436. Should You Keep Podcasting with a Small Audience?

And I have some questions in this episode to help you try to figure that out, but I'll spoil it with this basic thought is the size of the audience probably doesn't matter. A lot of podcasters and people will talk about visualizing that many people in a room to listen to whatever you have to say or talk about or share with them week after week after week or whatever your publishing frequency is. Certainly, visualizing that helps.

But I know that even sometimes that can feel like, should I even keep doing this? There have been times in my public speaking career, if you want to call it that, but I've been public speaking since I was a teenager. And there were times when I had a much smaller audience than I expected in the room with me, but I still gave it my all. And I still spoke to those handful of people in the room who wanted to hear the information I wanted to share.

And I had some fantastic conversations with them afterward. So instead of thinking about those, I would call them limiting words, like only. I have an audience of only 10 people or only 50 people or whatever, or it's only a small audience. You don't have to apologize for that. Instead, I want you to refocus on what actually matters to you for your podcast and why you're doing this. So that's why I've got 4 questions to share with you. And the answers to these are up to you to figure out.

You don't have to send them to me. You can if you want to. Go to podcastfeedback.com/audacity to send me your answers to these questions if you'd like, or just answer them on your own and use these to help you refocus on what matters most for you and your podcast. If you'd like to follow along in the notes for this episode, there are simple tap or swipe away. Look at the chapters powered, of course, by podchapters.com, or go to the audacity to podcast.com/smallaudience.

Question number 1, why did you start podcasting? This isn't an accusatory question. I want this to be a question for you to remember that enthusiasm back when you 1st started your podcast, which maybe that was a few days ago, maybe it was years ago. But think about that enthusiasm. Why did you start that podcast? For real, why did you start it? Did you start it because you wanted to be popular and famous and have this massive audience, or did you start it for some other

reason? I speak many times about podcasting profit, p r o f I t. I make profit stand for something. That is popularity, relationships, opportunities, fun, income, or tangibles. These are the different aspects of profit that you can gain from your podcast and that even your audience could gain from your podcast. You don't have to have all of these. You might just 1 of them that you're pursuing.

And if you want to learn more about that profit paradigm, listen to episode 320 from The Audacity to Podcast where I talk about what is podcasting profit. But these are the things that you might want to seek after as your goals, your why for podcasting. And I think for many independent podcasters, it is the r and f that matter most to us. The relationships and the fun. Many podcasters, independent podcasters especially, just start because they wanna have fun.

They wanna talk about something they are passionate about. And probably along the way, they'd love to connect with other people, that's the relationships, who are also passionate about that same thing. And does the number of people really matter in that case for you to have fun? Is it more fun if you have 1000 people listening versus 10 people listening if you're getting the same amount of engagement? Probably not. Think about just your friendships.

I remember as a kid thinking, oh, I don't have a lot of friends. And as I grew older and matured, I started to more appreciate not the number of friends that I had, but the depth of my relationships with those friends.

When I went through my unwanted divorce few years ago, I saw the depth of the relationship with several friends and was the recipient of so, so much love from so many of my friends who supported me and family members who supported me, who loved me, who challenged me, who encouraged me, who helped correct my thinking many times. And that was because of the depth of the relationship, not the numbers.

So often, we want to think about the numbers of things and how big, how wide is our reach, but we forget about the depth. This is 1 of the things that I think sets apart Podgagement from other services. When Podgagement 1st launched, it was actually called my podcast reviews, and it tracked just your reviews. Now it does a whole lot more. I really wanted to change it to do more about helping you to supercharge your engagement with your audience, and that's why I

renamed it Podgagement. I rebuilt it from scratch. And I tell people that this is not about measuring the breadth or the width of your audience, but the depth of your connection with the audience that you have. How deep does that go? And how can we even deepen that relationship with your audience? And if that interests you, please try it out. You can try Podgagement free over at podgagement.com. So why did you start podcasting?

And I really think this why needs to be the thing you think about 1st, not only when you're 1st starting your podcast, but even as you're approaching different challenges with your podcast, bring it back to your why or the profit, p r o f I t, that you are seeking for your podcast.

I spoke about this back in episode 388, why you should put podcasting profit 1st, Where previously, said that this framework for podcasting was content presentation, production, promotion, and profit, and that should be the order that you work through things. I've since changed that, that now I say profit should be 1st. It's not all about money, popularity, relationships, opportunities, fun, income, and tangibles. Figure out which of those you are going after, the why for your podcast.

Figure that out 1st, and let that then drive your content, which drives your presentation, which drives your production, which then drives your promotion. The profit does actually need to come 1st, even if it has nothing to do with money. So why did you start your podcast in the 1st place, and does that still matter to you?

Then question number 2, are you achieving your why? Or whatever that profit is, the p r o f I t, are you achieving that? Are you reaching your goals? If your goal, as for many independent podcasters, is to have fun and build relationships, are you having fun? Are you building relationships? My 1st podcast that I started called The Ramen Noodle, actually, it was called something else when I 1st launched it. I did, I think, 2 episodes under a different name, decided I didn't like that name.

