Ensuring Success in Podcasting | Glenn Hebert, Jaime Legagneur, Rob Greenlee

There's a 94% failure rate among podcast hosts and podcast guests. Most people quit podcasting altogether before ever achieving any meaningful results. The reality is that it doesn't have to be this way! There's a way to ensure your success in podcasting! In this episode, Alex Sanfilippo talks with Rob Greenlee, Glenn Hebert, and Jaime Legagneur to learn the 3 key things that have led to their success as podcast hosts and guests. Get ready to start experiencing positive results from your podcasting efforts!

MORE FROM THIS EPISODE: HTTPS://PODMATCH.COM/EP/355

Chapters

00:00 Introduction to Podcasting Legends
05:26 The Importance of Commitment in Podcasting
16:45 Continuous Improvement: The Key to Success
27:56 Building Community Among Listeners

Takeaways

Longevity plays a crucial role in podcasting success.
Commitment to a consistent schedule is essential for growth.
Starting with fewer episodes can help avoid burnout.
Continuous improvement is key to enhancing podcast quality.
Networking helps improve storytelling and presentation skills.
Building a community fosters listener loyalty and engagement.
Authenticity in hosting attracts and retains listeners.
Feedback from a focus group can guide content improvement.
Creating a space for community discussion enhances listener connection.
Engaging with listeners post-episode strengthens relationships.

MORE FROM THIS EPISODE: HTTPS://PODMATCH.COM/EP/355

Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction to Podcasting Legends
• 5:26 The Importance of Commitment in Podcasting
• 16:45 Continuous Improvement: The Key to Success
• 27:56 Building Community Among Listeners

Transcript

Hey everyone, Alex Sanfilippo here, host of Podcasting Made Simple. And today I am really humbled and honored to have three friends with me today, people that I really look up to and admire in the podcasting space. I'm joined by Jemi, I'm joined by Glenn, I'm joined by Rob. And I'm going to say this real quick. These three have been in podcasting longer than I have. I was thinking about it, like being in a room with people that have been doing this longer than me is a gift, is a really cool thing. And all three of these people...

have played very unique roles in helping me become the podcaster I am. So by the way, I hold you three responsible for the monster that you all created, which is Alex Santolibo. So thank you for that, everybody. But I'm going let each of you introduce yourself and Jemi, we'll just start with you. All right. I am producer Jemi. I am the owner and operator of Flintstone Media. It's a podcast production house consultancy firm that I've had since 2014. And I want to say congratulations to you, Alex, because apparently

Both your company and my company share the same anniversary date of June 16th. So you just turned 11 years, you turned six years. So that's awesome. So that's what I do. I help people launch shows and grow shows, whether it's a single show or a whole entire network. I'm also the owner of the Florida Podcast Network and the Power Mones Network. That's what I do. So cool. Love that. Glenn, before I have you introduce yourself, why do people call you Glenn the geek? Is that like a nice thing or? Yeah. Is it? OK. I was always kind of the first to do things like we had like the second.

course retail business online for the horse world. We were kind of the first ones to sell on eBay. I just kind of like doing things first. So that's how the geek came about. OK, so I wasn't sure if it was nice or mean, but Glenn, the geek, tell us a little bit more about what you do real quick here. Well, I've been podcasting. First podcast was in 2006. I founded the Horse Radio Network and we you know, we've done pretty well over the years. I've personally hosted over 5000 episodes.

And our daily show, Horses in the Morning, is almost 16 years now, and that one's approaching 4,000 episodes. Same hosts, by the way, that myself and my co-host, we started together, and we're still doing it all these years later. And then I sold the network about three years ago to a company called Equine Network. It's a media network in the horse world. And they've grown and they own like 16 different companies now. And so now I work as basically a consultant, still host my shows and don't have to the bills anymore. It's great.

That's so cool. I love that. who handles a lot of the equine network production? there you go. And Rob, by the way, I had this rumor because when I started becoming more known in podcasting, I told people that I was six, five, because someone guessed that on like a zoom call one time. So this is 2020 and then 2021 or 2022. When we came back in person, turns out I'm actually five, 10, but Rob, you might be that tall, which I didn't know until we met in person.

