¶ Introduction and Technical Glitches
Ask the Podcast Coach for July 5th, 2025. Let's get ready to podcast. There it is. It's that music that means it is Saturday morning.
¶ Meet the Hosts: Dave and Jim
It is time for Ask the Podcast Coach, where you get your podcast questions answered live. I'm Dave Jackson from theschoolofpodcasting.com. And joining me right over there is the one and only Jim Collison. And what's interesting, Jim, as I do this... is I keep getting a message on my screen that says audio is muted. Can the audience hear me? Can you guys hear us? A great start for a holiday weekend.
And of course we have to wait for the, you know, the delay, which we'll talk about here in a second. Good morning. Okay, good.
Jim. How's it going, buddy? Greetings, Dave. Happy Saturday morning to you. Happy post-4th of July. Let me see them. Do you have all 10? We're all ten fingers. Okay, good. All right. The toes are good, too. I can't see those. Don't show
them, too. Let's watch Dave fall out of his chair trying to lift his feet up.
¶ Post 4th of July Reflections
It was like a war zone out there last night. I know that's not great for everybody, but welcome to the day after Fourth of July here in the United States anyways.
Yeah, especially the dogs. The dogs, the cats,
the pets. Tough on a lot of people. Not a
fan. And that's one thing I remember. I had a little Shih Tzu man and he was not a fan of the Fourth of July at all and would just jump in my lap and shake. So great fun. But I don't know about you. I did not sleep well because I had lots of neighbors that were launching commercial grade fireworks.
Insane. I just like how much money is being displayed in the air.
No.
It was
crazy. So there is one way, of course, to get you back up and going, and that is the one and only coffee pour. And that coffee pour is brought to you
¶ Podcast Branding.co
by our good friend Mark. over at podcastbranding.co, not .com, .co. Mark is such a great guy. He's worked on a lot of my different projects and, well, the School of Podcasting and Ask the Podcast Coach and Podcast Rodeo Show. Now your podcast website. Now that one is Podcast Website Tips, Podcast Hot Seats. So when I say I know he does good work, it's because I know he does good work. And the beautiful thing about Mark is he's been a graphic artist for, well, forever, 30 years.
He's also a podcaster, been podcasting since 2013. And so you're going to get personalized, hands-on working with Mark. He's going to listen to your show. You don't have to explain to him what a podcast is. So whether you need artwork, whether you need a full website, maybe you just need a PDF or a lead magnet, anything that's going to be audience-facing and you want to look good, There is only one place to go, of course, and that is podcastbranding.co.
And when you go over there, tell them that Dave and Jim sent you. There you go. Jason says, Mark is working on a project for one of my groomsmen. There you go.
Nice.
¶ Based On A True Story Podcast
Big thanks to our good friend, Dan Lefebvre, over there, based on a true story. Based on a true story, podcast.com. This week, Titanic. Big show, big event. We just can't stop talking about it. There's a whole museum on the other side of the world in Ireland for this thing. A Titanic with Mark B. Perry available now. Check it out. How much of the movies based on True Story or not, you'll know. Check it out today. Based on a True Story, based on truestorypodcast.com.
Dan, thanks for your sponsorship.
Does he ask about like... How big was that door, and couldn't Jack just really just fit on there? Rose,
could you scoot over for just a little? Just squidge. Could we spoon? Could we just spoon on this thing and keep each other warm? But no, couldn't get on it.
Yeah,
¶ Live Call Demonstration
Randy has also been playing with this. He says, hey, Dave, do you want to do a live call using Call Me during the show to demonstrate how it sounds? And now if you'll notice above, we always have this on our screen, askthepodcastcoach.com slash question. And if you go to that, it used to jump to a Zoom meeting. Well, now when you go there, you have a screen that says, would you like to join via Zoom or would you like to join via your phone?
But if you're going to join, you can also click a link there and it will open this call me service in a new tab. And if you've ever listened to a podcast, you know, call and show on the radio, and they spend half the show going, please turn off your radio, please, if you could just, please, okay, never mind, next caller.
Well, if you are watching us, obviously, some of us, let's see, can I see, 16 of you are watching us live right now, and if you click that button and join via your browser, you still have us from 30 seconds ago streaming, quote, live. Well, when you join the call... You're now in the future with us where we're actually doing this. So what happens is I'll go, hey, thanks for coming to Ask the Podcast, Coach. What's your question? You're on with Dave and Jim. And there's dead silence.
And then in the background, you hear through the person's microphone, hey, welcome to the show. And he goes, hey, Dave and Jim. So you have, if you're going to use the browser, there's also a QR code, which is the easiest thing to do. Just point your phone at it. And then... Get on your phone and, of course, mute the show in the background because otherwise there's this massive echo. And so, yeah, it's there. It's ready
¶ New Podcast Features and Listener Interaction
to go. And what happens, in case you're wondering, on my side? Now, to do this, you have to have either a Rodecaster Duo or a Rodecaster Pro. I get a little screen that says so-and-so because they have to put in their name is waiting. And, like, right now I have Randy Black. So right now I hit a green checkmark and I'm saying... that Randy can be in number one.
Now, Randy can hear us now, but I have him muted because I can now, what's kind of fun about this, is I can go into preview mode in Ecamm, switch to the thing. I tried this last night and it worked, and I could come in here. You know what? Now that I'm running this live, though, Ecamm launches so many screens behind the scene, and I'm trying to get to the part where I can say, hey, Randy's on the call. And now what I've done is I've finished this in the preview mode. I say, hey, publish that.
Go back to the live mode. And in theory, we should have this thing now that says on the phone with Randy, to which I can now unmute Randy and go, Randy, you're on with Dave and Jim. How's it going, buddy?
Morning, fellas. How are you?
Holy cow. Do you see how great that sounds? I
put in your code directly on the RODECaster, so I'm not going through the web. Oh, okay. That's interesting. It is amazing. It sounds great. It is, I mean, the technology's been out for a while. Vortex Communications are the ones that came up with it. And it is just, you know, it's using an AUG codec or something. I don't know what brand it, what it is. But it just, it sounds great.
And if you're calling directly Rodecaster to Rodecaster, you're recording it with everybody on separate channels, and it sounds great, and it's awesome.
Yeah, if I wanted to, I don't know if I am or not, But you can apply the road processing to this channel if you wanted to. Yes. It's pretty cool. The big thing, Randy, have you run into the delay issue where people are listening on the web and then you ask them a question and they wait for
me? No, I've just used it doing calls just to test things. I forgot his name. Mark of the Walnut Grove cast. It's a great podcast about Walnut Grove, i.e. Little House on the Prairie. He and I did a call a couple of times where he went through the website and everything to just link directly in and we weren't doing anything live or streaming or anything. I've had my son call me a couple of times. So it's pretty cool. I'm happy with it. And when I looked at the pricing, isn't that bad?
Yeah, you get five hours for free. Yeah, five hours for free to do the web thing as a trial. Right. It's just a trial. Once you hit that five hours doing the web, if you're not paying, you're done with the web. But you get 10 hours a month, Rodecaster to Rodecaster for free.
Yeah, that's pretty cool. So if you are doing something with somebody else... And you have a Rodecaster. And they go, what kind of equipment should I buy? You're going to buy the Rodecaster. And then you'll sound like Randy, which is cool.
But, you know, even if you want to pay the subscription, which gets you unlimited Rodecaster to Rodecaster and unlimited web, it's $9.99 a month or $99.99 for the year.
Yeah, that's pretty affordable. Yeah. Ralph says, I feel like I'm experiencing history this morning on the show. I bet this is how Bell felt when he invented the telephone. Yes, it's nice. Mr. Randy, can you come in here, please? Yeah, exactly.
But when we answered, we didn't say ahoy like Bell did.
Ahoy. Boy, let's bring that back, shall we? We should work on that. Somebody calls on the phone. Ahoy. And then I found the only thing I did was I got online and I connected via the web. And then I connected via my phone online. And the Rodecaster didn't know what to do because I only had one channel open for Call Me. And I guess you could set up multiple ones. You can have two.
Yeah. If you pay for the Pro, which is the big expensive one that's going to be $50 a month or $500 a year, you get three.
That would be interesting. I guess if you were really doing something. And, of course, everybody's going to go, well, Randy, there's no video. What are you going to do? Okay, easy. Who cares about video?
Yeah.
