Consistency Counts: Building Your Business with Podcasts | Rich Brooks

Sadaf Beynon: [00:00:00] Welcome to Podjunction, where business meets podcasting. Whether you're on a morning jog, driving to work, whipping up a meal, or just taking a moment for yourself. Weekly bite sized episodes promise fresh insights from successful podcasters who have cracked the code of using podcasts to grow their business.

So whether you're a podcasting newbie or seasoned podcaster, grab your notebooks and get ready.

Matt Edmundson: Hello and welcome to a brand new episode of the Podjunction podcast where we talk about how to use podcasting to grow your business. Oh yes, it's the business of podcasting. We're getting into that. Me and the amazing Sadaf sat next to me who's just made some very rude hand gestures, but let's just not go there.

Welcome to the show. If it's your first time with us, we're a fairly new show. So if it's your first time with us, a big warm welcome to you. Make sure you hit the subscribe button and [00:01:00] all that sort of good stuff. Stay connected with us because we're just, we just love talking about how we use podcasting to grow business and we do it.

We're practitioners of the sacred arts And we also interview people who are also practitioners of the sacred arts and we get to listen to what they've got to say and we get to chat about what they've got to say, which is always a beautiful thing. And in today's show we have Rich

Sadaf Beynon: Brooks

Matt Edmundson: It's almost like we've rehearsed that, we genuinely did.

I'm just gonna sort that microphone out for you, there you go. So yeah, we've got Rich Brooks

Sadaf Beynon: Yeah, so he's the host of Agents of Change. His business is Flyte New Media, and he had a conversation with Matt some time ago. This is a segment from that conversation, and in this segment, he's talking about how you can leverage your podcast to grow your business or get more clients, very similar to [00:02:00] the.

The one we had with

Matt Edmundson: Dan Boudet. Yeah. Just do you remember who we talked to? Yeah, just take your time. That's great. So we've got Rich Brooks. That's awesome. Rich is such a legend too. So do check out his podcast, Agents of Change, especially it's all about marketing and all kinds of cool stuff. So you do want to listen to it.

He's a really cool guy. Rich, really like him. We keep threatening to grab a beer. Whenever he's over in the UK, whenever I'm in the States yeah, so we might just get a chance to do that at some point, which I'm very much looking forward to. So yeah, what's the name of his company again?

Flyte New Media. Yeah. So also check out his company, but yes, very good. Cool. So shall we start the clip? I've got a question.

Sadaf Beynon: Oh, is it? I've got a question. So in all of your years of podcasting, what was the most, I can't believe this is happening

Matt Edmundson: moment? When we were waiting to get on the show and you doing rude hand gestures, swearing at me.

I think actually it [00:03:00] was in a lot of ways, it was last year we have a podcast, if you're a regular to the show, I run a podcast called the eCommerce Podcast amongst other podcasts. We have quite a few now and we have a podcast called the eCommerce Podcast, which has been around since 2019.

It's got, it's fairly good established podcast now. And as a result, some interesting doors have opened. One of which was last year, I got to fly out to Subsummit, a big event in Dallas, Texas. I'm going again this year, 2024. If you're in the subscription eCommerce business. You should definitely go there.

Come see me. It'd be great actually to have a little meet up in Dallas. But last year I remember sitting on their stage doing a live recording, the first ever live recording of the eCommerce podcast. And what I mean by live recording was there was me and there was Alex chatting away in front of a studio audience.

And I'd never recorded a podcast in front of a studio audience before, and that was crazy. I love that. If I thought for one minute we could get an audience big enough every time, it'd be like having people sat in front of [00:04:00] us as we record this podcast either laughing or throwing things at you, both, yeah, or asking questions and all that sort of stuff.

But it was really great actually. And I had a big time doing a podcast event like that where you recorded it live on stage with an audience and we're going to do it again this year. Yeah, that's cool. At SubSummit. So yeah, psyched about that was pretty awesome. Cool. Pretty awesome. Does that answer your question?

