B2B Podcasting
Listen on Apple Podcasts here (or search on your fav podcast app to listen there).
Logan Lyles, director at Sweet Fish Media, a podcast production company, also produces the company’s top 100 Marketing Podcast the B2B Growth Show. Logan shares his unique podcasting tips that can a help a business generate new sales, customers, content and more.
He also shares unique ways to organically promote your podcast through how you set it up and structure it.
Watch Logan and Stacy talk about B2B podcast production tips:
NOTE: The intro I talk about in the episode was actually not from Logan’s current direct boss, it was a partner who sold their part of the Sweet Fish Media company a few years ago!
Logan Lyles & Sweet Fish Media
Logan Lyles 0:00
Other people find that getting up to the mic is way easier than staring at the blank screen with the blinking cursor and trying to create written content from scratch. So podcasting can kind of grease the wheels and help you create more content that then you can turn into written content and video content, short form LinkedIn posts, long form blog posts, those sorts of things.
Stacy Caprio 0:23
Hi, and welcome to the Hurst SEO podcast with Stacy Caprio. The best advice comes not from your critics, but from those who are already where you want to be. Listen along with Stacey each week to learn from those who have already built their dreams so you can learn how to build your own.
In this episode, we get to talk to Logan of sweet fish media. Logan not only directs a full service podcast production company called Sweet fish media, and is the host of the b2b growth show podcast. He’s an incredible podcaster and the most strategically thoughtful podcaster I’ve ever met, the way he structured everything from his podcast names to the thumbnails to the marketing and promotion are so thoughtful in a way that will not only bring more podcast listeners, but also increase sales for the company running the podcast. I’ve never spoken to anyone so strategic and good at aligning running a podcast and actually getting business results from it. In this episode, we get to hear all his juicy podcast tips.
And we get a behind the scenes peek of what has worked for his own podcasts. And his many successful suite media client podcasts. He’s the most qualified podcaster I know of. And I’m very happy. I was able to have him on the show before I officially launched this podcast because I was able to structure things differently. And plan my promotion and production strategy for the best possible results after learning how the best of the best in the podcasting business, aka Logan, and sweet fish do it. Hi, Logan, thank you so much for coming on today. And I was hoping we could start going over your background how you got into podcasting, sweet fish media and how your company helps podcasts and businesses.
Logan Lyles 2:27
Yeah, absolutely. Stacy, thank you so much for having me on today. It was great to meet you via LinkedIn and I love making LinkedIn friends, friends in real life as as much as we can be in real life these days. And and podcasting is a great way to do that. My name is Logan Lyles.
I’m the director of partnerships at sweet fish media. We are a podcast agency for b2b brands. So we help companies that sell business to business, develop and continue production have a podcast that they use for both their content marketing efforts as well as a creative way to engage decision makers at Target accounts that their sales teams are trying to reach. I kind of had a winding road getting into my current role in b2b marketing and in podcasting in particular. So I actually graduated college in 2008. With a journalism degree which I always tell the story, you know, it was a great time to graduate college and hit the job market during the Great Recession and also a great time to hit the job market with a journalism degree when the news industry was going through all sorts of convergence and newspapers were closing their doors, left and right all over the country.
I quickly sold my way into my first sales job, and did that for about 10 years, I actually sold locally and regionally b2b office equipment. And for anyone who you’ve ever heard say, Oh, it was in the office equipment industry or I sold office equipment. That’s code for I sold copiers and printers. So anyway, I did that very fun job for about 10 years. And then I came across sweet fish media by getting to know James Carberry, our founder and CEO Now, a few years back through LinkedIn, and we became friends and I was eventually the first sales hire at sweet fish. And so for the last two years, I’ve been heading up sales for our podcast agency, being the serving as one of the primary co hosts of our flagship show b2b growth, where we interview b2b Marketing Leaders every single day. And I also do some other hosting and content creation on the team as well. I’m a host for some of the shows that we produce for our clients.
Stacy Caprio 4:34
Awesome, thank you. Yeah, that’s a really interesting background. And one question I have is, what are the benefits you’ve seen for businesses who you’ve helped have podcasts as well as your own podcast?
Benefits of a Podcast
Logan Lyles 4:49
Yeah, there’s really three primary benefits I think about when it comes to podcasting, especially in b2b and I think the first two are fairly obvious to folks. One is It’s brand awareness, I literally hopped off a sales call earlier today, probably 30 minutes ago. And that person on the other end of the line said, I feel like I already know you. And this was the literally the first time we had spoken live or been on a zoom call, because they’ve been listening to our podcast very regularly.