But yeah, I've never heard this before, where Rodecaster to Rodecaster, because this just sounds like Brandy's in the same room with me. So
that's pretty cool. When I got invited in to apply for the beta and test it, the closed beta, and I used it that first time, I was like, holy crap, this is awesome. I was very happy with it. Yeah, pretty cool. And how is your new show going? First episode came out on Tuesday. I couldn't tell you the download numbers. I haven't looked at them. We sat down Thursday evening, recorded episode two. Jim, my co-host, didn't run away. He still wants to do it.
So we got about 30 minutes into episode two as we were recording, working through our outline of things. And I had to pause the recording and go, Jim... you've come up with a lot of really good stuff. We have to split this into two episodes. So he's on board with it. He's gung-ho on everything.
And in the second episode, he really talks a little bit about why it is that He chose the topic we're starting with, and it's about his journey with cancer and everything and trying to get his thoughts and his messages and what he teaches to kids when he's coaching basketball and stuff out there. It was really good. I love sitting down with him. It's probably the most fun I've ever had podcasting. Well, there
¶ Podcasting Tips and Listener Questions
you go. Hey, Jeff has a question. He says, so it has to use a roadcaster, so it wouldn't work to do a show while traveling if you didn't want to bring all the equipment. That would be correct. Yeah. Yeah. It's a roadcaster thing at this point. I don't know. Because when I first Googled Road Call Me, what's the name of the company that they're using this through, Randy? The
company that created the product is called Vortex Communications. It's a British company. Yeah. And they have all kinds of actual hardware devices. And they took what they did with those hardware devices and actually wrote their own custom firmware for the RODECaster. So they were selling a RODECaster with this custom firmware. They would buy it and then resell it. And RODE caught on to it and said, hey, maybe we need to work with them. And now they're working to integrate it.
And like I said, it's slick and everybody can hear it. It sounds great.
Yeah, amazing. Cool. And what's your website, sir, for your new show? Shooting it straight podcast.com. Excellent. All right, my friend. Well, thank you so much. And then if I want, like for say, you know, Randy started screaming, Baba buoy, you just click the channel button on your roadcaster and I can see, call me and I can see Randy black. His call is connected. I can also adjust his level, which I didn't know. I can, I know I can adjust his level, but it shows that.
And then I have a disconnect button. So when I click on disconnect, That is the end of it. I can rate the call. How was my call with Randy Black? It was great. And I click on Done, and that is it. So the inaugural, that was amazing. That was amazing. Now all I need to do is everybody just use my affiliate link to buy a Rodecaster, and there you go.
How would they do that? What's that link again?
If you just go to askthepodcastcoach.com slash question, you'll see there's a link right there. to join via Zoom. So if you want to jump into the Zoom meeting.
Or that too, but what's the affiliate link?
Oh, to buy a Rodecaster? How would I do that? Supportthisshow.com slash Rodecaster? Let's see if that is correct. Supportthisshow.com slash Rodecaster. Did I get that smart? It should be that smart. Survey says no. Well, let me find out what it is. It's probably something of that, probably road duo or something that I see. Roadcaster. It is supportthisshow.com, roadcast, roadcaster
duo. This is way too hard. Yeah. Yeah. Let's, by the end of the show, let's have it much easier for people to be able to do that then.
Yeah. Supportthisshow.com slash roadcaster duo.
Road caster duo. Okay. All right. So, or it's spelled how
D U O. So, or try dash and spell dash hyphen underscore this K X 27 X hike.
Yeah. I'm with you. And I was confused is where we were going. So it's okay. That's right. It's all okay. We got it.
And if it's even more fun, you have to put the road caster into beta mode because which is weird. Oh, okay. Yeah. You, yeah. She's Randy says you need a link for the road caster pro too. Yeah. So yeah. So it's fun, but technology, you know, we'll see how
it sounded really good. Sounded really good. Like the audio on that is dynamite. So now if someone was coming on in on their iPhone or on an Android phone, Same audio quality?
What I'm hoping, this is what I think is going to happen and what I don't want to happen is people will go to askthepodcastcoach.com slash question. They'll say, I want to join via the phone. Or if they want, they could even scan the QR code. That's the easiest thing if you're on your phone. And then they're going to put it on speaker and put it about 10 feet from them. And I'm like, no, you want to talk into it like it's a phone. Remember this?
There's a little microphone down here at the bottom of this thing. You
could still hold it like this and get it close. I don't know why you hold that in front of you like this. I don't
know. I'm pointing it in the direction. I think they're calling from the east. I don't know what the deal is for that. It's a phone. Hold it up to your, you know, there's a thing up here where you have to listen and, you know, you don't have to put it on speaker so we can all listen to your phone call while I'm waiting for the grocery line to move or whatever, things like that. So keep that in mind. Randy says if they put it on speakerphone, they can turn on the echo cancellation.
Yeah, there is a little echo cancellation button there, which is handy as well. I thought what we could start off once I made sure that Jim had plenty of coffee. The way John's got a question. I missed the beginning and I need to go back and see how Dave took a phone call. It's a feature, new feature in the Rodecaster beta called Call Me. Oh, and Ralph is calling in as we speak. So I'm going to mute Ralph. Or at least mute this channel. And I will add Ralph. And he is muted.
And so now, again, this is the part I'm probably going to change. This whole thing where I go into preview mode. Because either that or I'm going to have to go... You're on with Dave and Jim or something. And then Jim will have to take over. So I can come back here and change the... Yeah, this part's got to go. It's cool.
And if I had a producer... to do this, then I could, but I could, behind the scenes, I'm now saying, hey, we're on the phone with Ralph, and I publish it, and I go back to the live mode, and then I think we're on the screen, and then I can say, hey, Ralph, you're on with Dave and Jim. How's it going?
Hello, friends. How are you?
Good, but do you have it on speaker? Because I'm hearing me.
I do not, actually. I'm just coming through my iPhone, and I don't have anything else connected. Just right through my iPhone.
Interesting.
Yeah,
because can you hear the echo,
Jim?
Yeah, I hear a little bit of an echo, just super quiet. Yeah.
Yeah, I'm just calling you right from my iPhone, so I thought I'd give you a test on that.
And do you have it held up to your mouth? Are you doing the on-speak?
I am about three centimeters from my mouth.
Oh, all right. So not quite as good as Randy. And we got a little echo, which is fun. Hey, can you click on the echo cancellation button there on the phone?
Hold on one second. Let me do that.
We'll see if that takes care of it.
Switch on. Let's see.
We'll be billing road later
for it. Oh, don't
let you do it before you join.
Yeah, it looks like you can. It won't even let me switch it. It's a little thing in there, but it won't let me do it. Hold on.
I think it did it. No, maybe not. Yeah,
I'm trying, but that's all right. That's all right. Sorry, the gods of the iPhone are letting me do it this morning.
All right. And what website are we promoting today, Ralph?
Today we're promoting Grit and Growth Business.
There you go, .com.
So if you're looking for a way to grow your business, you feel like you're getting ready to burn out, go check it out, and I'll help you get back to some sanity in your business life.
There you go. Yeah, Randy Black is saying you have to turn on the echo before you connect. So there you go. Thanks, gentlemen. All right, man. We'll see you. Take care. Bye-bye. See you, Ralph. See you, Ralph. Yeah, so that's another kind of echo. Like I said earlier, when I did this on a pod page meetup, and it was people waiting to hear me ask something on YouTube, and that was fun.
But no, I had this question come in, and I thought, well, hey, you know, I know somebody that does podcasting for their business, in your case, obviously, with Gallup. And it says, hey, let me... Wow. So many. I know I say this every week. I really need to lose my PC so I can use both monitors. You need a few more monitors
is what you need. You need a few more monitors there.
Because how many do you have? 11. Yeah. That sounds like a sickness. And I need more. All right. So this person says, hey, everyone, I'm looking for practical tips and ideas for a podcast that I'd like to start. I run an AI consulting practice and want to kickstart some kind of AI podcast, albeit I fear this could be massively boring. There's your typical new podcaster. So looking for creative, practical ideas to keep it interesting. I'm thinking keeping episodes short and relevant.
That's good because the longer you go, how long can you hold their attention? Not true. Yeah, okay, all right. Varying formats a bit, video interviews for different platforms, trying to leave people with something they can possibly use each episode. Any other ideas? I feel like podcasts are rarely viewed and I'm not expecting a massive following, but I want to at least figure out how to convert the time. invested into something that pays off.
And so I know you do, how many shows do you do for Gallup? Three now.
Yeah. Three.
So how, how do you guys keep it? Like, what do you guys do? How do you figure out in terms of choosing content and things like that? Cause I
go ahead and keep going.