Yes,

Sadaf Beynon: it does. Thank you. Should we go into the segment? Oh,

Matt Edmundson: you're the Yes, let's go into the segment. You're in charge. Okay. So here's the segment with Rich. Sadaf and I will back up to this. So I guess the most obvious question here, Rich, for you is From an ROI point of view, and I appreciate there's more to it than just this simple question, but from an ROI point of view, does the podcast make sense for you?

Rich Brooks: Yes, I've never run the numbers down to the last decimal on this, but even if I just think of this one client that I have in mind who came through the podcast, basically he was an avid [00:05:00] podcast listener, discovered the agents of change. And this is like maybe six, seven years ago at this point. And he just basically shared on Twitter.

Twitter was for that kind of stuff. An episode of mine and said, Oh, I really need help with this. I was on lead generation or conversion rate optimization. And so I tweeted back at him and we exchanged a couple of tweets, then DMs and ultimately a phone call. And we ended up getting his business. And he ended up spending three to 4, 000 a month with us over, sometimes it was more than that.

Sometimes it was less than that, it was well into the six figures. Over all these years. So from that standpoint, it, that pays for all my expenses and more. And like I said, there's been a few of other clients that we've gotten as well, but that's really been probably the biggest and most longstanding.

So I think that. Yes it has paid for itself and the other thing to keep in mind is, there's also the content play. So there's also that visibility factor, sometimes it's, we talked about some people are just like drawn to, Oh, you're a content creator, you're a podcaster that raises the [00:06:00] level of interest, the level of intrigue as well.

So all of a sudden you start to be positioned as a thought leader, even if you didn't see yourself as a thought leader. So from that standpoint, I definitely think that there is an ROI in there. But what I would caution anybody who's listening to this and Oh yeah, maybe I'll get a podcast. It's about putting in the time.

No one ever got rich on their first tweet or their first YouTube video or their first blog post. It's about, or I should say almost no one, right? But for most of us, mere mortals, it's about putting in the time in the lab, getting better at the craft and so find something that you enjoy.

If you absolutely hate podcasting, then please do not do it because you will make yourself miserable. But if this sounds interesting to you, I think that this could be an opportunity, but I would say, you want to get to episode 50. Before you decide if you're going to quit, because you're going to need to build up your podcasting skills, your interview skills, your editing skills.

And yes, you can outsource a lot of that post production stuff, that's it. Like people need to know that you're going to show up every single [00:07:00] day or week or month for them. That's when they start getting really invested in what you're doing.

Matt Edmundson: That's really interesting. So do you do yours every week?

Is yours a weekly podcast? We

Rich Brooks: try to. Sometimes I'll get 10 weeks ahead and then other times I'm like, okay, this is going live in about four minutes. So just be prepared for that. Sometimes it is a little hand to mouth and I've gotten better at when I have lost track of how many episodes we have ahead of us and suddenly I find that it's really short and then invariably somebody gets sick and they can't make that call and so now I'm.

I've been okay with just letting it go. There have definitely been weeks for one reason or another where I just didn't have a show and I didn't want to rush something and I didn't have anything to talk about. on my own, so I just let it go and life moves on.

Sadaf Beynon: If you're intrigued and want to dive deeper into this conversation, check out Podjunction [00:08:00] Cohort where you can listen to the complete interview and much more. Simply visit thepodjunction. com for more information about how to join.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah, welcome back. Do check out Podcast Junction.

Check out the podjunction cohorts for more information to watch Richard's interview in full, which was a great interview. I'm just going to hold my hand up to the camera in case you're watching, just put your hand in front of your face. The reason I want you to do this is because then hopefully the camera will actually get into focus.

It seems to be out of focus right now, so sorry if you're watching on video, it will figure itself out, I'm sure. I'm just going to hide my eyes like this, maybe it will focus. . There we go. . Maybe it won't. The cameras has gone. I'm just not gonna work right now. . But welcome back. Rich, what do you think?

