Today's topic is going to be so much fun, so much fun. So I have been, like I guess introduced to the idea. I mean, it's not a brand new concept, creativity, right. It's been around since the dawn of time. But I can see that I take a different approach to it now that I have created. So so many different things in the last few years. And I want to talk today about taking
creative risks. Because I know that if you're listening to this, right, you either have a podcast or thinking about starting a podcast, or you are listening to the show, because you want to learn how to grow in scale. And I can tell you that over time, things will probably change, like what you do today may not be the same type of content, or what you're creating five years from now, or even 12 months from now, right at the the
rate and the speed of how everything changes. So we're going to talk about taking creative risks, what I've learned from a specific show that I watch, yes, I do have time to still watch lots of TV. This is a one show, and writer in particular that I'm really curious to explore with you. But we're going to talk about taking creative risks. So let's get right to it. Welcome to the Proffi t Podcast where we teach entrepreneurs how to sta
t launch and market their podcast. I'm your hos , Krystal, Proffitt, and I'm so excited that you' e here. Thanks for hanging out with me toda . Because if you've been trying to figure out t e world of podcasting, think of this show as t e time saving shortcut you've been looking for. o let's get right to it, shall w
So if you're a longtime listener of the podcast, and you've heard me talk to other experts that are either legal or financial people, and they come on to the show, I'm really quick to say, I'm a very risk averse person. And I think that that's important to know, simply because I like to step back calculate things I like to create my pros and my cons list like this is just something that I do on a regular
basis. So if you are someone who is like, no, like I'm, I'm willing to risk this amount of money or this amount of time, or whatever it is for you, then I just want you to kind of know that this is the perspective that I kind of just come to the table as a saver. Like I said, like, you know, if you think about the Dave Ramsey, like if you're a spender or a saver, I'm a saver, it comes to the financial piece of it, I'm not quick to, you know, drop a ton of money on anything. And it's kind of
the same thing with my content and creativity. I like to be risk averse. But I do tend to think of myself as more experimental with content simply because I know at the end of the day, if I totally botch a piece of content, I'm going to learn something, right. And I guess it's the same whether it's a legal or financial matter, right. If you take a calculated risk, and things go south, you're still gonna learn from it.
But today, I really want to talk about taking creative risks. And the show I want to talk about I kind of teased this out in the beginning, but the TV show is Ted lasso. If you have not watched this, please run, do not walk and go watch it. It is phenomenal. It is so good. I love the just, I mean, Jason today guests come on. And I love it when people who are creators of the show star in the show, or they
play a role in some in some way. I think about you know the office, you have Mindy Keeling and BJ Novak. And you know, Paul lieberstein, like they were writers on the show, and they also played characters which I just love it so much. And this is where my dorkiness and my geekiness comes in about really loving and understanding like how TV production works and how writing and all this goes so to know that Jason Sudeikis is him and coach beard if you watch the show coach beard, that is
another His name is Brendon. I can't think of his last name. I'm like putting myself on the spot. I'm like crap, what is his last name? I can't think of it right now. But they are two of the CO creators of Ted lasso. And just in case you haven't seen it, I don't want to give any spoilers away. But I do want to tell you there is a one particular episode and it is a very creative risk that they took and season two Now I have a friend that you know, we go on walks in the neighborhood.
And we were both talking about how we love Ted lasso. And she said, Well, have you seen episode, whatever? And I was like, No, don't tell me anything. I don't I don't want to know we're watching it. We just started Season Two. Don't tell me don't tell me anything else. And she said, Okay, I can just tell you. It's interesting. It's very different than all the other episodes. And I was like, What is she talking? Okay, you know what I like? That's it's such a broad statement to
make, right? There was no specifics. No, you know, the storylines different, this character is different, like, there was nothing. And I gotta tell you, for those of you that are gonna watch TED lasso, it is very, very different. They took a creative risk with their content. And I'm not going to tell you what it is, if you know what it is, I want you to send me a DM on Instagram. And tell me, tell me your thoughts on this episode,
that kind of just went off on its own path. It went off on its own journey, and it came back around, right, it eventually came back around.