It had different connotations I didn't want to associate with, so I renamed it to The Ramen Noodle, and it was a clean comedy podcast. And my whole goal with that was just simply to have fun. I had some funny stories I wanted to share, and I thought maybe others would appreciate them too. Because when I told those funny stories to my friends, they would laugh at them. I just thought this would be fun to share this with other people. So my whole goal with that podcast was simply to have fun.

Over the years, that's why I just kept coming back to is let's have fun with this show. Yes. I can experiment with it. Yes. There can be some ways I can try to monetize it and different things like that. But the whole goal of starting that show in the 1st place and the whole goal of every single episode was to have fun, and we were achieving that goal with that podcast. So what is that goal for your podcast? What is your why? And are you achieving it?

Are you even remembering it so that you can try to achieve it? If you set out for your podcast to have fun, the audience size doesn't really matter for that very much. So are you still having fun? Could you keep having fun with your podcast even if your audience never grew larger than it already is? Think about it even like this. Even if nobody was listening, could you still have fun talking about what you're talking about? I think for many of us, that answer is actually yes.

Because we're so passionate about these things that we start our podcasts about. Podcasting is just so full of passion, and I love that. Yes. It's the buzzword passion in podcasting, but it's so true because we take our free time to put together content that we hope is of value to someone. And along the way, we are pouring ourselves into this content. Unless you're doing a podcast for your boss or your business, but even if you're self employed, most likely you're working on

something you enjoy. So are you achieving that why? Are you actually having fun? Are you actually building the relationships with your audience for your podcast? Or maybe your podcast is there to try to make you popular or to help you earn some income. Are you achieving that? Are you doing things to help you achieve that?

And I wanna take this moment briefly to give a special thanks to some people who have engaged more deeply with The Audacity to Podcast and, in fact, given some income to The Audacity to Podcast. 1st, 1,219 Satoshi streamed from Lyceum and also 1,776 Satoshis. That's my favorite number. 17 76 in this case. And that was on episode 433, 4 types of podcast niches. It's not just your topic. And Lyceum said, I will share this episode with 2 cohosts for a forthcoming podcast that we are planning.

We have recorded material for 4 episodes so far, and we will launch it in the near future. I will talk about this episode as I am celebrating 20 years as a podcaster. And I plan to publish some new episodes for Ego Netcast, Pluck the Day, Swing That Gig, and Tea Party Media on my birthday, May 25, which has now since passed. But congratulations on 20 years of podcasting, Lyceum. I have mad respect for you on that because I have not been podcasting for 20 years.

I've been listening to podcasts now this month for 20 years listening, but I didn't start a podcast when I 1st wanted to. I'm only at about 18 years of podcasting, and I still love it, still enjoy what I'm doing. And also 459 Satoshi streamed from Brian and Smeener. Thank you so much for that kind support. If The Audacity to Podcast means something to you, if I provide valuable inspiration or information to you, would you consider whatever that's worth to you?

And put a number on it, consider giving back over at the audacitytopodcast.com/giveback. And the reason why I wanted to thank those supporters and those fans right now is because this is part of my why. Not necessarily the money, although The Audacity to Podcast is part of my business, and I do have to think about how I'm investing my time and how it promotes my business and different things.

And that's why I try to mention PodChapters and Podgagement within my episodes in ways that is fitting and relevant for the episodes, not just like an ad break. But I love when I see people actually giving back to the podcast in some way, whether that's feedback or streaming Satoshis or giving fiat fund coupons as I've heard some people call them, dollars through PayPal or something else. That tells me that what I'm sharing is resonating with people and that they're valuing it.

And I would so much rather get a dollar here and there from different listeners than have a sponsor. Because even if you're giving me only a dollar per episode, let's just say that number for now. Even if it's only a dollar per episode, that's a deeper connection with you. And it's more meaningful to me than if I was getting a $100 per episode from a sponsor. Because it tells me that you value the information I'm sharing. You value the relationship.

The relationship is deeper, and that's a part of the why for why I started The Audacity to Podcast, not to make money, but to share things for podcasters to consider and to challenge some thoughts, to give some different perspectives on podcasting, to educate podcasters in other ways of doing things, to give you the guts and teach you the tools to start and grow your own podcast for passion and profit. That's why I started The Audacity to Podcast. And I do feel like I am achieving that goal.

And so regardless of the size of the Audacity to Podcast's audience, I feel like it's a success because my goal is to educate and inspire and innovate. And I feel like I'm doing that. And I'm having fun along the way, and even along the way, earning some income from this or from different things I'm able to market from the podcast. But it really comes down to, I want to give you the guts and teach you the tools. That is my goal, and I feel like I'm accomplishing it.

So I feel like The Audacity to Podcast is a success. Even if I have, quote, only, unquote, a 100 listeners, I'm still having fun with it and still inspiring. So, yes, it's a success. How is it for you? How is your podcast working for you? Are you actually achieving those goals? Are you even pursuing those actual goals why you 1st started your podcast? So that is the next question to challenge you to think about this. Number 3, what are you doing to work toward your goals?

