The Four D's of Podcasting: Novel Marketing Conference Recap
I just got back from the Novel Marketing Conference. This was put on by my friend Thomas Umstattd Jr (who has a great podcast for authors). I love single track events, and this one was AMAZING. It was all about book marketing (which applies to podcasting). Only the original Podfest comes close (but that didn't feed me Schlotzky's deli Sandwiches).
I need to give credit, the "Four D's" come from Chase Replogle who does a few podcasts including the Pastor Writer, Let's Talk Bible: Kids, and he's the Pastor at Bent Oak Church. His opening keynote was AMAZING. I have adopted it for podcasters.
Main Points:
- Single Track Conferences: I explained why single-track conferences are my favorite—you don’t miss out on sessions, and the Novel Marketing Conference was one of the best I’ve attended.
- Opening Keynote – The Four Ds: Chase Replogle’s talk resonated with the “Four Ds”: decisiveness, discipline, discernment, and devotion—applies to both writing and podcasting. My favorite: nobody listens to what you record, they listen to what you edit (editing is magic!).
- Marketing Parallels: Even though this was a book conference, book marketing is a close cousin to podcast marketing. The basic principles really do translate.
- Serving Your Audience: I reflected on the courage to create, facing the fear of “what if nobody listens?”, and focusing on service and devotion to your listeners.
- Is Your Podcast a Painkiller or a Vitamin?: Thanks to Thomas Umstattd Jr.’s talk—a “painkiller” solves a direct need, while a “vitamin” is nice to have but not urgent. Think about what pain your show removes for your audience.
- Podcast Competition: I highlighted that we’re not just competing with other podcasts, but with all forms of entertainment—TV, games, etc. Know your unique value.
- Why People Listen: People consume podcasts for entertainment, education, or escape. I asked: Does your show serve one (or more) of these needs?
- Value of Listener’s Time: All podcasts are “free,” but listeners pay with their time. We need to make it worth it.
- Improving Your Show: Attending other sessions gave me ideas about making changes that truly improve the show rather than just making it different.
- AI & Prompts: I shared tips I learned about using AI—give ChatGPT clear instructions about who you are, what you need, and who your audience is.
- Book Covers = Podcast Artwork: Don’t be cheap with your cover! As much as we say not to judge by appearances, we all do. Your show art matters.
- Networking: The conference structure ensured everyone met and interacted with new people every day—awesome for making connections.
- Feedback & Iteration: Get feedback and be willing to edit and improve. Like writing, multiple drafts (and edits) make better episodes.
- Target Audience: Jonathan’s session hit home: don’t just market for yourself—know your actual audience, and don’t trust social media polls alone.
- Conferences in General: I appreciated speakers not blatantly selling from stage—a rarity!
- If You Want to Start a Show: Record everything (planning, editing, writing, etc.) to see how much time it takes, then set a sustainable schedule.
- Finding Your Listeners: Look for audiences in adjacent markets—not just podcasting-specific spaces.
- More Takeaways: The importance of networking, getting feedback, and attending events that put you in the room with your ideal audience.
Mentioned In This Episode
Mentioned in this episode:
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00:00 - Untitled
00:41 - Brother Love Intro
01:00 - Opening
05:02 - The 4 D's of Podcasting
10:44 - What's the Worst That Could Happen
12:33 - Vitamin or Painkiller?
18:23 - School of Podcasting
19:52 - Podcasting Observations
20:11 - The Shower Analogy
21:07 - Same Topic Different Approach
23:08 - Jonathan Shurrger - Don't Market To Yourself
25:18 - Do the Right Thing the Right Way
27:38 - Some Day is Today
28:35 - The Ultimate AI Prompt
31:25 - Artwork Tips
32:19 - Really Great Content
34:13 - Thanks for the SHout Outs
34:55 - Planting Seeds
35:40 - What Should My Schedule Be?
36:17 - There Was No Selling From the Stage
39:44 - Question of the Month
40:36 - Where Will I Be
40:46 - Should I Make This Change?
41:24 - Late Episodes or Forever bad?
42:08 - How to Target Christians
42:40 - I Need Your Bad Pitches!
43:14 - Podcast Adjacent
45:12 - Who Do You Want To Attract?
47:27 - Feedback the MIssing Ingrediant
48:52 - Thanking the Silent Partner
49:51 - Need Help With Your Podcast?
51:26 - Why Do People Listen?
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People often ask me, they're like, dave, how do you do a solo show? How
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do you talk to nobody? And I go, well, there's always at
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least two voices in my head. And I just got
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back from the Novel Marketing Conference in
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Austin, Texas. This is an event that was put on by my
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buddy, Thomas Umstadt Jr. Because it's just fun to say
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umstad. And it was an amazing
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event. And so this episode is
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like, you asked me, dave,
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how's the Novel Marketing Conference? And I'm going to answer it like
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you're sitting across the table from me. Don't overthink it.
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Hit it, brother. What's happening? This is Brother Love of the Just Keep Talking
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podcast. You are hanging out with Dave Jackson. The only
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way to listen, and the only way to learn is to listen
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and learn. The school of podcasting. Plan, launch,
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grow with Dave Jackson. Again, this is Brother Love of the Just Keep
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Talking podcast.
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Podcasting since 2005. I am your
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award winning hall of fame podcast coach, Dave Jackson, thanking you so
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much for tuning in. If you're new to the show, as Brother
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Love said, we plan, launch and grow your podcast here. And I
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am fresh back. As in, like, just got off the plane, just got home.
