Podcasting Your Funny Marriage: Creating Content Using Your Personal Life With Jessie Artigue of the Marriage is Funny Podcast (Podfaded)

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, welcome back to Feed. You'd brand center of Influence and this interview has been rescheduled and rescheduled and we finally got our calendars together. And I'm so excited about it because I finally get to talk to someone who's co hosting with her husband. And as all of you know, I have that experience too. And so I'm glad it's not just my viewpoint. Now I get to talk to somebody else who has that too. So I'm really excited to talk to Jesse Arteek and sometimes known as Gerard and Jesse Pepper because that's how they go on their show. Their show is Marriage is Funny. And it is funny. It's, I'm going to say sarcastically funny. And so there's lots to learn there, there's lots of interesting things and we're going to deep dive into why they started it and what they've learned from it. And we're going to say, you know, did Jesse get something extra special out of it? So let's see what's happening there. But she's a style expert. She is on air host with over 10 years experience in fashion, beauty and lifestyle industries. She's got a great Instagram everyone, you should check that out. She's excited about the podcast that she co hosts with her husband, Marriage is Funny and they have it as their mission to encourage modern couples across the world. She is also the creator of Season Every Day. It's an eco friendly silk dress that can be worn as multiple garments and is ethically sewn right here in the US. She's a self proclaimed serial entrepreneur with an impressive portfolio of digital media clients, but considers her role as a short term foster mom the most fulfilling part of her work. And I want to talk about that too. So Jessi, welcome to the show. I'm so glad we finally made this happen between the two of us.

I know it's so exciting to talk to you, Traci. Thank you so much for having me.

So you'd been doing a lot of, I'm going to say, I think you started blogging first, right before you started social media. Right, right.

Way back when, before it was much of a thing, to be honest. I'm kind of one of the OG bloggers, and I don't do much. Right, you get it. I don't do it much anymore. But it was definitely a huge part of my entrepreneurial journey and one that's allowed me to really kind of get a feel for what this online world is going to be doing. And I'm thankful for it. But, yeah, that's kind of how I got my start.

I think it kind of opens your eyes when you started in that place, as to what still works now. Like, there's so many surprising things that I learned as a blogger that still works today. What are some of those things that you still do?

You know what jumps out at me first when I hear you say that is the ability to move quickly. Honestly, as the space moves quickly. And it kind of feels like the growth of the online world and online business and digital media has. The growth has been picking up with an exponential speed. And so way back when I started, which was. Would have been 2008, when I started my blog, actually, in April, it'll be, what, like, 12 years now? So that's kind of exciting. And, you know, I remember that back then, first of all, Twitter didn't even exist, so definitely was no Instagram. Facebook was around, but it was used in a totally different way. And yeah, I mean, it was just a space for people to kind of share their ideas, their thoughts, their projects, whatever it was that they wanted to. And I think one of the things that I've learned the most since then is just the ability to pivot is going to be what really kind of throws you forward with progressive motion. And that is something I've continued to implement, I would say, as I grow my brand and my various. I should say the various brands, kind of underneath the umbrella of style and pepper. And, yeah, that's one of those things where I learned it early. And it kind of has been ingrained in me. Even though I don't technically blog as much anymore, except for just for fun, that particular practice has still stayed at the forefront of my entrepreneurial journey.

Well, in 2015, you pivoted and started a podcast. What made you be interested? What made you think about podcasting? That's about the same time I started. We started ours maybe a couple months earlier, but it was right around that time.

Right. And actually, you know, I remember when we started feeling like we were on the late end. Do you know what I Mean, like, people like you.

I do know what you mean. I was like, I feel like I'm behind totally.

But people like you had gone before us. And actually, to be honest with you, we started our show because my husband and I both were avid. Avid podcast listeners. Fun fact about me, I actually. So I majored in broadcast journalism, and I had a college radio show all four years of university at my school that I went to. And I always been into media since I was 11 years old. I thought I was going to be on camera in some form or at least writing as a journalist in some way.

See, I thought I would be a journalist, and then I went to art school, so it totally changed.

You know what, though?

Yeah.

I mean, obviously things like that can change, but there's certain. I think there's certain parts of us that when we express or pursue what we want to do, those little things that, like, were inklings when we were younger sometimes do carry a common thread all the way throughout our careers.

You're right.

You're right.

It so happens that you're, you know, you're driven to these things that you're attracted to that. I. The day that they offered me my Ink column, my dad said to me, you always wanted to be a writer. Why aren't you taking it? And I was like, you're right. That's why I'm going to take it. Right. That's why I'm going to do this, even though it's outside of my work and my normal realm of things.

And some would argue that writing is an art form in and of itself, and all of these things, you know, can sometimes cross and weave themselves together. And so we. So I've always been a media junkie. Always, always, always. We were both avid podcast listeners at the time that we started our show week after Memorial, basically, like the week of Memorial Day, like you said, in 2015, and we decided to start a show a year before that.

But it took you that long to, like, do it?

