Episode 43
Podcast Can Build Your Brand with Chris Greenfield
Welcome Chris Greenfield, marketing expert, to Saturday Soundbites! He brings his marketing expertise to the podcast and shares how he has grown and supported successful podcasts in various spaces.
Join Chris and Veronica as they talk shop and discuss how podcasts can grow your brand and truly bridge various threads of your visibility strategy, including leveraging podcasts to optimize your SEO efforts. If you have always wondered how to get started in podcasting, this is the episode for you.
Chris is a Veteran, entrepreneur, business guru, and a generous mentor!
Transcript
[00:00:00] Veronica: Hello. Hello and welcome to Saturday soundbites. I'm your host, Veronica Sofer. And here at Saturday soundbites, we talk all things. Visibility, strategy, marketing, advertising, public relations. Branding networking and how to tie it all together. So in this episode, we're going to talk about how you can incorporate podcasts.
[00:00:22] Now, if you're listening on our podcast, then I want you to hit subscribe right now so that you don't miss any of our amazing content. And if you're watching on Facebook, make sure you let us know, and we will communicate with you and engage with you in the comments. And if you're watching on the replay, hashtag replay, so of my guests and I can come back and connect with you there as well.
[00:00:42] And so in talking about. On a podcast. We're going to talk about how it fits into your visibility strategy and how important it is to connect all the dots so that you're repurposing the content from multiple ways. And the guests I have for you today as an expert in this, he's actually the guy that got me started in this space.
[00:01:00] And so I'm super excited to bring up Chris Greenfield. He is joining us today.
[00:01:05] Chris: Hello. Good morning, Veronica.
[00:01:08] Veronica: I'm fantastic. Thank you so, so much. So Chris, I, you know, I, I couldn't have started all of this without you guiding me through the process and part of the reason why we connected so well in this space is that you knew what I was trying to do.
[00:01:23] And you didn't know what I wasn't what I wasn't asking. I didn't know what I didn't know. And you did, so kind of start us through the process and tell us a little bit about how you even got in this space.
[00:01:33] Chris: I'd been a podcast. I kind of fell into it. Veronica, and I'm going, I'm not going to work on not calling you Ronnie.
[00:01:39] So I've known you for way too long to, to not mess up and say that. So. We've been in I've been a podcast listener for probably over well over a decade. I started listening to podcasts 2009, 2010. And most of those were, you know, my interests at the time firearms training different things like that.
[00:02:03] Instructional. How to improve public speaking, stuff like that. That's what I was listening to. And a few years ago I started my own coffee company and I was like, you know what? I've been, I've been wanting to do a podcast on certain subject or a different subject. I was like, this is my opportunity to finally do something that I've wanted to do for years.
[00:02:24] And I started a podcast and that was as simple as downloading a program called. Sign up to a program called stream yard. I believe that is what we're on currently and lining up guests. And the nice thing about the podcast space is there typically. Any shortage of guests, you can find a guest that will talk on almost any topic, and you can find a podcast on almost any topic.
[00:02:55] So if you're a new entrepreneur or you've been at it awhile no. Or if you just want to tell stories or whatever, just relaying information podcasts are of, you know, a wonderful avenue, a great medium for you to use to convey that message to the public.
[00:03:15] Veronica: and then there's some technical things that people might get overwhelmed with when they first think about it.
[00:03:20] You know, they're, if they're watching a recording like this, they might see headsets and microphones. And they're wondering about all the technical things. Should the technical stuff really stop you because there are lots of ways to do it simpler and there's lots of ways to do it in a more complicated in a studio way to,
[00:03:38] Chris: you know, I think the biggest hurdle on.
[00:03:41] Is the sound quality because the sound quality has got to be very, very good. Typically to get a bunch of people listen, or even watch on YouTube or Facebook, you have to have good sound quality without good sound quality. And so you're, you're looking at the financial investment of at least, you know, a couple hundred bucks for a good microphone or a good headset.
[00:04:04] I'm talking to you on a gaming headset. It's got a pretty good, it works pretty. Pretty well but it's also limited to a certain range of, of recording quality, but it works typically for podcasts, a professional setup like you've got there. I did have, I think a belief when I first started podcasting was Microtech headset.
[00:04:25] Or not a migratory headset, but in my Microtech microphone that I just picked up for off of Amazon and black Friday's a good time to pick stuff up like that. Right. Then, if you go into the video podcasting and kind of like what we're doing today a decent HTMI camera that, you know, records at least what 19, let's see, 19 or 10 ADP.
[00:04:49] That's what we want. You've you can do 4k, but if you're using Facebook, It's going to get downgraded. Anyway, if you're on YouTube, most people are watching it on a phone and they're really not going to get the 4k out of it. So it's origin for the 4k video is this, unless you're Joe Rogan, you know, right.