And podcasting is such an intimate medium. So creating brand awareness and helping people get to know you before they actually know you would be number one. Number two is that you know, a lot of people find that getting up to the mic is way easier than staring at the blank screen with a blinking cursor and trying to create written content from scratch. So podcasting can kind of grease the wheels and help you create more content that then you can turn into written content and video content, short form, LinkedIn posts, long form, blog posts, those sorts of things. So most people I talked to, they understand the brand awareness, and the faster content creation that can come from having a podcast. The third one that I think has been the biggest benefit, and has really changed my sales career that a lot of people aren’t thinking about is a strategy that we call in our CEOs book is titled, content based networking. So a lot of people understand content marketing, you create content for the people that you want to sell to. And then they will become educated and or entertained by your content. And then you will be top of mind when they’re ready to buy your product or service. content based networking says don’t just create content for those folks create it with them. So in our case, on b2b growth, there’s a reason that I head up sales for sweet fish. And I’m also the primary host of our podcast. And that is, I interview people who fit our buyer persona. So instead of just hoping that VP of Marketing at b2b tech companies who are our typical buyer persona, find our podcast, listen, and then find out more about sweet fish, which definitely happens.
But the the other side of it is, I interview people who regularly can buy from us and it opens up the door to a new relationship that wouldn’t have been there otherwise. So we actually look at our podcast in it as driving revenue for our business. But not just the audience. It’s the guests as well. And a lot of people skip over that. But it was from that that I kind of sold my way into my first sales job. I spent about 10 years doing office equipment sales copiers and printers in local b2b sales in different regions. And I got to know the founder of sweet fish through LinkedIn. So, link, I’m a big proponent of LinkedIn as a content channel. But also just in my own career journey. LinkedIn played a huge role in allowing me to connect with one of my best friends. And now my current boss James Carberry, who’s the founder and CEO at sweet fish. And so now I head up sales for sweet fish. I’ve been doing that for about two years. And as I mentioned, we we are a podcast agency for b2b brands, I head up sales, and I also am the primary host of our daily show for b2b marketing and sales professionals b2b growth. And that’s what I’m doing today. And I kind of love it, because it’s this mixture of sales, marketing and journalism that I get to kind of wear all three hats at once in my current role, and I drawn draw from, you know, each part of those different pieces my background every day, so it’s a ton of fun.
Stacy Caprio 8:28
Oh, that’s awesome. Yeah. Interesting. You say that about LinkedIn. James had actually reached out to me on LinkedIn after hearing about the website investing, and suggested I reached out to you and I mentioned the podcast, so small world, how we all get connected through that. Yeah,
Logan Lyles 8:45
exactly. And LinkedIn plays a big part of that, at least for me these days.
Stacy Caprio 8:49
Me too. And I always read every connection request. So I think it’s a great tool for people doing sales and outreach as well.
Logan Lyles 8:57
For sure.
Stacy Caprio 8:58
So that’s an awesome background. What would you say, to any business who’s hesitating to start a podcast? What are the benefits they can gain from having one?
Long Term Benefits of a Podcast
Logan Lyles 9:10
Yeah, absolutely. I would say there’s really long term benefit. But then there’s also short term benefit, you know, businesses that hesitate to invest in, you know, what I think of as top of the funnel marketing, brand awareness, thought leadership, things that don’t necessarily lead to this conversion equals this sale. Sometimes folks hesitate to invest in that sort of marketing and and podcasting, or organic LinkedIn content, they fit into that bucket. But the way that we approach podcasting is not meant to just provide your brand with more thought leadership content. If you think about a podcast, it’s usually an interview, just like this one that we’re doing right now. And what does an interview need an interview needs a guest and what we found out a long time ago, five years ago, and when James Founded sweet fish media is that when you invite people who fit your buyer persona to be guests on your podcast, you’re not only playing the long game of creating content that other people who fit that persona will learn from, and then be aware of your brand and then maybe buy from you.
That person who is the guest, if they fit your buyer persona, guess what they could buy from you directly, or they could refer a friend directly to you. And so a lot of folks, just think about the content marketing benefit of a podcast. And we’re all about that we help our customers take raw interviews on Zen caster or zoom, turn them into video clips, turn them into LinkedIn content, turn them into finished podcast episodes. So I don’t want to downplay the content marketing benefits of a podcast.
But the other side of it kind of the other side of the double edged sword, as I often put it, is what we call content based networking, the way that you can network the way that you can build new relationships through content collaboration. And so if your brand has a podcast, instead of just having your CEO or your marketing leader, talk about your product, or service, or even the industry that you serve, have the majority, or at least a good portion of the interviews that you do with your podcast, feature people who fit your buyer persona, because then you’re playing the long game of content marketing, but you’re taking the shortcut to through what we call content based networking, where you’re building relationships that can map to revenue and can lead to legitimate business results that are very easy to track.