Yeah. And do you know what happened? So here's. Here's the real story. So Gerard and I were having a really, really rough patch in our marriage the year PR 2014. And we got married very young. We were 22 when we got married, 21 when we got engaged, and we'd moved around a little bit, and we experienced some circumstantially difficult things really early on in our relationship that we weathered fairly well in terms of, like, our. Our marriage. And I remember then. I think that was good in a way. But then around Year seven, which was when we decided to start the show. We were just. It was almost like there was a lull in life, and it created a little bit of a vacuum. And then we started to grow apart. We were both pursuing our careers very fully, spending a lot of time apart. We didn't have a lot of friends that were in common at the time because of our moves and our jobs, and things were just getting rough. And it was to the point where we would get in arguments, and sometimes the arguments would end in either one of us saying, did we make a horrible mistake in choosing each other? Are we supposed to split up and go our separate ways? And that's a rough place to be, as many people could probably understand or relate to. And so I remember one of the things that we immediately decided was that we needed mediation. At the time, we weren't in therapy together, but we both really value that idea of having an outside perspective. And so a lot of our close friends, because we'd moved around in grad school and that kind of life stage, a lot of people are sort of transient in a way. We lived in New York City at the time and not near any of our close friends. And so I said, why don't we just record our conversation, send it to Rick and Joanna or Liz and Ben or Tim and Shawn or whoever, and just say, can you guys tell us who's winning the argument? Like, who has this all wrong and is totally confused, and who's the person that is making some sense? And he joked and said, that sounds like a great idea for a podcast. I legitimately thought he was serious and was like, that's a great. Let's do it. And then it took me a year to convince him.

So, you know, I come across it so often here as I interview podcasters as center of influence, and I would say about 80% of them are not podcast listeners. And I can tell the difference by listening to their show.

That's fascinating to me, isn't it?

It shocked me because I was a serious podcast listener. Of course, my husband and partner wasn't. He was not a big podcast listener until, like, you know, we started to enter the genre, right? And then now you're picking up shows left and right, and you're trying to get better, and, you know, it's a little bit different. But he wasn't before and I was, and so that was a bit. But you can tell the difference in the show. You can tell how approach. You can tell. I can tell sometimes who coached them.

Like, that's.

Isn't that funny?

Totally.

Yeah. And so because you'll see a sort of pattern going on in a bunch.

Of shows, you can tell who they listen to. In a lot of cases, your show.

Has that same somewhat. I'm going to call it the Broadcasting Edge, which you see in certain shows or you hear in certain shows. And that's where you have a kind of an interesting beginning and, you know, where you're kind of taking little excerpts and clips of the two of you talking and then you have a little bit more formal intro and then you go into the show from that point forward and it's this enticing kind of little bit of tease and little insight because it does jump you kind of in the middle of the conversation. I'm sure that was a really stylistic choice, but did you base that on, like, some other shows that you found that you really liked at the time, or did you just sort of base this on your idea of what a good show should be?

Truthfully, first of all, I'm so flattered that you noticed because I don't necessarily get to talk about podcasting with fellow podcasters all that often. It sounds like such a geeky thing, but I love it because I was telling you earlier, I love the medium so much, but I can't think of any other shows that I listen to that do that as well. But we love the cold open. Truthfully, I would say it comes more from. So Gerard and I are big comedy fans. Like, we love the art of comedy. We love comedy theory. We actually, we write stand up sets together, perform them separately usually, but we love just that whole world. And so there are like a handful of, again, not necessarily podcasts, but I would say there are different, like, yeah, like, stylistic characteristics that kind of, we've, I think, picked up from other forms of media. And it almost, I don't know, it almost reminds me. And again, I don't mean to necessarily flatter myself in this way, but it kind of reminds me how certain TV shows where like, you know, you flip it on and what it does first is you see like scenes from last week kind of. They'll catch you up. I mean, I'm thinking of like, this is us as one of the ones that always does it.

Yeah. And in a way it's necessary with you because, I mean, a lot probably happens between weeks of episodes. Right. So between the week of episodes, your marriage is progressing and yet we're vicariously watching this. So.

Yeah. And so a little bit kind of almost like. And it's funny a Lot of people say, oh, so you have a show about marriage? What, like, what gives you the. What gives you the permission or the expertise to have a show about marriage? And what we usually say is, actually the show's not as much about marriage as it is about our lives. It almost listens like a reality show. I think, in a way, we talk about the world around us from the context of being a married couple. So, of course, there ends up being components that apply and relate to what it's like to be a married couple. But we're not really, like, picking apart the, you know, the different, like, tips and tricks always. I mean, occasionally we'll get into that, but otherwise we're just trying to figure out how to be married in a healthy way, in a proactive way, in a resilient way. And, yeah, I do like to have fun, though, with the editing. And oftentimes that first lead in the cold open is usually a joke or like an outtake, I'll say. And then, you know, the other thing I like to do in terms of sort of giving snippets during what you're speaking of is, like, during our intro music, I'll give snippets of that particular episode, just audio clips overlaid on top of that. And the reason I do that, too, is because I think it's a lot more. It gives the listener a glimpse of what the episode's about in a more interesting way than us saying, in today's episode, you'll hear, da, da, da, da, which is not a bad thing. I actually love that in any of the shows I listen to about business.

Yeah, you want them to tell you what it's going to be about, so, you know, you're in the right place, but.

Exactly. Yeah. But for ours, like, if we told you what it was going to be about, it would be a major spoiler. So, so, so true.

So it took you a year to convince Gerard to do this. Now, I mean, I have to say that there's probably a lot of podcast, aspiring podcasters out there listening to this, going, yeah, I've been thinking about, you know, having a show about my kids or about my recovery, something that's very private and personal. What were some of his objections and how do you overcome them? Because, you know, maybe some of our listeners need to overcome them in their own minds.

That's such a great question. I'm very persistent.