Oh, I gave him the answer of take the questions that you get all the time. If you're running for your consulting business, what are people always hiring you for? Cause you know, that content will resonate with the audience because people ask it already. So you're not wondering, well, I wonder if people want to know about this. So that was my one tip. But how do you guys come up with ideas for the show for Gallup?
Well, people are infinitely interesting, I think. You can interview, I think, in most cases. You could interview people endlessly. They all have different points of view. They all have different stories. They all have different successes. And so, you know, I just, I, you don't, I don't feel like we're running out of content. The, in the, you know, in my space, in the CliftonStrengths space, there's always new things going on.
We just, you know, we had some, we just made some changes, have some new software. We've got, you know, AI has kind of changed the game on some things. And so there's those things to talk about. I'm very similar here where we, you know, how do you keep talking about podcasting? Well, there's changes that happen every single week. So make sure you're having conversations about those. So I don't think.
I think if you're interesting and you're interested in other people and you ask really good questions, I think that you can it'd be tough to find the end of the internet on this one. I just, I don't see it coming. I don't see those topics coming to an end anytime soon. I mean, listen, you and I've had that conversation about this show. Like how much, you know, we, well, we stopped talking about microphone recommendations. We stopped talking about hosting platforms.
I think we actually talked about more meaningful things now than we did back when we were trying to do microphones and hosting platforms. Right. It's a, and money. How do I
make money with
it? Yeah. How do I make money? Right. Yeah. I talk about it. Talking about the ethics in it or talking about the motivations in it or talking about the personal, you know, kind of the what it takes to do these longer than a month or two. I mean, it takes some grit to get through all this stuff. So I don't think and I don't think you have to keep it short. Like, I think this is one of the biggest things.
misconceptions or the biggest myths that we have out there is, oh, people won't listen to it if it's long. And I just, I don't agree. If you've got that much content, go for it. Now, don't stretch it out and don't be, you know, don't have a, don't have a podcast about A and then get on and talk about 50 other things. Hey, let's just get together. What'd you do yesterday? Well, what did you do? And then 30 minutes later, that's the kind of stuff that gets you into trouble.
Unless, You developed an audience that's expecting that. If it's that interesting that people want to listen to how your day went or how you chewed your bubble gum or what kind of coffee you made, great. If that's what they're there for, then do those kinds of things. But I don't like this. I'm going to do it short and it's going to get more listens. I think that's a myth.
Yeah, I... Well, I always say if that's the case, why does the word binge exist?
Not for sure.
You know, if that's real, if we have short attention spans and blah, blah, blah, the only thing I'd want to do, it comes down to the why. If you want to be seen as an expert, do a longer show and do deeper dives to kind of go look at what I know. But if the goal is to keep your brand in front of people, then do quick little tips and keep them short. You know, so it kind of depends, you know, Why are you doing this?
Well, some content is better or shorter. There's just some things you don't want to stretch out. If you're going to be in the product review space, I think that's a really important space that you have fairly quick... reviews right now, you know, because most people, that's what they're looking for, you know, when they're searching for stuff.
If they get there and they're like, oh, it's an hour-long review, okay, the intent of them is not, they didn't land there to listen to your hour-long podcast. They have a problem, they want it solved quickly, right, in that regard. So, yeah, I'll leave it at that.
Well, there you go. John Jumango says, my Podcasting deep dive right now is how to use AI to assist me in the whole podcasting process. I'm a big fan of Magi, M-A-G-A-I. It's a tool that you pay 20 bucks a month and you get chat GPT and Claude and this and that and blah, blah, blah. Chris from castahead.net says people will stick around for content that isn't boring. Yes, that's the key. You know, it doesn't really matter on the link.
Yeah, because if I saw a, it was a YouTube video and it was something like can you do blankety blank with such and such, right? That was the title of it. And he went in and gave us the history of the blankety blank. We're like, yeah, but can it do that? And you could see that it was like a seven minute video and about six minutes through, he answered the question. And so we're all just, that's, we clicked, you know, play because I want to know the answer to that question.
And for the first five minutes, he's giving the history and, How it works, and we're like, we don't care. It's a yes or no question. Show us how it works. So tell them, Glenn. Don't be boring. Yeah, don't be boring. Also, you have completely, you have smashed the competition,
¶ Jim's Multi-Monitor Setup
Jim Cullison, with 11 monitors. I think I saw, I think Randy has four. You know, it's crazy.
Well, so people always ask me, why 11? Like why? And I, listen, I put it. Because you wanted to go to 11. I've tried to put a 12th one in here and there just isn't the space at this point. Okay. So, like in my work style and when I'm podcasting, if I'm using a screen, I want it visible all the time. I don't want, even at work when I'm not podcasting and I'm just doing my regular chores. I like everything I'm working on to just be visible. I don't want to have to click a tab.
I don't want to have to go to another window. I don't want to flip something up. I don't want to switch virtual screens. I don't want to do any of that. I want it all visible. That's just me. It's part of who I am and the way I'm built. Not everybody's built that way. Some folks are okay with that. But so for me, having multiple spaces to go to and having it, you know, I'm 57. My eyes aren't the best. So I make sure that I have it in. It's like a large print Bible everywhere down here.
I like to make sure I can see things from a distance because, you know, when you're in the heat of battle and you're doing some podcasting or what, the last thing you want to do is be like, what did that say? You know, you have to kind of lean into it. That's not me. I don't want to do that. I want, you know, and I think I have a little bit of air traffic controller built into me where I want, you know, I kind of want the everything. I can just look Boom. Bam. I got that there.
Okay. We're moving this. Yeah. That kind of thing. So for me, that supports my habit. Now those 11 run off four different computers. It's not all off one computer. That would be, it'd be amazing.
How many do you have at work?
Four. I have four at work. Now when you go
to work, do you just feel like, oh, this is so primitive?
No, even because even, you know, here, part of the 11 is a work setup that sits right here. That's four monitors here. So, and I don't use those. Like when I'm down here podcasting, I don't have this setup rolling, right? It's when I'm at work though, when I'm working from home, I'll have these four going and I'll have these. you know, whatever, equals 11 on that working over here, all seven of them. So, because I'm kind of going back and forth between things and I want them all on.
So, Yeah, that's me. I don't recommend that for everybody. That's a lot of space for folks. But I kind of, one of the things when I'm at work, I have, you know, the camera shoots this way across from me, you know, going the other direction. And I've got some monitors that have fancy like matrix-like things happening on them. It looks like it's cooler than it actually is, right, kind of thing.
And I like folks to see, you know, my home assistant dashboard is up and so they can see all those kinds of things. A little bit of it. It's just to have a cool backdrop for when I'm at work. The irony is I don't really work from home anymore. I used to be home a couple of days a week and now I'm going in five days. So I don't work as much in the workspace here and that's fine. Studio at the Gallup, the studio has five. My desk has four. So it's just, I just like it that way.
Just works out better for me.
Yeah. The Chris wants to know, have you ever lost track of your mouse? Yeah.
Well, no, because, well, yeah, every once in a while you're like words that I use a app like, so the Mac is the center of all things here. And then I use Synergy to tie together, right, Windows and Mac computers together. No, not generally. You know, you can, you pick that up and it lands on the screen that's in front of you. And you go from there. I haven't had that trouble where the mouse is somewhere I can't find it.
Even running, if I go to the left, that's a Windows machine that goes, the monitor is one down, one up. If I go to the right, that's another Windows machine where there's one down, two up. So that's an interesting mouse. I got to go over to the Windows and then go up and over to catch that other monitor. I have a solo laptop that sits right up here just for anything I want to run. If I need to run something separate, I can run a laptop. It's on a holder and faces down like that.
Jeff says, we thought AI was pulling all the power. It's actually Jim's house in Nebraska.
Yeah, listen, I do all of it for 700 watts. So let's just be clear.
Well, I was going to say, because Ralph was saying, all right, challenge accepted. I'm going to go buy the 12th monitor now. Listen. And a
chiller to keep it cool. Yeah. Samsung in the winter, it's beautiful down here. Samsung makes some, I think they're called arc monitors, and they're 5,000 feet wide, whatever they are. You can tilt those things up, and then my dream would have three of those tilted up. You can get three 1080p monitors.
screen sizes in each one of those tilted up that means i'd have nine in a cube and you don't have to look up for the you know you'd have to go like it'd be almost arcing over your head kind of that would be great
jim is
basically the best day
he's rebuilt the sphere from las vegas
yes in his basement yeah now that would be great it's just to have a half dome sphere kind of a
Yeah, Chris is saying, we need a behind-the-scenes gym cam. Yeah, exactly. It is funny, though, because as you're describing this, we are creating that brain gap where people are like, wait, we're trying to manually picture... you know, how you got it.
