Podcasting Unplugged with Authenticity, Community, and Lessons from the Journey | Lee Houghton

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 simply taking a minute for yourself, our 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 a seasoned podcaster, this episode is for you.

Matt Edmundson: Hello, welcome to a brand new episode of Podjunction. My name is Matt and beside me is Sadaf and we talk about how to use business. No, that's not what we talk about. We talk about podcasting. We talk about how to use podcasting to grow your business. Am I in the right shot?

Sadaf Beynon: That's the right one. Yeah.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah. Okay, cool. It's professionalism at its highest level, [00:01:00] obviously rehearse your intros before you do them would be one tip,

otherwise you sound like I just did, but a warm welcome to the show, glad you're here, glad you're with us, if you haven't done so already make sure you subscribe to the show because we just talk every week about podcasting and how to use this wonderful thing Call podcasting to grow your business. And if you are a podcaster.

And you have a show. Let us know. We would love to hear from you. We'd love to check out your show and maybe even if get you on as a guest on Podjunction, we'd love to interview and talk to people podcasters about their show. So can they do that on the website?

Sadaf Beynon: Yes, they can.

Matt Edmundson: What was, what's the website?

Sadaf Beynon: Podjunction. com.

Matt Edmundson: There you go. That was flawless. Or check us

Sadaf Beynon: out on Instagram. Again, Podjunction is the hand, Podjunction podcast is the handle. We'll

Matt Edmundson: You're asking me or telling me?

Sadaf Beynon: I'm telling you, I think.

Matt Edmundson: Probably go to the website. We know the website. Yeah, [00:02:00] go on the website,

Sadaf Beynon: leave us a mess, an email, a message there, or go to our Instagram and message us from there.

Cause I do check that.

Matt Edmundson: Do you?

Sadaf Beynon: Cause you, you wait a couple of weeks, don't you? Yeah.

Matt Edmundson: I'm useless with that kind of thing. But no, yeah, definitely check us out and we'd love to hear from you. So yeah, show your show. We'd love to you know what we should do. We should probably at some point put a feature on the website, Mark our technical guy is going to hate me for saying this, we should put a feature on the website where you should, you could feature your podcast if you're a podcast listener.

Sadaf Beynon: Share your show.

Yeah, there you go. That'll, you'll see that in about three years time. Yeah. which is normally about how long it takes to get technical developments done. 'cause there's a long list

Sadaf Beynon: that's for now.

Matt Edmundson: That's a

Sadaf Beynon: temporary issue.

Matt Edmundson: It is a temporary issue. For those of you who don't know, and why would you know, we actually, the reason we talk about technical developments is we have our own podcasting platform called Amp.

And it's the platform we use to drive our websites, drive our podcasts [00:03:00] and all kinds of things. And so we've not made that available to the public.

Sadaf Beynon: No, we

Matt Edmundson: haven't. We only let our clients use that. platform for a number of reasons. At some point we might make it public.

Sadaf Beynon: Yeah.

Matt Edmundson: It just doesn't, it works really well, but it's a little bit ugly.

Sadaf Beynon: Yeah.

Matt Edmundson: Would that be a fair comment? Yeah. Bit clunky, maybe in terms of the back end in terms of how you use it. So

Sadaf Beynon: yeah, it's not very intuitive for

Yeah, it makes sense to us.

Matt Edmundson: Makes sense to us wouldn't necessarily make sense for a new guy. Yeah. And so what we're doing I don't know why we're telling you this story, but anyway, what we're doing, we've got to get, we've got some folks working on it.

Mark and Micah on working in terms of prettying that up and making it much more usable and user friendly, which is the main reason why we've not submitted it, but it's the platform we've used and built over the years. Yeah. To drive our own podcast. So we have an in-house dev team with the other work that we do.

And so we thought it's an easy thing for us to build,

Sadaf Beynon: hence three years for the next, hence three years

Matt Edmundson: for the next [00:04:00] because it's so easy. So we thought actually there was. We couldn't find a platform out there that did what everything that we needed it to do that had not been built for podcasters.

And so this platform we think is, we like it. We think it's cool. So more details on that to follow in about three years time. If you just see that come up it'll get launched at the same time as you will be able to share your show on podjunction. com. Oh, love it. Love it. Love it. Love it. What have we got coming up today, Mrs. Beynon?

