Everyone thinks that the hardest part of starting a podcast is the techie stuff,
the microphone, uploading and editing it perfectly, publishing it to the podcasting apps.
That is actually the easiest part. The hardest part about creating a podcast
is creating a show that the right people want to listen to, growing it,
and using that content strategically to draw your business. That is the hardest
part. The strategy behind the show is much harder than any of the techi
things. Welcome to Imperfect Action. I'm Steph Taylor. For years, I
read all the books, downloaded all the freebies, and did all the courses,
But it wasn't until I started taking imperfect action that my business had its
first million dollar year. Imperfect Action is about doing things before you're ready,
prioritizing consistent action over perfect action, and moving forward even when you're not sure
you're doing it right. On this show, you can expect mindset advice,
actionable marketing tips and strategies to build a bit business that brings you more profit,
more freedom, and even more joy. Are you on the list to
get my daily businesses? Every day, I'll send you a bite sized prompt
designed to help you grow your business in a more intentional way. Sign up
at Stefphtaylor dot co, forward slash DBB, or at the link in the
show notes. Hey, welcome back to In Perfect Action. This is episode
seven hundred and forty. Today I'm sharing seven of the big mistakes to avoid
if you are thinking about starting a podcast coming into twenty twenty four. A
lot of people ask me, ahy too, Am I too late to start
a podcast? Is it already oversaturated? My response is no, it is
absolutely not oversaturated. There is still so much space for new podcasts out there.
The difference now is though that you have to be really intentional with what
you are creating, what you are putting out there, and the seven mistakes
that I'm going to share in this episode, If you can avoid these,
this is going to set you up for a lot more so excess with your
new show when you get it out there into the world. Mistake number one
looking for the things that are working well when you're creating the strategy for your
show. So I get asked this a lot, Steph, what's working well
for podcasts at the moment? And if you are asking this, you are
missing the point because podcasting is a long game. It's not about just jumping
on a trend that's working really well right now, because if you do that,
you might find that when that trend stops working or everybody's jumped on the
bandwagon and it's become pretty popular, when that trend stops working, then you
have to pivot. So your strategy isn't about jumping on what's working really well
right now and instead thinking about what can you do that is going to bring
you so much joy that you are going to want to keep podcasting forever.
What do you love to talk about? What would you love to have Your
show will be about who would you love to interview? What format would you
love to create your show in example this show, there's a reason why I
do most of my episodes solo because I like doing solo episodes. I find
them much easier for me to create than for me to do interview episodes.
Yeah, the show might have grown a lot faster if I'd had more guests
on the show who could then share their episodes with their audiences. But the
solo episodes for me are so much easier, and they allow me to impact
my audience in a different way. So that's why I chose my strategy.
I didn't jump on it because it was working well. Mistake number two.
Emulating a competitors podcast format or topic because you think it's working really well for
them. Just because it's working well for somebody else doesn't mean it's going to
work well for you. And if someone is already listening to your competitors show,
why should they then switch and listen to your one that is basically similar,
basically the same. Instead, what I would be looking for is where
are the gaps in your particular niche or your particular subject area. For example,
when I started this show, most business podcasts were forty five minute long
interview episodes where you had to listen for the whole forty five minutes to get
two takeaways, two actionable takeaways. So instead I thought, well, here's
an opportunity for me to create these shorter episodes that are much more actionable that
somebody can take what I'm teaching and go and implement it straight away without having
to listen for forty five minutes. Mistake number three picking a super broad topic
because you think that's what's going to attract more listeners. And I've talked this
in regards to niching your business as well. Typically, the bigger your niche,
the bigger your market, the broader you want to go, the more
competition you're going to be against, the more people you are competing against.
Seth Godin has this beautiful analogy around making waves. It is much easier to
make waves in a swimming pool than it is to make waves in an ocean.
And it's the same when you are picking your business niche, when you
are picking your podcast topic or your podcast audience, If you pick a narrower
audience, it's going to be so much easier to make those waves to become
known in that area, rather than competing against all of the other broader topics
that are reaching a larger, broader audience. There are super, super super
niche podcasts out there that are super successful because they chose a really specific niche.