Yeah, I think it's safe to say you can't really tell the height by the zoom call. You know, it's bad when you're the one that people thought was tall and ended up being short, which 5'10 isn't short, but I was called short. Like, wow, you're short. I'm like, no, I'm not. Right. But anyway, Rob, tell us a little about yourself real quick here. Well, I'm six foot eight and I played college basketball. So I put that height to use for 13 years. I played competitive basketball.

I don't need it now, so I'm happy to share. Then my pants will all fit again. I started podcasting in 2004, but I originally started on the radio back in 1999. Did a nationally syndicated radio show on the XM cell, that radio network for a few years as well. All about the topic of the growth and development of the internet and the web and the technological.

evolution and that gets back a little bit to Glenn and why he was probably titled a geek was because in the early years of podcasting, all of us guys that got involved in it very early are really geeks. that's the reason why- We were writing code in those days. Right. I was hand editing RSS feeds when I got started. So if that tells you anything, right. In Sanskrit. Yeah, Sanskrit. So things have changed a lot. And so I've been involved in the medium working at

Places like Microsoft on the Zoom podcast platform for about seven years I did that. And then I used to work as the CTO for podcast one down in Los Angeles. And I used to work for Spreaker, Lipson, Podbean, and did a recent gig with StreamYard on the kind of video creation side. This was about almost a year ago now. So I've been kind of dabbling in all sorts of different areas, but

I started as a creator and then kind of evolved into helping others and building platforms to support the growth of the industry. So right now I'm still doing that kind of thing, but I'm still experimenting with trying to learn too. I mean, I've been around the space a long time, but there was a lot of new things going on. So I'm always kind of learning and creating some new companies and working with others and partnerships and stuff.

Yeah, Rob, I really respect about you. think you've always returned to the core of being a creator and I really admire that about you. Like you've never lost touch with what it means to be a creator in this space. So again, for all three of you, thank you for paving the way. I really appreciate it. Again, I'm really a product of the influence of the three of you. So I just thought it'd be really cool to have all three of you on today. So what I want to talk about is this idea of ensuring success in podcasting as a guest and as a host. Everyone who listens to podcasting made simple there. They're both guests and hosts. And so I really wanted to dive into kind of both sides of the microphone here.

One data point I wanna share before we get into the three main points we're talking about today, and it's this, it's the episode milestones in podcasting, like your chances of making these milestones. So from zero to one episodes and from one to two, I kinda don't include that in the data because pretty much no one makes it past that. But when I look past that point, let's say eight episodes from the podmatch.com slash report, industry report that we put out every month. I look at eight episodes, it's a 41 % chance of a podcaster making it that far. 50 episodes, it's a 10 % chance.

and 100 episodes is 6 % chance. And we really look at the listenership as best we can. We're finding that about 95 % of listenership comes from that 100 plus episode group. So 6 % of the independent podcasters are really making up 95 % of the independent listenership. And so for guests that are hearing this, this doesn't mean don't go on shows with eight episodes. It doesn't mean wait till they hit 100. And for hosts who are like, I'm only at 20 episodes. I got a long time before I reach 100.

Listen, there are signs that someone is going to make it. There are signs that someone can make it early. Like these aren't set in stone. This is just kind of the standard, but I think that today the goal is going to be to, again, try our best to ensure some success and to make it happen a lot faster. And that's what I really want to get in here today. So the first thing I want to talk about here, because I have three main points to share, and these are the three steps I think that will help ensure our success in podcasting as a guest or as a host. And the first one is the commitment to sticking with it, more or less the role that longevity plays in podcasting.

And Glenn, I want to turn over to you on this because you already mentioned how many episodes you've done. You've got to have some sort of record for most episodes and just sticking with it daily for so, long. don't advise that by the way, ideally. Listen, I want you just to rip on this commitment of sticking with it. Like maybe you don't advise it, but just talk about this idea because you had to at one point say, I'm going to do this. Like what did that look like for you and what advice can you give to guests and hosts today? Well, you know, when I think it,

you have to commit to what you start with, right? So like right now, if I have some, we're starting a new show, we don't let them even do weekly anymore. We have them start twice a month because we've seen that the weekly fade out rate is much, much greater than somebody that's twice a month. It's a lot of work. You know, the reason that you do have people fading out to the such, the degree they do is because this is work. mean, there's a lot, you know, booking, if you're, especially if you're booking guests, whatever your prep and your pre and post show.