Sadaf Beynon: So we have got Lee Houghton.

Again. Again. And this one is different in that

Matt Edmundson: It's not Lee.

That's how different it is.

Sadaf Beynon: It's different in that Lee

Lee asks Matt, the host, a question.

Matt Edmundson: Oh, is that why it's different? Yeah. Okay.

I was expecting something much more profound.

Sadaf Beynon: Yeah. I won't tell you what he asked. We'll just jump right [00:05:00] in.

Matt Edmundson: Are we just going to go for it? Yeah, let's go for it. All right. So this is Lee, apparently doing something different, asking me a question and I'm just trying to, I'm racking my brain to try and remember what that question was.

But yeah, so this is me and Lee chatting after this small clip from our conversation, Sadaf and I will be back, so don't go anywhere.

Lee Houghton: Here's Lee. If I had my time over again, I would have done it differently, definitely.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah, but that's true for everything, right? You could say that, if I had my time over again, there's things I wouldn't do.

And podcasting is definitely one of them. Oh, we always say that to people like, in the first 10 or 20 episodes, they're going to be, are going to be your worst episodes, they just are. So just be okay with that and go this is where I'm honing my craft. I'm learning it. It doesn't mean every episode since that is going to be brilliant, but There's definitely a steep learning curve at the start.

So just on that, Matt,

Lee Houghton: am I allowed to ask you a question?

Matt Edmundson: Yeah, go for it, man. You are now, so Yeah.

Lee Houghton: Because I've had the same thing the first 10, [00:06:00] 20, 30 episodes are probably the worst ones. Would you ever recommend re recording the first 10, 20, 30 episodes When you're more skilled and crafted in the art of podcasting, or would you just accept that they are where they are and allow the listener to to develop with you?

Because what I've found is some people go right back to episode one to to then binge some of the podcasts. So I'm just wondering, what's your view and take on that?

Matt Edmundson: I don't know if I would, Lee. One, I haven't got time. And two, I think. There's an authenticness isn't there which says this is my journey and you can go back to those points and go this is what I said and actually I think it's quite refreshing when someone sits there and goes you know what, I said that and you can listen to that podcast.

But this is what I now think, and this is a reason why that has changed or that's evolved, and this is a journey that I've been on. And I think censoring the past slightly political statement [00:07:00] now, I think trying to censor the past is nonsense, and I know we've tried to do it with our, on a bigger scale with our history and you try and censor and neuter and pretend like things didn't exist or happen, which is, you then fail to learn the lessons, right?

No, I'm a big fan of just leaving it there. And if you're doing the interview style podcast, Because like you, I did the first 20 episodes where it was just me talking, I'm like no. We need people to talk to, you get tired of your own voice after a while.

Some of those early people who came on as in the interview format, I would then get them back on the show now, and I think probably do a much better interview, is probably the way that I would do it.

Lee Houghton: Yeah, amazing. No, I'm glad you said that because I'm of exactly the same view. It's a journey and the listener can join you on that full journey.

I had a little bit of doubt in my mind once when I thought, if somebody goes back to the beginning, what if they don't like it? What if they don't but I've [00:08:00] just become comfortable with that, but that's some of the thoughts that I had in my head, would I have to, should I redo it, should I try to do it better than I did, but I'll be there all day, I'll be re recording every one of the 200 and all that.

That's it,

Matt Edmundson: because, yeah, where do you stop if you've got 200 episodes, where do you stop, because in 200 more episodes, you're going to go, episode 200 was a bit rubbish, I now need to record, and it just becomes a yeah, I'm with you, man. And I do, I love the people that get in touch with us. I had one lady contact me recently, I just came across your podcast and I just want you to know that I, over the last week or so, I have binged listened to all of your podcasts from day one and you're like, really?

I just sent her a message saying, I'm really sorry, I'm really sorry for some of those earlier podcasts and we had a great conversation, it was great, it's brilliant, isn't it? Is fun when things like that happen. Yeah, so you've got your podcast, you're 200 in, you're overconfident, you've got [00:09:00] better at interviewing people.

I always remember our conversation because you asked a question which no one else has ever asked me, which is, do you see yourself as successful? Which I think is such an insightful question. And I thought that's a really clever question to the point where I've stolen it on a few occasions.