It's exactly like you think it is. The, it's not very, listen, I bought the monitors at different times, right? These are just monitors last forever now. So they do. I literally run them until like, I can't see them anymore. And, and so you would think they'd be organized in a grid. No, not really. I mean, I kind of have the, I have my eye layout across, you know, so I don't have to turn my head for the important things. I want to just, I don't want to look up for the important stuff.
And then above that is stuff I'm monitoring. So if I've got the weather going or I've got my webcam or I've got my ring cams for security on one, I'm monitoring some crypto on another. I might have a new source on a third. So it's not like in during the day when I'm working, it's not like they're all I'm working off of all of them. I probably are working at three at a time.
But the other ones have stuff that I'm monitoring that I just kind of want to keep, you know, during the day when you're down here, if the doorbell rings, I want to look and see who's at the door. So I keep those things up all the time so I can look at it. For me, it makes me feel cool. And I don't care if it is cool or if it actually works cool. It just makes me feel cool. And that's worth it, right? You don't get too many things in life that are for you. This is for me. I like it.
Yeah. John says the hard part of multiple monitors and podcasting is having the podcaster turn away from the mic as the editor. Yeah. They're like, oh, great. And then their notes are over here. You know, can you look at monitor one, please?
You don't get stuff too far away. I'm trying to keep it all, you know, I could put the 12th like over to my left. There's a spot here. I could get a 12th. Fill me with a
monitor.
Yeah, really. And I might do that today. No, I'm just kidding.
Yeah. Rich says there's a 27 inch monitor on Kickstarter. That's as thin as an iPhone with a touchscreen. There you go. I was at Best Buy this week and they had, I believe it was 98 inch flat screen TV monitor thingy. And I just, I was like, I don't have a wall that big in my house. It was giant. And it wasn't, I forget what the price was. But, you know, you can get a big monitor, you know, for, I don't know, three, 400 bucks. And those used to be like two grand.
And I'm like, holy cow, it's crazy.
The Samsung Arch is a 55-inch. Here, I'll throw a link to it in the chat room. Sorry, guys. This probably has an affiliate link buried in it. So if you click on it, just know you're doing that. But yeah, 55-inch. They're $1,700. So you're talking about... you know, $6,000. If you're going to do three of them, it's a $6,000, a little less than that five, something five and some change. If 5,000 is worth it to you. I thought about it for a while and I'm like, I don't need that.
I'm fine with the setups that I have.
Yeah. There you go.
¶ Final Thoughts and Lighthearted Questions
Well, here's a, a lighthearted question that I was just like, and I replied to this person and said, you know, I don't want to like shame you, but just realize you could have done it better. So Jim, if somebody comes up to you, and says, hey, I'm looking to become a podcast co-host. I'm not sure where to start. I'm a 31-year-old female looking to get into podcasting as a co-host, but don't know where to begin, or if anyone is looking for a co-host, I'd love to have a chat.
And for me, when I saw this, I was like, okay, well, you're in the right place, but what's missing from that message? What would you say?
What you're going to talk about?
Yeah. What do you want to talk about? I was like, okay. If you had said I've been, you know, I would love to talk sports or whatever, or, you know, women's health, men's health, whatever it is. I was just like, but just say, hey, I'd like to be a co-host. I'm like, you could have done that one a little better. The other thing is I forgot how people do this because at PodPage, we're not really closed like ever before.
So I checked in yesterday thinking it would be really quiet, and the bad news is when people have free time, because, you know, it's a holiday, they start, in some cases, doing all those things that you really shouldn't kind of care about kind of stuff, like font sizes. It was interesting. Not that my customers are dumb, but it was just like, oh, we're going to really obsess over things that we don't really need to. And this would be one.
Now, this isn't a pod page thing, but they said, they even said it's a dumb question. And I'm like, well, sometimes they are, but sometimes they're not. And again, we all start from different places. So when I started a podcast a little while ago, the feature for adding podcasts to YouTube started rolling out. It wasn't available for my channel right out of the gate. So I've been uploading them as videos with a generic stand-in background through the entire podcast.
though the entire podcast is audio focused. So they're basically uploading a static video. And they asked, so my question is now that I'm close to 30 episodes in, should I re-upload the WAV file directly to the podcast section and remove the videos, or should I just keep going the way I'm currently going? And obviously, what the difference is, now I know I can Google some of this information. Yes, you could.
But I'm not getting any solid information about if I should switch and continue to do this way or not. So they thought they would ask the lovely people in the Reddit group. And so what we're looking at then is do we want, you know, the MP3 file that you've uploaded, which you controlled to your audio host, or do you want to, you know, upload a WAV file to YouTube and let them convert it?
And the other thing I just thought of was, you know, A, Static videos on YouTube are not a waste of time, but they're very close to being a waste of time. So to me, I just was like, these are the things that we worry about. Because can you imagine how much time it would take? Now, granted, it's only 30 episodes, but to delete them or make them private. So you're going to not, you know, YouTube doesn't let you replace audio. So you're going to lose all your stats for that.
If you had any stats being a static video. But I just was like, yeah, these are the things that I just wouldn't obsess over that. So I was, well, that's a good example of that. We are still on the monitor train. Jason wants to know, curious about going with a wide curve monitor, but my camera's between my two monitors right now. Just not sure I want to go with a top-down kind of thing. Jason,
you'd have two different options to try. One is use a Manfrotto clamp. So Manfrotto, they're common camera makers. They have all kinds of clamps and extensions that are designed to hold cameras. I have a Manfrotto clamp. Actually, I'm using it for a tablet that's holding up my tablet right now within arm's reach for me. But you could put the camera on that and put it in front of the monitor if you want or anywhere you want. You could do it that way.
Or you could, they make these clear now like plexiglass holders for cameras that you can put on there. Then you can kind of center those. Now, don't try to actually, if you're gonna put your camera someplace, don't actually, this is where it gets really hard, is, I mean, if you're gonna try to look through the camera and read things, you really need a teleprompter. right? That's the way to do it right, where you're reading and it's looking through.
If it's just faces that, you know, some people will put their cameras in front of the video here of faces, so they're constantly looking forward, right? But if you're trying to read through it, you should probably get a teleprompter. That's just the easiest way. Otherwise, you're going to be moving your head around, right? Because the camera is going to be in the way when you're doing
¶ Dual Monitor Setup Tips
it that way. So I love the dual monitor with a camera in the center. If you have good, I don't have good eye contact, like I'm looking at my camera right now, but I almost don't, I don't look at it. I squint So you can't tell where I'm looking most of the time. That's my secret. I say, just, you can't see all the time.
And who cares if everybody thinks you're high?
For sure. Yeah. Are they bloodshot though? Is that the, so the, so Jason, that those could be three different options. If you wanted to go with a curved monitor and get the, listen, if the two monitor system is working for you and the monitor is still working, I wouldn't buy it. I would not go widescreen just to have a widescreen. I don't think that, Like, unless you get, you got to get a big one with a low resolution. Like, I have 47 inches. That's actually not enough.
You need a 55er to get two full screens in there, right? The 47s are not, or 42s, I think, maybe 43 is what I have here. They're not wide enough. I know that sounds weird. You're like, it's an ultra-wide screen, and it's 43. Yeah, it's not wide enough to get two full screens side by side. So if that setup is working for you, I don't know if I'd change it, you know? Yeah. What I would consider changing is getting two of them and then still putting the camera in the center.
And then you could have four monitor spaces around you going out wide like this. That would be cool, Jason. So that's, I don't get one to replace it. Get two. There you go. That's what I do.
Yeah. Randy says, wait, you can upload a WAV file to YouTube? I don't know that you can, but even if you could, no. Just that whole thing is just... Ralph has a question.
¶ Dealing with Monitor Glare
He says, since I record video, I've been having an issue with my monitors reflecting into my 85-inch TV behind me. That's his video background. And he usually just puts an image back there. So instead of having a green screen, he actually has this ginormous TV. And he says, any ideas for monitor... filters for anti-glare ideas.
Yeah, the filters, to get a filter for an 85-inch TV, I don't know if they even make them that big. Basically, the glare is because it's straight on. right? You could try tilting that TV. We won't see it from the monitor. We won't, it won't look to, I mean, you can't tilt it 45 degrees. But if, start tilting it a little bit to see if you can get that glare out of there. Oftentimes, I used to run monitors up to the upper left here for me, up here where I'm pointing, if you have the video.