[00:05:10] Then, then do the 4k video. But I think that's a little bit out of the. Out of the ballpark for what most people need.
[00:05:18] Veronica: Yeah. Yeah. And most people are using podcasts to either have the passion project or passion topic that they're interested in, maybe gardening or maybe something really important to them like parenting or something like that.
[00:05:30] And then the rest of the folks that are in this space, those are online entrepreneurs are really just trying to promote their brand and share some of their content. So I think that there's a. There's a way to find the right fit for you and then grow into it. Cause that's what we did, right? I mean, you gave me some suggestions.
[00:05:47] We went and we started and then we grew into it and it was a, it was an evolution that was not as hard as I thought it was going to be
[00:05:54] Chris: using an iPhone as, as, as much as I, I I'm an Android person myself, but using an iPhone and a good quality Bluetooth wireless microphone to record that audio. We'll make, I don't know if you can.
[00:06:11] I hear children screaming, so I'm just making sure that I don't.
[00:06:16] Veronica: Okay.
[00:06:18] Chris: Mom went to pick up Starbucks for everybody, but. Using an iPhone and a good wireless Bluetooth microphone to pick up the audio is more than enough to do most podcasts more than enough. If you start interviewing, then that's a little bit different.
[00:06:35] If you start, if it's just a one, one person show, then that's, you can get away with a Bluetooth microphone and an iPhone for your video camera. If you want to.
[00:06:46] Veronica: Yeah, no, I agree. And I've enjoyed some of those. Some of those con the content that I see that's done like that, I kind of feel like it's more organic and I feel more connected to the people.
[00:06:55] Cause it seems more authentic to me. So that doesn't phase me one bit. Not at all. I think it's great.
[00:07:03] Chris: Also, one thing I want to take note on, and this is one thing that we talked about when we first started in and I don't really have it here, but your, your environment, your backdrop, if you're doing a video podcast or a video cast of any sort is very important and how you set it up.
[00:07:23] It's part of your shows personality, and you've done a really good job there, Veronica. Oh, thank
[00:07:28] Veronica: you. Yeah. I always try to keep the family photo in there. And definitely our Hamilton poster that's autograph people have actually messaged me and said, are those real autographs? I'm like, absolutely. We got it in New York.
[00:07:39] Yeah, no, I think you're right. It invites people like. And, and it makes them feel a little more comfortable and connected with us. So we talked about the technical part, Chris, and this is the part that I really think the nuggets are at, and that is your expertise in helping people find the right space.
[00:07:57] So online YouTube, it's all so grand, but there's a way to find your people. And I want you to tell us how you have helped others and how you figured out where your people.
[00:08:11] Chris: Oh, well, you, you said it YouTube, you know, YouTube is such a powerful tool because it's a suggestive search engine. And what that means is YouTube will look at the videos that a person is watching and they say, okay, this.
[00:08:26] The Veronica likes Broadway shows. She's an entrepreneur. She likes this, this and this, and it will show you a variety of videos that fall into that subject. So that person that you're trying to find that audience, as long as you're setting up your YouTube videos properly with the proper tags and proper descriptions and putting it out there, you're going to.
[00:08:52] To get suggested to the audience you want to find on YouTube. It's a fantastic, fantastic way of going about finding your audience. And, you know, eventually once you grow an audience on there, you start to actually earn income off of, you know, from YouTube, sponsorships, whatever whatever the case may be.
[00:09:14] You know, we sponsor the company I work with now, big Tex ordinance, we sponsor. Two different podcasts with, you know, directly with financial contributions. We sponsor two different YouTube channels at this point, we're, we're always looking to grow and you know, that one, one of our YouTube channels that we sponsor has like 2.5 million subscribers.
[00:09:38] That's their full-time job. And when I say a full-time job, it's a full-time. Job for, I think, seven to eight individuals to produce that YouTube channel. And that is where our audience is. It's about going out and finding your audience no matter where they're at. And you know, it currently we're on Instagram or on YouTube, multiple channels on YouTube, multiple different.
[00:10:02] I think we have like 30 different influencers, if you will. Instagram that we financially contribute to different means or per, you know, single product to test out and, and post about. And that right there, I think is the biggest challenge for anybody is finding their audience. And if you do it for a podcaster or you do it as a podcast, or you're going to get more downloads, more listens and more subscribers.
[00:10:29] Veronica: Yeah. Wow. That blows my mind. So is that considered your marketing budget? Is it your advertising budget? Is that how that works? Because as a podcaster, I want to know how to connect with someone with those marketing dollars. And, and, and if I'm still finding my audience, I'm not quite there yet. What do I need to be doing to get there so that I'm attractive to someone like you, who has those marketing
[00:10:52] Chris: dollars.