I think, really, what ended up being with clincher, I think, for me. So, as I said, obviously, the initial motivation was a little bit selfish. It Was like, how can we? How can we. I think we immediately were able to see how that would provide a certain accountability that we really needed. And then beyond that, I think we realized, well, I'm a verbal processor. Gerard, not so much, which you'll quickly be able to listen. You can hear that. Yeah, but he is, man, he's a trooper. He's really, really gotten a lot more comfortable with that. It's funny, it's like verbal processors don't always need the person listening to also be a verbal processor. So I almost couldn't care less if he is or isn't. But at the same time, I think it's just we recognized that it would be healthy, just for starters, and a positive thing for us on its own to begin to have these heartfelt conversations, or what we call them as need a knee conversations. Because when we first started recording, we just had this one little tiny microphone we'd put in between us. We'd have to sit really close because the microphone was like multi directional. And so we had to turn the gain way down so it didn't pick up the echoes and all these things anyway. So we call them these knee to knee conversations. And I don't know if I'm really answering your question, but I think one of the things that sort of gave us the guts to keep going is when we started, we launched with three episodes, and almost immediately we started to hear from people who, you know, first just put it out there to our family and friends, because that's a good way to.

That's what everybody does when they set up their podcast. Right, Right.

Otherwise, like, how. Yeah, how are people gonna find it? And granted, the space was a lot less crowded back then, so we did, you know, we like made it to new and noteworthy right away and all these fun things. And it's like impossible to do that now. Practice. Not impossible, but you know what I'm saying? So I think one of the things that really kept us going was very quickly we had people reach out to us and say, man, I thought I was the only one that had ever experienced. I thought I was alone. And guess what? That's what we thought too. So it wasn't like we were saying, you know what, we know a lot about this whole marriage thing. We should talk about it on the mic and then put it out there so that people know they're not alone. No. We were like, okay, this is really hard and we don't even know if it's gonna work out. But we are committed to each other and Were scrappy and creative and are trying to like, almost like make an excuse to spend time together again, as it were.

Well, that's what I think is actually the brilliant thing from having been married. So we were just talking about this, we're recording this, and my anniversary is this weekend and Tom and I will have been married 28 years.

So. Amazing. That is a huge deal.

Yeah, we got married one month after I turned 21. So we've been married since we were young too now. And so thinking about all of that, like, you know, there comes a, a point at which you do spend so much time. Like I used to really travel for my job. We spent so much time apart. And it puts a strain on your marriage and finding a way to make sure that you have committed time together, doing something that you then have fun and enjoy doing, that's important to put in. So you, you actually created a space for you guys to find, you know, something you enjoy together. The process of podcasting for some people can be therapeutic in and of itself.

I really do agree. I mean, I think that's what happened for us. And I can see, and I've seen it happen for other podcasters as well. That's one of the things that I think can be so beautiful about the medium, is the connection that it allows with the listener. It can be so powerful, but then also just the ability to commit to something, whether it be personal development or business related or parenting or whatever it ends up being that you're actually talking about. It could even be more hobby related, gardening or cooking or whatever. It allows you to not only dig really deep, go in depth into the subject matter, but of course, it's a great way to build your brand. Of course, is a great way to have an excuse to do lots of research. And I think those are all good things.

Absolutely. So, I mean, I suspect there was still though that little bit of fear of we're putting ourselves so far out there, people are going to get in our business, we're going to get a lot of hate mail. Nasty intrusiveness. There had to been some of that. I mean, I interviewed Bel Robertson, who, that's not her real name because she's a sober coach. And so the privacy and all of that. So she kind of switched that all up and kept it private from that space. And you never. There's not a picture of her on the Internet anywhere. It's like the back of her head. And so, you know, interesting way for her to approach that. But what was the conversations about? This could get ugly in some ways. What do we, you know, are we going to handle that or what are we going to do about it?

Yeah, that's a great question. Well, first of all, we're very fortunate. I think we've only gotten like two nasty kind of email review type situations and both of them have been what we deemed important enough to address on the air. Addressing things head on. If you do end up. I kind of jumped ahead there. But we've addressed both of them head on because we felt like the people were, while they did them in a really mean, immature, unfortunate way, they brought up valid points that we thought, you know what, it's possible other people are thinking the same thing. So let's address it. So I think that's one thing. The other thing in terms of privacy. When we first started, Gerard was really concerned about what effect, if any of this may have on his career. He works in corporate finance and at the time he was working for a large publicly traded company and doing things that were fairly high security, meaning like just a lot of things that he wouldn't necessarily even come home and talk to me about. He since has switched industries a little bit. He's still in corporate finance, but he's a consultant now, so he works more for a huge corporate firm. And they actually love the fact that he has a podcast. He never talks about who his company is. He keeps that private. You can figure it out, I bet, probably if you looked him up. But anyways, all that to say we started out having that Gerard and Jesse Pepper pseudonym and that gave him, I think, the amount of privacy that he felt like he wanted or secrecy. I don't know what you'd call it, but just kind of like prior, you know, as we already discussed, I had been a blogger for a while, so I was really comfortable sharing online and it was less scary to me. And I think one of these other things that I would suggest if someone is maybe on the fence because of this specific reason, you know, put guidelines in place for yourself and that way you don't have to. It's like having bumpers in a bowling alley, you know what I mean? Like we, one of the rules, these.

Are our rails, we're not gonna deviate from them.