The fun part's this. This is the best part of the gig, right? This is what we all love to do. But the rest of it is work. There's, you have, you know, from marketing to everything you're doing. We always say it takes 10 to 12 hours for every hour you're on the air in pre post production. So you have to realize what time you have to commit. Can you commit to 10 to 12 hours a week for a weekly show? I venture to say most people can't. So we have to start twice a month. And Jamie will tell you, most of our shows have been going for a very long time.

like years and years and years. And that's because we don't overcommit the hosts. So, you know, we've found that once a month when you're starting a show, if you're coming in without an established audience of some kind, it's not enough to make it, it's not enough to create an audience once a month. Twice a month you can. Weekly is kind of the ideal sweet spot, but again, it's a lot of work and you're probably not going to stick with it for a long period of time. So start that twice a month. I'm also a stickler and everybody that's heard me speak at podcast conferences will tell you,

I'm a stickler for consistency, for being there. You're making a contract with the listener. The listener is going, okay, I know your show comes out on the 15th and 30th of the month, and I'm gonna listen to it then. And I know I'm gonna listen to it then. If it's a weekly show, I know exactly when in the week I'm gonna listen to it. I listen to Dave Jackson's School of Podcasting in the shower every Monday morning. I've been doing that for, can't tell you how many years I've been showering with him every Monday morning. Whether Dave likes it Whether Dave likes it or not.

I'm gonna take just that sound bite and send it to Dave when this is done and get his thoughts. You Dave Jackson, by the way, he's been on the show before. I love that guy. But I know when his show comes out, if he, if it's not out, I'm kind of pissed off I'm not showering with him on Monday mornings because in my mind I have a commitment that that's what's happening, right? I know when I'm listening. If we're late putting out our Horses in the Morning show, our daily show, and it's not out by two o'clock, we hear from listeners because they know when they're listening to it every day.

So you kind of have a contract with them. And that's why I firmly believe that consistency in getting the show out a certain time, we don't go to a certain time a day. We just say a certain day every month it's going to come out. I just believe that's so important. And it's proved to be true with the shows that we've had that have been eight, 10, 12 years, you know, coming out regularly. You know, obviously, if you have sponsors and things, then you have a commitment to them too. You've got to get it out, right? So there's some added pressure there.

Also, having that in your mind gets you in the habit of getting out at certain times because it's easy not to do a show. It's easy not to hit record. It's easy to say, I'll skip one and then come back in a month. And you don't. Then you skip two and then you skip five. And then all of a sudden you don't want to come back anymore. So, you know, it just creates consistency. And I think that's the biggest part in your brain is creating a habit. Right. I always say it takes three weeks to create a habit doing anything.

So give yourself that time to create that habit so that you know at a certain time every month you have your own kind of deadline. That's really good. Very helpful. I think to a show that the host I recently had a conversation with and they said they've been podcasting for, I believe they said eight years. And I was like, oh cool, what's the podcast? They show me the podcast and I 15 episodes. I was like, oh, what was your other podcast? Like, oh, that's it. And I'm looking and I'm like, there's some like year gaps in here, right? And I didn't have the heart to tell them that, but I'm like, I don't know if you could.

label yourself a podcaster. And I think the takeaway here for a podcast guest or even aspiring guest, and this is something I actually do every single time, I look at the show's past episodes, not just to listen to them, but to see, is there a cadence that I can find? Or is it just like they release episodes when they can, when they feel like it, right? I like to see that, you know what, every Monday morning there's an episode coming out and it's been like that for the last two years. That's a show that I know, there's some sort of system behind that, right? And so I look to that sort of thing.

That's the same thing I do when I'm guesting on a show. I look at consistency. Also, if a show wants to come onto our network, that's an established show. look for consistency. If they're not consistent, how am I going to put a sponsor with them and expect them to be consistent after the sponsor's there? It's very important in many different ways. If you eventually want to have sponsors for your show, you better be consistent because they're going look at it.