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It is a whopping 66 degrees in my office and we're going to talk
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podcasting. And I got to tell you,
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my favorite, my absolute favorite kind of conference
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is a single track conference. And I just got
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back from one of the best single track conferences I've ever,
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ever been to. You've heard me talk about Thomas
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Umstadt Jr. Before. You can find him at
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novelmarketing.com or authormedia.com they both go
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to the same place and this was a lot of fun. Now, in full
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disclosure, I got floated a ticket and I got to sit in the
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back and it was absolutely great. It was great to see Thomas.
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Congratulations. Every time I see Thomas, his wife is expecting
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and I was like, holy. I mean, seriously, like 6, maybe
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27. I forget how many kids he's going to have. But you know
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what? Those kids are lucky. We need more umstats in the world.
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And so the opening keynote was
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amazing. It's this guy named Chase and I believe
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it's reploggle. This is where it
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would have been good to go hear that guy say his name. But he was
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amazing. And it was. He
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had so many cool stats and he was talking about,
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you know why? Now here's the cool thing. This was a book conference
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and you might. This is a cool strategy. So. So we weren't really there
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to talk about podcasting, although Zach and I'll talk about
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him in a second. Was there talking podcasting.
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But it was a book conference. But here's the thing. It was book
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marketing, and they're not a whole lot different between
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book marketing and podcast marketing. We are both artists,
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man. We're artists. We just want you to consume my stuff.
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It was interesting in a way that
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there was a different. It's always interesting when you go into somebody else's bubble. You
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know what I mean? Like, their own little niche. Because there are, like, apparently 37
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million types of. Of books.
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Like, one was steampunk,
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one was like comfy fantasy, and then there was,
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like, uncomfy hillbilly. Like, wait, what
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is that a real. Like, no, I don't know. But it was. I knew I
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was in a niche when they started talking about things that I didn't know.
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Meanwhile, back in my notes, I was telling you about
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Chase Rep Logel, and he. Oh, wait, before I
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even say it, I gotta play the sound effect because I'm gonna mention maybe
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a P and J word. You
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guessed it. Invisible sky buddy alert. Invisible sky
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buddy alert. Beware.
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Yes, Chase is a pastor, and he
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does a show called the Pastor Writer
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show, among other ones. And this was the one I was
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like, I got to share. That's really cool. And he talks about how
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he has some kids as well, and his one
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son is taking jiu jitsu, and
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he tells his children that there are
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times when we're afraid, but really courage is.
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Is doing it afraid. It's like being afraid and doing it
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anyway. I don't know exactly the
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stat he quoted here. I just wrote down that a thousand people start
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something and only six people will finish. We all think
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about doing it. We might take a couple steps, but apparently not many
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of us will basically finish something
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that we started. But he brought up some things, and I thought this
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was really cool. The first one is, I'm going to call this the
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1, 2, 3, 4 Ds
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of podcasting. And again, he was talking about writing. But
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writing and podcasting are distant cousins, really.
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And the first D is decisiveness.
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And this is where you need to decide,
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I'm going to start a podcast. Not. I think I'm going to,
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like, no, make the decision. Like, are you gonna do
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it or not? Come on, man. Everybody's doing it,
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right? And he said, nobody
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reads what you write. They read what you
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rewrite. So let's put that into podcasting.
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Nobody listens to what you record. They listen to what
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you edit. And that is a key. In fact,
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I had a lot of questions about that. Like, how do you do this and
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that? And what if you do this? And I go, that's the magic of editing.
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I am not perfect by any means. So the first one is you
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have to decide, as they say, you have to poop
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or get off the pot. The second one is a
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discipline, and this is the courage to
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keep going. You jumped into the pool and you're like, hey,
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I gotta kick my legs and move my arms to swim. And you're
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like, uh, huh, yeah, takes a little discipline. And
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he talks about how writing. And I agree, this applies to
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podcasting is kind of blue collar work. You get in there, you get dirty,
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you turn that wrench, you batten that wench and turn
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that bail. Something like that. I don't know. Don't hit the wench. That doesn't
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sound right. But you have. I
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decide, then you have the discipline. Because it
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does take a little discipline to go, well, I could just
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sit here and watch yet another rerun of Friends in
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Seinfeld, or I could do something productive. So
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decisiveness, discipline and
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discernment. And this is a fun one.
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In other words, how do you know when it's ready?
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And you kind of have to. Is this good is. Because often
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he said you don't feel as good as you thought you were going to
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feel like you're like, hey, the episode's done,
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you know, or the book's done, and you kind of thought
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you'd feel a little more like, you know, oh,
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like it's done, like the angels sing, etc. And
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he said, but instead we kind of keep
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making changes. Maybe I need a new microphone or maybe I
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need to do this, maybe I need to do that. And
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I love this line. He says, when it comes to making
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changes, are you making changes for the better,
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or is this change just making it different?
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And sometimes making it different doesn't mean you're making it better.
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And I see a lot of podcasters making changes
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so they can say, well, I'm working on my show and we'll get to
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this. In the end, there's kind of repeated in a different phrase. So
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yeah, the discernment to know when it's done.
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And then the fourth one is the devotion,
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and this one is, okay, we've decided to do a
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podcast. We had the discipline to go through the work and
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to roll up our sleeves and get in there and do the work.
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And then we decided, yep, that's good enough. And it
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was. In the end, you kind of go, I hear this all the time, man.