Can B2C Businesses Benefit From a Podcast?
Stacy Caprio 11:36
That’s awesome. And do you think that an e commerce business should also have a podcast to build the connection like that? Or is it only for businesses that are more sales focused?
Logan Lyles 11:52
Yeah, I would say, you know, if you are a direct to consumer brand, and you’re an e commerce business, the the benefit of content based networking might not be as direct as maybe a company that is sells b2b. And sells, you know, one to one, they have a sales team that sells, you know, one to one face to face, or at least face to face over zoom these days, you might not get the relationship benefits, but an e commerce business, there are probably folks in your space that are that would be good partners for you to have that might be some sort of distribution partner or someone else who is trying to reach the same the same audience that you’re trying to reach.
So having a podcast and featuring them and cross promoting each other’s content, you can still build key relationships, they might just not be directly with the end consumers of your product if you’re an e commerce business, but pretty much any business is driven forward by some sort of relationships. And so thinking about how can I invest in relationships and content at the same time? I think if you think about it that way, an e commerce brand still could definitely benefit from a podcast.
Stacy Caprio 13:04
Awesome. Have Do you have any favorite examples of sales relationships or relationships that have really blossomed or that you’ve directly seen benefit from an originate from a podcast?
Logan Lyles 13:21
Yeah, absolutely. So I mean, the short story is, I interview VPS of marketing at b2b tech companies with 50 plus employees every single day on our podcast and a lot of them that the reason I’m able to spout off those demographics so easily is because that’s our buyer persona that is most often the demographics and and the look and feel of someone and the type of company that would usually buy our podcast production service. And oftentimes I’m talking with them. And after post interview, after we conduct a podcast interview, they bring up to me Wait, you guys don’t just produce this show. you produce podcasts. We’ve been thinking about that for a long time. I didn’t even know there were specifically a podcast agency, let alone a podcast agency, just for b2b brands that can help us out. And then we we have a conversation.
And so it was within the first 60 days of starting to be a regular co host on b2b growth. Then I closed the deal with actually an SEO agency that hired us to be their podcast production company. You know, one of my favorite stories is actually how I became an employee of sweet fish. And so this story actually relates to a podcast guest becoming a customer but also recruiting new employees. So several years back, my wife and I and our two kids were living in Texas and we were looking to relocate back to Colorado where most of our family lives.
And I was looking at companies that were doing cool things out in Colorado not sure what my next move was going to be. And I started following this company on LinkedIn called Bom Bom. Bom Bom is a video Sending platform, they let you record and send one to one personal videos via email and text so that you can get face to face when you’re not face to face. And I thought was a really cool company. So I started following them on LinkedIn. And then I saw that they promoted this virtual summit that was going on. And it was sweetish media that was putting it on. And so I signed up for it, I got access to some of the videos that were being released on demand. And one of the people who’s being interviewed was at that time their VP of Marketing Ethan Butte, and he was doing an interview with the CEO of sweet fish James Carberry. And that was great content, I got on the email list of sweet fish. And it was actually through that that then I met, I connected with James on LinkedIn, we became friends, we started engaging with each other’s content. And eventually James hired me to be the first full time sales hire at sweet fish.
The really cool part about the story I think, is not only did that content collaboration lead to my becoming a an employee of sweet fish, but about a year after joining sweet fish, maybe within eight months, Ethan from bom bom who had been featured as a guest on that content summit with with James reached out to me and said, Hey, we’re thinking about starting a podcast, we’d like to see if sweet fish might, you know, be the right fit to help. And Ethan and the team at bom bom became a customer so that content collaboration reached me. And I ended up becoming a customer of sweet fish. And Ethan, who was not the audience, but he was the guest in that content collaboration scenario, later became a customer after I joined as as a salesperson at sweet fish. And so it just kind of came full circle, just seeing the power of the content, the power of the relationships and the relationships in a variety of different ways in both recruiting and gaining customers. So I tell that story a lot, because I can remember when that happened, it just it brought it full circle for me to see the benefits of what James talks about in his book, The strategy that we call content based networking.
Stacy Caprio 17:08
That’s awesome. Yeah, it sounds like you’ve made a lot of connections that way. And it’s a podcast is really such a great connector and business tool. My next question would be, what are the biggest mistakes you’ve seen when people start a podcast? Or even just ongoing that hurts their podcast, in the short and long term?