Rob, you've done a lot of things in podcasting as you shared. you have any perspective around this whole idea of us sticking with it? What have you seen that you would advise the companies you've worked for and things like that? Yeah, I would take even a stronger place than even Glenn has expressed. I think the market has shifted to multiple times a week as a foundation to grow the fastest.

Because if you do too few, then you're not in front of people enough. it's, you know, each creator has to make that choice for themselves. I mean, it's not a easy choice. mean, the landscape of media creation now is extremely complicated now. It's extremely challenging and it's extremely hard to know what the right model is to deploy. It depends on what your media strategy is. If you're playing with YouTube, it's a completely different ballgame.

than if you're playing as a podcast. If you're playing as an audio only podcast, these principles apply, but when you're playing with YouTube, these principles that we're talking about here don't apply at all. that's what I think that's what makes it hard to, for new creators to come into this medium and know what to do. I think people are very confused. Now, a lot of people don't even know what they don't know. And that's the real challenge of this, but I'm a, I'm a pretty firm believer increasingly in

multiple times a week. Like I see shows out there, very successful shows that I have contact with and that I occasionally will work with that are actually doing as many as three episodes a week because of that frequency benefit that can come from the increased exposure on social media, the increased activity, the faster growing kind of network of guests that can promote your show. But I do also agree with Glenn's.

assessment that a lot of people start podcasting really not really realizing what the time commitment is. And they may not have the resources to build a team around what they're creating to actually enable them to do three episodes a week because most mortal humans can cannot handle that unless they've really tapped into AI to really help them scale this. it's a, it's a complicated question to answer right now, clearly for everyone that wants to get into creating online media.

Yeah, for me, what I've done is I knew I could only commit to one a week and I knew that, but Rob, I've been following your stuff forever. I know I've already said that a few times here, so I'm kind of keeping up with it. So I decided to finally, for the first time ever, start doing some repurposed posts during the week on different platforms and things like that, shorter form. And I've actually seen it move the needle. And I had never considered that before, even though maybe it's been a best practice for a while, but I've seen that actually work. And so for me, I'm like, okay, I know I can only commit to one a week.

but I know that every day I have these little snippets, these little pieces, written content, video content, audio content. can get this stuff out a little bit more. And a lot of that is pretty automatic at this point, getting it out. So it's not a whole lot of extra work, but it does keep you front of mind, which I think is, again, a really important element of this. So. There's so much noise in the market now that you have to rise above. Yeah. And it's not, you know, I think the podcasting has come out of an era where we're very series oriented and that we create, you know,

rapid fire type content, but it's increasingly we're moving into an era where each episode matters, right? And you have to get every episode right. The flexibility that I think we had in the past with audio podcasting specifically is there could be big variabilities in the quality of individual episodes just because of life gets in the way, right? So sometimes that causes variability, but now the space is so professionalized now that

every, I mean, I know creators out there that will record an episode and won't even publish it for three to six months because they're working on all the elements of making each episode successful. So this is, this is the challenge that I'm seeing in the market right now. And you know, that's a good segue here. And Jimmy, I'm going to move over to you real quick here, but I want to move on to the second point for sake of time here. Sure. Real quick though, Jimmy, did you have something that you wanted to add to this real quick? If you did, I want to give you a second to do that. Yeah, real quick.

Thank you. So I just wanted, I'm to kind of sit a little bit between Glenn and Rob to squeeze myself in there because I want to talk about people who are just kind of getting started, especially, you know, gone to a very certain extent, gone are the days where we're just audio only. There's, that's all you're putting out there is your audio episode and you got to figure that out. That's enough work in and of itself as Glenn was talking about. But now there's also this expectation that you're going to have a video of it on YouTube, that you're going to put out some reels on Instagram or on

TikTok, all these other things. Are you going to build other separate content? Do this, all this other stuff. So there's an expectation now that you're going to show up to your audience several times of a week. So I'll never forget a lesson that Glenn taught me way back in the day. You we were at a conference, we got approached by a new podcaster. Their show hadn't started yet and they were all excited. They had all these things. They had merchandise already, all these things. was great. Lovely conversation. They walked away and Glenn said they're going to burn out. I'm like, what?

Are you crazy? They're so excited. He's like, yeah, exactly. That's the problem. And it took me a minute to figure out what they meant. They were coming in to out of the gate too hot.