You can see I have a laptop up there. It's turned off. But I used to have a monitor up there that would do the fireplace. Remember, during the winter, I'd have the fireplace going up there? That often gets gets the lights from here, you know, the lights in front of me, it shows those lights and you get that glare on there. I'd have to tilt it just a little bit to kind of get that, to kind of get that out.
Yeah. And so I don't think you could, rather than getting, so Ralph says, no, he was saying glare filter for the monitor. I wouldn't put a glare filter on your monitor. Just turn it down.
Like
it does the same thing. That anti-glare, you could try. I mean, certainly for a regular monitor, you can pick up those anti-glare ones. Or sometimes they have those ones where you can't see in from the side. Those have some of the, I haven't tried that to see if I get the glare out. I would tilt the monitor first, the back of the monitor behind you. I would tilt it just a little bit to see if you can get that reflection of it out of there.
And then just do some recording to see what it looks like. That would be my first step.
Yeah, Jason says my TV behind me hits my key light and the frames on the wall behind me used to get them too. Yeah, I remember when I had a big monitor on a stand that I could roll around and the problem was I had a white background with the School of Podcasting logo. Well, I'm blasting a white light right back into the camera lens. So that caused all sorts of problems.
And then in the early days, I had to go into my camera and turn on some sort of feature because you would end up with this weird line that either made things flicker or you would just see this line constantly going through the screen.
That's the refresh rate on the camera, right? That's doing that. Because the camera is refreshing at a different frame rate than the the monitor is. And so that's when you get those lines. We don't see that anymore because a lot of the computer stuff that's made today has that anti-flicker built into it so that they've just kind of taken it out. I can't tell you all the technology they did to do that. We're just not seeing that anymore.
If I bring my mic down, you'll see right above here to my right, as you're looking there to your, that's an Amazon Alexa screen, right? And it's flickering a little bit. That's the, it's just an old one, but it doesn't get any glare because it's mounted backward. I mean, it's tilted, right? And so I don't get any glare off that. And as you look at that screen, you really can't tell that it's tilted. So that's the secret.
This is why sometimes if you don't want glare in your glasses, you'll see people, they'll tilt them up like this. You know, now I think that looks silly when they do that, but you know, that was, that's the trick for getting glare out of glasses and some of those kinds of things just to tilt them up. So try the tilt, try the tilt first. See if you can on that big 85 inch as far as the way it is back. A little bit of tilt may take that glare right out.
Yeah, my lights are in the ceiling, and they're basically not really pointed at me. I just happen to be in the cross path, and it's pointing at the logo that nobody can see behind me. Well,
higher lights are better. I mean, you have a point there. If your lights are glaring back into you, you might have them too low. Get them higher up and point it down and a little softer. And oftentimes, you know, my lights disappear when I tilt my head down a little
bit. Yeah, I'm going to say that and I just don't talk like this. There
we go. You can see some of the glare, yeah.
Yeah, that'll, it's, again, every time you add something to the mix, it's okay, you know, now what's going on.
¶ Seasonal Podcast Stats
Let's talk. I don't know if we talked about this or not, but it does come up from time to time. I'm feeling despondent. My stats have dropped off after a pretty steady run of increases in everything from followers to engaged listeners. This morning, I did a smart thing. I went into Apple for creators and went back through the timeline to the same time and month from last year. It's this time of year, not my podcast. June and July have rubbish. They have rubbish stats.
And August is a bounce back. So I've decided that instead of working through them, these months are when I'm going to take a much-earned pause. I don't know if I would take a pause, but okay. Batch record, there you go. Learn the things I need to learn and write that book.
So yeah, especially if you're doing any kind of seasonal show or a wedding show, for example, where everybody gets married in the spring, you're going to have a drop-off come winter because who wants to stand outside and get married in the snow? Some people, I'm sure. They're definitely people.
We see a solid dip in the summer on our numbers. I was just looking at them the other day. Some folks were asking me to justify some things. So I was like, well, let's pull some stats. And yeah, I see this. February, March peak, and then April, May, June, and then June, July, August, it really dips. And then it'll come back again, September, October. That's the, I think that's the nature of our content. I don't know if that's necessarily true for everyone.
But I think keeping stats and checking them year over year is a smart idea, if you're going to do that. I mean, I was, I think I was talking to Ed earlier. Sullivan the other day, and I was talking about my stats, and I had been so long that I'd logged into Blueberry to get my stats that I didn't, I couldn't, like, my password had expired, like, everything. I had to reset up some stuff and send some emails to places to get it. It had been so long since I'd been in.
I don't see those kinds of dips in Home Gadget Geeks. That's just a show, does the same download numbers. I do about four, 450 Every show just kind of like clockwork and it just, so I don't see those regional bumps. So I think it depends on your content for sure.
Yeah. I know my show gets a bump in January and then kind of, you know, November it start, it picks up at the later end of the year and the beginning of the year. And then I have to go back and look. But I just know it doesn't have huge swings. January is always a
huge swing. What does this show do? Do you know? From a download, do we see any seasonal in this show?
I don't think so. The only thing I saw was for a little bit, I started running one ad in the show, and that did not go over well at all. And I was like, okay, never mind. I'm just kidding. We're not doing those. I just want to play with Buzzsprout ads. And all of a sudden, I was like, well, there's a dip. Here's another one. I'm doing these live now. I looked at all the ones I had before, and I'm like, I think we've talked about all these. Again, it's hard to find
¶ Paid Collaborations and Guest Appearances
stuff. He says, I'm looking for a paid collaboration for a podcast to have a guest with my COO. So he's, hey, we will pay you to vote my COO of a renowned IT software consultancy company. He holds more than 25 years of tech experience, and they have a great vision for But technology, cybersecurity, and AI, if you're a great host or know someone who is a great host with huge subscribers and views, I'd like to collaborate with you.
Do feel free to DM me, which is interesting because I guess that's not self-promotion. But the other thing that nobody talks about when people say this, if you're paying somebody to be on your show, you have to disclose that at front. If you ever listen on Sundays – on the talk channels and all of a sudden it's like, the following is a paid endorsement by the Dr. Rob Foundation.
And then you're like, welcome to the Dr. Rob show where he talks about how to crack your back so you'll never be blah, blah, blah. Or the power of cinnamon. Welcome to Dr. Rob and the power of cinnamon. Buy my cinnamon pills. But you got to disclose that stuff. And I'm starting to see that come up a bit more about charging guests to be on the show. And I'm like, okay, definitely not my favorite strategy at all. But if you're going to do that, it has to be disclosed up front.
So that's something to keep in mind that you might get yourself. Because there was a thing for a while. It was like ftc.gov slash influencers. I don't think that's still there. But for a while, they had a quick link that led to a video that was like, hey, if you're a YouTuber or a podcaster or an influencer, this is what you have to do. Because Kim Kardashian used to be like, oh, look, it's the Samson Q2U microphone. I think it's cute.
And then she wouldn't disclose, oh, by the way, I just got paid $100,000 to hold this up and say it was cute. And so you got to do that stuff. Yeah, I tell you what, let's do this while we're here. In theory, yes. We haven't talked about our awesome supporters yet. And things are just, it's, ah, there we go. Again,
¶ Thank You Supporters
I say I need to lose this PC so I don't have these weird issues. But you can be an awesome supporter by going over to askthepodcastcoach.com slash awesome. Also, just on that topic, today, like we have askthepodcastcoach.com slash question, because I own my domain and because I control that link, that used to point to Zoom, that now points to a page that explains, do you want to be on Zoom? Do you want to be on audio? Whatever. So always have those links that you can control.
as opposed to, you know, go to whatever, supercast.com slash SOP or something like that.
¶ Join the School of Podcasting
So we're brought to you by the School of Podcasting, where you get step-by-step courses, unlimited coaching, and an amazing community. You can use the coupon code COACH, and remember that comes with a 30-day money-back guarantee. And
¶ Try Podpage
if you go to Ask the Podcast Coach, we are using PodPage. And if you'd like to try PodPage, Go to tripodpage.com. That is
¶ Home Gadget Geeks
my affiliate link. And if you need more Jim Cullison, and who doesn't, you can go over and check out homegadgetgeeksattheaverageguy.tv. And
¶ Ecamm Live
yes, yeah, I know. I looked at Ecamm, and I love Ecamm. Go to supportthisshow.com slash Ecamm if you want to. I have not made... and a single affiliate sale on that. And I went, I think my audience is happy with their live streaming solutions, whatever they have. And
¶ Grow Your YouTube with Vid IQ
I went, hey, and I just started playing with vidIQ because I've heard so many people go, oh, dude, you got to get vidIQ. So I was like, hey, as I learned this and start to use it, after using it for a day and a half, just watching a bunch of videos, I was like, this thing looks pretty cool. So vidIQ, if you're on YouTube and you want to learn YouTube and how to do it right, All sorts of fun stuff over there. Go to supportthesshow.com slash vidIQ. And he said clicking to go to number six.