Exactly. It just, it makes it so that you don't have to think about it as much in the moment. And one of the things that we have in place, we've fudged it a few times, so but, but always like, well, I'll just tell you the rule and then I'll Give more of the explanation. But one of the rules that we have in place is if there's an issue that we are really. That feels really current that we're, like, currently working through and have not come to a resolution on, we really don't talk about it on the air. Partially for privacy's sake, partially because we don't ever want to use our life as fodder in a way that feels like we're. It's almost like if you were on a reality show, you wouldn't want the producers to, like, take advantage of your real life struggles. And so we'll talk about things in retrospect quite often, and we're very comfortable with that. But if it's something we're still working through, we kind of just table it until we at least have enough distance to where the perspective is going to be helpful and not confusing or ugly or we're not gonna, like, be tearing each other apart. Now, that said, every once in a while it will make sense to say, to reference something that we are still working on. But we always have, like, we're never recording live.

So you can always edit it out.

Yeah, we can always edit it out. Or sometimes we'll like. We'll be talking like this recording, and I'll say, oh, do you mind if I bring up the thing about da, da, da, da? And he'll either say yes or no, and then we continue accordingly. It's like a choose your own adventure situation.

We have that across. So Tom and I record across the table from each other and we'll be like, okay, we'll have this hand signal to each other. We'll raise your finger and then we'll say, should we mention this? And then, okay, good. And then we go back and say, editors. Okay, pick up now, because we have editors. So we just do that. But that is the same kind of method you can do when you have it. Is that when something comes to your mind but you're concerned, rather than diving into it and having the other person uncomfortable, say, hey, is this okay? And then if it is, let's go for it.

And let me just say too, that's interesting because I just got a text message from a dear friend a couple of days ago, and she listens to our show. And she also just knows us in real life and we've hung out with she and her partner. And she knows that Gerard and I are very forthcoming about our relationship. So, like, if you're sitting with us at the dinner table and it feels like it makes sense, like we're just really open about a lot of that stuff. And so she is used to having us be like that. And she has also seen, and we talk a lot about how positively that has impacted our relationship. We talk about it a lot. Yeah. About how being vulnerable with other couples and other people that we do life with, like opening up about the things that he and I are experiencing as a married couple has brought about so much healing and growth and all the wonderful things. And so she was asking me in this text the other day, she goes, what do you do if either you feel like you want to bring something up in, you know, like at the dinner table, dinner party kind of moment, or if your partner brings something up in the dinner party moment and you're not comfortable with it, like, what do you do when that happens? And I was like, you know what, just ask, like, if you feel like you want to bring something up in front of your friends, just say, honey, is it okay if I ask them about xyz? You know what I mean? And like work that into your normal day to day life. I would say as anyone who's pursuing a healthy relationship, it's a really respectful way to go about building friendships as a couple. And I think that's one of the things that we've learned just from recording about our life together on the microphone.

So you did a whole episode on why you didn't have kids, which I suspect was one of those comments that was very intrusive that you were getting, like, when are you going to have kids? Why haven't you had kids yet?

Lots of questions.

Yeah. And you did a whole episode on it, which I thought was great because you're just addressing it right up front and you're just like, you know, hey guys, lay off. This is not your marriage, it's ours. We get to choose. And I thought that was really an interesting way to just right up front address it. And so I'm assuming that was one of those subjects that you were feeling like people were intruding.

In a somewhat consistent way. So did you find the response to that episode work out really well for you? Did it kind of stave off some of the comments and it just changed the course of sort of the sentiments that were going on in your comments.

Yeah, I would say it's done two things. One, it's allowed us to now, for instance, if someone just finds our show now and listens to like the one or two most recent and then the any subsequent, you know, going forward and they happen to notice that we don't have kids. They get curious. They ask which. We do not mind talking about it. We do not mind being asked about it. But what's nice is now I can say, like, oh, you should go back and listen to episode 44 or whatever it was. I actually don't remember. We've talked about it a couple times. We did.

I can't remember the numbers to our show either, so don't be. Yeah, but there's one.

There's one where my brother interviewed us. Was that the one you listened to? Okay, so that's kind of the main one that I point people to because he. My brother, is actually definitely. Besides Gerard, he's my best friend. He's also one of Gerard's best friends as well. So we have this, like, really interesting kind of trio dynamic. He lived with us when we lived in New York City, and we have a great relationship with him. So we were like, who better to ask us these things than someone who already knows us really well? So he interviews us, and we point people to that episode if they still have questions, and they haven't listened to that one yet. And then we've talked about it a few times since then, just because our approach to quote, unquote, parenting is fairly unique. And so we've talked about it a few more times to clarify some things kind of about how that's taken shape in our lives. But, yeah, it definitely. The second thing I was going to say that it's done is yet again, so many people have come out of the woodwork to say, you know what? We've chosen not to have kids also. And we had no idea that it could feel like such an intentional life decision and less of like a, oh, they can't, or, oh, they're selfish, or, oh, they just haven't gotten around to it or whatever. Like, any of the reasons that other people would maybe assign to your own life decisions. Like, the amount of people that have said us, too, has been really, I don't know, not that we necessarily, like, need more people on the not no Kids team. That's not what it's about. But in a way, it is nice to know that others are hearing us talk about it and realizing that, like, it's maybe not that weird, or it can be just another normal way to build a family or build a life. And that's been wonderful. I think that's been a fun and really gratifying part about talking about it on the air.