Yeah, absolutely. Oh, that's what we do as podcasters. We just go to people's podcasts and just go, Oh, I like that. Let's implement that. Okay. That was an abrupt ending.

Sadaf Beynon: Yes. Sorry about that.

Matt Edmundson: We really need to bring that middle segment back to that sort of people acclimatize and adjust.

But yeah, I remember the question now. I remember that conversation now, which is good. So I'm back in the throat, which is great. And it was a great question actually.

Sadaf Beynon: It was. It was a good question. And actually I've done some recording for Podjunction, like for this show, but I've done like a full episode recording with Egan Heath.

So that will be coming on. But going back and finding those segments. I understand what you're saying. You're like, I'm so [00:10:00] sorry. I'm so sorry. So yeah, Egan, I'm so sorry.

Matt Edmundson: That's true, actually, because when it comes to those interviews, like that interview I did with Lee, you go through That you and Tanya go through that and you pick out the clips that we're going to do on PodJunction, right?

So I turn up to this show, we watch the video and we chat about it. But I suppose for you, if you're doing the interview, you and Tanya have got to pick, you and Tanya have got to watch you and pick out those clips, right? Which is one of those things as podcasters, it takes a little while to get used to because you hate the sound of your own voice.

You hate the way you sound, that you are your own worst critic, you constantly pick up on, why did you say that? Why do you look like that? Why do you laugh like that? And all those sort of things come out, don't they? And you're oh, and so I can imagine watching it, looking for those clips is a bit more interesting now you've started to do some of those interviews as well.

Sadaf Beynon: Yeah. I can't say it's fun.

Matt Edmundson: Oh, brilliant. We should [00:11:00] actually, it'd be the most boring podcast in the world, but we should video you watching the video of you.

The other day I was walking past your desk.

Sadaf Beynon: Oh no.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah. And you sit next to Jen, don't you? And if memory serves me right, Jen was laughing at you. Because you were watching one of the episodes we recorded for Podjunction going through that episode. And I think this was when you're in your post COVID, wasn't it?

And there was a joke on the podcast. I think I made some wisecrack like I normally do. And you just didn't get it for a little while.

Sadaf Beynon: For a week.

Matt Edmundson: And so you start laughing at it when you're watching the show. It's just absolutely tickled Jen. So that's when Mark came, Mark, who's the technical guy I mentioned earlier, it's when Mark came up with the statement. If you want Sadaf to laugh at your joke on a Friday morning, [00:12:00] now, how do you get Sadaf to laugh at your joke on a Friday morning?

You can tell her on a Thursday afternoon, no, on a Tuesday afternoon, whatever it is. That's because it takes a little while. I didn't hear him say that.

Sadaf Beynon: Did you not

Matt Edmundson: hear that one? Or maybe I

Sadaf Beynon: did and it's only just landed,

Matt Edmundson: You'll start laughing about that tomorrow.

Anyway, I think we digress. This is the danger of watching yourself on video. You do become your own worst critic, which actually is at the heart of what, of Lee's question, because if you go back to the first few versions of your podcast, they will not be what you want. Very few people have gone crack that on episode one.

Infact I have not met them yet, and I think what I can do is I can look at many podcasts or listen to many podcasts and actually, they will have changed significantly from episode one, do and I get that and at the heart of Lee's question is actually I'm not satisfied. Yeah. With the quality of the episode in episode [00:13:00] one, do we therefore go back and change it?

Yeah. What happens if people do listen to it? Yeah.

Sadaf Beynon: Yeah. But I liked what you said that it's honing your craft and it's gonna take time. As much as I would love to go back and re record with Eagan I won't put him through that. But as you said. Everyone's

Matt Edmundson: subscribe to the show, subscribe to the show.

I need to hear this Eagan episode. Is it that bad? I don't know. Way to sell it. Way to forward sell. Everyone's now, no, I'm not subscribing. I'm unsubscribing now. I don't want the Egan one.

Sadaf Beynon: But as you said, having them back on the show when you're better at it.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah.

Sadaf Beynon: Is another way to do that. To make up for it.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah, it is. Last week we talked with, or Lee talked about finding guests on LinkedIn. And one of the things that we, that he didn't talk about, or maybe he talks about in the following interview, I can't remember, but. One of the ways you get guests on your podcast is to get past guests to come back on, right?