And sometimes when you come out the gate too hot, you don't give yourself enough time to really put all the pieces in play. You don't give your episodes enough time to start to really gel your, and now you add all the marketing elements to it as well. So the whole entire wrinkling circus of your show, you need to really get all the handles on it. Otherwise you start to not see.

the growth and improvement and that starts to make you feel really small and like, what's the point of this? You might feel frustrated. So one way to do that is to not just have multiple episodes in the week as Rob was suggesting, which is a great thing to build up to, but think about alternative ways to do that. I have an example of this one show I work with where they were putting out weekly episodes. They wanted to bump it up a little bit. So every other week they do a short 15 minute

tip episode and that's all it is about 15 minutes. But that frequency increase has really helped our audience growth and it's at another way for people to tune in and another reason for people to tune in. So there's lots of different ways to cut the cake. yeah. You know, this is, we've already hinted at the second point here today quite a bit, which is to focus on continuous improvement. I'm going to go back to what Glenn said, like, Hey, we start at two episodes per month. And when I first got into podcasting, I did one 15 minute episode the first Monday of every month.

and I was talking into my phone going back 10 years ago, which I'll admit I should have been using a microphone. I didn't know, I just talked into my phone, but that's what I knew I could commit to. Alex, all of our sounds sucked 10 to 15 years ago. None of us knew what we were doing. So it didn't matter, that makes me feel better. It makes you feel better. I did blog talk radio because we were live on horses in the morning for the first five years, and we were on blog talk because we wanted to take callers. That sound was bad back then. I recorded some episodes.

On my phone, driving to Glenn's house in Ocala. That sound was bad. You all make me feel great. So this idea of continuous improvement. love that we're, we can talk about this a little bit because yes, listen, we got to stick with it. That is number one. Like you have to commit from day one. You don't have to do all the episodes from day one. So if you're listening to this and you're maybe you're a guest, he's like, I'm only going one show per month. Maybe that's good for now. If you feel that's how you show up best, it for a little bit. I made the commitment because I looked at a

very high performing creator going on multiple shows per day as a guest. So I was like, I'm going to try to go on a few a week. I'll tell you what, by the time I get to third one, my performance lacked. I used my filler words more. I was tired. I was fatigued. I wasn't as excited about the message. So I dropped back down because I was more worried about or more interested in showing up in the right manner. And so even for guests, this stuff matters. You can focus on continuous improvement, but finding that cadence is just one small part of it. But Rob, I want you to talk about this idea.

of continuous improvement, because I think you've set a very good standard in the industry for learning more about what's going on, but also sticking with what works. And over time, figuring out what you want to do different and better. maybe that's just because you've worked with so many companies and stuff, it's just kind of been a byproduct. But can you talk about this idea of continuous improvement for us? Yeah, I think it's critical. And to kind of back down a little bit from what I was talking about multiple times a week is that getting started, there's a lot to learn. And I do agree with this concept here that if you start out

twice a month that gives you an opportunity to improve without overstressing yourself with this whole process and being able to work out your process before you even consider trying to scale up. trying to learn, try different formats, try different, you know, like a solo episode now and then, and then do a guest episode now and then, kind of mix it up with your audience.

a little bit and also expand your skills. mean, that's what I've spent the last year really doing is doing all sorts of different formats of shows to improve my skills. And so I can speak more intelligently about what the landscape looks like around doing videos on YouTube, doing video podcasts, doing live, doing all of these areas. And there's even more that I haven't had a chance to play around with yet.

that I would love to, I actually played around with doing what I call walk talks, which is a portable handheld camera that I just walk through a park and I just talk into the camera. And so that's a popular genre. think a lot of people think that all the videos on YouTube are all done in professional studios and everybody's, you know, spending a lot of money, but actually some of the most popular channels in there now are just people, you know, holding a camera up to their face and

talking into it with not really caring about lights or background or anything. It's more about the content. I think as you get better as a presenter and if you get better at your concepts for your show, I think some of the things that are going on at YouTube are applicable to podcasting too. I think about focus, teasing topics are very important to podcasting, audio podcasting as well as what's on YouTube. The audience needs to know what they're going to get.