So now everybody's gone saying, hey, wait, didn't Tracy say at the end of your bio that you are a short term foster mom and it's a very fulfilling role for you. So tell us a little bit about, about that.

So, gosh. And then we have a whole episode about this also. So if people want more, I will just touch on it quickly. They can go and check that out. We volunteer with a organization called Safe Families. It's a national organization started in Chicago. We're part of their Orange County, Louisiana, San Diego. It's like the tri area down here in Southern California. And it's been amazing. We basically are a host family for parents who otherwise their children would likely be put into long term foster care. They need what's either respite care because they've got a medical emergency or they have to have a surgery or they're disabled in some way or in some cases they're homeless. Essentially what happens is once you're approved, you'll get a text message anytime there's a need. Which just to be honest, these days, especially in the winter, I mean I'm getting, I could look and count, I would say I probably get between five and ten texts a day with needs. And it just gives us the age, the gender, usually the length of time and sometimes like a quick snippet about what the situation is and we call the number of our social worker and say, hey, we can, you know, actually I can share this with you next week. I think we're going to end up having 3 month old twin girls.

Oh my gosh. Twins. Yeah, twins.

And it's actually a family of four kids and the mom's looking for work, has no one else nearby. They really do a nice job of making sure that the families who utilize this program are treating their kids well in the first place. They're screened for things like addiction problems and they're basically allowed to use this program or this service as someone who's trying to get their life back on track and that otherwise like if she left her four kids at home going out in search of a job or God forbid, like left them, just get.

Them taken away, right?

They would be taken away, the police would come, they would be taken away. And she's actually probably perfectly fit to be a mother. She just needs a little bit of a hand.

Well, that's fantastic. I love that you're doing this. So my brother and sister in law are foster parents and they were approved I think a year and a half ago and they've already had three sets of kids come through their household in that time. And I have to Tell you that it breaks my heart when they come through, but at the same time, there's like such a need. So good for you that you found a program that fits you and something that you can give back and do.

Yeah. One of the things I love about this program is that it actually, we don't get our hearts broken at all because it's when we're giving the kids back, they're going back to their parent.

Yeah. And it's.

Yeah, it's exactly. It's very, very happy.

That's wonderful. Well, that's so good. I'm so glad you found a program that fits you, because that's what I was saying. I was like, I see that there's such a need, and while I have kids of my own and I would love to do that, the reality is this. I think that would break my heart every time in the system. But you found a niche where you're needed and then it doesn't have to have that full heartbreak all the time. But there is a privacy concern there as well, which you guys are uniquely suited to because you're used to not mentioning names and you're used to not mentioning that because, you know, this is the thing, like we get an invite to one of the foster kids birthdays because it just happens to be while they're still caring for them. And, you know, it's all this private information. There's no pictures involved. It's like, you know, foster daughter one is turning two. Right. You know, like that. Yeah, there's like a whole. Yeah. We don't use names in any kind of invitations and emails or anything like that to try to keep the security and safety up for them. So you guys are kind of used to that in your system. So you already have that somewhat built in that you're keeping privacy going.

Yeah, yeah, it's worked out really well, so.

Well, good. Well, so how do you avoid. Now, this is the sort of thinking of that, like, you know, you've got this thing and I mean, I'm sure you had a lot of people going to you. So, so, so what are you going to do with this podcast thing? Like, you know, you can turn it into business. You're going to take some sponsors. Like, how do you address that for yourself? It's like, because this is a really personal thing, way shape or form. How do you make it feel like you didn't capitalize on that?

That is such a good question. Oh, my gosh. Yeah. Because in many cases we've had opportunities come about and it has like brought up this feeling of like, okay, if we say yes to this, is that yucky? Or like, does this feel weird in some way? We've monetized our show a handful of different ways. Obviously it's been around for a few years, several years now. And so we've gotten to experiment and this is kind of what I was referencing earlier with that whole like being able to pivot quickly and being comfortable with that both as a business owner and an online personality. And so, you know, we've had traditional sponsorships, we've had more of like an advertorial sponsorship situation available. We've actually done partnerships with large scale brands where we've created content for them, exclusive content for them. One of my favorite things that we've done is we actually host a. Usually there have been some years where it's twice a year right now it's once a year vacation for our listeners where we take everybody down to Mexico and we rent a big house in Puerto Vallarta right on the beach and has a full staff and it's all inclusive and it ends up being such a fun opportunity to just connect and rest and play with other like minded couples. And like it's honestly one of my favorite things in the world. We also are doing a big summit coming up. So it's here in Long Beach. It's a much larger scale event. So where the Mexico vacation, which we call the Great Love Getaway, is much more vacation vibe. This summit is actually more like brilliant meeting of the minds. We've got speakers, we've got activities, we've got workshops. It's going to be much more enrichment focused and this is a departure for us. We've never done anything like this before. We've done workshops all over the country and we do speaking opportunities quite often as well all over the country. And that's been another way. But it's interesting.

It's.

It's sort of, you know, we both have. Gerard has his full time job and really my. This is I would say like maybe a third of what I spend my time doing in terms of my career. And then I've got other projects on the side as well. And so luckily we haven't needed to like eke a ton of cash out of.

Wasn't an urgent need.