And if you are thinking of taking on sponsors as a way to grow
your revenue, then there are sponsors who will pay more for niche audiences because
they want to reach that particular niche audience. So keep that in mind as
well. Mistake number four thinking that your podcast will grow itself. Now,
podcasting isn't an audience growth activity on its own, it is a nurturing activity.
It is a way to build a connection with your audience and to share
content with them that ultimately delivers value and moves them closer to buying from you.
But your episodes won't just magically reach new people because discoverability on the podcast
apps it kind of sucks. And unless your show is in New and Noteworthy
or in the top charts, or it gets featured by Apple Podcasts or Spotify,
your podcast isn't just going to reach people magically. So that means that
you need to get your show in front of the right people. And that
might look like being a guest on other podcasts and doing interviews there. It
might look like optimizing your transcripts into blog posts and publishing those on your website
and optimizing them for SEO so that somebody can when they search that topic,
they land on your website and they find that content. Right. That's how
you intentionally get your show in front of the right people. But it won't
just attract the right people magically on its own. Mistake number five doing it
without a strategy for how it will grow your business. And I talked about
this last episode. I shared ten ways you can use your show to grow
your business. And I would really encourage you to think about how you can
use your show or how you will use your show this strategy for it.
Otherwise you run the risk of it just becoming another thing that's on your to
do list, but that isn't actually driving any growth or isn't actually moving the
needle in your business, but it's taking up your time. And there are
so many ways that you can leverage it outside of just using it to get
clients or grow your audience. There are so many other ways you can leverage
your show. So go back and listen to that last episode because that will
get you thinking about the strategy behind your episode. And if you are starting
one, always come back to this question, how is this driving my business?
How is this growing my business? And then that way, when you
create the show, you can create it with that strategy in mind, because
that's what you decide to use the show as, or how you decide to
use the show to grow your business. That's going to determine your topic that
you talk about. That's going to determine your format, it's going to determine
pretty much everything. Mistake number six worrying about what microphone you will use,
where you will host it, or how you will edit it before you even
know what your show is going to be about. Everyone thinks that the hardest
part of starting a podcast is the techie stuff, the microphone, uploading and
editing it perfectly, publishing it to the podcasting apps. That is actually the
easiest part. The hardest part about creating a podcast is creating a show that
the right people want to listen to, growing it, and using that content
strategically to grow your business. That is the hardest part. The strategy behind
the show is much harder than any of the techi things because you actually have
to think about it. Whereas the techie things you can tick your way through
the techlist of it. You can find how to do that online. I
teach it inside the podcast launch plan as well. But the strategy you have
to be the person who is thinking critically about how this is going to grow
your business. Mistake number seven not being able to clearly and succinctly tell me
what your podcast is about, who it is for. For example, this
show I can tell you really quickly this is a bite sized online business strategy
podcast for online business owners with new episodes every Monday, Wednesday, Friday.
Great. That tells you what it is, who it's for, when you
can expect new episodes. Your podcast topic is so important, and knowing who
your listener is is also so important. These can be the difference between a
show that skyrockets and one that gets no listeners and you do ten episodes and
then give up because you haven't seen any traction. And inside my free masterclass,
I'm letting you in on my simple strategy for a powerful podcast topic.
You can watch that masterclass. It's called your First one thousand Listeners. How
to start a podcast without the overwhelm. Head to steptaylor dot co slash podcasting,
or if you prefer, you can DM me on Instagram and there at
stephtaylor dot co send me the word podcasting and I will send you the link
to register for that masterclass. There you have at seven mistakes to avoid if
you are thinking of launching a podcast in twenty twenty four. If you're not
already subscribed to the show, hit the subscribe button or the follow button and
it just means you'll get each new episode straight to your podcast app every Monday,
Wednesday and Friday. Thank you so much for listening, Catch you next
time, M.