Podcast Guest Swapping: Unleash The Power Of Audience Sharing

Want your podcast and videocast to be seen, heard, found and rewarded in this noisy digital world, you are not alone. Join the nonprofit community at Podcasters United and podcast industry experts Tom Hazard and Tracy Hazard as they debunk all that outdated and bad advice you've been getting from the podcast gurus and find out what actually works. Today, get ready to finish Feed your brand with smart cut tactics proven to cast your original voice to the world.

Hey everyone. Welcome to Feed you'd brand. I'm Tom Hazard with my co host and better half, Tracy Hazard, and today we're going to talk about podcast guest swapping. Unleash the power of audience sharing. And I'll tell you, if you have a podcast where you interview other people or have discussions with other people, with guests of any kind, whether it's every episode or or the occasional episode, you want to pay attention to this topic today because you're going to learn a lot about the power. It is quite something. And Tracy, in my opinion, is the authority on this subject, having done over 3,000 interviews and you're a hyper user of a AI tool that matches you up with guests. And so not to reveal too much, but this is cool stuff and there may be some things you're all surprised to learn.

So here's the thing. Podcast guesting is difficult if you are don't have a podcast show, never had one. You just don't understand this podcast thing from the guest perspective. And us podcast hosts know that. We know you don't get it yet. So this is the easy thing. Our good friend over at Podmatch, the founder and creator of it, Alex Sanfilippo, said this to me. When it's easy for someone to pick a guest who's already been a podcaster because they understand intimately what us podcast hosts are struggling with, audience growth, how we want to converse on there, the fact that we don't want to have a lot of selling. They get it and because they get it, they're easier to select as a podcast guest. That's one thing that happens. But here's what I really know. If I swap shows, I go on your show, you go on my show, and we have the same audience, we're both going to grow. It is not a win lose proposition. It is a win win proposition. Tom, why is that? What's the stat that makes that so powerful?

Well, one thing I want to just quickly add to what you said is that so you said the same audience. And I just want to make it clear to our listeners, you don't have the same exact audience, the same exact subscribers or listeners, but you have the same profile audience, the same target audience, likely to have compatible audiences. And that's important, you and what we know about podcast listeners is they continue to subscribe and listen to more and more different podcasts on a weekly basis. The stat was 6 to 7. It's now up to 7 to 8 on average shows each listener listens to. So each week? Yeah, every week, again and again every week. So just because you, you know, have listeners and you want them to be loyal to you, doesn't mean you don't want to share your audience with other shows. You're not going to lose listeners. Just some of of them are also going to listen to that other show. And more importantly, some of their listeners are going to come and listen to your show. So that's why guest swaps are so.

Powerful and it goes up one level. Even because you're the person that introduced me to that great podcast, I still want to stay subscribed to you because I'm afraid you might introduce somebody new that I don't know yet either, because it was such a good fit. So it does have a compounding effect in audience growth. More importantly, the other side of this is that when I am sharing my audience, those are all podcast listeners. So when I invite a guest on who's an author or I invite a guest on who's TikTok star, that's great. I'm hoping to expand and get some TikTok people. But how much percentage of that audience is a podcast listener? If I go on someone else's podcast and they're a podcast host and they come on mine, chances are good the large majority of their audience on social media and everywhere that they go is a podcast listener. I have a higher percentage opportunity to grow my show from guest swapping than I do from inviting any other guest on my show.

That's for sure. When you think about, I mean, how many. We get bombarded with guest requests by PR agencies and all sorts of promoters that are trying to get someone who's an author that has a book to go on every podcast. And we know from experience, a lot of times those guests are very formulaic. They say the same thing over and over, and it's not going to be a unique experience for your listeners anything different than what it was on someone else's show. And I think again, that shows one of the differences between a guest that is a podcast host is a podcaster. They get it, they understand the benefits for each of you and know how to help make it something a little different on your show than they did on the other last five shows they were on, right?

Let's talk about some high power ways to do guest swapping. So first things first. If you're new to your niche, if your podcast is new, the most important thing you can do is reach out to the other podcasters in your niche. First off, the podcast community, you may not realize this yet because you're new to it. The podcast community is so collaborative. If there's a new kid on the block, we want to help them, we want to pull them up because we know how hard it was to be that new podcaster. So invite the guys and girls you want to imitate, right? The ones you want to be, invite them on your show. That is a power move. They will not take that wrong. They will say, you know, you say, hey, you're the OG in the industry. Just absolutely love your show. You inspired me to start mine. Would you be willing to come on my show? Chances are really good. They're going to come on your show, they're going to talk with you, they're going to like you, and they're going to invite you back. Now you've really got double growth. So we did this early on in the binge factor. I had Pat Flynn, the godfather of podcasting, on the show. I had him on the show. He doesn't invite anyone on a show that doesn't pay like you have to pay to be on a show nowadays. Sure enough, the end of the conversation, he's like, let me get you scheduled on my show. We got what we wanted out of it and we couldn't afford to pay for it in the early days of our show. Right? We couldn't afford to pay for in the early days of our business, but we were able to make that swap happen today. It is still one of the most powerful, me being interviewed on his show still to today, somebody will say, I listened to this episode and I decided to come work with you. We get that all the time. That has had long term residual value and that's probably like three years old now, maybe two and a half, something like that still has residual value.