Yeah, no, no, no, no. But it of course is nice when it pays for itself. And that was the goal from the beginning, is at least make it pay for itself and then if it goes beyond that, that would be great too. We've had people Say, like, why don't you make a course or do something like that right now? The only two other things that I would say have worked out well for us. One is we do offer mentorship for other couples. Since we're the peppers, we call it a little pep talk. You can sign up to do pep talk with us. Yeah. And that's been really fun. And Gerard actually has his Masters of Divinity. He studied pastoral care and counseling for his grad school program. And so he's kind of got that background. I've got my mindset coaching that I do, and so it pairs really well. And then I am working on a book right now. But again, that's not meant to be any sort of money making endeavor. It's just because, like you, I'm a writer at heart and it's gonna come.

Out at some point. Yeah, well, unfortunately for me, like, I always point to the back behind me because my credenza is back there. I have like three books sitting back there that still haven't gotten through a final edit because once I write it, that's it. Like, I'm good. I got it out, I'm done. I didn't need to publish it.

Yes, that's probably. Who knows, that might be the same thing. I actually, the only reason I even started writing this particular book for that's related to marriage is funny, is that we had someone reach out with interest and I was like, and. But they want it. You know, essentially depending on how you do it, they get all the rights to the content. And I was like, so I started writing an outline and I was like, wait, I want. This is mine.

This would be mine. Yeah.

And so even, you know, even if I end up finishing it and it ends up sitting in my drawer, I'll probably be okay with it. Unless someone wants to come flip, give it a flip through. I don't know.

But otherwise, I'm sure your listeners will be interested. Yeah, exactly. Well, every time I do one of these, we've got to touch on some tips from you, so I want to get to those. And then, and then we'll wrap up with a couple more questions. But how about some lessons from your experience? And it could be as a blogger as well as a podcast and a social media influencer, because you've had that as well. But about some of the best ways and you don't book great guests, but sort of like, why don't we talk about it in terms of get great ideas, so get great topics.

One of the ways that we come up with Our topics for our show. And just, you know, it's interesting. It's shifted a little bit. Most recently. Well, season eight was our most recent season, and we take breaks in between. We're on a break right now. But so season eight, we did interviews. Season seven, I believe, was also unique in that we only would talk about one topic per episode pretty much from the beginning. And then up until then. So through season six, what we would do is we would each come up with a topic in our head and not tell the other person what it.

Was going to be.

And at the beginning of the show, we say, what do we want to talk? What do you want to talk about today? And then the other person says, today we're going to talk about. And then we both say it at the same time. So we're surprising each other with the actual topic. And then the goal. And this is kind of like. We don't really say this, but if you. If you're interested in comedy or if you've ever taken an improv class or if you like improv, it's kind of almost like an improv game where. One of my favorite episodes, we talked about rollerblades and budgeting in the same show. And again, neither one of us knew either person was gonna say those topics. But the goal was we talk about one first, and then we find a way to segue it into the other one. And you're like, what the heck? How would those two possibly even be?

But that's an improv thing. I haven't seen it done yet.

So it's like we're trying to work it into the other one. And then at the end, the goal is to then tie both up in a bow and almost like, address or create a way that the two are linked. And the reason we do that is because we always wanted these to be unscripted. So the only thing we script out, which you'd be able to tell by listening to this is just our intro. And that's just so we remember to say all the, you know, announcement Y type things we want to say. And really, those topic ideas come from just like we keep a private list, he and I do just on our phones, essentially just throughout life, like. And it's funny what's happened more. More and more as we get into it. I mean, now that means what we're coming up on five years, which is crazy to me. I know.

Doesn't it seem crazy?

Wow. That. Blowing my mind. Okay, so what. What really happens is, for instance, like, well, I'll just Tell you, this is an exclusive. He's not home, so he can't hear me right now. I'm not gonna let him listen to the show until I get a chance to tell him myself. I got rear ended in the grocery store parking lot the other day. Oh, no, nothing happened to our car, thankfully. It was like a gentle, like, you know, we're both going like two miles an hour. But it's the story that happened after that was funny and interesting. And what's funny and interesting about the fact that I'm even bringing this up is that I got home and of course I want to be like, you'll never believe what just happened to me. But I didn't because I'm like, you know what? That's gonna make such a good podcast episode.

So you're like, I'm gonna tell this story later.

No, yeah, I'll save it for a show. And we actually joke about that now where, like, something will happen or we'll come up with an idea or a thought or a tweet or a story or whatever, and we'll save it for the show. Which, you know, probably professional marriage counselor would say, like, yeah, maybe not so healthy, but it works for us. Obviously, we're, you know, it's situations or.

Keeps everything surprising and funny. That can't be bad, right?

Exactly.

Yeah.

And if I tell him once, then the second time I tell him, like, it's gonna be more anticlimactic. He's gonna be like, yeah.

Oh, Tom could never do that. He could never do that. He would have to tell me. He would never be able to hold back. He couldn't keep it a secret. Like, he just wouldn't be able to do it. So I love that. Okay, so that's great. So you have a process for getting topics going and, you know, how did you decide then which guests you were going to bring on during that season?

That's a great question too. One of the things we looked at was what are the areas? And this is where we, like, fudged. That guideline I talked about earlier is we wanted to talk to people who had expertise in areas that we legitimately want to be better at. And so, for instance, we talked to a couple. Then, let's see, one, two. Two or three of the couples are existing dear friends of ours. And then two or three of the couples are people that we have met but we don't necessarily do life with. And maybe like our long distance acquaintances, as you know, happens a lot of times in the online world. But basically we Were like, okay, one of the things we want to get better at, his budgeting. So let's talk to a couple who are dear friends of ours here in Long beach that recently paid off $238,000 of debt in like seven years. We want to be better at our sexual intimacy. So let's talk to a couple who. That's what they do. They coach other couples through that same pursuit. And, you know, we talked about a. We talked to a couple who are very well known marriage experts about how to work through healthy conflict.

