(Upbeat Music)

Trent: Welcome to,

Trent: Storytelling in a Small Town.

Trent: Welcome back to Storytelling in a Small Town. It's just AJ and I again, again, hope everything's going with Brian. Brian, we miss you. Hope to see you again here soon.

AJ: Come back. Come back to us.

Trent: And this is a topic that I feel like he, I know he has some really good business podcasts that he does with businesses. So this is a, he would be great on these and maybe we'll have to revisit that.

AJ: Yeah, we might have to do a part three so that we can get Brian's take on some of this stuff. Yeah. He also has a unique view though. Brian has his own subset of podcasts that he's both on and produces that are with his company. And so I know he's got his own cool set of experiences to share and Brian's always got unique takes on things that he comes with. So we'll probably do a part three. We'll do our fourth or fifth episode about podcasting, but that's okay.

Trent: Yeah, and the reason we're talking so much about this right now is I think it's becoming very hot topic. It's been growing for a while and everyone thinks all podcasts have been around for a while. They start in 2003, technically never hit mainstream until like this year by number of statistics of like over 50% of the population listening to them on a monthly basis. We've not hit that statistic till like 2025. So like you're not too late to jump on it. And I think that's why we want to talk about, we previously talked about guessing on a podcast and now let's talk about if you want to start your own, we're not going to necessarily get into the details of how to start your own. You're going to have to go listen to Snohomage Podcasts Playground, which is another podcast that I do that literally walks you step by step of how to start your podcast. We want to go over more of what do you need to consider? What do you need to think about and everything else that goes into that decision before you even get into it. Because there's so much of what a podcast can be or cannot be and how you can then make the most of it.

AJ: So yeah, sort of big topic. We'll try to keep it, try to keep it a little bit streamlined.

AJ: I have people come to me, like I know you do that will start, they'll start the conversation with

AJ: should I be doing a podcast? Or do you think it's a good idea if I do a podcast?

AJ: And it's always such a like generalized question, but very quickly you start to kind of want to dial in you know, what is their purpose or what's the why behind trying to do this podcast? Something's happened in your life that has triggered this thought to you that you have something you need to say to other people or that you want to tell other people or that you want to tell the world. And you're excited about it now. And so now we got to figure out really what the why is here and how we're going to do it. And I feel like this is like the starting point of like a lot of these conversations is that that seemed pretty common

Trent: to you. 100%, I've also gotten a lot of times, like I feel like I need to do a podcast is it too late as another one that I get a lot too and just people like, oh, I'm seeing these people do it or everyone's telling me I should do a podcast. I've had like three or four people specifically say like, I love the way you talk, or they heard me on other podcasts and were like, you have a great voice, you should do your own podcast. I love what you say, right? Like, yes. Absolutely. We hear this all the time. I think the whole point of like why we're having this discussion is it comes down to it depends.

(Both Laughing)

AJ: I love that. Yes, it is very, very subjective.

Trent: The other thing is like, we're not trying to shut down anyone's voice. Like I want to make this very clear. It's not that we want to shut down anyone's voice or say you can't have it. Like, yes, anyone in theory can go out and do it. You can go and do this on your own. You could theory start tomorrow and do it. And the question I always ask is what do you want to get out of this podcast? I think that's one of the most important things going back to what is the why that you want to, what do you hope to get out of it? Because sometimes what you're hoping to do and what you want to do for your business, for you, whatever you have in mind might not align with the podcast or it's gonna be so much more work to do a podcast like that than you realize like, Right.

Trent: So much. Yeah, we can just go down.

AJ: Do you have the time to put in, to get the quality that you want out of the end product? Or do you have the money to pay for the quality?

Trent: That's one of the biggest things I tell everyone when they think about starting their own, you either have to have the time or the money.

AJ: Yeah, so in thinking about the why component that is this huge, just this like massive wealth of possibilities.