That's actually true of podcasting in general. As long as your topics you're speaking on are evergreen, are still relevant. And if you have a daily news show, yeah, that's going to age out of relevance pretty quickly. But if what you do is tried and true and doesn't really change your podcast and the companion landing pages, you Create on your website, all sorts of things continue to provide value for years to come. Tracy, you were a guest on a dozen podcasts at one point early on and that provided tremendous value for a few years, didn't it?

Yeah. So, I mean, that was a little different model back then because there weren't as many people guesting as there are. There wasn't like the machine that is podcast guesting nowadays where every publicist in their sister has a guest matching system. Now I'm a big proponent of Pod Match. We talked about that before. I think it does a way better job of matching up without the ugliness of pitching that goes on from the guesting services. Now there's a high level concierge guesting, which I love. There's someone who's going to go out there, going to find you exactly the right shows, they're going to build a relationship with that host, they're going to get you on it. The ones that just send out random emails to a whole bunch of people is a waste of time. I would rather you used a Pod Match system every day of the week because it is much more friendly to me as a host looking at and being able to choose the right matches and the AI gets it faster. So I mean, I can go in any given week and there's like six or seven suggestions that the AI does for you, does it on a daily basis, but I only go in once a week and five out of seven of them will be right and I'll invite them on and I'm done with my guest, my guest outreach for the month. Like I can just do it and then I just do a couple of extras from people that do referrals or things like that, that kind of top level, more concierge relationships that I built over time. So that makes it super simple for me because it's already dialed in. But I know exactly what I'm looking for. If you don't know what you're looking for, you have a feedback loop you can do in Pod Match, which is really so powerful. So I can say, so I take them on my show, but afterwards I can say, this was a perfect fit for me. And I take the time to do a review, give them a rating, tell the system that it was good for me, they're going to give me more of those type of matches in the future and it gets better and better and better. That's really what I see happen. And it does it really quickly. Within a couple of months of use, you find it so dialed in Like, I don't know why I would even. I can't get my assistant to do it. I've tried. They do a better job. These are some things. So talking about the power moves, back to that part, Tom, like, let's talk about those power moves. Power move of starting up. You most definitely want the people who already have podcasts in your industry. You need to be appearing side by side with them. And if you can only do it by inviting them on your show, that's okay. Give first, because if the reciprocal nature is there, it will happen automatically. And that's the second power move. Give to receive. Create reciprocity in the process. So go out there, reach out on LinkedIn, invite someone on your show. Invite someone who already has a show. You're not on their radar yet. It's great. Put them on your radar. Let them say, hey, come on my show. Nine times out of ten they're going to invite you on there when you've done the work to know that they're a right fit. Their audience is the right fit. They know that their audience is going to want to learn from you too.

And that's a really powerful move too, for any new show. And the thing is, even for the season show, the seasoned podcaster who's being invited to go on your show, that's brand new. I have a lot of new podcasters always are apprehensive about that. Well, they're probably not going to wait on my show because it's one of the first few episodes and I don't really have an audience yet. And that's actually not true. Any good podcaster knows those first few episodes are going to be the most listened to and it's a good opportunity for them. Even though your show is new now, long term, they'll be heard by every one of your listeners, where somebody who is at episode 44 or 50 or something may not be heard by as many people.

Yeah, my favorite thing to do is go find those elite shows that claim that they don't take any guest solicitations and like, you know, they're too hard to get on and just invite them on my show because they will always invite me back. That so it's also a way to get into something that you might not have had access to otherwise. So that is also a power move for you. Use your podcast smartly. The other part about guesting that I really want you to think carefully about in the guest swapping model is if they're doing something that you could learn from, are they Doing a really good job of putting stuff out on TikTok or Instagram and you just don't do it. That's a great way. Go on the invite them on your show, talk to them about things, and then at the end of the call ask them, hey, I see how you're promoting on Instagram and I was really hoping you're going to do that for our interview right now. But could you also tell me a little bit about how you do that? Podcasters are so open to sharing their ideas, their tactics. So if you see someone who you want to be like, invite them on your show and learn from them, take it as an opportunity. You just gave them publicity. There's no way they're not going to answer your question.

And they usually like to talk a lot.

Yeah, that's right. Podcasters like to talk. Imagine that.