Sadaf Beynon: I thought that was really good. I thought he had some great things to say. What I really appreciated him saying was that actually the pod podcasting isn't for everyone. And [00:09:00] 'cause a lot of people jumping on the bandwagon, which is. It's great, but also if it's not something that if, if it's not something that you love and you're not able to, are willing to spend the time building and honing your skills, then it's going to fall

Matt Edmundson: flat.

Yeah, it is. It is. It really is. It's interesting in the sense that he talked about all the other stuff that you have to do with podcasting as well. So not only have you got to be committed to podcasting and on the whole, that was a weekly show for Rich. Not only have you got to be committed to that, you have to be committed to following up people on Twitter, for example.

He talked about, didn't he? And there's the, so there's all that stuff that goes along with it that you have to do. And if you don't enjoy it and if you can't be committed to it, then definitely don't get involved with it because it is a fair bit of, a fair bit of work. Yeah.

Sadaf Beynon: Yeah. Yeah. Connecting with your listeners.

Yeah. Is good, isn't it? And also because one, you [00:10:00] get feedback and two, you maybe can get some clients

Matt Edmundson: out of it. Which is always a beautiful thing. So yeah I thought it was great what Rich was saying and interested in terms of ROI as well and not just. He gave an example of, a client that's bought in six figures worth of income as a result of the podcast.

And I think every podcaster that's been around a while has got probably one or two of those stories. But like he says, it doesn't, you don't make a fortune off your first tweet or your first YouTube video, at least usually you don't you've got to be consistent. You've got to put in the time which I thought was a super valuable statement.

So I think podcasting makes sense if you can put in the time and if you enjoy what you're doing. Yeah.

Sadaf Beynon: Yeah. And building that. And I guess as a result of that, you build your your loyalty with your listeners. Yep. Oh,

Matt Edmundson: you fixed it. I did. I just fixed the camera. Yeah. Sorry. If you're watching the video, I apologize for the last few minutes.

Sometimes it just goes here. I just don't want to focus on anything. And now it's back. Yeah.

Sadaf Beynon: Sorry. What were you [00:11:00] saying? I was just saying that building your loyalty, building loyalty with your listeners and you're putting consistent quality content out there. And also I liked he's realistic too, that sometimes you just don't have.

I guess for whatever reason last minute and you've got to go at a sustainable pace, but if there's nothing there, then there's

Matt Edmundson: nothing there. Yeah. It's interesting, actually, because if you do the, so he does the interview show format, right? I've been on his show, actually. He's been on ours as well.

That's how we connected. So I've been on his podcast and it's a lot like ours in the sense of it's an interview. So like I was, that clip with Rich was me interviewing him and having that conversation. So if you do have those episodes set up, you do have those recordings set up, I'm going to say probably one in 20 people from my experience, maybe one in 15 people for whatever reason will cancel that appointment, usually a few hours or the day before something comes up, the sick, the cat threw up in the slippers or whatever it is, something has happened to cause them not to be able to get there.

And so if your strategy is [00:12:00] live streaming, which is what we did in the early days, didn't we? We did the live stream thing. So we would have a guest scheduled in, we would live stream that recording out and that would be our podcast. And as soon as that guest didn't turn up, you're like, Oh man, what are we going to do?

It was complicated. And so if you're doing the interview format, that is one of the downsides of that is when guests don't show up, and how are you going to fix that? But one of the things that, one of the reasons we've done Podjunction the way we've done it is because it's a lot easier when there's two of you.

Yeah. So when it's you and me just chatting to the camera like this, that's gone furry again. There we go. Just need to reach my hands out to it. When it's two of you like this, if we were relying on a guest and a guest didn't turn up, we could probably quite easily just create a podcast without too much drama.

And so there's a benefit of co hosting, of course, there's dramas with co hosting as well. They make rude gestures. Yeah. Just saying, I'm going to let it go at some point.

Sadaf Beynon: Episode 50.[00:13:00]

Matt Edmundson: Question that you've taken to this, I'm going to ask you a question before we get into the video thing. So episode 50, have you forgiven me?

Sadaf Beynon: Yeah,

Matt Edmundson: I should make a note of that. Yeah. What episode are we on now? We are on 12. Episode. Okay. So I've got a little while. I'm okay. I'm safe.