So it sounds like you followed your own curiosity.

We followed our own curiosity. We looked at the ways in which we actually want to make our own relationship better because it made for really organic and earnest conversations with these people. And I think the other thing we really wanted to show in season eight, specifically how important it is to build a tribe of other couples that you can rely on and that you can like. These friendships with these people and many others are literally what have held our marriage together. And I don't mean that in a like, we're barely hanging on by a thread kind of a way, but I mean, we want to build and pursue. Yes, they're essential. We want to nurture our connection and our lives and our relationship and our connection are so much deeper and healthier when we do life with other people that we respect and trust. And so that's kind of what we were trying to recreate on the mic, showing others what it's like to have these conversations in an honest and open way. Because we get that question a lot. Actually, you might be interested to know that that's one of our most frequently asked questions. It kind of. It's like a two parter. One is how to make. How to make friends as a married couple is easily one of the most frequently asked. And then as a close second, and that kind of goes hand in hand is. But then how do you like how. Where does the depth come in? How do you allow for that without it feeling awkward or forced or embarrassing or any of those things? So we really wanted to model that. And I don't know if it fully worked because it's always hard to know. It's a work in progress.

So you'll keep refining it. Well, then how do you. The next thing that we have is one of our biggest questions is how do you increase listeners?

If I knew, I would be a millionaire. Yeah, I think for us, it's been a lot of just asking our great love gang, which is what we call our people asking our great Love gang to share with their friends. And when we engage with our listeners, a lot of times I will ask, how did you hear about the show? And I would say the majority of the time they say, my co worker told me or my aunt told me or my sister told me or whatever.

So it is getting passed around. Word of mouth.

Yeah. We don't do a lot of promotion and to be honest with you, we haven't grown as much in the last year as we have in the four years prior to that. And that's been discouraging. I think as the space gets more crowded, I think as people have more and more options for what kind of content they're consuming, both within the podcasting space and outside of it, I think that's always gonna shift and change. And that's one of the reasons why we're always looking ahead to what's next. And again, goes back to that whole being ready to pivot thing. We don't know how much longer we're gonna do the show. We really never do. When we wrap a season, we're always kinda like, no, we don't know when we'll be back. One year we took a lot of months off. We took like 10 months off between seasons one time. But most of the time it's just a couple months. Gives us a chance to live our life and figure things out.

So wait, I'm going to stop everyone right there, because this is what I do for a living here. A lot of times this is the reason why you're not growing as much. And so it's a technical reason that you're not growing as much. So you need to every 25 days put out a short piece of content so that you keep the subscriber base on an active basis. Because what happens if you take a break more than 30 days, iTunes stops pushing the podcast to them. That means when you produce a new episode, they have to actively go in and see that you have a new one and re pull it back into their feed. So you may have some that aren't like, oh my gosh, when are they coming back? But they were listeners for a while and they just sort of like forgot about you and you dropped down on their list. Because they've got so many podcasts, because who doesn't listen to a lot of them, right? So they aren't actively. ITunes stops pushing it to them if it's been 30 days or more since you published or since they listened. It's just an iTunes thing. And because iTunes is probably about 60% of the listener base and subscriber base. That's probably having an effect on the growth. So one of the ways around it is to just do like a little ten minute, like that. You would. You could record them at the end of your first season, but just drop them in every 20 days, 25 days or so until you record again, until you start your new season.

Very smart. Yeah. And we have done that occasionally, and so that's. And it's not that difficult. So that's really good advice. And we should definitely try to start implementing it again.

Then keep seeing your growth path. Just be a little more stable.

That's great advice. Thank you.

Well, let's go. You've talked about how you produce the show yourself. So what is the most essential part, do you think, to producing it in a professional way for you?

That's a great question. I mean, for me, I think a big part of it is setting both reasonable but also setting deadlines that are, I would say reasonable but also aspirational. So that I'm like, staying on top of things, but I'm not killing myself in the process.

So you're not going. You're not like, this is going to take three weeks to edit. I'm going to take my time. Right. Like, you're like. I'm like, I need to have it done in a week.

Right.

Well.

And so usually what we do is we record on either Saturday or Sunday, and then I have the episode up by 12:01am on Wednesday morning. So.

So you kind of set yourself a short timeframe.

Yeah, I finish it Monday or Tuesday. Monday and Tuesday. Usually here and there. And then in terms of production, one of the things I definitely think has helped me is listening to other shows with unique formats because it just kind of keeps my understanding of the space fresh, allows me to be creative if I come across something that like, oh, we could try that or this or, you know, we don't drift a lot from our pattern or our format, but I think it's just smart to see what's out there and understand what other.

People are doing and stylize your show. Yeah. Which you've done. So how do you encourage engagement in that community? Called it the Great Love Gang. How do you encourage engagement within that community?

So we have a very loyal and engaged private Facebook group. And I would say that's one of the primary. Well, that's the primary place that we engage with people. And every episode has what's called kindling questions. We used to call them trigger questions.

But that sounds a Little violent. Yeah. Yeah.

And like, with all that, we're.

Yeah.