How about that?

So, yeah, any other things? Like, I mean, have you've done some podcasts but you don't always do swapping, right?

I have certainly done podcast swapping. Yeah, absolutely. But especially in the last few years, I've done more co hosted podcasts that don't have a lot of guests like this one, quite honestly. I mean, occasionally we'll have a guest.

We have a coaching crasher, we call them. Yeah, yeah.

Sometimes only one of us will do it. Either you'll do it alone or I'll do it. Because it gets to be a lot having three people on. We used to, in our earlier podcast, we were co hosts and we'd have a guest and we would both be involved in that. But I don't do as much guest swaps as you do.

That show didn't lend itself well. Our, our 3D print podcast didn't lend itself well because There was like five podcasts on 3D printing and four of them were like crap. Like they were just junk and so like it was not worth listening to the other shows then. So we were like, we can invite one host occasionally, but we just really didn't have anyone else that we could invite on on a regular basis.

It was too small a niche, I think.

Right. And so we really had to look out to who else could we invite. And we invited a lot of innovation podcasts, news media, event coordinators that helped us. So, like, there are other ways for you to take a look at that if in case there's similar audiences, but not exactly in your niche. And that's something that you really have to take a good look at. So if you're in a really tiny niche, what other Shows are my listeners listening to what other types of categories? Be, you know, be expansive in your thinking on that. If it's a very narrow field now, it can happen. So the last thing I want to mention about podcast guesting and the powerful guest swapping is the idea of a collab. And we've been doing a lot of that. And so when I say collab, that is very much an Instagram thing. It's an Instagram term. But think about it like this. I invite you on my show and then I go on your show. Now I have two shows back to back that I can promote on social media. So I promo each one of them separate when they air. But now I promo them together. I've got a third piece of more powerful content. We're both tagged in it. Because sometimes your guest doesn't do a really great job of sharing their guest interviews. They just don't, you know, we have to push them to share it. But now I've shared their show, so I've shared their show and my show put em together in a post. They have to share that one out. That would be silly for them not to share a promotion about their own podcast at that point in time. I so that collab model of doing it and doing it properly, where you let them know ahead of time, hey, in the next hour, let me text you or let me let you know I'm going to collab, you have to accept the collab on their end. It now has a power boost within Instagram and that can really help you boost both your shows at the same time. So that boost can be tremendous on social media. And when, because you might do a clip from your show and a clip from their show, doing that in that way can be also a power move in terms of getting the algorithms to work in your favor on Instagram. This also works really great in YouTube. So a YouTube isn't, doesn't quite work in the same collab. But if I do a short of my clip from being interviewed on someone else's show and then I link to the original show even though it's not on my channel, YouTube is going to make a tremendous boost out of it because I'm boosting long tail content from short content. So I'm boosting it like a teaser. And so you can do both directions, you can do it to each other's shows. So here's a little short of me on this person's show and here's the interview I did with him. Like, and so like you're kind of cross doing that and creating a cross collaboration across YouTube. They love that. Because what do they want? They want their viewers to just dive in and stay in YouTube as long as possible. So if they can go from one piece of content to the. To another, real powerful. And the other thing you want to do is at the end cards on YouTube when you go back, because you can edit your. So let's say my interview with Pat Flynn came out first. So I can then once the interview of me on Pat's show airs, then I can go and alter the end card and say up there, hey, now, suggest this one as the next video. So now it's a double video. It's a double header.

Definitely a power move, Tracy. And it can be disappointing when the other host doesn't share your show as well. But if here's the other thing is you do a really good job sharing it and you make sure they're aware of it. That guilt factor sets in where like, oh, I need to step up my game and help promote your show because you did such a good job with mine. And if you ever know that a guest has a social media manager or a PR team or something, and you provide them with all sorts of materials to share, they love you, you make their job easy and they're going to promote it. So that's even better.

So I've had it happen just recently that we started doing this collab model thanks to our advice that was given to us from Angie Lyle, who was a coaching crasher in the last. So that was really how we really stepped up our game and really followed the algorithmic process properly. We were doing it. We just weren't doing it in quite the way that would like, get the algorithm to help you. And so we now do it that way. And now that we do that, what I've heard back from the hosts that we've done that on, where I've done a lot of swaps in the recent days, they keep coming back and telling me my episode of my guest interview on their show is outdoing the other episodes and we're beating out and getting to the top of the View list, which makes them want to have me back again. Like, that's what they see the power of. They're getting more listeners, they're getting more views, they're getting more from a guest interview with you. What that also does is they've also referred other podcasts host to me, and so I'm getting better and better referrals to bigger shows from that as well. So I don't know about you, Tom, but I think this should be on your radar. Yes, Swapping.