Trent: And maybe we should talk a little bit about, because we keep saying like, there's so much to do with podcasts and we're like, there's so why and so dependent on what you're trying to do. I feel like a lot of people are like, what are you talking about? There's like, you just sit down and interview someone, right? So I think it would be good to talk about why is this such a big topic for us? Why are we hitting on so much of making this a big deal?

AJ: And so if you are a small business owner or organization leader, what have you, and you've got this idea about podcasting, I think one of the very first places that my mind goes to is as a tool by which to engage people

AJ: and has this effect of being a marketing piece, a branding piece. And when it is managed and manicured and produced really well, and given the forethought of how it's used in that way, it can go from being like fun, kitschy, sit down interviews

AJ: to a full court press marketing plan that carries your organization or your business to the next level, or that builds your brand authority into something that people know and understand and want to work with or engage with or buy from or what have you. And so that's like zero to 100, like really quick, right? But that's the potential power of your podcast

AJ: if you're thinking about it in that way.

Trent: I think that's so powerful, right? Because that is something I don't,

Trent: not everyone might not have that experience of like how powerful it really can be. Right. Because here's one, I want to do a little experiment with everyone listening right now and you can do a list too. Ooh, I'm excited.

Trent: I want you to close your eyes and just picture this when I come to mind when I say a local podcast, what comes to your mind? When you hear local podcast, AJ, what are you thinking? Like what's the visuals that come to mind? Like what, yeah, let me hear it.

AJ: And now there's anything wrong with doing it virtually, but I frequently think Zoom style podcast, I'll say like low technical lighting, like lighting that's not well dialed in or- That's generic. You know, like that doesn't have a purpose. We'll put it that way. Maybe that's a better description. Lighting that exists without a purpose, right?

AJ: Unrefined, you know, so sort of unrefined. And not that raw is not acceptable. There's plenty of raw podcast. I mean, I would even like the Joe Rogan podcast, I think even as like an example is shot in a sort of raw type, raw sort of way. But it's more about the sort of the skill kind of like level that is involved.

Trent: I'm gonna say two things that people probably think of, like two people either in their basement or their garage, sitting around a microphone and around a table.

AJ: Yeah, there you go.

Trent: I'm guaranteed that's what most people think of when they think local podcasts, especially. Yeah, that's super fair. And I could be wrong.

AJ: If I use the reference of public access channel, does that like send me into like a total time warp? Does that make me a boomer?

(Laughing)

AJ: If I bring up like, if you don't know, there used to be this thing called public access TV that was sort of the TV equivalent of the podcast in your basement.

Trent: And then like it has a purpose, right? There's a point to it. And when we're talking about your brand and representing you, is that what you want it to be? Right. So that's where I feel like right now too with the podcast network and some other stuff I'm trying to do, I'm trying to break this mold of when people hear local podcasts, especially local Snohomish podcasts, it's like, no, these are full fledged productions. There's more to it than just two people sitting on a couch, because there are a thousand ways to tell the story. Because to your marketing plan of like, hey, why are we just sitting this as a conversation? Let's say I work in some business, it's a very active, like very visual kind of service business. Like, cool, I'm going to tell this one experience that I had, but we're gonna tell it like a crime drama. Wow. Like that would be so much more engaging. You can do so much more stuff, adding just the sound design that you can add into there with that of like, I was slowly walking around the studio and this, and you can make the most mundane thing into the most exciting thing and add these amazing sound effects that will have people hooked. And it's like, does this come from like NPR or like this high level thing? Yeah, I was thinking about all things considered. So that's what I'm talking about. Like there's things that you can do for your business, especially depending how you frame it, right? If you're just like, hey, this is just a Q&A for people about our business, talking with suppliers, customers, get to know our business, having that interaction. Awesome, that's one way to do it. And there's a purpose for that. And again, why we say so much, depending what your goal is, like I want a deep connection, I want to create a cult following, I want all of this. Awesome, we're gonna turn something into a crime drama. We're going to have a superhero, basically graphic novel that's gonna be narration. We're going to create a space Odyssey that we're gonna have multiple characters, sound effects. Like there's so many ways you can do this, right? It's like, we're so used to this like small box when it comes to podcasts right now. And it's just like, there's so much that you can do and it can apply to your business.