And we do this on occasions where past guests, they've maybe got a new book or some reason to come back on the show [00:14:00] and to talk about something. And I think that's not a bad strategy. And so you can do that. You can go back to previous guests. Now you've honed your craft, you've honed your skill and you think I'm going I want to re not rerecord it, but I want to record a second sort of follow on conversation or a second follow on interview because I have more questions and you can listen back to the original and go, I wish I'd have asked this.

We're like, Hey, we'll get them back on the show and ask that question. And it gives you a future show.

Sadaf Beynon: And also for something like Podjunction, what we're doing, asking them again in however long it is they've also been honing their craft too. So they've gone down that much farther along their journey as well.

Yeah.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah, absolutely. Like you take that conversation with Lee. I can't remember when we recorded it, but it was a while ago. And it was a while ago because we had a, this was pre Podjunction, wasn't it? It was, yeah. We had very different ideas. And it was because of the interview with people like Lee and the other ones that I did that we went, actually, there's a show in this.

And it took us a little while to get it started off.

Yeah.

Matt Edmundson: But I reckon if we, in six [00:15:00] months time, got Lee back onto the show, Yeah, absolutely. It would have been 12, 18 months in between interviews. He's going to have learned a whole bunch more stuff, right?

Yeah.

Matt Edmundson: And so we will be doing that. I had no doubt, we'll be reaching out to Lee and all the other guests and saying, listen, come back on the show.

Continue your story because it's a journey. And one of the things about podcasts, I think, because it's such a personal medium. 75 percent of people that listen to podcasts, I don't know why you're listening to this now, but some people watch them on YouTube, yes, but the majority of people in their car are walking their dog listening to it through airpods in their ears in a sort of personal space, so it's quite an intimate setting in a lot of ways, and because of that, and because we're super chilled out, people do follow you along the journey, and they grow with you, and I think people like that, they like to see the growth, and they like to see the journey, and it's not just true for us, it'll be true for the guests as well.

Yeah, getting them back on would not be something that it'll be something that we will definitely do because you're going to want to follow their strategy in a lot of ways. Yeah, when's episode five with Lee coming out then? I guess we just need to record another interview.[00:16:00]

Sadaf Beynon: With Lee, yeah. Yeah. It will be another interview.

Matt Edmundson: Which is, I'm looking forward to already. You should do the next one with Lee. And we'll see who's the best interviewer.

Sadaf Beynon: Okay. Give me about another 40 episodes first.

Matt Edmundson: Actually, who do you prefer? If Lee had any sense, he would go Sadaf is much better.

Given that you're the producer of the show. Yes, that is true.

Sadaf Beynon: You might not get aired.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah, Sadaf has all the power. Absolutely. So yeah, it was a great

Sadaf Beynon: question.

Matt Edmundson: Was there anything else off at the back of that?

Sadaf Beynon: No.

Matt Edmundson: I can't remember, was there? I can't even remember what I said. I was more interested in his take on it really. Yeah. You do go through this journey where you get better and better at your craft, but at what?

You never reach a point where, You have reached a state of perfection where you go, I am 100 percent satisfied and happy with how we're doing it now. And if you do get there next week, you'll have changed your mind because something else would have happened, [00:17:00] right?

Sadaf Beynon: Yeah. I think you both talked about having done like however many episodes and then having someone come to you.

You, you shared your story about someone contacting you and said, I binged all your episodes in a week.

Matt Edmundson: I still remember the conversation with that lady. I was just really, cause we've got hundreds of episodes. That's hundreds of hours worth of content people are willing to sit and go through and you're like that's incredible, really, that people are willing to do that.

And I think it goes to show actually that what that is, it's a testament to how good your content is now because if people catch a show now, and the content is good, that they're willing to go back and listen to them all from the start. Yeah. That's actually a testament to how good your show is.

Sadaf Beynon: Yeah. And I think it's also, there's also got to be something to be said about the host as well, which I think drives them to do that.

Otherwise they could just go and look at all the titles and pick the ones that they think are relevant to them. But I think it's that journey, as you were saying with the [00:18:00] host as well. Yeah.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah, absolutely. I think it's really fascinating that people are willing to do that. I have to be honest with you, I've never gone back to episode one on anybody else's podcast.