And look, there are some people that in their podcasting journey have a list of people they want to have on their show as guests, especially from the beginning, if they've been thinking about it for a while. And that's great, that makes sense. And. But the reality is I see a lot of podcasts that are like, takes me such a long time to find guests and they're not thinking about any of these things. So I hope these tips are going to be helpful to a lot of you podcasters out there. There are tools available that can help you get connected with other podcasters, and it's oftentimes you're more desirable as a guest when you have your own show and you're willing to do those podcast swaps.

Right. So before we close, I just want to do some quick little tips for those of you who are Pod Match users. I want to give you a few power tips to making sure that you get the guest swapping opportunities because there's not a like mechanism for it. I just, just messaged Alex sample info back and said, you know, I wonder if we should have a mechanism for it in Pod Match. I suggested the feature, but the idea here is this. If you are a Pod Match user, make sure you set up your podcast, not just your guesting profile. Make sure you do both sides of the equation. Make sure you've linked up your podcast website, not just said, I have a podcast, because that's also a section where people will go on and they'll click through that and they'll check out the podcast website. That's what hosts typically do. They're going to check that out first rather than read your whole profile and your pitch about why you should be on their show. Right? So they're going to do that and check that out. So make sure you have both sides of your profile. Select it out. Then there's a setting in it where you select that you want a guest and you want to host, where you're allowing both sides of the equation to go into effect. Make sure you turn that on and that will help you. Now, there is some caveats to it, is that make sure you know if you're in the guest view or the host view when you're trying to accept or reject people or you're using the AI, make sure you know whether you're accepting them to be a guest on your show or if you're accepting to be a guest on their show. Make sure you know which one you're in when you're doing the. The accept and request. Accept and pass is what you do. So you say so that you're doing that properly. Because you would hate to reject a great guest for your show if they were just on that side of it thinking that they were asking you to be on their show.

You sound like you speak from experience, like you've made a mistake and rejected somebody for the wrong reason.

I've definitely made that mistake before. Yeah, well, only because I'm pickier. So I don't go in the guest side as often. I more go in the, you know, side where they're pitching me and I just allow that. So I only look at the guesting side maybe once a month. Because I'd rather invite you on my show, find out if there's synergy in our audiences, find out if there's synergy in you. I'd rather give first and then find out and then go and say, oh yeah, sure, I'll come on your show as a, as a follow up. So I do it that way more often, but I do by allowing both, you're opening yourself up to some great opportunities and ideas, and that's why I recommend them.

Well, you're telling the other people and the algorithm you're open to both, which I think gets you more, offers more opportunities. Right?

Exactly. Now, just a final note. For those of you who have been had a lot of interviews and maybe you've burned out on them and you've decided to do a lot more solo shows, still keep the opportunity open for an occasional podcast guest that is a host on another show. Because of the audience power, there's still some great opportunity for you to expand your audience. Yes, they want to hear it. You can operate it in a different way. You can invite that host on to have a conversation with you about a topic rather than do an interview. So there is still a way for you to powerfully use guest swapping with another podcast host without having it have to be an interview. Just think about that in putting that into your repertoire if you've decided to move into solo shows.

Sounds like great advice, Tracy. And as I said, you would know you're like the power guest swap and I would say power pod match user. I wonder, do they have stats on that with how many people, how many collaborations or how many things you accept or people you book are the. Is there info like that on that platform or no?

Yeah, so when I asked Alex about it, he said he's starting to see a significant trend in Facebook and LinkedIn groups that offer a lot more guest swapping and say, hey, I've got a show. Do you want to be on my show? And I'll be on your show, where they're actually offering it there. But they don't have as many swaps happening because the mechanism doesn't quite work like that because I told you, it's separated into guesting and hosting. But I suspect that it is happening. But they do say, but Alex did say that when a podcast guest is also a host, they get more bookings, they have a higher booking rate than those that are just straight guests because hosts know that they get the drill, that they know how it works.

Yep. That makes perfect sense to me.

Yep. So I'm so glad we covered this content, this topic today. It really is something that I think is underutilized and we don't do it enough to help our shows grow. And you can do it in the beginning, you can do it as an advanced tactic. Doesn't really matter when you do it. But using other hosts to grow your audience and reciprocating back, it's going to grow the community overall. You're growing podcast listeners everywhere. Power move.

Power move. Duly noted.

All right, thanks everyone for listening. I'm Tracy Hazzard along with my co host and partner Tom Hazard, here on feed your brand and we'll be back next week with another topic live.

Heard something valuable today, but didn't get a chance to write it down. No worries, we've got you covered. We partnered up with podcasters united.org where podcast hosts like you can get free resources, free masterclasses, the largest podcast tip library assembled, and free promotion opportunities. While you're there, don't forget to follow us on YouTube and on social media at United Wepod so you can get feed your brand live. Until next time, keep podcasting.