AJ: You can use a podcast as a creative framing tool for your business. Yeah, that is so powerful. I never put that into words in that format. That's so cool. I really love that idea. That's genius.

Trent: So going down this rabbit hole, why we're talking about this is

Trent: you really need to think about why you're doing it and what that end goal is because there's so many different ways that you can end up shaping what this podcast looks like then, right? Again, we're all used to that interview style, but we can do, I don't know if you've seen Dropout, one of the online TV channels, YouTube channels, they do something called very important people. And what they do is they bring comedians in, basically blindfold them, put them in ridiculous prosthetics and like costumes. They're like, you have to do a personality and we're gonna interview you as that personality. And it's called very important people. It's a really cool content. But think about that, how can you get creative? Like, cool, I'm gonna do an interview with AJ about his business and my business and what we're doing, but how do you make it a more fun format than just we're gonna sit here. It's like, hey, we're going to pretend we're announcers at a hockey game while having this conversation.

Trent: Like, let's get more creative with this, I guess is what I'm trying to say. Because everything is sounding-- Yeah, you can really have fun with it. Yeah, there's no limit to it. I think that's the other thing. There's no right or wrong. We're all familiar with what people are doing right now. And that's kind of the reference that we go off like, oh, this looks great, I wanna do this. And the more people to do that, you have to do that much more to be able to stand out.

AJ: I think you have an interesting comparison. If you go on Google and look up professional headshot styles

AJ: for different industries, yes, professional headshot styles for different industries.

AJ: I was just looking at this on Etsy, and an incredible scroll of here is Linda. Linda is a nonprofit executive.

AJ: We took her photo where she looks very confident but welcoming because that was how we wanted to convey their organization, their community service organization. We wanted them to be welcoming.

AJ: And then here is here's Steve, and Steve is a real estate agent. And we wanted him to look very, like he was really knowledgeable and like he knew what he was doing. And so he has this sort of thoughtful pensive look. And so you could kind of think of it in the same way. If you want this output, and so how do you want your input to be received? So I'm going to be confident, or I'm going to be whimsical. We're gonna be humorous. We're gonna break the mold by turning this completely on its head. We're going to tell this story in the most absurd reverse way possible. We're gonna tell the story backwards, whatever it is that you're going to do. You know, if you have this final output in mind, then you can curate what this manner of presentation is going to be. And so that, I think that's really what, really what we're trying to touch on, right?

Trent: Yeah, and that's all the stuff that you have to think about before you ever hit record, before you ever do anything, right? Like, yeah, go listen to this, know how much podcast playground, I break down my whole process of starting from literally, who are you trying to talk and dress to through? What are they getting out of it? And then even how you do all this stuff, if you want to try and, if you have the time and you want to try it yourself without paying someone, right? Like, I'm trying to break it down to that level so it's accessible, people can get into it. Because there's so many ways to do it, right? And there's not a right or wrong way.

AJ: Yeah, absolutely.

AJ: Every time we talk about podcasting between, like you and I are between the three of us, I am always somehow like enlightened with new, a new piece of like the puzzle in the podcasting equation that I did not, had not considered before. And like this creative element of it, about just kind of turning it on its head and making it work for you as there's, that's just so cool. That really like, that's like really excited me for the day. So what else should we be talking about, you know, when it comes to these sort of, this like core origin conversation about your why, and then where to go next. So if I've, I've got my concept, you know what? I want to do, I want to do something

AJ: that's a sort of dark humor twist on my lighter service. And I know what I want to do now, now what am I going to do? Yeah, I mean, well first I'm going to go listen to Snow much podcast playground, but.

