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The official podcast of Shoemaker Films. Every week we share content related to digital marketing, video production, and brand building; and frequently meet with local creatives, entrepreneurs, and business owners for in-depth conversations. Get to know local heavy hitters and influencers in the Greater Philadelphia region while picking up some tactical advice and tips on starting and running a business, being productive, creating content, and everything in between.
Welcome to the Shoemaker Lab. This is your host, Dane Shoemaker. I'm the founder and CEO of Shoemaker Films. We're a greater Philadelphia based video production company. We work with businesses, in the Greater Philadelphia area or around, producing video content, anything from podcasts, social media content, brand stories, documentaries, any kind of video asset that might live on their website or social media, we can work with you to, help you to do that.
Dane Shoemaker:So if that's interesting to you, feel free to reach out to us. On this podcast, we often share, you know, information, tips about video marketing, production, you know, tips for small businesses. We also frequently interview local businesses, entrepreneurs, creatives. So if that's interesting to you, go ahead and subscribe on YouTube, or, you know, follow us on, the various social media platforms as well as the, the audio listening platforms as well like Apple and Spotify. So today is a solo show.
Dane Shoemaker:We we launched our podcast really back in January. We started reaching out to local businesses to interview them, And today's podcast is really about, you know, why we started a business, or why we started a podcast for our business. Right? First of all, we work with, a handful of clients today, where we produce their own podcast. And it it is a great tool on so many levels, and we'll go through that.
Dane Shoemaker:We've actually, put out a, a video a couple of months ago, you know, why your business should start a podcast. I'll I'll link to that in the description below. But today is really why we started a podcast. So Shoemaker Films. Right?
Dane Shoemaker:So we'll kinda go through five reasons. You know, essentially, we're we're calling this Shoemaker Lab, and we're just gonna dive right into it right now. So Shoemaker Lab, the reason why we're calling it Shoemaker Lab and not Shoemaker Films, podcast, or, you know, anything else because we really look at this as like an experiment, but also we're we're in the field practicing our craft here. Right? So our business, we produce videos.
Dane Shoemaker:We also produce podcasts. We produce social media content for for brands. But this is an opportunity for me and my team to really be out in the field practicing our craft. Right? Whether that's every single week, we're going out and interviewing local businesses.
Dane Shoemaker:So we're in different environments. And and first and foremost, we we always do in person interviews. You know, I think just personally, you know, we spend so much time on Zooms and Google Meets and and Webexes and all that stuff, doing things virtually that I believe people are craving in person interaction. And I think the production quality overall is much better when we can be in person talking to somebody and we're setting up cameras and lights and mics. You know, it's really an opportunity to show, our services and our capabilities when we're coming into, you know, a, a business.
Dane Shoemaker:Right? And we're we're setting up things. We're setting up lights. You know, there's different scenarios, that we're we're faced with different challenges. Right?
Dane Shoemaker:Maybe it's a a small space, and we had to figure out how to, you know, use some wider lenses or get creative with lighting. You know, maybe there's just there's just different aspects, of, you know, going into a space and figuring out what the best lighting and audio and camera setup is. Right? And so doing that every week with our own podcast makes us better at doing that with our clients. Right?
Dane Shoemaker:So that's really first and foremost. We're in the lab. We're we're practicing our craft. We're also testing out ideas. Right?
Dane Shoemaker:We're experimenting. Right? The podcast is really the first part, of it. Right? You know, you have your podcast, your long form, and then what you do with it after the recorded, episode is is released, there's infinite amount of things that you can do with a podcast to repurpose that content, whether you cut it up into shorts and put it out, you know, on social media, like Instagram, TikTok, Facebook.
Dane Shoemaker:Right? You can also take, you know, transcripts from the podcast and turn those into blog posts, turn those into carousels. You know you know, if you have enough of a a podcast over time, you could actually take those and build them into chapters for of a book. So what we're doing is basically using our podcast to test out new ideas, test out different, different types of content, and, you know, really get better at, you know, analyzing trends, analyzing data, and use that to, you know, share that that wisdom with our own clients. So, again, we we work with other clients, to produce their podcasts.
Dane Shoemaker:Why wouldn't we have our own podcast to kind of have some skin in the game and drink our own Kool Aid? Right? So the next reason is really around we'll call it business development. Just to be very transparent, we see our own podcast as a tool for building relationships with, clients or potential clients in the market where we wanna build a relationship with, and they could be potentially a client. Right?
Dane Shoemaker:The podcast is free right now. Right? We might charge in the future a couple $100 or something as a as a sort of loss leader, because it is a is a lot of significant time investment. Right? It's 2 plus hours on-site with a client.
Dane Shoemaker:You're setting up stuff, equipment. You're having the the 30 minute, 45 minute conversation with a business, tearing it down, then there's, you know, 3, 4, 5 hours of editing time, to put together that podcast. That's a that's almost a full work day, right, of time spent, to produce one episode, of of a podcast. It's it's not exactly the most efficient means. It would be much cheaper and more efficient for us to rent out a studio or, you know, you know, if we have our own studio space, basically, set up the podcast, day, and we have 4 or 5, 6 guests come in, and we boom, boom, boom, interview them right in a row.
Dane Shoemaker:I think it's more interesting and more engaging to be in, you know, in a a business's place of business. Right? And interviewing them there, really getting their vibe under you know, it's the the the business owners can be a little bit more relaxed because they're in their own space. It's an opportunity to showcase their business. And, yeah.