But I also think about shows like Grey's Anatomy, Okay, y'all don't judge me. I have watched Grey's Anatomy, it started whenever I was a senior in high school. And Netflix was like I was just getting into Netflix. So you know, where you get the blu rays, I thought it was fancy to get a Blu Ray, not just a DVD, I could get a Blu ray of all of these shows and these movies that I wanted to watch. So for anybody that's listening. That's the younger generation. Netflix started with DVD deliveries,
right? We're not talking about Redbox or anything like that we're talking about, you had to put the cue in the order and do all the things like oh, it's just it makes me feel old. Starting to feel older, as technology, you know, is unrecognizable, as it is today compared to what it was when it started, you know, this a long time ago. But going back to Grey's Anatomy, I remember watching. I didn't watch the first season because I was in high school. I didn't you know, it wasn't my
thing. But I got to college, and I found myself, you know, I had like downtime or extra time. And I thought oh my gosh, okay, I'm gonna catch up. I was starting to watch, you know, the rest of Grey's Anatomy. And that was like, when the big bomb like episode came out, I will never forget, I was in my freshman dorm room. And I was with my roommate. She loved Grey's Anatomy too. And she was like, What is code black? And we all were like
Googling, like, what is code black? I can't even imagine how many like if you look at the Google trends of like everybody that Googled code black, because that's what they were talking about, on Grey's Anatomy, trust me, I'm gonna rein this in
in a second. I'm just nerding out for for those of you that are great fans, like, you know, you know, when I'm talking about, you know, the very specific episode with Kyle Chandler, and the bomb squad and all the things, but they've taken a lot of creative risks over the life of their show. They've had ones where the crew members or the cast members are singing, right? They were it was when Snow Patrol was really big, and it was
chasing cars. And I just remember They've taken all these creative risks over the life of the show. Why am I bringing all this up today? Because we're talking about creative risks, the pros and the cons, I'm sure Shonda Rhimes, you know, and Betsy beers who they're some of the well, Shonda Rhimes, obviously, she's the creator of the show. But Betsy beers is someone who's been a longtime producer and director. I think that they probably sat down, and they're sitting at the, you know,
the drafting table or the writing table. And they're like, is this a crazy idea? They're probably looking at each other, like, Will this work? And maybe they're thinking we don't know, but we have to try it. So I want you to think about your content that way, whether it's your podcast, it's, you know, putting up reels or tic TOCs, or doing YouTube or going live, like whatever that is, there's risk involved. And taking creative risks can pay off really big or
you could fall flat on your face. Right?
Those are the risks that come with creating something that's different, but I've talked about this book before. I want you to go, Listen, not read. I want you to go listen to the big magic book by Elizabeth Gilbert. So it's all about creativity. It was so funny because I was I was watching a live with my good friend Heather Sager. And she was like Krystal, has gone on about this book. And she wa
holding like the hard copy of the book. Krystal' been going on about this book, but it was just yo know, it was it was kind of it was okay, it wasn' mind blowing. And I was like, Oh my gosh, it' because you didn't listen to The audiobook, yo have to listen to the audiobook because Elizabet Gilbert who wrote Eat, Pray, Love, and she's gon on to just create so many incredible writings. An I just I love this book so much because it gets m
out of a creative rut anytime I get stuck. Anytim I've listened to the audiobook, at least I'm no joking eight to 10 times at this point. And wha happens is, every time I do get stuck creatively something dislodges like on in my brain on m journey, and I'm able to find this ne inspiration, this new motivation to try somethin new. And that's really what I want you to thin about
Right now I'm in the middle of finishing my book proposal for a new book that I want to write. And more on that later. It's something that's really in the early stages. And I have this idea that I believe will help lots of content creators, and I know I will get stuck along the way because that's just what happens in the writing process. You write, you get stuck, you write you think of a new story, you think of something funny, you're right, then you go back
and you say, Oh, that was terrible. I'm just gonna cut all that out, I get it. But what I'm also doing is taking a creative risk, and I'm adding more humor, I'm adding more personality into my content, because over the years, I found out
that's what people want for me. When I first started this podcast, not even the rookie life, right, that was my original podcast for those of you that don't know, and then I rebranded to what is now the Proffitt Podcast where we teach abo t podcasting and running your online business a d all those things. Whenever I made that creati e risk of just going to podcasting, I was terrifie , I was so scared that I was gonna fall flat on
y face. But here I am, more than two and a ha f years later, and it's still one of the be t decisions that I could have made. I love what I talk about, I love to talk about podcasting, I love to talk about things that have to do wi h marketing and online business and YouTube a d content creation. Like it just genuinely makes e so freakin happy. And writing a book about it s just another way that I can channel the creativi
y that I have found. So that's just a little b t about creativity in general.