(Laughing)

Trent: Appreciate that. And I think it's one of those things of, you don't even need to be at that level yet. I think if you get to that level of like, I want to do dark humor podcast about like to promote my business, you've done a lot, right? And you want to make sure everything's kind of in line. Like I would recommend talking with someone even before, like really as you're talking about why am I doing this? What's the intent? What are people getting away from it? Like start having those conversations with someone like a producer or someone that has it or just floating it by your friends to like, hey, how would you feel about a podcast that did this? And you walked away with this. And they're like, yeah, I would actually love a podcast that does this. And then you can be like, okay, now what if it's a dark humor? What if it's these different styles to walk through it? Right? Like I tell people from the first time I have a conversation about starting a podcast, it'll be three months until we ever like release anything. Just because we will spend over a month, month and a half sometimes just nailing down those beginning facts. So that's the thing where I just want to emphasize the importance of taking your time in the beginning. You touched on this a lot before with the pre-production and everything else that we do. But this is one where if you don't set it up right, you don't know why you're doing it. You don't really have that established and you kind of rush into it. You're going to be changing it so often. You're just going to be hard for the audience to follow. You're not going to get that product you want. It's one of those things, spend the time up front and it's going to save you so much time later on.

AJ: It's been like a lot of spinning wheels and I don't want to say duplication of work, but you're sort of repeating steps and kind of stumbling over yourself. If you're not, you know, if you don't have a really firm idea, and you probably, you may stumble anyway, but at least don't have your stump stumblings be complicated by also not knowing what it is you want your product to be.

Trent: And I guess it's also like have confidence stumbling.

AJ: Sure, yeah, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, a hundred percent. Yeah, I did not agree with that harder. The other day I was at an event and I tried to very gracefully slide between two

AJ: like chairs that were seated on the floor and completely lost my balance and decided to just sit down in one of the chairs to make it look like I'd recovered, recover gracefully. Just sit down confidently and get it done.

Trent: So to your question, I know it kind of... No, no, totally okay. Gave the corporate answer there or whatever you want to say, but you really want to make sure you have that great foundation. Because once you do that, there's so much about the flow, how often are you going to post?

Trent: When are you going to post? Like there's all these things, what music are you going to use? What's your cover arc going to look like? Right? Like it just starts a chain reaction of all of these other things that ultimately you kind of want that beginning stuff of, who's my audience? What are they getting from this? How am I telling the story that becomes your guide, your North star for all of this other stuff that's happening? So that's why I'm so adamant about spending your time there. And once you kind of get all that developed again, working with someone, figuring out on your own, I have packets on my website that you can go and find to help you go through this too.

Trent: But once you're there, it's start recording. Like this is why it's called the Snohomish Podcast playground, you've kind of just got to play around. If you're doing it by yourself, it's like, okay, what about the gear? Cause that's the other thing we actually haven't even talked about yet. Right? Okay, I'm going to go do this. Now do I do it myself? Do I hire someone else out? All right, if you're going to do it yourself, you need gear. So you need some sort of microphone, probably not nothing this fancy. Actually, please don't start with anything this fancy. And then your recorder,

Trent: you've got to have your hosting platform. You got to have your software to be able to edit this. And then you've got to have time to actually edit it. Again, if you get really good, some people don't do a lot of editing and sometimes that's great, right? And if this is your first time ever talking on a microphone on a platform like this, you expect to take a lot of time just sitting down, editing it, making it sound the way you want.

Trent: So I think- Also expect to not like your own voice at first. Oh, a hundred percent. And there's so much that you can do to change how your voice sounds and posts too. So we're not really getting to the answer of like, once you have this, what do you do? It just becomes more questions that you kind of have to answer is ultimately where it's at, right? Cause okay, cool. Maybe I figured out all the hardware stuff. Now I got to sit down and record. I get that recorded. It's ready to go. Okay, where am I hosting it? What hosting platform am I using? How am I promoting it? Here's something else that I like to say. If you're hosting a platform, this is a great way to build a deeper connection with people, but people aren't just randomly going to find it. You still have to promote it and put it out there as part of your brand. To your point of it being the marketing and branding side of it. If you're like, I published this on Spotify or whatever, why is no one listening? Does anyone know about it? It doesn't, you still got to have that distribution. It's not like social media where it's out there and you can put it in databases and stuff, but you still need something to kind of push and promote and let people know. And there's so much more behind it there too.

