120. Tim Reid On How To Use Podcasting To Attract High-Value Clients

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Books Mentioned:

• The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom (A Toltec Wisdom Book) – Don Miguel Ruiz
• The Boomerang Effect – Tim Reid

Key takeaways:

1. It isn't too late to start. The biggest challenge isn't the crowded market, it's deciding what your show is about and how you'll deliver it.
2. Write your editorial mission in three parts. What you offer, who it's for, and the outcome they can expect. Tim's is marketing tips for small service businesses so they get more enquiries.
3. Test it by writing your first 10 episode titles. Once you start, listeners suggest more topics.
4. The results can be ones you didn't plan. A speakers' bureau booked Tim because a client listened to his show, and he spoke at 63 conferences in eight countries the next year.
5. Don't wait for the right microphone. Practise where nobody hears you, and hand the technical side to someone else so you can focus on the content.

Action steps:

1. Test and develop your podcast workflow.
2. Write the headings of your first 10 podcasts.
3. Create a sound framework for your podcast episodes that delivers value and caters to your listeners.
4. Look for a podcast format that works best for you – Interview type, Q & A, Opinion, or with a Co-host.
5. It is always okay to discuss similar topics with different guests as they deliver different insights and nuances on similar topics. The key is to keep it interesting for the listener.

Transcript

Machine transcript, lightly edited for reading. Speakers aren't marked. The sponsor message and sign-off are left out.

Welcome everyone. Our guest for today is the founder and host of Australia and New Zealand's number one business and marketing podcast, The Small Business Big Marketing Show, which can be found on all Virgin Australia domestic and international flights. Having launched this hit program seven years ago with well over 300 episodes under his belt, it regularly ranks on iTunes above the Australian Stock Exchange, Alan Jones, Tim Ferriss and even outranks the Harvard Business School as the number one business marketing podcast. He's the author of The Boomerang Effect and has built a global audience of motivated business owners in 110 countries.

I'm delighted to welcome Tim Reid of timreid.com.au. Welcome Tim. Oh my goodness, Ash. I will just go and find that fellow. He sounds incredibly impressive. Anyway, out there. No, sorry. He is here. Good day, Ash. And hello to all your wonderful listeners who I'm guessing are business owners in their own right. Correct. Small business owners and self-employed professionals. Yes. So, mate, we are here to talk about podcasting. So, Tim, why don't you kick it off and share with our listeners why you think podcasting is such an awesome tool to attract high value clients and how you've used it to build an authority platform.

You know, Ash, about eight years ago, I found my first podcast and I can still remember the day and the feeling it was like, you know, as a marketing guy, which I always have been, I'm like, I can't believe this small business owners can now have their own show. And I thought that's incredible. That is like, you know, in years gone by to have to get on the radio or to create some kind of audio or video content, you needed to spend a lot of money, right?

Yeah. And all of a sudden there were these people all around the world creating these things called podcasts. And I'm like, I'm going to get one of those. I need one of those because it was for me, podcasting is such an incredible way to share your thoughts and opinions, to entertain, to engage people. And from my point of view, you know, I feel like I'm on a bit of a mission to share, to sort of shine a very bright light on a very dark art that many small business owners call marketing.

So podcasting was my way of doing that. So, you know, from the outset, it just, it ticks so many boxes for me. And so I did start a podcast, it was my way of actually differentiating myself also from all the other marketing consultants out there, because that's what I was doing at the time. And because at that time, there must have been almost none. Certainly there were a few, I think I was possibly, I have never looked into this and categorically figured it out. But one of the first Australian business podcasts, there's a lot of American content and the angst are always, you know, ahead of the game in that regard.

But I mean, now it's, it's a very competitive marketplace. Oh yeah. And we met at the OzPod conference. So it's, it's endorsed by society now and it's starting to really come into the fold. Yeah. And it is. And I will say for all those small business owners listening, just because I said it's competitive doesn't mean you can't go and do it. I think it's a limiting belief that many have, which is the boats left the shore, you know, teams up to episode, I posted this morning, episode 337 of the small business, big marketing show, Ash, how many episodes are you done?