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That took a lot more time than I thought it was going to. And when
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you first start out, that's absolutely true. It's called a learning curve,
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and I'll talk about that in a second. But the devotion
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is. You know what? That was hard. And it
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wasn't as fun as I thought it was going to be at first. And of
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course, nothing ever is. But then you
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decide to do it again. Why? Because
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you're devoted. And for me,
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at the heart of every good podcaster is a
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devotion to your audience, to serve the
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audience. So decisiveness, discipline,
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discernment, and devotion
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from Chase Replogle,
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I believe is how you say that. And I will put a link to
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his website and to his podcast
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out in the show notes. Just go to
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schoolofpodcasting.com
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1021. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
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I want to give a quick thanks to Aubrey
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Hendrick, who writes medieval fantasy and historical
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fiction. And again, that's. I hear this and I'm like,
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oh, well, I write reluctant lore. Fantasy or
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speculative domesticity. I was like, what?
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Is that real? No, I just made those up.
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But it was cool that I was like, wow, I'm in a niche and I
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have no idea what they're talking about, but the marketing
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applied greatly. And so thanks to Aubrey. Thank
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you also to Emily Kate. You can find Emily Kate
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Milykate Creative. She writes Fantasy Comfort. There
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you go. And Aubrey. Oh, doggone it, Aubrey, your
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website is not on your business card. And I do
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a similar thing. People notice that my email was not on my business card,
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which kind of defeats the purpose, which is why I'm having new cards
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made. But, ladies, thank you for the dinners that
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you took me to. I deeply appreciated that. Yeah, yeah,
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yeah. And one note I took that was inspired by
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Chase's opening keynote was
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we always worry, right? We're always scared.
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And what if nobody listens to my show?
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Well, somebody will. You will get at least
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two downloads. One of those will be you. And maybe mom listened.
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But let's go. Absolute worst case scenario.
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What if nobody listened to your show? The
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only person that would know that nobody listened to
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your show is you.
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There's no shame in that. You swung the bat and
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you missed. All right, well, let's take that knowledge
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and try to swing again. And maybe this time keep our eye
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on the ball. And I'm not saying that getting your ego
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smushed isn't fun. Right? That would
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be not easy in some cases to get over But I just had that
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in my notes that we. All right. Because he was talking
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about doing things, afraid, and what's the worst that could happen?
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Nobody listens. Yeah, yeah, yeah. All right. And going
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forward, I'm not going to. Here, go. Oh. In books, it's
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this. In podcasting, it's this. I'm just going to translate everything into
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podcasting. And Thomas did a great talk, and
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he said, make your audience a promise.
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And so whatever the title of your episode is,
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that's the promise that you are
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saying to your audience. Hey, today I'm going to share the
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four Ds of podcasting with you and then get to that topic as
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quickly as you can. But he asked a question. He said,
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is your podcast, is it a vitamin or is it a
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painkiller? And the difference there is you can take vitamins. I take a
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bunch of vitamins. I have no idea if they're working or not. Right? It's like,
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do I have more energy? I don't know. I keep getting older and I have
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less energy, and I don't know. But if it's a
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painkiller, when you have a headache and you pop a
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pill and the pain goes away, it's noticeable.
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And so you have to ask yourself, what pain am I
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taking away from my audience? Make the right
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promise to your audience. And
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realize that podcasters, we think about
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the competition because the last time I checked, there were like,
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4 million podcasts. But don't poop your pants with that. There's only,
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like 250,000 that are actually putting out
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episodes. And actually, it's probably less than that. It's really.
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When you Compare it to YouTube, there's much less competition
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in audio podcasting. But realize we're not just
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competing against podcast.
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We're competing against video games. We're competing against
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satellite radio. We have to look at all these
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different things. We have to be more fun than tv, in
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a way. And so we have to ask ourselves,
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what makes our podcast the best? And
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it's easier to answer that question when you have a
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clear picture of. Of who your audience is.
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Who is it for? And when you try to do it for everyone,
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it's really hard to ask everyone, hey, what's your favorite thing? And
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then put it in the show. And so he went on to
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talk about, why do people consume
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books? And again, we're talking podcasting. But you'll
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see where this applies. Number one is entertainment.
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I listened to be entertained. Am I entertaining you?
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Right? And the people that
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consume things for entertainment. I remember Waking up once
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and it was like 4 in the morning, and I
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get up to pee and I see the light still on
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in the living room, and I go out and there's my dad. And my dad
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was one of those guys that if you gave him a good book, he would
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not put it down until it was over.
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And so people that consume content, they
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just have to finish it. So when you're binging that thing
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on Netflix or Hulu or whatever, you're into the
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entertainment. And next week, we're going to talk about what
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makes things bingeable. So stay tuned
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for that. Some of us consume podcasts for education,
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and this is where we're constantly listening on
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the plane. In my case, maybe when we're
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walking around the neighborhood, wherever we're at, we're
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trying to get to the answer to that question. And I listened to
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an episode. I won't say what the podcast was, but they
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said they were going to answer a question. And, man, did it take forever
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to get to the actual answer of that question.
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But we want to know how it ends. What's
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the answer to that question? And then some of us
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listen to podcasts for escape. It makes us feel different.
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It takes us. Calgon, Take me away.
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Remember that commercial? And these people
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where the people that read for education or for entertainment,
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they really are, they're trying to get to the end of the, like, what's the
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answer? These people that consume things for escape, they
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kind of don't want the episode to end
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because it takes them to a different space. It
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helps them forget the fact that their boss is a total
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jerk. Right? And so
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when you hear shows that are kind of like, well, that seems kind of dumb.
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Well, sometimes we need things that we don't have to think. I don't
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want to have to think about it. Just take me away.
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And so sometimes you will hear shows like that where it just seems like a
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bunch of people babbling on about nothing. And sometimes that's
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exactly what people need. But realize
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we've got more competition than the other podcasters.
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And that sometimes can, again, make us a little nervous.
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But sometimes we do things scared. And so
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think about recording a podcast
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that people want to listen to. I know that's kind of a duh,
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but, you know, record a podcast that people want to
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listen to. And here's the other one. These are my notes
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after listening to Thomas. All podcasts
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are the same price, right? Almost every podcast is free,
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but they're not. Thomas pointed this out.