And that's key thing. And that's something that I've had to improve on and try and get better at as well. So you, there's all these areas. I mean, I've been doing this for 24 years on the radio or 25 years, and I don't feel like I've got this thing under control and understand all the elements that are required to be successful in that. Cause they're always changing. The audience is expecting more from all of us. And how do we realize that?

Do we have the skill and the talent to adapt to the new landscape too is another big question. Yeah. These are some good points. And I do want to mention this for everybody who's a guest, who's a host. We're not talking about perfection and we're not talking about. It's never. Yeah. It's never about. mean, listen, it's so many of us, know, there's this idea of like, want it to be the best, the reality is.

just keep on going, keep on releasing it. And Glenn, I actually want you to talk about this for a second here, because I imagine with a daily live show, you might not always feel like it was your best or you didn't have time to improve. I don't know. And you know what's interesting? Yeah, we'll get done with show and Jamie and I at the end will go, well, that guest was terrible or we sucked or, you know, it was just boring or whatever. And then that's the one we get the most reaction from listeners. They love it. So we are not always good judges of what's good or not good, right?

We'll love an interview and then we get no reaction at all. We have one that we go, well that was out in left field and that's what all they're all talking about for the next week. So, you know, we can't lose sight of something too. And this goes to YouTube, this goes back to Rob's radio days. So Rob will appreciate this. The first slide I always put up at conferences when I speak, and that is they come for the content, but they stay for the host.

So they may come because they like your guests. They're a fan of your guests, but the only reason they're hanging around and gonna give your show another shot is they like you. So there's the only one reason that people come back and subscribe to your show, whether it's YouTube or radio or podcasting, audio, whatever it is, is because they like you. That's the only reason they're coming back. We have to keep that in mind. So yeah, we are always improving, but we never lose sight of the reason that they're coming back.

is for us. One of the things that drives me crazy, and this goes back to your guesting, is it's an interview show. At the end, the guest is done. The host says goodbye and you're out. I'm staying to this show because I like the host. I want to hear you talk about what the guest had to say after the guest leaves. I want to review from you because I'm there because I like you as the host.

So I wanna hear from you what you have to say about it. You may totally disagree with the guest and that's fine. You may agree with some points or not some points, but I want you to spend at least a couple of minutes with your opinions and that'll get me to hang around to the end, number one, because I wanna hear your opinions. But so many people who do interview shows don't do that. They lose sight of the fact that I am there for you, the host. I'm not there for the guest, I'm there for you.

You know, that's so good. I want to mention this whenever I'm, whenever I'm going to be a guest on a podcast, people, someone asks like Alex, how do you decide? And it has nothing to do with download numbers. Sometimes I'm the quality of the show. The number one factor is do I actually like the host and do I like them? It's do I have any synergy with them? But like potentially, right? And sometimes I listen to podcasts. I'll be real. You all hear me. I talk loud. I talk fast. And some people it's a little more dry, a little slower and listen, their listeners show up cause they like that. I don't think I can contribute to that. So those are typically shows I just say no to because I can see

there's not gonna be a real connection here that the listeners are gonna wanna grab onto. So glad you brought that up, Glenn, that's good. Jemmy, what do you have on this real briefly and then I'm gonna flip the third one. We've all got a lot to say. I'm hoping I can this thing under time. So, when it comes to always improving, first of all, I've absolutely 100 % agree with everything that's already been said on the table, but I will say my other piece of advice is never stop networking. And the reason that can always keep you improving is there's multitudes of reasons, but a few of them are.

that it keeps you learning about what's new in your industry. It also keeps you learning about what's new in podcasting, depending on what kind of networking you're doing. But also, especially if you're on the guesting side of things, you need sometimes to practice how you introduce yourself, how you talk about yourself, what your story is, some of the highlights of your career. So if you go out to a network opportunity event, then you have...

multiple opportunities to introduce yourself to people. So there's so many reasons why networking is such a great way to constantly improve yourself. But one of the ways that I love the most is just about the practice of telling your story over and over again to different people. And as you mentioned, Alex, different hosts are going to are they have, you know, different cadence, different tone, different. So you're you're able to kind of adjust how you are and how you're going to be received and give back in a conversation with different energy, with different people. So always network. I think that's a

great way to keep improving. That's good. can think back to one of my first guesting opportunities. I was talking to somebody. They're more, I don't know, they were more polished and well spoken. showed up and I was like, what's up everybody? How you doing? I look back, I'm like, Alex, you idiot. Those people are not interested in hearing from that Alex, not that day, right? Anyway, all right. Number three, our third point here. So we've talked about some really good stuff here. This last one is to foster community among your listeners.