Over a hundred. It's okay. So a hundred episodes. And, and you know, it doesn't mean that it's too late. It's not too late because the challenge is not in deciding to do a podcast. The challenge is what are you going to podcast about? What's your message going to be? How are you going to deliver it? That's the challenge. I mean, you know, just because podcasting has been around for a long time and it's getting more competitive is not a reason not to do it. I couldn't agree more.

It's a bit like content, any kind of content like writing has been around for centuries, but good quality writing is always going to stand out. So it comes down to the quality of your content in your podcast and the transformation you can deliver to your listeners. Correct. Okay. So you have used it as an authority building platform and what role has it played in your business? How has it taken your business to the next level? How has it actually helped you convert listeners into clients? Yeah, amazing.

I constantly, I've written a whole book about this, not about specifically how podcasting has done that, but how creating helpful marketing has done this. And for me, podcasting is my way of being helpful with my marketing. So I've come up with this concept called the boomerang effect, right? And the boomerang effect, and I'll explain how this is played out in my podcast, but the boomerang effect is when you get back from your marketing far more than you put into it. And it's the result of creating helpful marketing that returns multiples.

So let me explain how the boomerang effect has taken place in my business thanks to podcasting. So I started podcast seven years ago. I'm a marketing consultant. It starts to get me a little bit more business. I had enough clients because I'm a one man show. I had enough clients already, but it started to bring me in more business. And then, so that's good. Tick. Then at a point in time, about actually about three years or four years into my podcasting journey, I got a phone call from a speaker's bureau and that speaker's bureau said, listen, we have a client that listens to your podcast and they have a need for a marketing speaker to go on tour with them around Australia.

Their client was an insurance company to go on tour with them around Australia to speak to their financial planning clients and licensees. At that point, Ash, I didn't know what a speaker's bureau was. I didn't know what a roadshow was. I did a bit of speaking, but I certainly wasn't a professional speaker. Anyway, long story short, I flew up to Sydney and met that client. They booked me for the roadshow. I did it. It was successful. Off the back of that, they booked me for more jobs and the speaker's bureau going like, who are you?

We normally book TV and radio personalities. You're a podcast. So then they signed me up as an exclusive speaker. All of a sudden, my speaking career was born. In the next 12 months, I did 63 conferences in eight countries. That is a direct line result between starting a podcast and growing my business. There was nothing in the way of that. I was just creating good, helpful content delivered in a way that people liked. And now I have a speaking business. Then off the back of that, another example of the boomerang effect in action in regards to my podcast is that in August of this year, 2016, my podcast is now appearing on all Virgin flights internationally and domestically out of Australia.

Again, a direct line result of just simply creating good content, helpful content through podcasting. And I could go on and on about how the creation of content can do amazing things in your business that you just didn't expect when you set out to do it. Right. I've got a couple of stories to add to yours about the boomerang effect. Right. I think definitely does work. It's worked for me. I recently spoke on the 9th of September at Macquarie Bank at the event, and I was invited to be the keynote speaker as a direct result of my podcast.

And I was actually invited by my client for whom I launched a podcast. I've got a podcast launch service as well. And she spoke at an event called the Owners Corporation Network. She's a strata lawyer. And in her case, she actually had a client call her up within six weeks of her launching a podcast saying, I've been listening to a podcast, I'd like to work with you. And she went on to bill that client $10,000. And I've built a case study out of it as well.

So I mean, I'm not saying that will happen every time. I'm not what I don't believe in this, you know, launch a podcast, you're going to be in a millionaire overnight. I think that's just nonsense. And I do definitely think it's a long game. You should not go in expecting to make money overnight, but you should go in expecting to deliver value and deliver you know, some meaningful insights to your listeners. And then the results will come over time, sometimes faster, sometimes over a long time, but I believe they will come.

And they will. And you don't know what they're going to be. I mean, we've talked about, you know, getting speaking engagements and, and getting new inquiry, new business. You just don't know. I mean, another mate of mine who he, he's not a podcast, but he, he does. He has a YouTube channel. He's now he's a boat guy. He sells and services, sells and buys and services motorboats. And he's now a weather reporter on Melbourne's leading talkback radio station because of these videos he was creating. So you just don't know what's going to happen when you embark on a journey of being helpful in the way you market your business.

