all the time here. We are not necessarily for the story entertainment type podcasts. We're not always going to give you the best advice for that. If you want that, maybe come on and do a hot seat because I can tailor our advice specifically for you. Right. I can get into what you're really your goals and the way that your show runs and I can get into more detail there and make sure that we're advising you properly through that. And hopefully there'll be some other people who have that search style podcast who will be able to learn from that. That's why I don't usually have those kinds of people on my show for the binge factor. And we just don't really give out a lot of advice like that on feed your brand because it's probably less than 5% of our podcasting base is that story Style podcast, most of them. It's really hard to compete with iHeart, who puts out 200 plus of those style shows at all times. So that's just really not something that we would want to play in. We're solely focused on alternative monetization for business podcasters. Right, so now let's talk about success tips. So the thing is, is that I'm interviewing people on the binge factor, right? That means that I'm not always in control of what they say. I rarely, if ever edit something out unless I think they're seriously misleading you or if you took their advice, it might harm your show. Just because it works for them doesn't mean it's going to work for you. This is what I find again and again. Look, the Gary Vees of the world, even Pat Flynn, who I absolutely adore, right? They have advice that they give to people, but you don't necessarily have the bandwidth of things that they've already got under their belt. The platform, I talk about that all the time. The platform underneath them that they already have. So when they try something new and they think this is the hottest thing ever, you know, that's great, except that you didn't have this gigantic email list to launch it with. You didn't have the success of having all these courses to upsell people to, right? So all the people through your courses, you didn't have a giant membership group. So if you didn't have that basis for what they already have, you may not be successful. And we don't always dive into all those details with each of the success interviews that we do here on the binge factor, we just. I don't have. I mean, it's not a long interview. So I'm going into the things that they're doing specifically related to podcasting. And if I know that they have something, I will talk about that. But sometimes there's a lot of hidden things that they have in their business that they don't talk about, like the fact that they have a giant list or that they spend money on ads and they don't tell people. This is a thing a lot of people pay for listens. But would they admit that on the air? To me, not likely. And they won't admit that to you? I think if it's happened once where someone actually admitted to doing that, so it's not likely something somebody's going to fess up with. You don't hear Instagram influencers talking about how they buy clicks unless they're in a company selling you clicks. Right. That's how it works. Right. So unless they're in the business of selling you clicks, they're not telling you that this is valuable and that's actually how they made it. Right. Same thing in the podcasting world. So I want you to take some of the things that they say and think about that. And then really, just based on the way my show is structured for the binge factor, I'm structuring it to set you up for success. I'm structuring it so that at the beginning, I'm introducing and I'm trying to give you that little nugget that I want you to listen for in the show. What I think they're really sharing with us, that's valuable. The title should also give it away for you. Right? I've given you the direction of the title of what I think is the most valuable thing that we talk about in the show and then in the post. If you don't listen to my close, then you're really missing out. Because in my close, if there's something they said that I think might be a quicksand that you could fall into or a pitfall or something that you might not find success with, I'm going to point it out there. Sometimes we'll point it out while we're in the interview, but sometimes I don't want to go down that rabbit hole and derail the conversation. So I use my clothes to talk about the detail. You know, I think it'd be worth trying this. However, if you're going to do it, try X, Y and Z to make sure that you're able to be successful with it. Right. I'm going to try to frame it for you and help you through that with a little additional advice or warn you off of it. Unless you have a specific type of show, that's my place for doing that. So make sure you're listening to the clothes, especially if you found something you think you'd like to try. And then remember it's hard. You're listening, right? You're not necessarily taking notes. I can't imagine that most of you are. Although I have to say that I listen to podcasts and occasionally I flip over to my notes app in my phone and I take notes. Or I'll send myself a text message to remind me to try something. So I will do that. Or better yet, I just jot a note off to my team and work chat and send it to them and tell them to go do it. So, like, that's a better, better plan altogether. But the idea is, is that you're not always able to do that. So that's why we have such a rich blogging environment. Right? Right. We have blogs for every episode. Why we have keyword searches. Why we have everything that you might need to find, even if you can't remember what episode it is. But to find the topic. Right, to find what you're looking for within it. And our search in our website is so much richer than anything you could possibly do on the app because the app is not searching what is being said. It only searches that short description that goes with the episode or the title. So it's not giving you the ability within a podcast listening app, whatever you chose it to be able to find all that information. So definitely want to go check out the website. So we've got the binge factor and we've got feed your brand. You can go to the bingefactor.com and you can go straight to potatoes.com and you can get feed your brand the binge factor and our new one, the next little thing. So you can connect to all of those through that method. So just wanted to kind of give you some ideas on how to listen and be more productive, be more successful with applying what you're hearing on the shows, both from our successful podcasters that we're interviewing and the tips and tactics we're sharing with you. And remember, on feed your brand, we're sharing them with you after we've shared them with our clients. So our clients have likely tried some of these things, refine the questions before we're even putting them out into the podcast. So you're getting them at a place at which we know these are really good to apply, that they have some application with some of our shows with some of our podcasters and they're looking for this piece of information or it wouldn't have made it even into an episode at all. So I hope this helps you. I really look forward to bringing you. I've got tons of great new interviews for the binge factor. I've got some really great successful podcasters who are doing some really unusual things. Some of them have really, I'm going to call it explosive shows, shows that have really hockey sticked and grown. I've got others that are plugging away but making good money for the podcasters. And I want to share with you all types. Some that have low listenership, tons of episodes and it's successfully working for their business. And then others that are just blowing it up and ready to take ads and move into other places for monetization because you know, I know all of you have shows that are in all different stages in all different places. If there's anyone you'd like to hear on our show, if there's any tips that you haven't heard yet that you'd like to know, burning questions that you have about what you should do with your show, make sure you send us a message anywhere on social media. You can find us at the Binge Factor or Odditize. Thanks everyone for listening. Here's to being a successful and continuous podcaster.
You've been listening to the Binge Factor Podcast. For more information on podcasting and videocasting success tips and tactics, please go to thebingefactor.com and be sure to listen to our other show for podcasters called Feed you'd brand. If you'd like to be interviewed on this show as well as featured in Tracy's column, please go to thebingefactor.com guest and apply.