If your goals are to earn money from your podcast, don't just expect, like, the field of dreams model that you just put your podcast out there and the mattress sponsors and such are going to be knocking on your door, begging to sponsor your podcast. You have to work toward that goal. If you want a large audience, what are you actually doing to get that large audience?

You could have the most amazing podcast out there and publish it in all of the places and still not get a big audience because you need to do things to bring people to your content. And I will be honest here. I am horrible at marketing my own products and services like Podgagement and PodChapters. I feel like I have really good products that rival others who have come and gone in the space.

And and I feel like I'm innovating in certain ways for podcasters, doing certain things that no 1 else has done before and that podcasters could really benefit from these things. But I am terrible at telling people about it and marketing it and getting the word out there. Like, the people who use these products typically really like them. I just need more people coming to use the products and getting to see them and try them.

So for me, with my business goal of bringing more customers, well, what am I doing to work toward that? I am trying to learn how to bring more customers, how to reach the ideal customers, how to communicate better with them, how to make certain things more obvious to them, to focus more on the benefits and not the features, certain things like that. So I am working toward my goals, reading books, listening to podcasts, even using AI along the way to help me with different ideas and tasks.

So what are you doing for whatever those goals are for your podcast? The p r o f I t, profit, relationships, opportunity, fun, income, or tangibles. What are you doing to work toward your goals? And this might be the hard challenge. I think some podcasters are doing nothing, and then they're getting frustrated that the results just aren't there. And it's it's obvious that the results aren't there because they're doing nothing to bring about results.

You have to take action if you want to achieve your goals. So what are you doing to work toward those goals?

And question number 4, how can you invest in what you have right now? I know we often want to think about the next stuff. We want to think about the bigger dreams where we want to be years from now, months from now, whatever. But what are you doing right now with what you have in terms of your audience? Let's say you have 10 people listening to your podcast. Do you know their names? 10 people. It's really easy to remember 10 people's names. Can you learn about them?

Can you learn about why they listen to your podcast? What they're most interested in getting from your podcast? The more that you can do things now that do not scale, the deeper those relationships will be, and that does help you to grow. Because as you deepen your relationships with them, they will be more likely to do things that help you, whether that's telling someone else about the podcast, maybe even supporting your podcast financially, or whatever those goals are for your podcast.

When you have a deeper relationship with them, when you have invested in the audience that you have, when you can scale. So go ahead and do those things now that won't scale for 10,000 listeners for your podcast. But what can you do with 10 or 15 or 20 or whatever you have? Do what you can now. Invite them onto a a Zoom call, maybe, and get to know them.

Ask them to email you information about them, of course, respecting their privacy, but ask them questions and give them your personal email address. Or maybe you set up a text number, like with Google Voice or something else where they can text information to you. Read their feedback in your podcast. Yeah. I know it can sometimes feel boring that it's the same names over and over and over in your podcast, but it's not boring to those people who share that with you.

And then what that does for other people, and I say this often when I talk about Podgagement and how to use Podgagement to help you grow your podcast, is when your other audience members hear someone mentioned in your podcast, their comment read, their review read, their feedback answered, anything like that. It does several things. But the most important thing here in this case is that it inspires more engagement because other people often think, hey. I want her to read my message too.

I want him to answer my question. So invest in what you have now. Deepen the relationships with your audience now, however big or however small that is. Go ahead and do it. Don't worry about, oh, there's no way I can scale this. You won't scale it, and that's fine. So how can you invest in what you have right now regardless of its size so that you can better serve the audience you currently have.

And as you seek to better serve the audience you currently have, I think they're going to become more excited about what you're doing and more excited to tell other people about it because then in a way, you're kind of niching down, not exactly in the sense of narrowing your topic, but you are focusing in on serving the people you have. Not the people who aren't listening yet, but the ones that are listening. So these are 4 questions I challenge you to ask yourself.

And if you want to send me the answers to these, go ahead. You can send those through podcastfeedback.com/audacity. These 4 questions are, why did you start podcasting? Are you achieving your why? What are you doing to work toward your goals? And how can you invest in what you have right now?

When you figured out the answers to these and how they apply to you, my hope is that you will realize that you are more blessed, more if you wanna say the word lucky, that you're more lucky than you realized. And I hope that this can reenergize you to realize, oh, yeah. I really wanted to start this podcast just because I wanted to have fun. I'm having fun. So let's just have more fun. And forget the numbers. Let's just do this for fun. That can be a great perspective.

Just having fun with it or just building the relationships with the audience that you have. Or if you had a goal of accomplishing something bigger like becoming famous or earning money, or then focus on that goal, learn what you need to do to work toward that goal, whatever that goal is. I'd love your thoughts on this. If you want to answer these questions and send me those answers, feel free over at podcastfeedback.com/audacity.

And if you think other podcasters could be helped or inspired by this, please share it with them too over at the audacitytopodcast.com/smallaudience. Now that I've given you some of the guts and taught you some of the tools, it's time for you to go start and grow your own podcast for passion and profit. I'm Daniel J. Lewis from theaudacitytopodcast.com. Thanks for listening.