And for me, podcasting, it's just a medium that I love. It's a medium that works for me. Absolutely. Podcasting YouTube or written content, all of these are forms of content marketing and content marketing is essentially just providing value through good quality content, which potentially would lead to a sale because you're delivering value first and you're asking for a sale later. In some cases, you're not even asking for a sale. It's just organically developing out of the content. The other thing I love about podcasting, Tim, is that I'm finding that a lot of self-employed professionals, people who are fairly time poor are trying to self-educate in their off-screen time.

And so podcasting is growing because of that. So while driving the car, while falling asleep, while at the gym, times when they're not sitting in front of their computer doing their work, they're still trying to self-educate and podcasting is really delivering in those circumstances. Do you agree? I continue to be amazed at the quality of the shows, the podcasts that are out there. So totally, no matter what your area of interest, go to Google or go to iTunes, go to the search box and key in your area of interest, followed by the word podcast.

And there will be someone somewhere in the world creating a show on that topic. It might not be a good show, but iTunes have suggested that there will be 16 billion hours of podcasts listened to this year, 2016. So this is not a medium that's, you know, it's established itself. It's here for the long term. It, you know, it's had some ups and downs. I think someone for podcasting to really, really, really take off someone needs to create some disruptive technology that really makes it easy for the average person who isn't technical in nature, who isn't maybe aware of how do you find a podcast?

How do you listen to more than one episode? How do you subscribe to one? How do you interact with the owner of that podcast? All these things, that technology doesn't really exist yet. But boy, oh boy. Yeah. I mean, people are listening to it in all places. Like you, like you just said, I mean, I get emails from listeners who are walking the dog in the car at the gym, in bed, whatever it is. And that's a wonderful thing about podcasting. It's like, it's so consumable.

I mean, people say video is better. Look, it's not better or worse. Video requires you to look at a screen. So you can't do it while you're driving. Generally, you can't do it while you're at the gym. You can't, video has higher conversion. Yeah. I think it does because you can say to someone while they're watching on video, hey, listen, push the link below or, or whatever. But just think podcasting here is infinitely more consumable. And I just love the audio medium. So. And mate, you know, about the technology piece, I was contacted by this company called Adori Labs not long ago.

I met with them for the second time. They're here in Sydney. They're doing some deal with one of the radio stations here. And they are working on creating this technology that when certain words are said, buy now buttons flash up on your screen related to those words. So they're doing it by creating audio hooks in the MP3 files. And I don't know the details of it. It all sounded too complicated to me, but it's very interesting what they're working on. And I agree with you. I think the podcasting technology seems to be really way behind.

Apple has kind of been ignoring it, but someone else is going to pick it up. And when they do, we're going to see some really big movements in this space. Yeah, yeah. Really exciting times. And then, you know, just going to that OzPod conference the other week where we met, you know, it's, there were 350 people there. Right. You know, I think, I don't know whether we had the conversation or not, but there was a mix of, there was sort of half of them were radio people.

The other half were what I call bespoke podcasters like you and I. Clearly radio stations are seeing the value in taking what they're already broadcasting and putting it on to sites like iTunes or Stitcher or Spotify or whatever it is. And that's kind of, yeah, look, I get it. That's great. They're doing a sort of, they're doing our industry of service. I prefer a bespoke podcast that just isn't an adaption of something I could have listened to on radio, but again, absolutely growing and exciting times.

So my next question, which we've already answered was going to be, you know, how does podcasting play a role in the growth of small businesses? And I think the way we've answered it already is through content marketing, by delivering value, by creating content that solves a problem and delivers some kind of a meaningful transformation and actionable insights to the listeners. So let's talk about the biggest challenges you've noticed people face when developing or kicking off their podcast. And what's the best way to overcome these challenges in your experience?