Yeah, like I say, the downside of the interview format is when guests don't show up. And I love what Rich said. I'm just okay if I've not, if I can't put out something of quality, I'm just okay with letting it go that week. Yeah. I love, love, love that way of thinking because I've, there are so many times, and I've done this we've done it ourselves where it was like, no, we have to get an episode out.

It's our commitment is to get an episode out every week that sometimes you just put stuff and it causes you a lot of grief, but actually to have the ability to go, we'll be fine. Yeah. The world's not going to end. I'm not going to lose all my rankings. People will understand, it's that kind of [00:14:00] just being a bit more chill about it.

I think if it, if I did it occasionally, which is maybe how Rich does it, I think that's fine. If I'm doing it on a regular basis, I need to maybe rethink my life a little bit. But I think every now and again, I just love that. It'll be fine. We were a lot like that in the early days when we started EP, weren't we?

Because we did seasons. We did. So we got around it. It's let's just record 10 episodes. We'll call that a season. Yeah. And then we'll just have an indiscriminate break. So we felt

Sadaf Beynon: like it was time to

Matt Edmundson: start again now, and we've got enough episodes for the next season and that's how we did it.

Sadaf Beynon: But I also remember you had to fly solo a few times at the beginning just cause we were still building the podcast and looking for guests and it wasn't as easy at the beginning to get the

Matt Edmundson: guests. Finding guests, we've talked about this before, finding guests at the start is not always straightforward.

It's not, I think I could have made it easier on myself at the point that when we started eCommerce Podcast, like when we started Push, we have something called the first 10. [00:15:00] So if you ever do one of our courses, we talk about this shameless plug for the course. But on the course, we talk about the first 10, who your first 10 guests are for the show.

And this is one of the things that we figured out over the years with podcasting, actually just go and get 10 people that you know. You don't have to know them super well, but there has to be some, so if you look at the first 10 episodes of the Push Podcast. First episode, I think it was Ian Finch, good mate of mine, having breakfast with him on Friday.

Had Ram Giddemal, somebody I work with, a friend, I love that guy. He's such a legend. Ram, if you've not heard his episode, go listen to it because it was so cool. We had Chandra on from Pharmaco in New Zealand. We had Chris Ivers on from New Zealand, I've had Simon on from New Zealand. So these are friends, these are acquaintances, these are people that I know in industry that I thought would make an interesting podcast.

Set of guess. Yeah. Just to get me going. Yeah. And I didn't do that with ep I think mainly because when we started EP didn't really have a clue what format we were doing. Yeah. We just started Yeah. And figured it out. Yeah. But so [00:16:00] something nice about that.

Sadaf Beynon: Yeah. It's quite raw. Yeah. And we, like we were, we kept pivoting, didn't we?

Yeah. There was lots, we were learning so much as we went.

Matt Edmundson: It was very much touch and fear. It was like we figured it out and actually. I think if you're going to, if you're like that now, be okay with that. I love what Rich said actually about episode 50, do 50 episodes before you decide to quit at it.

Yeah. Which is in effect, do it for a year if you're doing a weekly episode. And you might be listening to that going, that's a lot of episodes. What's interesting, I can't remember what the stat is, but is it like 80 or 90 percent of podcasts? It's a horrendous amount. Don't make it past episode 10 or episode 20.

And so one of the ways to win at podcasting is just get, is just do more than 20 episodes. You've done more than 90 percent of people, right? It's just one of those things. Yeah. And I don't think, I think we were well into episode like a hundred really before we started to get proper downloads on EP on the eCommerce podcast.

I can't remember. I think that was, it was a high number. [00:17:00] I can't remember the number either. I should probably go and have a look at the stats, but yeah, episode 50, the 50 episode challenge would be a really interesting. Can you do 50 podcast episodes? Can you do this for at least 50 episodes before you make a decision not to carry on with it?