Podcast Marketing Tips & Mistakes
Logan Lyles 17:35
Yeah, I think one of the biggest mistakes that brands make with their podcast is something early on. And it is a pretty crucial decision because it affects whether you’re going to get the right guests, it affects the search ability and the discoverability of your podcast. And that is the name of your show. I see companies go wrong in really two main areas, they name the show after their company, which no one is searching Apple podcasts for your company name when they’re looking for a new podcast to subscribe to. So you’re not doing yourself any favors. And plus, you know, if we had the sweet fish media podcast, that to me would be like putting LinkedIn thought leader in my LinkedIn headline, I don’t think it’s something that you should ascribe to yourself, you should let others call you a thought leader. And I think naming your podcast after your company. It’s kind of right in line with that. So naming your podcast after your company, I think is a bad move.
The other that I think you could get wrong is naming the podcast around your expertise. So a lot of folks think about this. And they’re like, well, we want to be a thought leader in podcasting, or sales or HR, whatever it is, and they name their podcast around their expertise. And here’s a scenario and why that would not work out well. If we at Sui fish had the b2b podcasting podcast. You know, it’s not the Swedish media show, but it is about our expertise in podcasting. I wouldn’t be able to invite marketing leaders who could buy from us to be guests on the show. If because most often, they would say, well, we haven’t done a podcast yet. I don’t have anything to add a value to the b2b podcasting podcast. Now, what we did is we reverse engineered the name of our show, so that it was crystal clear for our guests that they could come on and be a featured Rockstar guest the name of our show is b2b growth. When we invite b2b marketing and sales leaders on they can talk about how they’re driving growth for their organizations. And guess what we can do a how to podcast episode we can do an episode on podcasting within that show. But going one level away from your expertise, and branding your show around your ideal buyer and their expertise is going to help you create better content, get the guests that you want to get on and be able to be found by more listeners.
The other area just from a discoverability point I’ll point out is a pitfall naming your show to pun heavy, you know something that isn’t really apparent, it might be kind of a fun branding thing. It might be a fun play on words. But again, it’s not going to be, it’s not going to do you any favors to help your podcast be found by potential listeners. One of the reasons b2b growth has become a top 100 marketing podcast in Apple podcasts is that people commonly searched the term b2b. And so we are one of the top shows that comes up both in Apple podcasts. And on Google, if you search b2b Marketing Podcast. And so I think, again, naming your show around your ideal buyer and thinking about what are they going to be searching for when they’re looking for a new podcast to subscribe to. So naming your show the right way, cannot be overstated, because it can have some really great impact. And it can have some really negative effects if you get it wrong.
Stacy Caprio 20:54
That’s really interesting. I’d actually never thought of that. And I assumed that most people name it after their company. But I think that’s a great tip. Are there any other ways that you recommend either optimizing your podcast listing so more people can find it in search, or just generally promoting it, some more people get to listen to it?
Podcast Title Optimization
Logan Lyles 21:17
Yeah, I think there’s a couple of things your podcast in addition to the name, you can put a tagline. And so with b2b growth, we put a tagline after the name of the show that says your daily b2b Marketing Podcast. And because we don’t have the term marketing in the name of our show, since it is in the tagline, then we show up more in search for b2b marketing, which is a key term that we want to be found for. So give some thought to the name of the show, as well as the tagline as well as the description in iTunes or Apple podcasts.
This is one of those things that you have to you have to have, you know, kind of a summary of your show to submit to all the different directories once you set it up for syndication into Apple, and Google and Spotify. So put some thought into the keyword that you want to have there. And then on promoting your show and gaining more listeners, we’ve got a roundup on our blog with 14 of our top audience growth strategies. I’ll share that with you, Stacy, we could share that link along with this recording. But one of the key things I see people get wrong is they focus on promoting their podcast on social. So whether it’s LinkedIn or Twitter or Facebook, whatever social media channel makes sense for your brand. And what we think about is not promoting your podcast on those other channels, but repurposing content for those other channels. Now it sounds like it sounds counterintuitive, right? Because don’t just want to promote the show and get more listeners. And it also sounds like Well, what’s the difference? promoting on or repurposing for? For instance, an example of promoting on LinkedIn would be Hey, this episode, Wednesday’s episode is live on b2b growth and posting that to LinkedIn.
And just here’s the link repurposing content for LinkedIn, which will eventually lead to more listeners, but also more exposure on LinkedIn would be breaking down what the guest shared on that Wednesday episode and sharing the top three things and not just teasing them, like, listen to this episode. And you’ll learn this, this and this, but actually sharing what was this, this and this, and then linking to that episode, maybe in the comments, because LinkedIn posts don’t. LinkedIn algorithm doesn’t like when you put a link in the in the post itself. So that’s a that’s an example. Take your podcast and think of it as a pillar piece of content that you can create micro pieces of content from. And that will lead to more listeners of the show. But it will also help you reach people in other channels, they might not be a podcast listener.