First challenge is getting started. So yeah, overcome that by starting. You know, like, really, I mean, what are you waiting for? Waiting for all the ducks to be waiting for a better microphone, waiting for a your voice to improve because you don't like the sound of your voice. What start, you know, start with the idea that no one's going to hear it. Yes. Go and create a piece of audio that it allows you to practice. Right. So athletes practice out of sight of the public and they go public when it's race day.

Right. Do the same. Yeah. People worry about, okay, well, that's a very well to say, but what am I going to start doing? What am I going to talk about? Because, and that's an absolutely valid question because just talking about anything could do as much damage as it could do, be of benefit. So I suggest they get clear on what I call their editorial mission. And the editorial mission is a really simple process that, and I talk about this at length in my book, because it's a really important starting point.

It is three questions. What have you got to offer to who and what outcome can they expect? Nice. So the editorial mission for my show and my brand, the small business big marketing show is, what have I got to offer is marketing tips and tricks for who small service based business owners. What outcome can they expect to generate more inquiry? So the marketing tips and tricks, the small service based business owners to generate more inquiry. In me knowing that Ash, I can then go, it absolutely frames fences, creates a filter for everything I talk about on my podcast from stage, everything I do, what I wrote about in my book.

It's all about that editorial mission. And once you get clear on your editorial mission, it sets a standard and an expectation with your listeners so that they know what to expect each and every time. And so that's a really good starting point. And then off the back of that editorial mission, in order to test that it's valid, go and write the headings for your first 10 episodes of your podcast. I love that. Right. That is awesome. Yep. So, and that's easy, you know, like it just, they should literally roll off the tongue.

And so once you've done that, then there can be a limiting belief around what do I do after 10, which is a stupid question, but people ask it and I kind of get it. I probably asked it myself, but what you find and what you don't know until you start is that content starts to show itself. Listeners will email you and say, Hey, listen, can you, can you do a show on this topic? Or when you're talking to someone, they might mention something and that is a mental note for you, the host to go down and find someone who could go in even deeper on that topic.

So, you know, great content as you create great content, more great content shows itself. And the other things that kind of stop people from doing this kind of stuff is, you know, they wait for the right equipment. I mean, that's a, you know, that's invalid. I mean, you know, if you really just want to get a running start, the smartphones of today have a pretty, pretty good inbuilt microphone and headset and all that type of stuff. But boy, oh boy, you know, you can go to the Apple store and buy a blue Yeti microphone, which is a $230 USB microphone that you literally plug in and you start because here's the thing.

Whilst I might've done 337 episodes of the small business, big marketing show, I don't get on the tools ash. I don't know how to edit. I'm not interested. I have a mixing desk in front of me, which I, and I just bought a new microphone. Don't even ask me what the microphone is because I don't care. I know it's a good one, right? I went to the guy who said this is a good one. I'll have that one. I've got a mixing desk that has a number of cables and buttons that need to be set up in a certain way.

I just took it to the audio shop and said, just push the buttons and dial so that it's where I need them. I took a photo of it. I've got tape on it, which indicates that's where that dial, like I'm actually proud of it. Some people would might be embarrassed to say that, or some people might be thinking Tim's a bit for not knowing that. No, no, no, no, no. I'm a hundred percent interested in creating helpful content. None of my listeners care about where the dials are positioned and what microphone I'm using.

So budget allowing, have other people do all that stuff, set yourself up and you focus on what you do best. Couldn't agree more. I love some of the things that you've said here. I really liked your point about the editorial mission. And by the way, this so beautifully, you know, leads to the action section, which is my favorite section of the show. So let's talk through the action steps for people who are finding difficulty getting started with podcasting. First of all, go and get the boomerang effect because Tim talks about the editorial mission in that book.

But the key points there are understand what you have to offer, who you're going to offer it to. In other words, your target market and what outcome they can expect. So what transformation or what problem you can solve or what transformation you can deliver to your audience. I love the hack about writing the headings for the first 10 episodes because it's a physical act of writing stuff down that gets you out of your head and onto the paper and stops you from this circular logic, which just completely paralyzes you.