[00:10:53] So first of all, you need to have a really good engagement for your audience. If you told me if I was in the marketing space that you were in and you said, Hey, I have 1000 listeners and I'm like, no, that's. That's really not what I'm looking for. I'm looking for a little bit more, but you're like, but I get 250 comments on every episode.
[00:11:15] I'm like, okay. And you have conversations and they're super engaged and we're talking about it and, and all this. So you've got a thousand listeners and a good percentage of that is very engaged with what you do. Okay. Cool. Well, now that really opens my eyes up and says, Hey, Chris, maybe we should pursue that channel.
[00:11:34] Even though it's a thousand listeners or a hundred listeners, they're super active. You know, one of our well, I guess three YouTube channels now that I think of it, one of our other YouTube channels. Fantastic. Click-through rate to our website. The if I'm looking for the word here the. The percentage of people that click on his link and then buy is, is super high.
[00:11:55] It's ridiculously high, typically industry standards between two and four, a two and 4% conversion rates. There's the word I was looking for that conversion. Right? But his is like 35 to 45%. So if it comes up, he calls and says, Hey, I need this school. Here you go. Send it because his listeners or his viewers are so in engaged with what he's not necessarily selling, but the information he's relaying.
[00:12:26] And that is what I want. I want that really good base of listeners because, but if I get one that's, you know, sitting in a thousand people and only 2% of are actually. Hey, that's industry standard. I understand that. That's what my conversion rate looks like. And I'm good with that as well.
[00:12:45] Veronica: And, and how does a podcast or improve that?
[00:12:48] So I'm curious about what makes his conversion rate. So, so a high is you mentioned. That people you know, they like his content, but it's gotta be more than content. Right? There's something about the way he's presenting his show, whether it's a podcast or his videos, there must be something about the way he's doing it.
[00:13:07] That's making people want to click through at least at that kind of level. So what do you think that is?
[00:13:13] Chris: One has videos are always very well done. Very well edited. That's the baseline sounds good. Video quality is good. It's consistent. He puts good solid information out and he's not pitchy. There's not a pitch.
[00:13:29] There's never, never a pitch. He's like, Hey, this is this. This is what I'm using it for. This is how I put it on. Check it out. Oh, by the way, this is where. And you know, our, our company, the company I work for we've, we've prided ourselves for a very long time on having a very, very good reputation. And so it's not a hard sale and we don't have to do a hard sell and that's, I think he's.
[00:13:53] Yeah, he's very genuine. And that comes out on YouTube that comes out on videos that comes out on sponsorships or affiliates. You know, if you're not genuine about it, people can tell that you're just trying to sell that, you know, that whatever you're trying to sell, if you're trying to sell it, it's not as good.
[00:14:12] Not going to work out as good as if you're just, if you just talk about it.
[00:14:18] Veronica: Yeah. And so the company you worked for is product based. So what about the service-based side of it? I know you've given me some, you've been a phenomenal mentor. I put that in the show notes. Cause you've, you just educated me so much, but for those of us on the service side that don't have widgets or gidgets and we're not shipping.
[00:14:35] And we don't have fulfillment type issues. What is it that we could be doing in our pod? To maybe tap into some of those things that, that make those kinds of folks more successful.
[00:14:47] Chris: I think you still have a product. You still have, your service is still a product. You might not be able to put that, that product in a box, but you still have.
[00:14:56] Product that you, that you're providing to a customer. So I, I think that's might be one of the first things that you need to kind of look at and be like, Hey, this is, this is a product standardize it, do it the same way every time, improve on it as you go. And, and, and make sure that product is, is a deliverable.
[00:15:14] You know, you can see the results from and, and yet it's more of a challenge for you as a service because sometimes maybe that service doesn't You don't have sort of physical that you can quantify right. Easily with.
[00:15:29] Veronica: Yeah, absolutely. Because it's true. I think sometimes we get we try to separate and make that line so different.
[00:15:35] You know, I've had guests on here that have been you know, in the MLM space. And so they've, they've got a very clear formula of how they do things. And then I've had brick and mortar business type owners, and they've got a very clear way of doing things. And I think sometimes for the online entrepreneur, Who is working you know, coaches are a great example.
[00:15:51] They've got launches and they've got passive income opportunities and they've got courses. And so there's sometimes a little bit of all of the above. And I think sometimes when you're thinking about a podcast and how best to structure it, or how best to have the right guests on or the right content, that might be a little bit more challenging, like you said, than some of the other, the other ways that people do
[00:16:14] Chris: business.
[00:16:16] Definitely. And I know when we, when you talk about, let's see if I can pull it up. Pod bean, hot bean. I'm trying to remember. There was a actual podcast advertising. I don't know if it is pod bean, or I need to go back and look and I'll, I'll find it for the show notes. But you know, you could go on there and.