So it shocked, the first time it happened, for the first time someone said to me, I've gone back to episode one. I was a little bit surprised. I shouldn't have been that surprised because you can see in the download data, you can see actually in the analytics, people still listen to episode one.

And you're like, I just, it was five years ago. This is in eCommerce.

Sadaf Beynon: Yeah. Things are changing so much.

Matt Edmundson: Everything has changed in the last five years. So it's such an extraordinary thing that I don't take, there's a guy you know him, Nick, the poster guy.

Nick van der Kloof.

Matt Edmundson: Yeah.

He started listening to the show. He messaged me on Instagram. The one message I did see Instagram and says, I'm starting again from the beginning. I'm like, Nick, don't.

Sadaf Beynon: Please don't. Yeah. Tell me what you need to know. I'll record those episodes now.

Matt Edmundson: Really fascinating. So yeah, I, there will be people who will go through your [00:19:00] back catalog, Matt.

And you will always be amazed actually how many people do that. Part of that is they, I think as your episodes get older, they're more likely to be found from an SEO point of view. They just get propagated more on the web, but some of it is genuinely people are interested to go back through , they scroll through your catalog and will pick out one or two episodes to listen to that I just find utterly

captivating in terms of its, people doing that. Because like I say I've never done that. Never. Not once. I

Sadaf Beynon: can't say I have

Matt Edmundson: either. There's one show that I've followed since episode one, which was Malcolm Gladwell's Revisionist History.

Sadaf Beynon: Okay.

And his show is probably the one exception to the rule where I would go back and listen to all the episodes if I hadn't listened to them, because I think they're so well done.

And they are evergreen and timeless. But yeah, absolutely fascinating. So yeah, that was the question. Anything else on that? Nope. Awesome. What's coming up next week? You don't know, do you?

I do [00:20:00] know.

Matt Edmundson: Oh, you do know, okay.

Sadaf Beynon: Egan Heath.

Matt Edmundson: Oh, is he? Okay. Okay. So stay

Sadaf Beynon: tuned.

Matt Edmundson: What we're going to do is we're going to measure the downloads of the episode next week and see how many people have gone, yeah, she just did not sell that to me whatsoever.

So this is your very first interview on Podjunction. Are we excited?

Sadaf Beynon: Scared? No, we're fine. We're fine. We're fine. It is what it is. It's very philosophical. Yes,

Matt Edmundson: it is what it is. We've all got to hone our craft. So next week, Sadaf is going to be talking to Egan, which is good news for every listener, because it's less of my voice, which is always a bonus.

So make sure you like and subscribe to the show because you are nuts. You are not going to want to miss this one. That's for sure. And Egan actually is a legend. I really like Egan. He's such a I feel

Sadaf Beynon: even worse. That's why you

Matt Edmundson: feel worse.[00:21:00]

Was it really that bad? Do I need to critique this? No,

Sadaf Beynon: please don't. Because you'll rip

Matt Edmundson: it. Or is this to show you just being slightly insecure before it airs?

Sadaf Beynon: I don't know. Let's just air it and see what happens. Okay. Yeah, give your feedback.

Matt Edmundson: Your kind, gentle feedback to Sadaf next week. But yeah, you're with Egan.

Egan's a good guy to do that with. He's a good, safe pair of hands, I think, and really interesting chap. So yes, join us next week as we talk to Egan Heath in a, even though it's episode 20 something or other next week, it will be a premiere. Is it 22? Episode 22 is the premiere of Sadaf's first interview on Podjunction.

Woohoo!

Matt Edmundson: Oh, brilliant. And on that bombshell, ladies and gentlemen, have a fantastic week. We will see you next week. I am really looking forward to this one. I hope you are too. We will see you next week. That's it from me. That's it from [00:22:00] Sadaf. Bye for now.

Sadaf Beynon: And that brings us to the end of today's episode at Podjunction. If you've enjoyed the insights from this episode and want to hear the full conversation with today's special guest, don't forget to visit podjunction. com where you'll find more information about how you can join Podjunction Cohort.

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 gain insights and to transform your business with podcasting. So keep on tuning in, keep on learning and until next time, happy [00:23:00] podcasting.