It certainly did me. The other thing I would like to add to what you said is I am a big fan of Rode Podcaster mics. Now I know, Tim, you're not really into the brands and stuff, but I love Rode Podcaster mics. They're plug and play. I just got the Rode Podcaster mic, but there's also a Rode lavalier mic, which you can get for like 70 bucks. Stick it on your, you know, pin to your collar or whatever. And you've got a podcast device right there, which plugs into your smartphone.

Once you start podcasting, if you have an interview based show like this one, you could pretty much talk about the same topic to different guests and you'd have different nuances and different insights come in because different guests bring awesome, interesting, valuable insights and variety into a show. So if you're comfortable with doing an interview based show, which I recommend is something you should consider, then you have the makings of an awesome show. Correct. Totally. And just on that, I mean, there are a number of formats.

If someone's listening and going, oh, I think I kind of, they're kind of talking me into podcasting. I'm liking that. Interviews one format, Q&A, you could do a Q&A, you could get go and identify all the questions that people are asking that could potentially buy from you and start to answer them. You could share opinions. You could get up on your soapbox and just share opinions that help people make a more informed purchase decision. You could find a co-host. You could find someone I like. I had a co-host for the first 80 episodes of my show and we worked really, really well.

His name was Luke. Now Luke just decided not to continue because it wasn't his thing, but we worked really well because we were very different people. His opinions were completely opposite to mine. And as a result, there was always that kind of tension. So that worked really well. My show is a mix of all those things. I don't do co-host anymore, but I share opinions. I answer listener questions. I interview someone and sort of, it's a magazine style format. So there's so many different ways of kind of formatting your show.

And again, it's what works for you. Absolutely. So let's talk about books, Tim. What are your favorite books and why have they had a big impact on you? Well, I am an avid reader, Ash. The one that's had the most impact, not even of recent times, but I love The Four Agreements, which is a beautiful book that kind of lays out how you should kind of run your life. So it's a bit, it's a kind of quite a, quite a big book in that sense. But that's a beautiful book.

You know, be impeccable with your word is one of the agreements, which just means, you know, don't lie. Yeah, it is nice. And it's kind of something I've got my kids to read. And I suggest people read that I'm reading a really interesting book at the moment, which for anyone interested in getting into the audio and getting into the audio medium, whether it be radio or podcasting, it's fascinating. It's completely R rated. It's the autobiography of Howard Stern. Oh, okay. Yep. Who is Australia, America is probably probably the most famous shock jock in the world, I suppose, but you've got to understand that he started way back in the early eighties when radio was really just just jockeys playing the next song and talking over the first 30 seconds of every song.

Whereas Howard Stern came in and kind of completely disrupted that by doing long form interviews, by asking all the wrong questions that people didn't want to be asked by adding segments and competitions and all sorts of stuff, you know, that really shook up the whole radio industry and how he went about that is fascinating. So that's called private parts. There's a big naked shot of Stern on the front cover. Sounds enticing. So yeah, that's one I'm reading at the moment. And then four agreements is another one.

Cool. Hey, by the way, speaking of disrupting, speaking of disruptive. Speaking of disruptive technology, there is this new technology that's come out. I only saw it yesterday on YouTube or whatever. It's called VOCO and Adobe has created it. Do you know they can actually put words in your mouth by changing the typed font at the bottom in the bottom panel of the spit software. And so let's say you say Tim says, Oh, I kissed the wife and patted the dogs on the way out to work this morning.

They can actually transpose the words and it can sound like you were saying, I kissed the dogs and patted the wife on the way out this morning. Yeah. And all they need is 20 minutes of your speech. And I was just thinking to myself, man, what's that going to do to podcast? It's called VOCO VOCO. Just Google it. You'll probably find it. Yep. And thanks for the speech therapy, by the way. I really appreciated that. You didn't, you still didn't say it. When the student's ready, the teacher will appear.

How do listeners find out more about you before we say goodbye? timreid.com.au is my speaking site where people can book me to speak and smallbusinessbigmarketing.com is where you can find my podcast and buy my book, The Boomerang Effect. Awesome. Well, I will be sure to add links to those in the show notes of this episode. And you can find this episode if you just go to productiveinsights.com and type in the words, Tim Reid spelled T I M R E I D.