But if it’s helping you create content for your blog or for LinkedIn, then it’s still a win. You’re increasing your awareness on LinkedIn, and you’re driving more traffic to your blog, and you’re gaining more subscribers to the podcast. So focus on delivering value with every piece of content, not always just trying to drive someone from one channel to another.
Stacy Caprio 24:16
That’s a great point, I think thank you for sharing. I was wondering, what tech tools do you use and recommend for podcasters? And do you think free tools are okay or do you need to pay for some types of your tools?
Podcasting Tools
Logan Lyles 24:35
Yeah, I think there is a lot that you can do with very low cost and even free tools. You can use a free zoom account, you can use Zen caster. We often use zoom for recording our podcast because we like the ability to get audio and video even though zoom isn’t specifically a tool that’s been made for podcasting. There are some tools like Zen caster I know video is in beta squad cast.
So any of those, I think the reason we go with zoom right now is it’s a low cost option. But also we can capture audio and video all at once. You don’t have to get too fancy with the microphone either I use a microphone that costs less than $100. And since I’ve been a host for a long time now I have, you know, a shock mount and a boom arm that connects to my ass, but all told, it’s like $250 worth of equipment, and you don’t even need all of that, in order to get started. Libsyn is a very low cost podcast host platform that we use.
But you can also use a free one like anchor, and a few other tools that are either free or low cost that we use, there’s one called Descript. If you go to descript.com, Descript, it allows you to transcribe your audio, and then edit the transcribed text. And that actually edits the audio, it’s like, it works automatically, as I like to say, I sound like a infomercial for those guys, but they have a free offering. They have a premium offering as well, but very low cost for the cool stuff that you can do with that. And then another tool that we use very frequently, it is paid but very affordable is called v lead. It’s veed.io. So it kind of spells out veed.io. When you look at the domain, we use this to create micro video clips from our podcast recordings. Even if you’re just recording via zoom with a webcam, you can create video that will perform really well on social if you use a tool like feed, to put a cap, put captions, put a progress bar at the bottom, put a branded frame around your video and optimize it for social. So those are some of the tools that we use, and you don’t need a 10 $20,000 podcast studio to have a successful podcast.
Stacy Caprio 26:46
That’s awesome. I really want to try out the transcribing tool you mentioned. So I’ll definitely take a look at that. I was wondering if you could give maybe a tip for experienced podcasters. I know we went over that tip for the beginner podcaster and how you format your title and description. But maybe set give us a tip for people who have already been podcasting have everything set up and kind of want to grow.
Logan Lyles 27:17
Yeah, I would say you know, focus on capturing video alongside your audio, and look at ways to repurpose that. The video tool that we use Veed.io, we create micro video clips out of those, and we repurpose those for organic content on LinkedIn. And we’ll push that out through personal profiles rather than through our company page. If you go to sweet fish media, on LinkedIn, you won’t see a lot of content.
But if you check out my profile, you can easily find me at Logan Lyles, I think I’m the only Logan Lyles on on LinkedIn that I found anyway, you’ll see some how we use these video clips for organic content on LinkedIn. What you can also do is if you create these micro video clips, you can repurpose them into retargeting ads, or Facebook ads, because they look like organic content. And so many people are running ads for their product or service. But they’re not running ads for their podcast or their video show. And you know, it takes some commitment to the long game, right, because you’re spending money to get people there. And that’s kind of top of funnel. So it takes some commitment. But when everyone else is zigging, if you zag sometimes there’s some tremendous opportunity that you can take advantage of. So I would say, you know, look at creating micro video clips, and then running ads for your show. I was literally just talking with our CEO about a customer who’s doing this. And the ads for their podcasts are performing and converting at a much higher rate than any of the social media ads that they’ve run for their product before. So that would that would be one way.
If you are not doing it now, I would highly suggest you automate or you find a system to regularly do this, have two follow up emails, go to every guest, make sure that you send an email to your guest when their episode goes live. put a link in that email that they can share and link back to that where you post the episode on your website, as well as where they can find the episode on on Apple podcasts and share that as well. And then a lot of people don’t think about doing this.
But it’s something that’s driven a lot of reviews for our podcast and reviews as much as downloads, help you climb in the charts in the category that you’re trying to rank for in Apple podcasts. So what we do is send another email to guests about two or three days after that go live notification. And it’s something like this. If Stacy you were a guest on b2b growth, it might say something like, Hey Stacy, hope you had a chance to listen to your episode. Again. It was fantastic.