Gerard's a pacifist. We're both fairly well without wanting to get political. We're not big fans of guns. And so anyways, we changed it to Kindling Questions. There's a fun backstory and an episode behind that. But anyway, we will post those. They're actually meant for listeners to be able to go and have heartfelt conversations with their partner after listening as it relates to the show.

Not necessarily within the group, but.

No, no. But we do post them one at a time in the group in case people want to share. And it's so fun. And actually, one of the things that I love about our great love gang and the group that goes along with it is that we don't necessarily always end up being the conversation starters. So, like, the other day, someone was like, hey, I'm going to Germany soon. I'm gonna be doing a lot of walking. I'm not a big. Like, I haven't done a lot of big European backpacking trips, but I really care about looking cute and feeling comfortable. Does anyone have shoe recommendations? I'm like, men and women came out of the woodwork. I mean, it was like 90 comments long. Or maybe not 90, but it was a long thread of suggestions.

So they trust the community. That's, like, such a compliment right there.

Oh, my gosh, it makes us so happy. And, of course, we had our suggestions, too. Like, I weighed in, Gerard had thoughts, and then some, like, branch off. Conversations happen, and people get to know each other. And a lot of people come to our events regularly and start to get familiar with each other. And it's been just a wonderful group of people that's popped up. And I think that's probably my favorite part. Aside from the fact that it saved the show, saved our marriage, I would say the friendships that have come about because of it have been easily a close second.

We talked a little bit about this, and this is sort of the last one on the list of things. We talked about monetization. But which one felt like the best way for you? Which one felt the most authentic and the one that you'd like to do more of?

Live events are easily my favorite in terms of scalability. They're not necessarily the most lucrative, but I would say for us, they provide a really healthy and fun mixture of something that we love to do, which is performing and connecting with people in real life. Just like in terms of without relation to a stage or any sort of platform, mixed with the fact that in A lot of those cases, we've got a client who has a need and a specific goal in mind, and then we're able to help them either by providing entertainment or providing a learning experience or providing. Because we've spoken at everything from. We've been the headliner at a large theater, we've been preached at churches, we've spoken in college campuses. So it kind of depends on what the situation is. And so I would say that's probably been my favorite. And then I would kind of lump our own events into that, too. The ones that we host, though, those are far less lucrative in terms of an actual profit generator because we're also having to pay the cost of throwing the event. And so it gets a little funny with, like, you know, paying ourselves versus paying for all the expenses, which is why we love being hired to do things like that. Yeah. And I mean, I don't mind ads. I don't mind having ads on our show, but it's kind of one of those. I don't want to call it necessary evil, because it's not really evil, but it's just one of those things. It's like it's advertising. Media is always going to have it as a part of.

Yeah, it could be an interruption.

Right.

You know, to some people. Well, well, the last thing that I like to do before I close with everyone is like, identify their bingeable factors. So I like to say what I think your bingeable factors, because it was more likely not what you expect it to be. And so having listened to a lot of shows and having sort of identified them, your bingeable factor is really so interesting. It's very opposite from the others. And that is that it's one of those things where you talk on a topic and I want to find out if it's going to come up again, like, if there's been further resolution. And so now sometimes it could be like, negative thing. Like, I'm very curiously wondering if it's gonna destroy you. Like, that would be bad. But it can be that. I mean, I'm sure. But you're still interested. And I'm still going to the next one. Wanting to find out, like, wanting to see the thread through it, which is. And you don't do it in a. In a. Like, it's like, not an obvious way. Like, oh, we're touching back and we're mentioning what's happened. No, it's organically happening. So I have to listen to the whole episode to find that out. That's your very interesting Bingeable factor that you've created. And so that's an unusual one. I have to tell people. So everyone out there, I want you to listen, because Jesse and Gerard Pepper have come up with a great model that is so interesting in how that they created their bingeable factor.

Wow. I had never thought about that, but I kind of see what you're saying. And again, I'm flattered because you're making it sound like we did it on purpose and we mostly did it.

But you didn't. It's very obvious you didn't. It's organic. Right.

But I get what you're saying, and honestly, like, it makes a lot of sense. There are a few shows that I kind of. You really do like, I want to know what happens next, so I gotta come back or, you know, how does this play out? Totally.

Right. But it's not a gimmick. It's real. It's really a part of it.

I do often say it listens, like when people tell me that, they jump around. First of all, I totally get that you're not gonna probably go back and listen to 100 episodes in one sitting or whatever, but I do oftentimes recommend that I just say that they listen. It's almost like a narrative format. Yeah. You get the backstory. We just sort of talk about things, almost assuming that you've listened to at least some past episodes. So we don't give backstory in every episode most of the time.

And that's what I think is why it's an organic thing. And you can tell so well. Thank you so much for being on the show. I really appreciate it. Future ran center of influence Marriage is funny. Comes out on Wednesdays. They do seasons, so you gotta catch them. But there's eight seasons, so you can go binge, listen to some eight seasons and catch up on all of that. Gerard and Jesse Pepper and Jesse Artigue, thank you so much for being on the show. You've been an inspiration of giving quite a different viewpoint on podcasting today, and I really appreciate that.

Thank you so much, Tracy. It's been a pleasure.

Anytime, everyone, you can catch feed your brand center of influence. Every Wednesday on feed you'd brand and you can go to feedyourbrand. Co as well as catch us on social media. Ed, love for you guys to suggest out your favorite podcasters and I'll go chase them down and bring them on the show. So thanks everyone, for listening. This is Tracey Hazzard.

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 the bing bing bing changefactor.com guest and apply.