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Whether you're reading a book or you're listening to a
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podcast, you're paying with your
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time. The reason I haven't listened to
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a Dan Carlin's Hardcore history, although I've had so
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many people tell me how amazing it is, Dan doesn't put
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out a podcast. He basically puts out an audiobook. And I look at it and
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go, three hours. That's a big
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investment. And so we need to
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earn their time and make sure that we are
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the best podcast for that person that we know
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like the back of our hand. The school
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of podcasting. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Here's another
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quick note that I saw that Thomas had put down and I was like, oh,
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that's a great analogy. You know me, I love me a good
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analogy. And if you look at a podcast,
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it's a lot like a shower. When you first turn it on,
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it's kind of cold. And then you just have to wait for the cold
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to go through until the hot water finally
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makes it. And when you first start a podcast, the
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numbers leave you a little cold. It's always kind of funny
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because first people are like, ah, why should I start a podcast? Nobody's going to
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listen. And then eventually that water starts to get warm and people actually do
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listen. And then people get nervous. They're like, holy cow, people are listening to
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me. So just be patient. Realize that sometimes
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you gotta let that cold water go through before the hot water makes it.
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And sometimes you gotta wait a bit for your audience to find you
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before things start to warm up. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Zach
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Russell did a session on podcasting. And I had
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met Zach, I believe, at the National Religious Broadcasters,
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which I'll be speaking at here in February. And what was
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interesting is Zach is like the
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rest of these folks, and I say this with love and compassion. He's a book
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nerd. And I am book nerd Light because
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of my book Profit from youm Podcast. And so Zach did
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a presentation on podcasting, completely different
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than I would have, but it was much more
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book nerdy. Like, he speaks their language. And I found
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that very interesting. In fact, if you think about it, there were
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a lot of Christians because Thomas is a Christian and he does a Christian
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show. There were a lot of Christians at this event. And the
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thing I thought about that is any Christian
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show is kind of tough
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because in theory, they are all using the same source
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material. They're all going back to the Bible, and it's just
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a matter of what angle are you going
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to show it at. So this was a case where Zach was
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talking about podcasting, but In a way that I definitely
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was like. And then finally I went, oh, I see where he's going.
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He would get to the point. Not that he was meandering or whatever, but I
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just didn't quite get it because he was doing a little more book speak than
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I would. And so keep that in mind, that sometimes
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what you can do is go
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listen to other shows and listen for what they're not doing.
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Like, when you listen, like, well, they're not talking about this. Okay, well, then you
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could talk about that. Oh, and I hate the lightning round. Okay,
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don't do a lightning round. You can be inspired by other shows. Don't
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rip them off. But it never, you know, just see how
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they do it and write down what you liked about it and what you didn't.
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And then maybe you can come up with a format that fits you and, more
Speaker:
importantly, fits your target audience.
Speaker:
Jonathan Schuberger. I'm messing up
Speaker:
Jonathan's name. Jonathan Schurger,
Speaker:
if you see the spelling. Jonathan was, first of all, very entertaining
Speaker:
the night before he spoke. He is a, I believe, former
Speaker:
Marine and had all sorts of fun army stories, and I
Speaker:
think his hobby. And he does this in a loving and caring way. I
Speaker:
think Jonathan just waits for the opportunity to punch somebody in the face.
Speaker:
I got that kind of take from him in his presentation. He
Speaker:
actually did some jiu jitsu, which was kind of interesting. He's a very
Speaker:
unique guy. And he did a whole thing on Amazon page optimization. And
Speaker:
he made a great point. He said, we often make things
Speaker:
to sell ourselves that we
Speaker:
think, oh, well, I would buy if I saw something like that.
Speaker:
So we gear our marketing for us,
Speaker:
which is great as long as our target audience
Speaker:
is just like us, and in some cases they're not.
Speaker:
And in a very, you know, again, he's got this military background. He goes,
Speaker:
you got to know what your target is, otherwise you're not going to hit
Speaker:
it. And Thomas had brought up a point that
Speaker:
sometimes doing a poll on,
Speaker:
let's say, X or wherever, you're going to do it
Speaker:
if it's something like that. People only get to
Speaker:
see your stuff if the algorithm says they
Speaker:
can, which means you may not be getting
Speaker:
an absolutely clear picture in that poll because
Speaker:
only certain people got to see it. And I was like, that is
Speaker:
a really good point. That's where newsletters really come in handy.
Speaker:
And I get it. Somebody said, yeah, but newsletters, those people
Speaker:
are people that just said, hey, I want more from you. And I'm like, yeah,
Speaker:
who do you want to Take care of more than those people. The people that
Speaker:
have already said, yes, I like your stuff. Yes, I want to make sure those
Speaker:
people are really, really happy. So again, it was
Speaker:
a marketing conference. Yes. About books. But there were a lot of good
Speaker:
nuggets in it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And Thomas, I
Speaker:
swear, is one of the most just brilliantly
Speaker:
intelligent. Like, the guy just knows everything about everything. And
Speaker:
he was talking about when. Back
Speaker:
when the United States was settled. People are driving across
Speaker:
this country and here's your plot of land, and it's just covered in
Speaker:
trees. And what was the first thing to do was to.
Speaker:
Yeah, cut down trees. But you had to figure out
Speaker:
which trees to keep and which trees to lose.
Speaker:
And then also. And we've all heard this analogy, right? If you're going to cut
Speaker:
down a bunch of trees, you better sharpen your ax. And so he talked about
Speaker:
that we need to work on the right thing
Speaker:
the right way. And I was like, man, that's.