And I think for me, this becomes our accountability. gives us a reason to stick with it. They're kind of the glue that holds this whole thing together is we can really engage some listeners. And Jemi, I think you've done a beautiful job with this. And I'll say this for two reasons. One, Power Moms Network, which is everyone who hears this probably knows about it, powermomsnetwork.com, shameless plug for everybody. You've done a great job building a community among people that you really love and care about. And on top of that, anytime I go to a conference and see you, there's people hugging you that are crying. And so I'm like,

She understands this idea of community, right? Like, why is everyone hugging her and crying? Like, people are just so excited to see you because you've built that connection with them. Maybe they've only ever heard you. They've never actually even met you in person. So I just want you to quickly talk about this idea of community and the role that it plays for a podcast host and guest. You know what? For better or for worse.

when you get jemmy, you always get this jemmy. Like there's no other version of jemmy. Like I'm always loud. I'm always obnoxious in a good way. You can hear my laugh from like across the room, like for better or for worse, you always get this jemmy. Okay. So because of that and because I'm authentic and I'm just always who I am, I think that's what people gravitate to. So if you're trying to build a community, that's what you have to be. You have to give people a reason. I mean, this kind of touches on a few things that have been said already, but you have to give people a reason to keep coming back and to want to grow.

with you and want to cheer you on and want to be a part of whatever the heck it is that you're doing. And it's because you're so enthusiastic about it. So first and foremost, believe in yourself. Secondly, believe in your purpose, right? So when I started building the Power Moms Network, it was about a couple of years ago, I had been invited to Mom 2.0. It's a summit that takes place in different places around the country every year.

and it's essentially to facilitate community amongst women who are brand builders and that kind of a thing. So I got asked to be on a panel about podcasting. So I'd never been to, I mean, I can't remember the last time I was at a conference that wasn't either a podcasting related conference or Comic-Con, because I love me some comic books, okay? So one or the other. So for me to be in a space that was all these mothers, and now I'm having conversations about how do you build a business and also be a mom and that balance and that great challenge and all these things, I'm like, oh my gosh,

These are the conversations I've been needing to have for so long. And it hit me like a ton of bricks that while I've had amazing mentors in my life, such as Glenn, he's been a huge mentor of mine, that there's always this disconnect, often this disconnect between the advice I get versus what I can actually do because I have to filter it through everything I have on my plate as a mother. And those conversations that day really hit home because I'm like, wow, everyone here already gets it. There's a shortcut.

in this conversation because we all just get it. And so that was, I went home to my hotel after the first night and I just started drawing up the plans for it. like, this is what I wish I'd been here 10 years ago when I was starting my business. And so then it was the conversations, I started tapping into that more while I was there and the women who've gravitated towards me, as soon as I said what the mission was.

you're like, my gosh, yes, that's me, that's me. And so I'll liken it to one other thing as part of my story. So I was being interviewed by this wonderful student at Tulane, her name's Lakin, that's where I went to college. And she's taking a digital media course. In fact, she's majoring in it, which is amazing. That's another future of podcasting is digital media as a major in college. But so she was interviewing me and she was asking me about different things. And one of the things I shared with her, I wanted to tell her about

a show of mine that I used to do. I'm like, but I have to preface this, but tell you the name of the show. I have to explain why I named it that before I tell you what it's called. said, so when I was building my business, you know, I was working at first full time while building it on the side. was at my, oftentimes in my bedroom late at night on the weekends. And so I was literally doing business in my bedroom. So I called it business in the bedroom, right? She started laughing, but it's what's funny about it is everybody who is doing that.

and saw my show name, instantly got it. They're like, that's me. They saw themselves in that moniker. And so, you know, it's all about being authentic, relating a pure message and inviting people to be a part of it. That's so good. Rob, I want to jump over to you real quick. For someone who's hearing this guest or host, it's saying, okay, like, how do I start this process? You've seen a lot of the tools. You've seen a lot of people get community right and wrong. Any thoughts around this for us? Well, I think the...