If you wouldn’t mind giving the show five stars on Apple podcasts. It’s going to help more people find the show, including your episode. So it’s a way to go back to the guest and remind them that their episode was great. Remind them of the value that they got. By being a guest on the show, and if they leave a review, they’re incentivized to do that, because it’s going to help people find their content. And it’s going to benefit you as the podcast publisher at the same time.
Stacy Caprio 30:11
Oh, that’s a great tip. I never would have thought to ask podcast guests to leave reviews as well. That’s great to think about. So when we’re wrapping up right now, I wanted to ask, are there any offers that sweet fish media or you currently have that you’d like to promote to listeners and let them know how they can work with you?
Logan Lyles 30:33
Yes, you can find us at sweetfishmedia.com. If you look me up on LinkedIn, you can connect with me there on LinkedIn, let me know that you heard me here. Or you can send me an email Logan at sweet fish media.com.
Those are three easy ways to get in touch with me. We have those 14 audience growth strategies in a blog posts that we can share with listeners as well. And the last thing I’ll mention, if you check out our website, we don’t have a lot of pop ups a lot of gated content. But one thing we do have there is our 26 step guide to launching a podcast. So if you go to sweet fish media.com, you’ll see my face in the chat window that pops up. But you’ll also see an option to download our 26 step guide that will really walk you through what we would do to help you launch your own podcast. But if you want to do it yourself, there’s all the content there for the taking, you can easily download it in in that PDF. They’re
Stacy Caprio 31:30
awesome. And I can vouch for it is a wonderful guide. I downloaded it when I was kind of reading up on sweet fish media and using it as I’ve been launching my own podcast. So thanks for that valuable info.
Logan Lyles 31:44
Awesome. Thanks for the endorsement, endorsement.
Stacy Caprio 31:48
Of course. So yeah, thank you so much. This is packed with great info. And I’m definitely going to listen to this again after just for my own kind of reminders and help. So thank you again, so much, Logan. And looking forward to talking again soon.
Logan Lyles 32:03
Absolutely. Thank you so much for having me.
Stacy Caprio 32:05
I loved hearing how Logan got his current job at sweet fish media through LinkedIn. Which is also ironic because Logan and I also connected on a roundabout way through LinkedIn, through his bosses outreach to me about website investing in a LinkedIn message. And then my introduction to Logan, when I brought up the her SEO podcast in my response. This is another example of the importance of meeting new people, and how it can foster growth and new content in your business, which you can easily do nowadays through platforms like LinkedIn. And using podcasts for relationship building, which Logan did a great job of talking about the benefits of in this episode. It’s interesting how Logan regularly uses and recommends using podcasts as a way to network and create new relationships, especially how he recommends using podcast interviews as a way for b2b companies to build new relationships, specifically with sales prospects.
His company sweet fish media, coined this term called content based networking, which essentially means building new relationships through podcasting, while creating new content at the same time, for both podcasters brands, this is something I had never thought about before he had never even crossed my mind until talking to Logan. So I’m so happy that I was able to talk to him and get his perspective on this because it’s completely flipped the way that I view podcasting and even the value proposition of podcasting. He’s the only person I’ve ever even heard, consider inviting your ideal client onto your podcast to help start a long term relationship. But if you think about it, why aren’t more people doing this? This is a really smart business move. And I’m surprised it hasn’t caught on more. have other b2b companies not thought of it.
That’s the only thing I can think of. And maybe if they learn about it. For them this podcast if you know any b2b companies that could benefit from learning about this, because maybe if they learn about it, they’ll start doing it, and it’ll start helping more companies grow. It’s an undeniably unique and effective way to build relationships with potential clients, business contacts, employees, really anyone your business wants to build a relationship with. And having a podcast is a great way to facilitate that. Logan very articulately outlines the Benefits of businesses hosting podcasts. And it’s more than just relationship building. Doing so is a great way to build thought leadership and brand awareness, which are both to have podcasting is more obvious long term value propositions, and also why people often hesitate to start a podcast, because they see only the long term value. And don’t see that starting a podcast can have a ton of short term value and wins as well. I’d never thought of the short term wins, as Logan pointed out, building relationships with your ideal clients by inviting them on your podcast, where they could become a customer in the future. Or they’ll refer people to you because they know what your company does and what you’re good at the huge benefit that he also mentions, which is a huge reason I started this her SEO podcast is because a podcast allows you to create new content that you can repurpose, and post, not just on your podcast, but also in video format, on YouTube, on your blog, on emails on social including LinkedIn, Twitter, your other profiles, and get high quality content that is created by experts in the field.