I thought that was really good call from Rich there. I can't

Sadaf Beynon: recall. Do you know if COVID around that time, did we get more listeners? Yes. Yeah. There

Matt Edmundson: was something about COVID. I remember. Yeah. COVID was great for podcasters. Yeah. There was a lot of things it wasn't great for, but we did really well in COVID.

I've got eCommerce businesses. We sold stuff. Yeah. And the podcast listenership went up, the YouTube channel subscribers, everything went up a little bit, which was really good. But yeah, I think you're right, probably something. Not that

Sadaf Beynon: we're advocating for COVID again.

Matt Edmundson: Let's call the government. I need to get my podcast numbers up. Could you do me a favor? Shut the country down? Yeah, just do a lockdown, please. And that would be really helpful. I'd really appreciate [00:18:00] that. Not necessarily a strategy that I would advocate on any kind of mechanism. Now, where else did you get out of Rich's?

Sadaf Beynon: Yeah, so the whole networking side and the client engagement, like with that Yeah, you've got to get on Twitter.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah. I to be fair, I don't really use Twitter. I should do. I've got 40, 000 followers on Twitter. But it's one of those where I think wherever your listeners are, they're going to be commenting somewhere and having a mechanism to monitor those comments is critical.

And just a quick plug, actually, not that we've got massive experience, but we've just started with Social Vista, or Vista Social, whatever they're called. We've got all our social media accounts on that. So not only does that help us post stuff, but it helps us monitor comments and direct messages all in one place.

Yeah, we can see the

Sadaf Beynon: engagement and reach out to people easier.

Matt Edmundson: Which is super important. You might not get anybody commenting on anything on social media for the longest time, but somebody somewhere at some point will [00:19:00] comment. For me, it's always been LinkedIn, which I thought was interesting. LinkedIn and Instagram, maybe.

I should probably log onto Twitter and find out I've got 4, 000 unread messages and just go, Ooh, I should have totally had that. I should put that into Vista Social is what I should do. But yeah, do monitor your social media channels because Rich would have missed out on a big deal. Yeah.

And just start conversations with people. I think that's what he did on Twitter. Hey, how you doing? What did you like about the podcast kind of thing? How can we help you? And just start the conversation. It's amazing. It's one of those things, and it sounds really weird when I say, I appreciate that what I'm about to say just sounds really weird, but when people listen to you on a podcast and you take the trouble to reach out to them.

They can feel a little bit starstruck. Does that make sense? It's I don't know if you've ever done that thing where the first time I did it was a friend of mine wrote a book. He wasn't a friend at the time. I just read the book and thought it was a really good book. I thought the title of the book was not great, but I thought the book was phenomenal, the content of the book.

And I put a note on, this was back when I was using [00:20:00] Twitter, I put a thing on Twitter, or X should I say? Yeah. I put a thing out saying. Great book, love the content of the book. And I think I made some wisecrack about how Americans always use a middle initial everywhere. He wasn't Richard Rising.

He was Richard L. Rising and I made some wisecrack about that on Twitter and he made some wisecrack back and we just got chatting back and forth and I was like, man, the author of this book has taken the time to connect with me and actually he's a really interesting guy. It turned out he was going to be in the UK.

I had him speak in an event and then we've just become lifelong friends ever since really. So when I go to SubSummit in Dallas, 2024, I'll go and spend a week with him because that's where he lives, him and his family, beautiful

Sadaf Beynon: family. I didn't know that's where your friendship started. Yeah, on Twitter.

I know you guys have been

Matt Edmundson: friends a long time. Yeah, just interesting. So I think as a content creator, again, one of the things that Rich said is you are, your credibility. goes up in the eyes of people, you're seen as a thought leader in a lot of ways, just because you do a podcast. It obviously, we need maybe, we need better, [00:21:00] maybe better mechanisms of grading how much of an expert we really are.

But in essence, that's what happens. And being okay with that, and then talking to people that connect with you, is a really great way to start a relationship with your audience, with your listeners, because you take the time to listen to them. You always feel better if you're, if you watch a YouTube video and you write in the comments and they respond back.