The way that I've played with the community part, I think more recently is around doing live shows. That creates that interactive experience with it. I think it is a little more difficult in a prerecorded show to create that community connection and have it be truly spontaneous and really drive direct connection. And I think that's another element of what's happening in the space is that

More and more shows are creating private communities where they're able to funnel their audience to a direct engagement platform that can create that kind of direct one-to-one community building type of a relationship where the audience can actually engage with you directly and have that connection. And so I've been playing around with that as well. I've got a school's kind of area that has a little bit of that element in it. So I've been playing around with that, but

Really my community building aspect has really come in through my live shows and having that conversation in the content. Now, not every show has a format that really lends itself to live. And I played around a lot with live over the years and there's a lot of downsides to it and there's a lot of good sides to it. So you just have to decide what's right for you. But that's kind of how I think about it. But I do think that this

direct audience to host relationship platforms that are out there is really the key to making that work. I add to that, Alex? Yeah, Glenn, I can tell you're definitely agreeing with some of that, Well, I think you have to get, to add to what Rob said, you have to give them a place to be a community. And that's the one thing that a lot of podcasters don't do. we have a very, Jamie, I'll tell you this, we have a very active community. Our Patreon people are just like crazy.

I was going to say, if you don't call them crazy, I will. But we gave them a place. In our world, Facebook is it, right? That's where horse people hang out. So we started a private Facebook group, and in our case, it's our Patreon community. It goes to our Facebook group. So we kind of had a block there in making it kind of an exclusive community. So, you know, we maybe have 600 Patreon people, not a ton like a lot of other places do, but they're very active. There'll be 40 posts on there a day.

But what we did was, it doesn't matter whether you have 10 people, 100 people or whatever, we gave them a place to go talk about your show and to talk amongst each other. If you don't give them a place, they're not going to. So we gave them a place. I'll tell you who else did this very well. And I talked to him when he started, Scott Johnson, who has a podcast called What Was That Like? I told him when he first started that, said, you got to give him a place to go. Thank God he did. They go in there and talk about every episode he does. And he has a very active community, but it's a Facebook group. It's a private Facebook group. He gave him a place to go.

Private I think is important because people also want to be able to talk to like people without it being public. So some of the things that happen in our private group are talking about divorces and selling horses and sick horses and very private things that they would never post anywhere else, but they're posting it in our community because it's a family. So you got to give them that place to go. I'll take that one step further for your more experienced podcasters. If you already have a community like that, I don't know why more people don't do this.

We have a focus group. So out of that community, I asked for volunteers. We have about 20 of them that are in a separate Facebook group that's very private, that's completely sealed off, that they are a focus group. They come on in every episode we do of Horses in the Morning. That's a daily show. That's a commitment. And they're on for six months at a time and they give us feedback on guests, on how we did that day. We get feedback on every episode we do.

And I don't know why I put more podcasters that already have a community don't do that. It's been invaluable to us. That's so good. And that goes back to number two, we talked about it's focusing on continuous improvement. And I mentioned it when we started this third one, like it's your accountability. It's how you know what they want. And what I do for guests, just so you know, and I think this is something guests should consider, is do the host bring you into the community? So example, anytime an episode comes out, I do share it in our community. I talk about it a little bit. And it's not just like episode alert, right? No, it's like, hey, here's why I'm sharing this one.

And like when this one comes out, the three of you will be mentioned in it, tagged in it, access to it, and I'll send it to you afterwards. So can go in there and engage. And that's how a guest can start to build relationship with the listenership as well. So guys and gal, sorry, Jimmy. This was a lot of fun today and we're at time for sure. But I just want to thank all three of you for coming on today. Thank you so, much for being here. And again, what we talked about is the three steps for really ensuring success as a podcast guest or host, committing to sticking with it, focusing on continuous improvement while avoiding perfection.

and fostering that meaningful community among your listeners. And again, I just want to thank each of you for being here so much. I appreciate it. Thanks, Alex. Thank you. All right. Thank you for having me.