Speaker:
I told him, I said, you have a lot of bumper stickers in these
Speaker:
presentations. That stuff we know. But
Speaker:
sometimes hearing not the basics, but you're just like,
Speaker:
oh, you know what? That's true. Because so many times
Speaker:
we start running around like a chicken with our head cut off, and we
Speaker:
just need to do something. And whatever is the closest, we grab our
Speaker:
dull axe and start hacking away at it when we need to figure
Speaker:
out, well, what do I need to do to move the needle?
Speaker:
And that might be, and in many cases might be
Speaker:
your content. I always say great
Speaker:
content is, you know, a great episode is made up of two things.
Speaker:
Remarkable content delivered in an
Speaker:
entertaining or educational way. And we've talked about that
Speaker:
before. You know, the whole laugh, cry, think grown, educate, or entertain.
Speaker:
Try to do at least one, two, or maybe three of those. You can solve
Speaker:
a problem, meaning save them time or money.
Speaker:
That's always a bonus as well. And he
Speaker:
talked about getting things done because it does
Speaker:
take more time than we thought when you first start off. And one of the
Speaker:
things I've done, and we talked about smart
Speaker:
goals, I won't go into that. I'll put a link to a show where I
Speaker:
talked about that before. But I had to realize
Speaker:
that I got 24 hours a day,
Speaker:
and at the end of the day, sometimes I've been doing the wrong things
Speaker:
the wrong way. And one of them is I have bought
Speaker:
so many courses that I will watch
Speaker:
someday. And so I just went to my calendar
Speaker:
and I put an hour block a couple times a week that just
Speaker:
says, learn stuff. And
Speaker:
I'm smart enough to go, well, right now I'm going through a bunch of SEO
Speaker:
stuff, but I have a storytelling course. I have a whole bunch of courses,
Speaker:
and I just keep buying more and I'm not learning any of them.
Speaker:
And that's that. Discipline to go. Okay, well,
Speaker:
maybe tonight I'm not going to spend 20
Speaker:
minutes scrolling through Facebook lives or, you
Speaker:
know, reels or whatever. I'm not going to do that. I'm not
Speaker:
going to sit here on Hulu trying to find something to watch.
Speaker:
You know, we have things to watch. So think about
Speaker:
doing the right thing the right way. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker:
yeah. And of course, we had to talk about AI
Speaker:
Thomas. If you look for Patron
Speaker:
Toolbox, if you are an author, you got
Speaker:
to go to patron. It's 10 bucks right now. And it is an
Speaker:
insane amount of tools that I will be signing up for as soon as
Speaker:
I get done here. I was going to do it last night, but are you.
Speaker:
Is this just me? I get really weirded out buying
Speaker:
things when I'm on a hotel WI fi. I just am always
Speaker:
assuming someone's going to hack something. But anyway,
Speaker:
I will be doing that. And he was talking about
Speaker:
AI. And
Speaker:
Thomas refers to his target audience as Timothy.
Speaker:
And so what you do with AI if you're brand new to ChatGPT,
Speaker:
this is super simple. You say who you are
Speaker:
and then what your role is. So it might be, hey, I'm Dave Jackson. I'm
Speaker:
a podcast consultant. And then what to
Speaker:
do? I need you to write a
Speaker:
blah, blah, blah about such and such
Speaker:
so you can kind of tell who the audience is there.
Speaker:
But here's who I am, here's
Speaker:
my identity, here's my role. I'm a podcast consultant,
Speaker:
and I need you to do this for these people. And he said, there's
Speaker:
a super prompt. Because if you're like, dave, I
Speaker:
don't know anything about that GPK. What is it?
Speaker:
M double X. What? Chi ChatGPT.
Speaker:
I still remember when ChatGPT was around and nobody could say GPT
Speaker:
we all said GT DEP GX thing.
Speaker:
It's this who am I? So I'm a
Speaker:
historical fiction author who wants to avoid historical errors. And
Speaker:
then what I want, I want my fictional story to feel like
Speaker:
it could have really happened. So who am I? What do I
Speaker:
want? And then here's the cool thing. If you don't know
Speaker:
AI, ask AI how to write a
Speaker:
prompt for for AI. And then he said, so it could
Speaker:
be help me create a prompt to check my manuscript
Speaker:
for Anachronisms. That's a big word
Speaker:
right there. Anachronisms. Try to work that into your
Speaker:
vocabulary today. And I haven't tried that yet, but he said it
Speaker:
is an absolute game changer. And
Speaker:
what was really cool is he. You can hear me turning these pages in the
Speaker:
background, probably. He had a sponsors and
Speaker:
stuff in the back, especially the stuff.
Speaker:
And QR codes are throughout the whole thing.
Speaker:
And so I'm looking at the page now from the pastor
Speaker:
writer and about him. And
Speaker:
again, Jamie Foley did a whole
Speaker:
thing on making a great book cover.
Speaker:
And that, again, applies to
Speaker:
podcasters. And the rule number one is don't be cheap.
Speaker:
Just don't be cheap. Because as much as you shouldn't judge
Speaker:
a book by cover, we all. What is it? Yeah, we all
Speaker:
judge a book by its cover. And we actually did it. She had these
Speaker:
little experiments where she had kind of a. Okay, book
Speaker:
cover and then one that was professionally made. And
Speaker:
she would ask the group, she'd put it on the screen for like a second
Speaker:
and go, which one would you buy? And everybody together was like, oh,
Speaker:
the one on the right. Oh, the one on the left. The one on the
Speaker:
right. It was really cool. And so he has. As I look at
Speaker:
this workbook, so this made this interactive. And here's the other
Speaker:
thing. I asked him at the end because I was like, dude, this
Speaker:
was. And again, I'm somewhat biased because I love
Speaker:
single track, smaller conferences. And that's
Speaker:
what this was. And I'm like, dude, this was so much fun. It was so
Speaker:
good. And I go. And I'm looking at the workbook
Speaker:
and there were little places to, like, fill in the blank. And
Speaker:
so just so you could kind of pay attention. You're always looking
Speaker:
for. It's that brain thing, right? You know, I always talk about
Speaker:
when there's a cliffhanger, the brain's like, wait, I need to hear.