Seriously, go to number six. It's time for the Wheel of Names.
¶ Supporter of the Week Ross Brand
And this is where the awesome supporters are spinning around a wheel. These are the $20 supporters. People like Ralph from the Growth and Grit business. Shane from Spybrary. York from Welcome to Earth Stories. Randy from the Shooting It Straight podcast. Who is it going to be? Well, we're going to click the wheel and could it be, oh, is it Ralph? Is he going to hang on or is it Ross? The one and only king of live streaming, Ross Brand, such a great guy.
And he's also the guy that puts out that book about podcast predictions every year. And if you want to check out Ross, check out live streaming universe.com. He's a great guy. Or just go over to askthepodcastcoach.com. Or you'll now notice that we can do this, Jim. Ooh. Yeah, there he is. Livestream universe. If you are looking to, you know, thanks
to all of our- Look at you, up in your game on links. Nicely
done. Trying to, at least. I was like, well, you know, now can I- Ooh, now if I wanted to- So I'm playing with this preview mode. So like right now, I know we are looking at that and I can say thank you to all the supporters. But in theory- Yeah, it's not working. I was going to try to switch because when I go back here, we're still at the wheel of names, except now nothing's working. Well, there you go. That's always fun. Yeah, we're just stuck on that screen. Can we? Nope. All right.
What was the problem the last time we got stuck in? There we go. I
was like, wait, it's just. You have to finish. Yeah, there
you go. Wow, there you go. It's just a very, yeah. So if you found this show valuable, it was just a weird, really long delay there. If you find the show valuable, consider going to Askthepodcastcoach.com slash awesome and being an awesome supporter today. Here's a fun one, unless I missed one. You sounded like you were going to say something.
Yeah, there was a question. Did you get Stephanie Graham's question?
Which
one? About LinkedIn? Yeah.
Oh no.
¶ Promoting Your Podcast on LinkedIn
She said, can you share how your, how you market your podcast on LinkedIn? I'm looking to be more intentional on that platform beyond the automatic new episode updates that pod page already posts.
For me, I come over to LinkedIn and here again, everything's on a delay. Can we zoom in a bit for anybody watching? What I like to do is kind of come over, And I've got, you know, the Dave hat and I've got the pod page hat. So if I, well, if I click here, number one, whoever's commenting on my stuff, usually there's an activity down here. So I can say who's, you know, what kind of comments have I gotten? So this is what I've said, but I'm kind of looking for ways to jump into a conversation.
And I forget, I'm not by any means like this is the platform I'm horrible at. So, but I just know if I go into PodPage, yeah, here I can come over to the activity thing. Now, maybe I need to have a business to do this. So I can see that Trout Steve mentioned your company in a comment. So I might want to go over here and see what the heck they're talking about. So this is the podcast tech stack. This is a show Brendan and I were on.
And so he's linking here to PodPage and I've probably already commented on this would be my guess. If not, yeah, here it is. Keep up the great work. So I will go and leave comments just because people that are coming to this, I want them to see pod page. Jim, do you have any strategies?
Do you play much on LinkedIn? Oh, yeah. We've got, and I stream our podcast to my personal account. We've just decided to not send those to the corporate accounts, but the corporate account and I go back and forth on posts for each other. So I'll like theirs, they like mine. And that seems to work out really well for us.
One of the things I found interesting is going live, and we're live on LinkedIn right now too, but the live views on LinkedIn, now, some of this is, and the reason we use my personal account is because in the work I do, I follow every single certified coach or I try to find every single certified coach that we have. So I have 20,000, now maybe 21,000 connections on LinkedIn. So when I go live or when I post something, it shows up in a bunch of people's threads.
And it's not uncommon with very little advertising. I think I did 150 views of a live episode we did on LinkedIn the other day with very little work. So it, for me, the strategy has been to make sure I'm connected to those folks. Now, I have a reason to be connected to them, right? They're part of our business. They're, they're customers, right? It's my expectation as a community manager that I can have that kind of relationship with them. Not so with everybody on LinkedIn.
If you just start going out and following or trying to connect to a bunch of random people, that's probably not as effective. I have noticed, too, the coordination between our CliftonStrengths or Gallup account and and my account going back and forth. I'll help them publish something or promote something on a post and they'll do the same with me. It makes a big difference. And so that's how we're using the LinkedIn.
I find the one caveat I would give with LinkedIn is for whatever you do not spam your LinkedIn channel. Be relevant. Be interesting. For the love of God, do not make everything AI. It's appropriate in some cases, but you can tell every AI post. I mean, I follow some folks, and every day they're posting something new with a graphic and a big, long AI thing. And you know it's AI because it's got all those silly emojis in there, right? You know how AI adds those emojis to everything?
Tons. And you're like, oh, yeah, you can tell in a second, oh, this is AI. No, not that AI-generated content is bad. But listen, if you spam me every day in my channel with that kind of content, I just don't have the time to read all that. I have found posting once or twice a week is a great rhythm. I get, I have great analytics on LinkedIn. So LinkedIn, I think, is one of those platforms you want to be careful on.
I mean, maybe you can get away with it on Instagram or TikTok or some of those kinds of things. But LinkedIn has a different expectation. And when I say not LinkedIn, but the people on LinkedIn, kind of have a different expectation for you in who you are and what you do. So I just, I would be reasonable. I mean, I'd say be reasonable on any social platform. But hey, if it works on TikTok to just blast a videos a day. And it does, actually. It does work well. Not on LinkedIn.
I would say be reasonable, be professional. It's a professional network. I mean, I think we all know that by now, right? Don't post your family stuff out there. Nobody wants to see that. We don't want to see your vacation photos. That's not It's not the place to do that. I'm starting to
see that, though, which is weird. I know. And I'm like, wait, this isn't Facebook. And I know she had mentioned about how I've heard people are leaving TikTok because it's just when they came out with the TikTok store, it's just kind of ruining it. Everybody's just, hey, buy my stuff. And she was saying how LinkedIn is maybe now the new Instagram. What I'm hearing now is Instagram is the new TikTok, right? basically, which is the old tick. You know what I mean? It's like people are on Instagram.
Then they went to tick tock and now tick tock has kind of ruined itself and everybody's going back to Instagram. But I'm like, I just go where your audience is and
don't spray and pray. Like I just, I get so tired and you can kind of, I can kind of see it in my feeds of folks who get up. They're like, I'm going to, you know, I'm going to do some things. And for a couple of months, every day, I'm just blasting my, you know, they're blasting threads out to me. And, Jim Collison, Ph.D.:
¶ Introduction and Technical Glitches
:
¶ Promoting Your Podcast on LinkedIn
Eventually, I'll say, stop. I don't want to see you anymore.
You
know, listen, you can do the same thing with email. Like eventually, if you email people too much, They'll be like, enough already. And they'll block you, right? Or they'll unsubscribe. And we know that. It's inherent for email. I hope we know that for email. It's inherent that, like, you can't, don't send people an email every single day. Although, to be honest, I have some advertisers that I've signed up for. Solo Stove is one of them. They literally send me a text every day. I got to stop it.
Like, I've got to, guys, if I haven't bought by now, I'm probably not going to buy. Or maybe I already bought one. Stop. Stop
sending me every day. And it's just every day there's more and more stuff. And I get it. They want to backlink, blah, blah, blah. But it's just, you know, and it's not even remotely related to podcasting. That's the part that gets me that, you know, they want to kind of partner up with, you know, let's let me write something for your site. And they're like, OK, but what do you want to write? Oh, about, you know, how there's aluminum in your deodorant. It's killing the world.
You're like, yeah, no, thank you. Randy says LinkedIn banned him from making a comment. on a news article about LeBron James and his son being the epitome of nepotism. Well, shame on you for having an attitude. You're not an attitude, an opinion. Yeah, it's what's interesting, kind of getting, so LinkedIn is, I just try to go over and interact with people. I know Jodi said she tries being a voiceover person. She says I make sure to connect with people who are in charge of audio.