AJ: So if you're kind of looking at, at least in my mind, like what's kind of like the next step in the evolution of getting to the point of working towards your release. Where I usually come in at this point is looking at what's the marketing schedule that we're trying to drive towards look like. And so when I'm thinking about that, that's like, this is like a full kind of vision of what I want to put out into the world. I'm going to do two podcast episodes a month. I'm going to release on the first and the 15th. So on this two weeks in between, I want to have a post every other day. That means I need to have X number of reels, X number of static posts, X number of whatever. And then however many ad hocs I'm going to throw in there or like random things I'm going to add to the mix is like my day goes on. Cause there's always stuff I want to add to the mix and never just be happy with the programmatic stuff. And so now I've got a calendar, right? I know how far ahead I need to be from how many episodes and I know how many reels I need to cut together. And so now I've got a timeline. I have a timeline piece that I can work against or that I can work towards.

Trent: And I think that's so important to talk about cause that is so important that scheduling that getting ahead of it. The other thing I also recommend have like at least six episodes recorded before you release anything.

Trent: Cause it's just, it gets you ahead. Sometimes if it's a new series, you want to do kind of a batch drop where you can just be like, hey, here's four or five episodes that you can go listen to right off the bat. So people can get that hook in them and get going. But even if you don't do that, it's like, you don't want to have to suddenly be like every week be like, oh crap, I got to schedule an interview. If you have six in the chambers, like, okay, this month I can schedule a couple of these here and there and then go forward and you have plenty of time. Again, some concepts that might not work. Like you want it to be very relevant of what's happening.

Trent: And in a large majority of the time, you can really space that out, record stuff ahead of time and you have space it out and you'll be surprised how relevant it still is.

AJ: Yeah, so you can really build yourself a timeline to work from that then powers kind of how you produce, how you think about producing the show in terms of, you know, the when and the how and the who.

Trent: And so- Well, and I want to add one other thing when you're talking about your outgoing, like all your marketing and stuff like that. Like if you do it right, your podcast can be your marketing for the month, right? Like you can get blog posts out of it. You have your social media posts from it. You have, I don't, like there's so much you can do. You have. Potentially testimonials from it, depending how it goes. Right, like there's so much that you can do by just scheduling that one thing again, depending how you do it. And this is the whole of the thing that can kind of factor in, how am I structuring my podcast? Right, thinking about how does this fit into my marketing plan? Like that can influence everything as well too. Cause you were talking like, yeah, I want to post this many times in the weeks that we're not posting. It's like, okay, well, I have a business where I have to do all this other stuff. I don't want this to be my whole thing. Why do you think so many podcasts end up with their own Instagram handles? It's because you really have to promote it almost like its own business to really get that traction and get high number of views if you want it to make a very large impact. Sorry, probably slight tangent, but I think it's like important to understand why there's so much complexity to it.

AJ: Then that makes a lot of sense. It can really take on a life of its own. And in some ways at a certain level really deserves to kind of live in its own realm that then feeds the other part of your business. And that's totally okay. Sometimes better, I think, in a way to almost have those things unmarried on the social media side, you have this advantage of the less you look like you're selling something to the platform, the less the platform thinks you're selling something, the better your organic results are going to be. So the less you have these things that are built into the text and whatnot that are going to convince the algorithm that I'm trying to sell my product from my business page, the better your results are going to be most of the time. So having this kind of separate handle that operates as this kind of separate entity that has a persona that's not wrapped around the product sale conversion component of your business can be a total boon. You can kind of live on this other platform and then sell in another place.