Speaker:
You know? And so you turn the page and like, wait,
Speaker:
there's three words missing from this workbook that I have to
Speaker:
fill in. And so it was a way. I was surprised at how much
Speaker:
my brain was like, wait, I've only got two out of three words. Did I
Speaker:
miss a word? It kept you alert.
Speaker:
And it was really, really good. I really. And the cool
Speaker:
thing was, here's another thing he did. And we're going to. I'm going to interview
Speaker:
him in the future. I want to interview Mark Roenick. Ironic. I always
Speaker:
get that wrong. Mark. Mark from Podcast Morning Chat. He
Speaker:
does the Empowered Podcasting Conference. I
Speaker:
want to Interview him. I want to interview Chris Komitsos because I think
Speaker:
this might be something we want to look into. And
Speaker:
this is. Look, I love podfest. I just had a blast at podfest. That was
Speaker:
the last episode, but for me,
Speaker:
it's just a little sprinkle on top. I got to meet so many people. And
Speaker:
this is one of the things that Thomas did is he
Speaker:
grouped people together and you all sat together,
Speaker:
and then after lunch, you had to sit someplace else.
Speaker:
He purposely made us sit someplace else. We're constantly doing
Speaker:
interactive things. So by the end of it, I got to meet a ton
Speaker:
of people. And what was fun again was I was
Speaker:
the podcast guy and shout out to both
Speaker:
Zach and Thomas. And I didn't ask them and I
Speaker:
didn't pay them, but they both said, hey, Dave, Jackson's in the room.
Speaker:
Dave, could you raise your arm? And if you have. Because they were talking
Speaker:
about podcasting, they said, if you really want to get a in depth answer,
Speaker:
that guy back there with the Pod page shirt is the guy you want to
Speaker:
talk to. So thanks both to Zach and Thomas there.
Speaker:
And Zach and I one time were at a
Speaker:
table, and we were kind of the podcast gurus that were
Speaker:
answering a ton of questions. And thanks to everyone who asked questions.
Speaker:
It sounds weird because by the end
Speaker:
of Sunday, and when I went out with Aubrey
Speaker:
and her husband, you know, here again was another, like, half hour,
Speaker:
probably time of just talking about podcasting. And
Speaker:
it gave me a chance to really go, yep, this is what I love
Speaker:
to do. Because I was answering, yeah, I was answering the same questions that
Speaker:
a lot of people had already asked. But to see the
Speaker:
answers plant a seed in someone
Speaker:
that they're like, you know what? I think I'm going to do a podcast. I
Speaker:
think I'm going to do it. And that, to me,
Speaker:
it puts gas in my tank, because I know. I know what's on the other
Speaker:
side. I know the things that can happen when you start a podcast
Speaker:
and when you do it right, and you figure out who your audience is
Speaker:
and you figure out why you're doing it. And a lot of times people are
Speaker:
like, what's my schedule? And I'm like, here's the thing. Do a couple episodes and
Speaker:
record everything. Thing. Record the time you're planning, record
Speaker:
the time you're editing, record the time you're writing show notes, record everything
Speaker:
and see how long it took. And then go, okay, that took three hours. Okay,
Speaker:
do you have three hours every week to do a podcast? And if the answer
Speaker:
is no, you're not doing a weekly show, you know, or
Speaker:
you need to make it shorter, things like that. So it was so much fun.
Speaker:
And just the speakers are great. And that's why
Speaker:
bring. I knew there was a reason I brought up the workbook because I went
Speaker:
to Thomas afterwards and I go, man,
Speaker:
I've been a person that ran the podcast track for the New Media
Speaker:
Expo. And when you pick your teachers
Speaker:
and your speakers, you know,
Speaker:
kind of they've told you what they're going to talk about, but you
Speaker:
cannot control them. We've all been at conferences where people
Speaker:
blatantly sell from the stage. And I'm here to tell
Speaker:
you, every conference I know of says you're not allowed to
Speaker:
blatantly sell from the stage. If you want to put a QR code up at
Speaker:
the end, that's cool. But we've seen people that you're like, this is nothing
Speaker:
but a 20 minute pitch. And there was none of that here.
Speaker:
Zach played a couple clips from his show, but it wasn't in a salesy
Speaker:
listen to my show kind of way. It was again, kind of
Speaker:
showing the book speak thing. And so I said,
Speaker:
did you know what everybody was going to say? And he said, well, we do.
Speaker:
He gives them kind of a like, here's how to make your slides,
Speaker:
here's what's expected. And so while I didn't know exactly
Speaker:
what they were going to say, he had a clue because he had to print
Speaker:
that workbook and he saw all the missing words. And I was like, that's
Speaker:
a really cool way to. Without kind of
Speaker:
micromanaging your speakers, at least have a clue what's coming
Speaker:
on. And that way he could also see if the
Speaker:
content kind of just flowed together.