So I try to be social over there now. I took a little baby course in LinkedIn and that was basically it. is, hey, it's kind of a social network for business people. So go, you know, be social. And I was like, oh, that's a novel idea. And then my posts are usually like what I did. We have a newsletter for pod page that goes out to our customers. And I was like, hey, like, what if somebody that's not a customer wants to be part of our newsletter?
And I said, well, hey, there's this thing called LinkedIn that we're trying to be seen more on. So I just copy our newsletter from our tool and put it out as a LinkedIn newsletter. And if you want it, it's there. And if you don't, but you know, Stephanie has a question. She says, Hey, I'm doing a survey with my audience. There we go. Granted the episode came out on Friday for the holiday, but still at zero responses. That's kind of normal.
Any encouragement, I have a gift card and I, and thank you gifts at the ready. Yeah. On a holiday weekend. Yeah. I would give it a good, at least a month, if not because you're going to get, this is sad, unless you're Ray from aroundthelayout.com because he has that super engaged model train audience. I usually say somewhere around 3% will take action anytime you do anything. I want you to buy something if you're lucky 3%.
I want to do this, you know, or in a survey, even if it's a, you know, hey, it's a $20 Amazon thing. You can buy some coffee, whatever, you know. So definitely don't get After one day, no responses. And then did you make it easy? Is it, you know, in the case of Stephanie, nosyaf.com slash survey. And it's kind of weird. Some people are a little confused on this. Do I send it to my newsletter?
And I'm like, well, if you're trying to survey your podcast audience, are they that different than your newsletter? That's one I can never really, I can see both sides of that one. But yeah, not having any responses there. Jim, what, do you know what kind of, are you allowed to say what kind of percentage you get on your, cause you're
the survey guy. I don't know. It varies. It varies. Cause we have panels that it's their job to answer these questions. And we've, we don't generally just do the, we used to do a lot of phone call surveys, right? Those have a different response rate. So I couldn't say cause not cause I can't, cause I don't know. Stephanie, I would, was that Stephanie? No. Yeah. Stephanie said that. Stephanie, Friday was before the holiday was a bad decision, but it's done. Yeah. Remind them again on Tuesday.
So Tuesdays are the best day to send surveys, Tuesdays and Wednesdays, if you're going to do that. You know, Tuesday mornings, because around the other planet, if you're sending them from the US, it's already Tuesday afternoon, they'll pick that up on Wednesday. But send out another reminder on Tuesday. and say, Don't do Mondays. Mondays are horrible. Stuff gets lost on Fridays and Mondays, right? So just send out a reminder on Tuesday. Resend that out and say, Hey, just a reminder.
Don't apologize. Just, it's a reminder. Surveys available. Go out there. It generally takes a couple reminders to get people to actually follow up on those things. So a one-and-done is not a great way. We, when we do our, even we have a very engaged um, customers that we send surveys to, it takes a couple reminders to get the, you know, to get what we're looking for on it. So that would be my recommendation. Don't send them before holiday. That's especially a us holiday.
If your customers are mostly us based, that's that, that don't do that on a holiday basis, but you did. It's okay. Send it again.
Yeah. Chris says I get spammed a lot on LinkedIn. Each new connection just tries to pitch slap. I've never
heard that phrase before. I'm going to use
that. Jason says, anyone using a gimbal for their video podcast just got an Insta360 Flow 2 Pro. Going to try to incorporate that with the Rode Micros with some on-location table video podcasts. I have a gimbal. It's fun. It's one of those where I could walk around, podcast movement, and It would take all the jitters out, and I think I've used it twice. It's one of those things where I'm like, yeah, or I could just hold it with my hand, but
yeah. Listen, Action Jackson is not, you're not out there. It would have been really good to use that for concert footage with why you're playing and someone's walking around. You know, they have very specific use cases and I don't see that being your use case. Yeah. So, you know, there's a lot of YouTubers that use a gimbal to help keep that if you're walking around a lot or some of those kinds
of things. Well, and Jason's on the road so much. He can make all sorts a cool travel video. So yeah. But I forget the one I have. It's in a box down there. So I'll... to get that for you. Jim Collison
There's some really cool cameras out right now, like for, I mean, this whole YouTuber thing that's going on right now has created, you know, the hero with GoPro. Yeah. The GoPros kind of started this way back in, well, yeah, I'll say they started it, of having some really good camera equipment really designed for on the move, right? And then others have kind of kicked in. But there's some right now, if you want to get And they're not terribly expensive. I mean, cameras are pretty reasonable.
If you want to get a good camera for both your podcast, for both up here, what you're doing in the studio, and maybe what you're doing outside of the studio, now's the time. I would pick something. I'd find something and upgrade your camera right now. I think this is the best price point we're going to see for a while. And then I think everything just goes north from here. So pick something up and upgrade. If you need a camera upgrade, now would be a good time to do it.
¶ Engaging Your Podcast Audience
And another question here from Jeff. What's the best way to get podcast listeners from passive to active members of your community? Not even purchasing, but just on your list or in your free group? That's a great question. That is a great question. Yeah, it is a
great question, yeah.
Fear of missing out sometimes. So if you're like, hey, on today's show, we're talking about something that Stephanie brought up. In the private group that we have, if you want to join it, because it creates that, hey, it sounds like all the cool kids are over in the Facebook group kind of thing. That would be one. Jim, you got any?
Yeah, one, I think this is the hardest thing to do is convert those lurkers, right, the ones that are out on the fringe into the active group. Sometimes there are lurkers for a reason, and I've brought lurkers in, and I regretted it. So one, be careful what you wish for on that one. Jeff, I'm going to say, like we say all the time, continue to make great content. Continue to invite folks in.
Don't miss any opportunity if somebody emails you or connects with you or joins the group to welcome them. You can never force them in. In some cases, I wouldn't recommend you force them in. But just be open and inviting and friendly, you know, and make sure you have groups that are open and friendly.
Because, you know, if I'll use this term that was out there earlier, if you have a group and the first interaction with that person is getting pitch slapped the first time they're in the group, right? They join the group and then they just get inundated with, well, do this and buy that. I'm not saying you do this, Jeff, by the way. I'm not saying you do that. I've just been a part of groups that have done that where it's just a sales pitch from the very beginning.
I don't think that makes for a very inviting group. I think you just got to be consistent. And maybe this would be the key. Be consistently friendly over long periods of time. And eventually those folks will convert. right? Have great products, and eventually they'll convert. Have great messages, and eventually they'll convert, right, in there. Bringing some, sometimes bringing them in too early, this is where I think a lot of podcasters, you know, oh, if I could just give something away.
Listen, giveaways bring in a whole different group of people, and they may or may not be who you want to spend your time with. We say, in management, right, we say you spend 80% of your time with 20% of your best performers, right? And the others get the 20% that's left over. Because there's great value in that. And I think that with your listeners, with your audience, I think it's the same case.
You spend 80% of your time making sure you're taking care of your audience that's there and existing, right? If you do that, they'll see that, and they'll be attracted to that, and they'll want some of that. right? They'll be like, Oh, man, if I see Jeff doing, you know, this, that's attractive to me. I want to do that, too. That's how you want to pull them in, right? Rather than gimmicks and giveaways and, you know, you just get a whole different group of people when you do giveaways.
I'm not, I did giveaways early, and I was, they, I wasn't super happy with what that pulled in, right? Because it's not very engaged. They're just coming for free stuff. You don't want people coming for free stuff.
I had a thing. I think I told this on the pod page meetup, but my band was giving away free kitchen magnets. And I got on a weird list, and all of a sudden people from all over the world wanted a free Sugar Daddy's kitchen magnet. I was like, wait, hold on. So maybe if the free thing is hyper-focused to your group, But even that, at least then they're on your email list. I mean, that's how you get somebody on an email list.
I know my buddy Eric A. John used to say, Johnson, he was like, nobody wakes up and goes, I hope I can find a newsletter today. But if you give them something, you know, so it's tricky.
Yes. Yeah, it is. Yes. Just be careful of the giveaway thing. Just be careful on that one.
Yeah. Because that person, because you want people that, yes, they want something out of it. But they're also kind of hoping to network with other people and kind of give back and, you know, that whole nine yards. So I'm trying to think if there are any other. I was just thinking, you know, creating fear of missing out. But that could also, if you do it too much, that's a delicate balance.
How about real value? How about real value, right? That's the key. What do people want? Speaking of that, I got some real value. How's this? Oh, look at that. That just landed on my desk. That's real value. Here, I'll show you. I don't know what we got. What do we, what we got? Cherry cream. We got cherry jelly on a croissant. Thank you, Sarah. I can't hear you. Cream cheese. Okay. Yeah, there we go. She just brought me a treat. So there you go. That's real value right there.