So you’re not just relying on your own expertise, but you’re getting someone who’s a specialist to actually help you create the content, so it’s easier to create it. It’s more reliable content that’s really founded in expertise. And it’s a great short and long term win for your brand. I’ve personally been super slow creating new content for her SEO. So sorry to all the listeners, but I’m doing a little better now creating the content, it just hasn’t been a priority for me. So these five episodes have allowed me to create a ton of new written audio and visual content that will help me restart the blog to get a little bit more organic traffic, which is a focus for the site right now. I like that Logan really expanded on the idea that any business can benefit from having a podcast because all businesses are driven by relationships and by content.
So he explained that even an e commerce business can benefit from having a podcast when I asked him that question. And it really made sense because any business, if your business needs a supplier or a new employee, or to build a relationship with a manufacturer, or to build relationships with any type of new business partner, you can invite those types of people on your podcast. And you’ll start a really personal relationship with them that is really founded in something genuine, in real. And you’ll be able to build new branded content at the same time down the line, you can use them to help you do your manufacturing or hire them as an employee or partner with them on something. And you’ll have a really solid relationship and something to reach out on. So hosting a podcast, it can even allow you to connect with new marketing partners or people you can promote on your podcast and they can promote you on theirs. You can grow your audience, any type of business relationship, and even if you aren’t a b2b company. And even if you’re selling a product, it’s interesting to think you really could benefit in some way likely from launching a podcast if you’re very intentional about who you invite on the podcast, and what type of content you’re creating on the podcast.
What surprised me the most when talking to Logan, was when he mentioned that you should not name your podcast your company’s name, and instead, name it what your ideal customer is searching for online. That blew my mind in a really great way. I completely agree with him, that you’re not doing yourself any favors if you name your podcast after your company name. Unless your company name is already your ideal clients favorite search term. Or if you’re a huge brand already, or if you’re including it only as part of your name, not the full name.
I thought it was funny how he compared naming your podcast after your company to calling yourself a thought leader and your LinkedIn bio. Both not really something you want to do. It’s funny because a true thought leader obviously would never call themselves a thought leader on any type of bio page that they wrote. Especially their LinkedIn It would just be something that you assume by looking. When you look at their accomplishment section, when you read, they’re incredibly detailed and content with great expertise. And when you hear other people talk about them as a thought leader, then you know, they’re a thought leader, not when they say I am a thought leader on their bio. And it’s kind of similar to your podcast name, which can be named after the content, your ideal client is actively consuming. And that’s the way that you can provide the most value to your client and to your own podcast. And then people will be able to see similarly, that you have great content, that you’re a great fit for them. And then they’ll see that the podcast is produced by your company, whether or not the company name is the podcast name, and they’ll know that it’s your company’s podcast, but it really benefits you so much more. To not, there’s no reason to name it, just your company name really. Unless, as I was saying, your company name is already your ideal client search term, which, honestly, if you if you’re just starting a small company, that could also be a good thing to try to name your company, what your clients are searching for, because it will help you when you’re doing SEO and all of that, at the same time, you want to choose the name that is good.
And using your podcast name as a keyword tool is a very powerful lesson from this episode. And it’s also the only reason that I put entrepreneur in the name of my podcast, the her CEO entrepreneur podcast, because my ideal listener would be searching podcast tools, and Google for entrepreneur tips and entrepreneur stories. Another caveat he mentioned is to not name the podcast around your expertise either, which was another interesting point. So pretty much just focus, what is your ideal client, looking for it, and name the podcast that don’t try to get creative with the name, don’t try to name it around your expertise. As he mentioned, the sweet fish media b2b podcasting podcast, if they had named it that their target market would automatically exclude themselves as a guest, because their target market has never done a podcast before. So that’s why it was more important to name it. The b2b growth podcast because it’s what their target market is searching for in their target market feels they’re fit for the show, so they’re not automatically excluded.
So to really get the benefit of this, you can just sit down and brainstorm a list of what your ideal client is searching for on different platforms, and then play around with incorporating that into your podcast name. To see more organic traffic to your podcast. It may take a little extra thought, but this is an important way that you can definitely get more organic podcast listeners, Logan’s own podcast, the b2b growth podcast is a top 100 marketing podcasts and Apple podcasts for this very reason, because their ideal client is searching their podcast name, unintentionally. And then they find Logan’s podcast through the podcast search tools, which is pretty cool. So they’re a prime example of how really choosing your podcast name intentionally to be what your ideal client is searching for can really help your podcast grow and get more listeners without having to spend money on ads or any of that. I also love that Logan talked about not promoting your podcast using teasers or having an entire post that tells people where they can watch your podcast and when. Instead, in this really makes more sense, you’ll get more traction in views by repurposing actually valuable content that contains valuable messaging, not teasers from each episode, and promoting this content on your social channels on your other channels. But not as a teaser, as something that is valuable.