Speaker:
And it did. It was amazing. There was a speaker on lead
Speaker:
magnets and everything you needed there for marketing. Again, this was
Speaker:
the marketing version of that. I guess another version of this is if you're going
Speaker:
to do a book launch and that will be coming up. And I may go
Speaker:
to that one because again, it's marketing
Speaker:
and I'm sure there's not a whole lot. Well, there probably are some different things
Speaker:
because you have to work with publishers and things like that, but I might go
Speaker:
to that. And it's in Texas. And it was weird because
Speaker:
I was in Texas and the one night it was, I want to
Speaker:
say, 41 degrees outside, which is
Speaker:
ridiculous in Texas, where it's supposed to be, you know. And I was
Speaker:
in Florida the week before and it was like 50. And I'm like, look,
Speaker:
I came back to Ohio. It was, well, the one night. The
Speaker:
night before I came back, it was minus seven in Ohio. When I got back,
Speaker:
it was 21, so it was much colder. But
Speaker:
I was waiting for some heat in Texas and boy,
Speaker:
the weather's really, really weird. But I had a great time at the
Speaker:
novel marketing conference. I'll put a link to everything. I don't know
Speaker:
that it was recorded. I don't believe it was. I could be wrong, but I
Speaker:
didn't hear any kind of talk about that. But if you are
Speaker:
a person that is interested in writing a book, or if you
Speaker:
have a book and you're looking to either launch it or get an agent
Speaker:
or any kind of book stuff, I'm
Speaker:
here to tell you Thomas Umstadt Jr. Is the man. And you can
Speaker:
find him@again, novelmarketing.com
Speaker:
the School of Podcasting. I thought it was done, but
Speaker:
I found another nugget in here. Again, these are
Speaker:
all like bumper stickers, but when you're trying to figure
Speaker:
out, should I do something, you want to
Speaker:
ask yourself, this was from Thomas again, how does this action
Speaker:
that you want to take? How does this compare to
Speaker:
my next best alternative? And
Speaker:
this is where he said the bit about social media is
Speaker:
kind of a bubble and it may not show reality.
Speaker:
And then I love this line if you're,
Speaker:
look, I get my ego gets in my way. I don't really
Speaker:
have much of an ego and I'm not really sure why, but I'm obsessive about
Speaker:
making sure I don't miss Mondays. And I've
Speaker:
always said that I would rather have a quote.
Speaker:
Can you just put up your little air quotes? A late show
Speaker:
that was good than an on time show that was
Speaker:
okay. And he made a point and I think he credited
Speaker:
Nintendo for this. But he said, a game
Speaker:
is only late for a short time, but it's
Speaker:
bad forever. And so if you're
Speaker:
rushing to do an episode, which I kind of was a
Speaker:
couple weeks ago, because you don't want to be late,
Speaker:
it's only late until your next episode comes out, right?
Speaker:
But it's bad forever. And I was like, oh, holy cow,
Speaker:
that's a thinker right there. And then if you
Speaker:
are in a Christian type of show
Speaker:
and you're like, yeah, it's really hard to target
Speaker:
Christians on Facebook or wherever
Speaker:
Jonathan mentioned in his talk that
Speaker:
you don't, you can't, in some cases, you can't target that. So what do
Speaker:
you do? You target Chick Fil A and Hobby
Speaker:
Lobby. And I was like, Oh, I see what you did
Speaker:
there. That guy. That's a good one right there.
Speaker:
Quick tangent and then we're going to go back to the conference. How to pitch
Speaker:
a podcast@pitchapodcast.com I got a few
Speaker:
examples. Somebody shared their stories. I need more.
Speaker:
I want to have 20 before I start. So when you get a bad
Speaker:
pitch from somebody trying to be a guest on your show, simply
Speaker:
read it into a microphone and send it to me, along with the name of
Speaker:
your show, your website, and who your perfect guest
Speaker:
would be and what you're looking for. Because you never know, they might be
Speaker:
listening. Go to pitchapodcast.com yeah, yeah,
Speaker:
yeah. And I think one of the things that I was really excited about, how
Speaker:
do you grow your podcast? Is
Speaker:
you find people that don't listen to your
Speaker:
show but should. And I was
Speaker:
in a room with a lot of authors and some of
Speaker:
them definitely are not ever going to start a podcast. They don't want it and
Speaker:
that's perfectly fine. But there were a lot in there that were like, I've been
Speaker:
thinking about it a long time. And then others are like, I've already started it,
Speaker:
but I need some help. And so I left
Speaker:
thinking. And hello to everyone from novel marketing
Speaker:
that is now listening to this. Thanks for a great weekend. It was a wonderful
Speaker:
time. But that's how you grow your audience. And I was like, I should look
Speaker:
for more podcast adjacent. So what is
Speaker:
your topic? Like podcasting? It's an art man.
Speaker:
And I was like, maybe I should go to more art related shows.
Speaker:
Maybe I should go to music conferences. Because every musician
Speaker:
should be doing podcasts, doing the behind the scenes of every
Speaker:
song, which then makes you do what it makes you want
Speaker:
to go listen to the song. And every. I remember once I
Speaker:
got some clients, I went to a webinar or a thing at a
Speaker:
library and it was about SEO. Well,
Speaker:
people that are studying SEO are trying to get more traffic and
Speaker:
to get more exposure. You know, a great way to get more exposure, start a
Speaker:
podcast. So sometimes going to not
Speaker:
an exact Facebook fit is kind of adjacent
Speaker:
to maybe what your topic is, but your audience might be
Speaker:
there as well. And then the one thing they stumped, a
Speaker:
question. Emily Kate has a question that you'll be hearing
Speaker:
for the question of the month. And if you haven't figured it out, we didn't
Speaker:
do one in January. And so you just heard Emily
Speaker:
Kate there a second ago for February. And we will be using I
Speaker:
know I hinted at one for January. We're going to Use that next
Speaker:
month. But there was a question that I was like,
Speaker:
huh? And that was, what if you do a fantasy
Speaker:
podcast? I got your. I'm sorry, I'm a fantasy author.