Dane Shoemaker:So that's that's why we do that. So it is a significant time investment on our part to do this, but I believe it's it's great networking. Right? It's a very simple thing to do is when you're talking to somebody maybe at a networking event or someone on the street or or, you know, even a cold outreach. Right?
Dane Shoemaker:So I might send an email to a business, hey, do you wanna be on our podcast? You know, it's free marketing for them, you know, because we're gonna put this video out on YouTube. We're gonna put the the audio out on Spotify, Apple, Amazon, etcetera. Then we're also gonna create usually between 2 to 3 shorts for social media. A lot of times, we're boosting them as well.
Dane Shoemaker:So we'll create a nice 15 to 32nd essentially commercial for that business, the guest, and we're gonna put that out. It's a it's a fun, little clip promoting that business as well as our podcast episode, but then we're gonna boost it. Right? We we'll throw 25, $50 towards that. And now you have, you know, 5, 10, 20000 impressions within the greater Philadelphia area that maybe are seeing that that ad or that boosted post about that business.
Dane Shoemaker:So there's a lot of value to not only us. We're promoting our company, but we're also promoting the guests that are on our podcast. And our hope is, hey, 10%, 20% of the guests, that will come on to our our show maybe become a client down the road, or someone will see that that episode and say, hey. I really like what what Shoemaker Films, is doing. I'm gonna reach out to them, see if they can put together a brand story or or, you know, something like that for us.
Dane Shoemaker:Right? So it's really a a business development and networking tool, in having a podcast. And that's something that we talk about with our own clients. Right? Because, look, if you're, you know, if you're in in in the industry doing anything, right, you have the opportunity to to create your own podcast.
Dane Shoemaker:It's a way to bring people into your orbit, provide value. Right? Maybe share expertise, but also just have a regular conversation about you, you know, about your business, with people that are on your show. Our one of our core missions really is around helping the small business owner. Right?
Dane Shoemaker:So kinda what we're talking about, you know, having somebody on our podcast is an opportunity to promote that that business and help that small business owner. Right? You know, this is a newer marketing trend. Right? Podcasting, you know, obviously, social media has been around for a long time, but I think podcasting has really gotten popular in the last, you know, 2, 3 years, especially video podcasting.
Dane Shoemaker:And, you know, this is an opportunity to, again, introduce, our services to a business, but really introduce the world of digital marketing podcasting to a business that maybe isn't too hip to that or familiar with with that. Right? So this is a right now, it's a free platform for local businesses in the Greater Philadelphia area to come on our show, share the share with the world, share with their with with their target market what they do, and it's a great opportunity for any business that's looking to to promote themselves, and generate some awareness and potentially bring in some more feet into their more people into their, their store, more eyeballs on their brand, their website, etcetera. Right? The last thing really, and and we've kinda touched on this a little bit, but but, you know, we're creating a lot of our own content.
Dane Shoemaker:Right? Obviously, we're we're going out every week. We're interviewing businesses, or we're doing podcast episodes like this where it's more sharing information, you know, sharing knowledge about a particular topic. And it's really our our main marketing driver. Right?
Dane Shoemaker:You know, we don't spend a lot of money on ads. We're not doing a lot of cold outreach. You know, we're not knocking on doors necessarily, but this is our main marketing driver. Right? So every single week, there's an episode going out of Schubert Schumacher Lab, and that's on YouTube.
Dane Shoemaker:It's gonna be across all the podcasting platforms as well. And then there's clips that are shared on social media. Right? So short form video clips, And, again, like I said before, this can all be repurposed into different types of content. Right?
Dane Shoemaker:So this is really our main marketing driver, at the moment. And so it's free content, not you know, it's free necessarily. It all costs us time for us. We already own the equipment. We're already using the equipment for clients.
Dane Shoemaker:We might as well use it for our own marketing, right, and provide value to to our audience. So, that's that's really it. I mean, there's there's a ton of benefits to starting a podcast. These are the reasons why we started a podcast. Right?
Dane Shoemaker:So, you know, it's a it's a an opportunity. Right? We call it SchumacherLab. It's an opportunity for us to practice our craft, be in the field, you know, using our equipment, getting better at interviewing, getting better at lighting and audio scenarios. It's a business development and networking tool, for us.
Dane Shoemaker:It's a way to help businesses in the area provide by providing a platform for them to share their story, share their, you know, their their business. Right? And then, really, really an opportunity for us to create content and and be be the primary marketing driver for Shoemaker Films. So go ahead and subscribe to this if you found some value in this. Hopefully, you can check out our our podcast.
Dane Shoemaker:You know, we we interview typically, it's about the goal will be about 5050. We've been heavy on the interviews the last, you know, month or 2 since we launched the podcast, but, you know, moving forward, I'd like to do more, you know, thought leadership, sharing information about what we do, answering frequently asked questions from clients. So expect, you know, interviews, but also, you know, topical content, maybe trends and digital marketing, things like that. So appreciate your time. Take care.
Dane Shoemaker:Thanks for listening today. Shoemaker Lab is an original production by Shoemaker Films LLC. If you enjoyed today's content, please consider subscribing on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and wherever you get your content. Follow us on Instagram at shoemaker.films. And if you're a business that's either interested in our video production services or would like to be a guest on the show, get in touch by using the contact form on our website, shoemakerfilms.com.