In and of itself this is a way to really engage your audience, give them something they actually want to see on their newsfeed the posts. When you do it this way, we’ll get more likes comments engagement, which will give them more exposure. And doing this will actually drive more traffic indirectly to your podcast and more engagement on your social pages at the same time. This seems a little bit like common sense. But I’m surprised at how many people do simply post watch my podcast at this link. And then not many people are engaging with it because it’s not a valuable post. It’s just telling people to go somewhere else to find something and people want to find something where they are. They want to see the value where they are and if they see that value, it’s going to motivate them to do go to another place to get more value like your podcast.
So I’m really glad that this was hammered into my mind and that I learned this before launching this podcast. So I will be able to focus on delivering value with every piece of quote unquote promotional content that I’m posting on other channels, as opposed to only trying to like use every post to drive people from my social channels to my podcast, because that’s not what it’s about. It’s about providing value on every channel. And then when you do that, people will actively seek out your other channels so they can get even more value. This has also made me think of each podcast episode as its own pillar piece of content that I can create micro pieces of content from, for every channel.
And I can drive brand growth and engagement in different ways through my podcast, my blog, and my YouTube channel, specifically, as the channels that I’m going to focus on for this growth, when people like one piece of content that they see on one channel, they’ll naturally gravitate to my other channels, which is what I do when I like someone’s content. I’ll check out their other channels and see what else do they have to offer. And it’s not something I’m going to try to force people to do because not only is that not fun for me or for those people, it’s also simply not effective. I’ll quickly go over some of the recommended tools that will also be in the show notes that Logan talked about. d script.com is a tool that helps you transcribe your audio. Logan talked about the low cost free and premium options. I personally want to try to script because I want transcripts of all my episodes posted on my website so her SEO can start getting Google traffic from the podcast posts.
Veed.io is the other tool he mentioned. His company uses this to create micro video clips from podcast recordings. And you can use it to create video that will perform well on social including adding captions, a little progress bar in a branded frame, which Logan has recommended when you’re creating video clips to share on social, something I’ve never used. And I only recorded small bits of video, and one full episode on video. So I’m not going to be using veed.io for this podcast, episode or even this handful of podcasts. But if I do start including more full video episodes in the future, it is something I will check out.
Logan talks about Libsyn and Anchor.FM as two hosting tools you can use for your podcast. Anchor.FM is free. And Libsyn has low cost and higher cost options depending on your podcasting needs. You can also view the sweet fish media podcast launch checklist in the show notes that Logan and I were talking about. I referenced it a lot when I was starting this podcast.
And it’s really helpful for anyone who’s looking to launch a podcast and wants to kind of go through things step by step and make sure they don’t miss anything and they know what they need to do. I also created a mini podcast episode that goes into my story from when I used to hate listening to podcasts. So I just didn’t it was kind of my own rule. And if I was super interested in any type of podcast or even any type of educational video, I would simply skim read the transcript to save time.
It goes through my view on podcasts from when I really disliked them and did not listen to them to when I was featured on a podcast, which changed my whole podcast perspective. Even to the point I started listening to podcasts for the first time to why I decided to start my own podcast
How I found the tools I used to do so which tools I chose to use and why the spoiler alert is I chose most because they were free or low cost and or the best version of the free or low cost options. I’m hoping my how and why I started a podcast mini episode will help you and anyone who feels overwhelmed or confused about why or how to start a podcast and wants a little bit more help and insight into how to do so. Feel free to listen to my mini podcast episode, which should be the next episode after this one.
If you’d like to know more about why I started my own podcast and what tools I use so you can use the same to start your own. Thank you for listening to this episode of The her SEO podcast. I hope you took something away that you can implement in your own life or business. If you want to make me smile today, you can leave a five star review on the podcast player you’re listening to. Thanks again for listening and feel free to shoot me an email with any questions or comments at stacy@her.ceo that’s stacy@her.ceo Thanks again.
Logan’s Contact Info:
Linkedin: Logan on Linkedin
Email: Logan@sweetfishmedia.com
Check out the B2B Growth Show Podcast
Sweet Fish’s 14 Ways to Grow your Podcast article
Sweet Fish’s Podcast Starting Ebook