Speaker:
What kind of podcast would you do? And you have
Speaker:
to think about, I'm trying to attract people
Speaker:
who read fantasy, right? That's my target
Speaker:
audience. Because you could do a show about
Speaker:
fantasy, like what's going on in the
Speaker:
fantasy author industry, but
Speaker:
that would probably attract fantasy
Speaker:
writers who may or may not be
Speaker:
fantasy readers. Now, you could
Speaker:
interview other fantasy authors and hope
Speaker:
that their audience who are fantasy readers
Speaker:
might go, oh, yeah, I love that interview with Shelley.
Speaker:
I wish her new book was out. Oh, wait a minute. You know,
Speaker:
Zach's got a new book out, maybe I'll go read his.
Speaker:
So you have to really think about sometimes who is going to
Speaker:
be attracted to this information. Again, going back to Jonathan, you gotta know
Speaker:
your target. You gotta use the right thing. Lisa did a
Speaker:
session on Lead Magnets, and you have to know. Again, it always starts with
Speaker:
knowing your audience. And the best
Speaker:
way to know your audience is if there's a conference around
Speaker:
or if there's a meetup around. The best way to know your
Speaker:
audience, when you can tell me what your audience's eye
Speaker:
color is, you're in the right spot because you'll
Speaker:
learn more things much quicker when
Speaker:
you're in person. Then you go into things like forums,
Speaker:
Reddit. And yes, Reddit can be kind of the CIS bull of the Internet, but,
Speaker:
you know, take it with a grain of salt and bring an extra layer of
Speaker:
skin. I know I've. I got trolled once on Reddit and it took me a
Speaker:
day or two to kind of shake it. You can go over to YouTube and
Speaker:
look at comments there to see what you know, Find a show that is
Speaker:
similar to yours and go look at the comments and you can kind of get
Speaker:
an idea. An idea. And again, I said kind of
Speaker:
an idea. And I don't think there's a way around it. You're going
Speaker:
to start a show and you're going to get feedback.
Speaker:
And this is where if we look at books. When
Speaker:
I wrote my book, I thought I was done, right? I'm like, oh, here it
Speaker:
is. And then they edited it and they sent it to me to
Speaker:
approve the edit. And I was like, here it is. And I was like, okay,
Speaker:
we're done now. Yeah, four more times it got
Speaker:
edited. And the last time was like, now we're fact checking. And I was like,
Speaker:
how dare you question my facts?
Speaker:
But it Went through a bunch. And that's the step I think most of us
Speaker:
skip. I don't think we get feedback. I haven't quite
Speaker:
figured out why, besides the fact that I just spent 10 hours on this thing.
Speaker:
I want it out. It's like in labor, right? I've never
Speaker:
been in a labor room, but I just, you know, I see the Hollywood movies
Speaker:
where they're the women, God bless them for going
Speaker:
through childbirth, you know, and they're just like, get this thing out of here.
Speaker:
And I think sometimes we. We adopt that mentality. Like, I've
Speaker:
been working on this thing. I can't. I can't take it anymore. Just
Speaker:
take this episode and get it out there. Which is
Speaker:
okay, but probably not the best strategy. You should get some feedback,
Speaker:
shape it up a little bit, polish it up a little bit, and just know
Speaker:
that when you do episode 10, you will still look back at episode one
Speaker:
and go, Yee. So thanks so much
Speaker:
for listening to this. Thanks again to all my. If
Speaker:
I start naming more names, I'm going to forget somebody. But
Speaker:
thanks to, you know, who really needs thanked. Of course, Thomas
Speaker:
Umstad Jr. But also, I don't know her name, but
Speaker:
Thomas, if you play this for her, Mrs. Umstadt
Speaker:
Jr. Who is home taking care of his, you know,
Speaker:
stage coach of children that he has. And that's such a beautiful
Speaker:
picture, my friend. Congrats on the new one on the way.
Speaker:
Just. Thank you, Mrs. Umstadt, because
Speaker:
one of the things you'll hear the question of the month that we're talking about,
Speaker:
sacrifices and, you know, when you have
Speaker:
lots of kids and you go, honey, I'm going to go do a conference for
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the weekend. You know, I'm sure she brought in maybe a couple
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reinforcements, but, you know, that's
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kudos to Mrs. Umstad for. Because
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we realize you're not there, but you're part of that conference just as much,
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and we appreciate that, along with all the speakers and everybody
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else. So if you need help with a podcast, if you, hey, I met
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you at that conference. We're talking about a podcast. This is
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where I am, schoolofpodcasting.com where I help
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you plan, launch, and grow. And if you want to monetize, but realize you
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don't monetize a podcast, you monetize an audience. And
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I'll have links to my book. I'll have links to all the things I mentioned
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here today. Again, you can find them at. And for the record, I
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just realized I said today and not today, but I'm
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not going to fix that. So we all know I'm not AI now.
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Schoolofpodcasting.com 1021 because
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today is episode number 1021.
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I'm Dave Jackson. I help podcasters. It's what I do. Been doing it
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going on 21 years, and I can't wait to see what we
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do together. Until next week, where we'll be
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talking about, why do people binge? I think I
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found the actual recipe. So
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until next week. Take care. God bless.
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Class is dismissed. If
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you like the show, please share it with a friend.
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If you like the show, pretty, pretty please share it with a friend right
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now. And then
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Joseph again, the guy that was talking about Amazon
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that wants to punch people in the face. I think it's his name. Hold
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on. What was his name?
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Yeah.