That's a keeper, man. That's
it. I'm not going to eat it while we're podcasting. So give
it. Yeah. Ralph says you could take the televangelist idea. I already don't like this idea and start telling your people. that you're going to be taken unless they subscribe to your show. Wait, am I missing something?
I'll be taken.
Like,
yeah, you know,
like, yeah, not the fear of missing out.
Just right here.
Just fear. Yeah. You're going to die unless you join my group. Yeah. That's always fun. Yeah. So it is moving anybody anywhere. Like I, whether it's, Hey, I have 8 million people on Instagram. How do I get them to listen to my show? I have like, you know, 800 people listening to my show. How do I get them to watch my YouTube? And getting, they're there where they're comfy. So
it's. How'd you get them? How'd you get that many to Instagram? And then I would say, okay, there's a value proposition. Either you dupe them. And if you did, they're not really valuable, but let's just say you generally got that many there. Right. And then they have to start kind of think through, okay, how do I move? What are the, why are they there? Why are they following me there? And then how do I translate that into content on the podcast? side where they want to be there.
Not everybody wants to listen. They don't have the time to listen to your podcast. Maybe on Instagram, it's just an easy, you know, they got two minutes and they like what you're posting on there and they don't have 15 or 20 or 30 or 50 minutes to commit to a podcast. So I think you have to think what's the value proposition. And then how do I translate that into the podcast? So they get there. Not everybody's podcast listeners, guys. I mean,
well, I heard something else and I was like, I need to think about that. They said, Instead of telling your audience where to go. So it's like, hey, if you want more of this, go to blah, blah, blah slash community and join the group versus, hey, if you want to continue on this conversation, I invite you to join our group. And I was like, instead of telling people to go, invite them in. And I was like, that is a subtle difference that I was like, Huh, that might, I might have to try
¶ Podcast Advertising and Giveaways
that. Randy S says, I boosted an ad for my podcast in Facebook and just got my butt chewed out by one person. It was a total, yeah. I have heard boosting things on Facebook is like lighting your money on fire. Not so much Facebook ads because that's targeted, but hey, I put up a boost and they go, you want to boost this? Here's $20. And they go, great. And they just throw gas on it and light it. So yeah, Ralph loves to advertise. He's just been tons of cash. And
advertising. I don't disagree. You just have to advertise in the right way. I don't think people generally are looking for things to, if it's your podcast, I don't think generally people looking for another thing. Like most people aren't like, oh, you know what? I got an extra 30 minutes of my life. How could I could add a podcast to it? I don't think that's sometimes, but I don't think that's the way it works. I think in most cases, people are looking to solve a problem.
And so they go out and they Google, you know, or they search or they do generative AI, whatever they do to get there, and they start saying, I have this problem, and hopefully you have the answer to it. And they find you through some search mechanism or however that works, and they go there. Very, I think very few actually think like, the exception might be where this podcast is very entertaining.
If it's a comedy podcast or right now, you know, true crime is real popular again for some reason, or maybe it's always been popular for those reasons. But I don't think if it's entertaining, then I think you've got a shot.
Yeah. Jeff says people seem to like my email. So I'm thinking about doing another voice memo type of extra podcast that during the week mentioned that content like this is. And my email every week, he says, Jay Klaus, who is a great resource for this kind of stuff, has added voice memos and are doing really well on his feed. I think his group is like $1,000 a month or something. And I went,
yeah, I'm not
quite
there yet. Jeff, have you asked, has anybody in your audience asked for that? Or, I mean, are you just, are you looking and testing? And then have you done a quick survey or have you even... polled some of your listeners to say, Would you listen to something like this? In that letter, in that newsletter, if they like it, that would be the place to ask and say, Hey, I've been thinking about doing an audio version of this. What do you think? If you get no feedback?
I don't know if I'd do it, honestly. Like, that content may not translate to audio, right, what you're doing. It might, with a twist. So I do some serious market research with your current listeners, ask them questions. By the way, not once, but about 10 times, I'd say, hey, just a reminder, I'm looking for feedback on this, because they won't see it the first time. Move it around in your newsletter. Sometimes put it on the top of the fold. Sometimes put it in the bottom.
Sometimes throw it in the middle. Make some different graphics so people see it. But I would ask, because that may not, it just may not translate. And it might. You never know.
Yeah, Jason says, I found my readers and listeners aren't super engaged with responses, but they do support at a decent clip. I've sunset advertising my Patreon levels. The people who have them are still in. I went
to one level. I went to one level.
Just
keep it simple.
Well, I was surprised. I have some people left at five, but we have Ronnie left. from the YEP podcast. He was the new subscriber. He came in at 10, but most everybody's at 20. I was like, okay. But yeah, Jeff says, good idea to ask Jim. The email community should let him know. Jason says, I've been using Substack for the newsletter deliverable. The paid founding people will get the perks. There you go. Yeah, Substack, I'm using both. I have Substack, but my real newsletter is on ConvertKit.
And I will still call them ConvertKit. I know they're a kit, but I still call them ConvertKit and yes, it's still Twitter. But I get, although I do get about, it's weird when you used to do nothing for a newsletter and I would get, you know, three to five a week if I was lucky. You know, there were weeks when I got one because I just didn't promote it much and this and that.
So I really went to, you know, I'm annoying people with pop-ups and I'm talking about it on my show and then, oh, well now I'm getting three to five a day. Now that's not huge. But it's, you know, hundreds of percentage more than I used to get. And that five will eventually turn to seven and seven will turn to 10 and things like that. Yeah. Jason says, Substack allows so much more robust embedded media compared to Patreon.
Yeah, that's, I know if you, I haven't done it in a while, but if you posted a link to, I have no idea why the woman in the tube is talking to me. I did not say anything. Yeah.
Yeah.
She's talking, which more robust? She's asking me like a quiz. Yeah, let's hit the stop button, shall we? But on Spotify, if you put a link to Spotify in, at least it used to be, in Substack, it would put the player. I was like, well, that's kind of cool. I don't know how that works via email. Yeah, and then Jeff says, Kit's recommendation engine has been huge. Yeah, and that's what I started. In fact... Colin Gray, Dr. Colin Gray from the podcast host, he mentioned me in his newsletter.
And so I was like, oh, thanks for that. And he's, well, you know, if you want to. And I was like, yeah, so I, there's something you do that, you know, recommends his stuff to my audience. So yeah, there you go. And Jason says he's going to send me a newsletter. All right, I'll check it out. Of course, Matt Talk Online, because he is, see, now we get to go to this screen. He's one of those that there is matttalkonline.com. One of our awesome supporters, and we thank you for that, Jason.
And I cannot find the ending music. There it is, because it is 11 minutes. Is it me, or that went pretty quick today?
Oh, yeah. Oh, it's always a good time.
¶ Taking a Break from Podcasting
Yeah, for
sure. so what is coming up on home gadget geeks yeah i'm on vacation for the next two weeks which is kind of nice i took this week off from work i'll go back to work i thought i'd just take two weeks off you know you can as a podcaster you can do that so let me encourage you if it's been a while since you've had a break take one they feel good and you can always get back to it when you're done
did you announce it at all or just i did
okay hey friends i'm taking the next two weeks off i still had folks show up thursday night and they're like hey and i'm like hey i told you guys i'd be up not everybody listens to the live shows, so you never know. And not everybody listens to every single word you ever do, but boy, it felt good to take a week off. I got one more in the can. Not doing episodes. I'm not publishing things I shouldn't do. It just takes some time off. It's good for
you. I'm working on a farmer's tan there, aren't you?
Yeah, for sure.
Yeah, I was like, holy cow. Yeah, on the School of Podcasting, I'm going to pull the trigger. I threatened this about a week ago, and I'm going to go slightly off topic, but not really, and talk about How to podcast and stay married. I threw that idea out. I asked a bunch of people. I'm like, would you want to listen to an episode about this? And they're all like, yeah.
And I joke, but it's kind of true because you either want to talk to somebody who's been married for 52 years or you want to talk to a guy that's got two divorces under his belt. Both have learned... Lessons in one way or another. So that is coming up on that. It's either that or my buddy Tracy. I interviewed her. I'm interviewing David Hooper today. So it might be David Hooper.
You'll have to tune in and find out what did Dave pick between Saturday and Monday because I assemble and publish tomorrow. So we'll find out then. But no show next week, by the way, for Ask the Podcast Coach. I will be in Chicago talking at the Higher Ed Podcast Conference. So Enjoy your Saturday off, and we'll see you in two weeks.