Now, what does it look like to take a creative risk with your content? Right, this is the question I want you to think about. So the first thing is just trying a new format or a new style. If you are typically a solo podcaster. What would it look like if you started doing interviews? Or vice versa? If you've only done interviews with your podcast? What would it look like to try a solo episode? I'm not telling you, you have to do these things. But I do want you to get out of just complacency. Because that's where we get stuck. That's where we started to like, approach burnout, or you get into pod fade, or you're like I just stopped podcasting because it wasn't fun anymore. Well, you need to start taking some creative risk. If you are bored with your podcasts, you're bored with your content, you're not having fun doing it, then I'm telling you, you need to get out of your comfort zone. And I think of it as your creative comfort zone. Maybe that's what it is. Maybe you're trying to do what someone else is doing. You're comparing your content to someone else that's been doing it for a decade. Don't do that to yourself. Or maybe you're really looking at it and you're not being honest with yourself when it comes to your content and you know, deep down the you need to switch things up or maybe pivot your brand entirely. This is the crossroads that I was at a few years ago, how I was looking at all the content I was creating. And I was like, this is fun. Like, you know, it's kind of like a mediocre. This is okay. You know, when you ask someone, how are you doing today? They're like good. Not great. Not bad, just just good. That's kind of how I was feeling about a podcast. It wasn't super exciting. But where I was really excited and enthusiastic was behind the scenes answering people's podcast questions. They were like, Hey, how do you get this like podcast host set up? What are you supposed to do? Whenever you want to market something? How does this work? Like I was like, my heart was beating faster, just getting excited talking to people behind the scenes about podcasting. So I knew I needed to take that creative risk, but I know some of you're listening and you're like Krystal, I don't know that I'm ready to take a big creative risk, like what's a baby step? Because I know I get baby steps I get like, kind of okay, like let me let me tiptoe into this creative, risky business. Well, the first thing I would recommend, and we're really talking about podcasting, or video type of content, is what if you do something that's a bonus, right, and I'm gonna link in the show notes, I have a few podcast episodes about creating bonus pieces of content. And the reason why I say that is because you're not making a commitment, you're not coming out to your audience and saying, Hey, from now on, we're going to post two podcast episodes a week or three YouTube videos, just release a bonus piece of content, go live or you know, do something that's not like super comfortable, because it once you commit to something you need to stick to it. It's kind of like when you launch your podcast, you got to be
consistent.
But if you just want to try, you want to dip your toe in the water, ask yourself, How can I release a bonus
piece of content? What would that look like? And then another thing you can do to take a baby step into the less risky creative risks is do a poll or a survey with your audience to see what they want, or how they would even respond to the new type of content or the new thing that you're thinking about trying the thing that's gonna be the creative risk, like, ask your audience, because at the end of the day, you could sit behind closed
doors and think of all these things. But if it's a terrible idea, and you won't know it, until you put it out there, wouldn't you want your audience to tell you like, Hey, I'm glad you're having fun creating that. But that's not what we need right now. We need this from you. What do you want to know what this is right? That fill in the blank that only your audience can tell you sometimes. So when it comes to taking a creative risk, I really
want you to explore this and think about it. And then if you need that baby step, do a bonus piece of content, do something that is not too high stakes, it's not going to cost you a lot of time, a lot of money, a lot of energy to do. But get out of your comfort zone, like shake things up every once in a while. And if that means just creating a solo piece of content, creating an interview episode, then I encourage you to try something out. Because you never know that might not be the
thing that you end up loving. But it could open the creative door to you trying something else that you stumble upon. And you're just like, this is this is it. This is the thing that I've been looking for. This is the thing that's been missing from my content. But that's all I have for you today. So I just wanted to share all about taking creative risks. Please go watch TED lasso. It is so funny. It will change your life. I love Brett Goldstein as well. He's the actor that plays Roy
Kent. I started listening to his podcast I'm gonna link to in the show notes. It's called films to be buried with. It's so good. It's such a unique concept and you just got to go check it out if you follow me on good pods. This is the podcast player that I listened to you can literally go see all of the podcast episodes that listen to I have been listening to the ones that he's been doing and
they're they're so good. It's such a well done podcast but everything we talked about today will be in the show notes. KrystalProffitt.com/episode303. And go check those out and go start taking some creative risks. Start doing it if you need to baby step, baby step into it, but I want to see you taking some creative risks with your content. But that's all I have for you today. So as always remember, keep it up. We all have to start somewhere.