Trent: Yeah, no, that's true. And yeah, I hadn't even thought about that, but that's-- Or serve in another place, whatever. Yeah, no, that makes a lot of sense. And for those that are like, I do not have enough time to do this, that's why we talk about planning out your social so much because you can take those clips and have them be kind of like your brand story videos that we've talked about before too, right? Like you can schedule it and schedule out your podcast episodes to make it fit that as well. So if you want to keep it all in the same one, you can have it, have that look and really fit into that as well. It really did. Yeah, absolutely.

AJ: It's not like a right or wrong answer. One size fits all use case situation. There's a ton of different ways to get to your end goal, especially in the creative world. So yeah,

AJ: it can be overwhelming. And I think that's why Trent and I spent so much time talking about your why and what your goal is and the kind of the prethought part of it that helps secure your footing in what you want to do so that then when you are going down the road of how do I film it? How do I speak to it? How do I do the technical parts of it? You can be overwhelmed by the technical part and manage through that and not be overwhelmed by what your purpose is.

AJ: Getting through the technical components of it, we can help you, YouTube can help you. You can get all the information on the world from the world about how to produce the podcast, but you're really the only person that can speak to why you want to do this and what the end result needs to be and all that part. So just having your goals and your thoughts and orders is a really powerful part of the whole process.

AJ: And that's coming from me. I'm usually super like,

AJ: follow.

AJ: Trent's usually the one trying to rein me in. So if I'm, you gotta respect.

Trent: And I think that's so important why it's just to work with someone. Cause sometimes you just like, I can articulate the why and all this, but translating that to that creative or that other thing can be really hard doing your own for your own project. I don't know why, that is the hardest thing to do. Get other people involved.

AJ: It's so hard to do in a silo. It's really hard to do in a silo. And even like, Trent and I and Brian, we all talk to each other about our podcasts in a sort of cyclical fashion that's beneficial.

AJ: So, I also don't get hung up on some sort of like faux competitive or some nature of it where we can't like all exist in the same space or whatever. Cause the creative space is so huge. And there's so much room for us to all live and exist and have fun and make money and do all the things here. So, yes.

Trent: Well, and I think this is a good place to kind of wrap this up. I 100% we're gonna have to continue this conversation once we've Brian back.

AJ: Yeah, I can't wait to get Brian in here for this. Cause I feel like we touched on a lot of really good stuff over this last couple episodes.

Trent: And I know he's gonna have even better stuff from his experience to add to this. So, this is, yeah, podcasts, you can do it for yourself and just realize it's a big commitment, but it's a big commitment and there's a lot to it because it can be a massive payoff for you as well. Massive benefit. Massive benefit. Well, any last parting words for this episode?

AJ: Ooh, nothing as good as what I had for the last one. Trying to think.

Trent: You dropped so much wisdom right there at the end. I hear, I'll help you out. I got this one. If you're thinking about this at all and wanna learn more about the process, go listen to the Snohomish podcast playground. There's short, only like 15 minute episodes is like the longest ones, but go listen and start understanding and helping through that process, right? I'm not gonna say it's gonna solve everything and it will just help give that context to really answer that question for you.

AJ: Ooh, and if it leaves you with more questions, then you've got a perfect opportunity. You've got a great reason to call Trent. Yeah, or. If there is one person who is here in the community that really wants to help you produce your podcast at like a high level and wants to come and support you, it's gonna be Red Trucks.

Trent: Well, and also we have the Snohomish podcast network, which we're members of. So we have a

AJ: whole group of people

Trent: that are podcasts trying to do this. So come to one of our mixers, go look at the websites, find these other podcasts too to hear other inspiration, other ways to do podcasts. And we have in-person mixers where you can come talk and ask these people that are doing podcasts and being like, should I do this and understand their process too? There's so many resources in this community. Don't feel you're alone. I know there's a lot to think about and we're all here to help you get you through it. That's right. See you next time.

AJ: Bye.

(Upbeat Music)