You're always like, that's really cool. If you, like I did I contact, I just tagged an author and they said, I appreciate that, rich, he got tagged and he just started a conversation. I just take the time to do it. I think it's such a powerful thing. It's one of the great things about social media nowadays.

Sadaf Beynon: Yeah. Yeah. They're so much more accessible,

Matt Edmundson: aren't they? Yeah, they are. Just check on it. If you use Instagram like I do, I keep forgetting to check the, it's almost got like the Gmail feature, isn't it? Where you've got your primary inbox, and then there's these, the promotional, all this other stuff goes over there.

Someone sent me a message six weeks ago, and I'm just like, I just had to respond, but I'm really sorry. I am really [00:22:00] sorry. I'm so slack. I am interested in talking to you, obviously, but yeah, I think to do check that if you use Instagram. But yeah, it's one of the things actually thinking about it.

What I don't do on the podcast, maybe what we should do is say, hey, be great to connect with you. Just follow me on Instagram. Connect with me on Instagram. I'm Matt Edmundson on Instagram. Just go to at Matt Edmundson. Yeah. And maybe we should start doing something like that on social or follow PodJunction.

At PodJunction. On Took gram. On the gram. I think he's saying

Sadaf Beynon: Instagram. Aunt

Matt Edmundson: Graham.

Sadaf Beynon: Or his aunt, I don't know. Aunt

Matt Edmundson: Graham. Aunt. On the gram,

Sadaf Beynon: not even Instagram.

Okay, gotcha.

Matt Edmundson: Oh, if my dad hears this, he's going to punch me. He's what was that Yorkshire accent? That was just wrong on But yeah, no, reach out to us at Podjunction on Instagram. We are also, you can also catch a hold of me at Matt Edmundson on Instagram, we'd love to hear from you. Sadaf, check the Podjunction one.

I do. [00:23:00] And I check the Matt Edmundson you think. Yeah, we'd love to hear from you. Connect with us, say, how's it? But don't be starstruck when Sadaf gets back into it, she's just a normal person,

Sadaf Beynon: which they know very well now,

Matt Edmundson: she's just a normal person that swears at you when you're starting to record the podcast because people can't see it.

And then she's just a normal person. She does charge 25. 99 for an autograph. But she's a normal person.

By the way, if anyone does actually pay you 25. 99, you're buying the beer. Oh, anything else? No, we're about out of time. When there were, we're getting there, aren't we? So listen, it's been great chatting to you this week. Love that. Thanks, Rich, for coming on the show. What a legend. Do check out his podcast and check out his company Flyte New Media.

Check out the podcast, Agents of Change. I know actually he's got a conference coming up, so check out the Agents of Change Summit. I think that's what he's calling it. It's got a whole bunch of speakers lined up for that. I think I'm part of the speaking panel. Okay. Yeah. I filled out a piece of paper [00:24:00] for him.

I've not heard back from him. So who knows? We'll find out. If you're going to be in Subsummit or in Dallas in June 2024, definitely let's connect up. Be great to hear from you. Do reach out to us on social media. And start all those connection things, but yeah, hopefully you've learned something from this today.

Go do what Rich said you should do. Do the 50 episodes. Do connect with people on social media. Don't worry too much if you can't measure ROI to the exact penny, but you will have some stories. Be consistent, do some good and don't be afraid just to take the average week off because why not? Yeah, I know.

It'll be okay. We're not that dogmatic about it here. But no, I enjoyed that. Thanks Rich, you're a legend. Thanks, Beynon. Thanks, Matt. It's been great. All right, guys. We'll catch you next time. Bye. Bye.

Sadaf Beynon: And that brings us to the end of today's episode at PodJunction, where business meets podcasting. If you enjoyed the insights from today and wish to hear the full conversation with today's special guest, [00:25:00] don't forget to visit thepodjunction. com, where you'll find more information about how you can join today.

Whether you listen while on the go or in a quiet moment, thank you for letting us be a part of your day. Remember, every episode is a chance to give insights and to transform your business with podcasting. So keep tuning in, keep learning, and until next time, happy podcasting.