[00:16:42] As an advertiser say, Hey, I'm looking for somebody in this, you know, horror movies or video games. And then you could go on and say, oh, this is my budget. And this is where I'm looking at. Okay. This person. 150 downloads an episode. He releases an episode every two days. You know that this is what you could find.
[00:17:03] And if you were looking to have sponsors for your product, that's a good word, a good place to start looking for sponsors or start looking, how other people. Are getting sponsors for sure on
[00:17:17] that.
[00:17:18] Veronica: Yeah. And I think some folks are definitely interested in the monitor, the monetizing part of podcasting. And I actually went to college with someone who has this very successful YouTube channel and does that for living.
[00:17:29] And he's one of those channels that has gotten awards and he's employees full-time. You know, staff to manage the channel, and then I've got other folks in my space who do it just for hobby and for fun. But and not necessarily in the monetizing that's not a big area of interest for them, but to know that there's a place that connects everybody would be really, really helpful.
[00:17:50] And the other thing that this might can do is just open up opportunities for a new audience, you know,
[00:17:57] Chris: And, and if you're selling something, I mean, if you're selling, whether it be a product or service, that audience is your possible customers. And that's why w why being able to find that audience and go out there and.
[00:18:13] And broadcast to them and convey information and get them to either purchase your product, whether it, whether it is purchase your product or look at your website, or if you're just using it to generate SEO links, then they're, didn't. Doing what it's doing and what its mission is, it's doing the job that you wanted it to, to do.
[00:18:34] And you know, a lot of people, and I'm just going to say this, this is kind of speculation, but I don't, I don't think a lot of people have got into podcasting. If you're getting into podcasting specifically to make money from podcasting. Good luck, good luck to you. I think the people that end up being really, really successful.
[00:18:58] Were originally doing it to do the money thing. And I w I would have to venture to the ones that are successful and making money at it. They were probably already successful at what they were doing prior to going into podcasting. I know one of my favorite podcasts to listen to is Amy Porterfield's channel.
[00:19:17] I don't know if you've ever, ever listened to some of, but she's a fantastic marketer and I've picked up a ton of stuff off with listening to her podcast, but she was successful before she was ever doing podcasts. And I mean, now she's even more successful, but that the podcast just added to it. It wasn't the key.
[00:19:39] Yeah in it. And I talked, you know, I talked two weeks ago. We're trying to expand our reach into Twitch. I don't know if you're familiar with Twitch at all
[00:19:47] Veronica: heard of it, but I haven't tried. I haven't,
[00:19:50] Chris: I'm a video gamer. I like to play video games, but I can't sit there and watch somebody play video games.
[00:19:56] It just does not make a lot of sense to me, but we, I talked to a possible champ channel on Twitch the other day as a. Possible sponsor for his channel. That's his full time job. He plays video games and has about 75,000 peach people watch him and episode. And I was just blown away at that. That's his full-time job.
[00:20:20] And I was like, Hey, you know, in the conversation, it was like, Hey. Is it going to work for you at this point? And he's like, yeah, man, it is. He's like, I'm good. I'm good.
[00:20:33] Veronica: So I had, I had a funny experience just a couple of years ago. I was invited to a career day, so I go, and I'm talking to these kids about career day and I'm talking about being a professional and what it took and what a day to day experiences like.
[00:20:48] And literally one of the kids goes, yeah, that sounds kind of boring. I'm just going to be a YouTuber. And I was like, oh, Okay. That's an option too. And it absolutely is an option because you don't want to discourage kids because the reality is it is an option for that. It's an
[00:21:02] Chris: option. It is an option. My girls absolutely love I can't even think of the name now of it, but there's a YouTube channel that they watch.
[00:21:11] Ryan's world Ryan Ryan's world. And that kid is like the richest YouTube kids star. In the world it's possible $42 million a year or something I'm probably off on that buy low ball estimate. But I mean, it's ridiculous how much, Hey, you know what? He's, he's got a short timeframe that he's going to be a kid YouTube star, and I hope he makes enough money that he doesn't have to.
[00:21:41] Do anything the rest of his life? Yeah. Well,
[00:21:43] Veronica: you know, what's interesting to me kind of going back to the core of what a visibility strategy is and, and that example that you just gave, it's all about connecting. So I, you know, when we're talking about advertising dollars and campaigns and our target audience and our tone and all of these more academic structure of messaging, it all goes back to connecting and your daughters are connecting to someone because of his authentic.
[00:22:10] And he's just messaging it and at its core, that's what it
[00:22:13] Chris: is. And he's playing on toys and they're like, daddy, daddy, I want that toy. I'm like, no, you have enough toys, but Ryan has. Okay. Cool. Get for Ryan.
[00:22:25] Veronica: Good for Ryan. Yeah, that's that's just phenomenal to me. It's almost like if we could capture that and put it in a little jar and give it to everyone who is learning all these different marketing strategies, you realize that it's just a simple, simple solution of connecting with people authentically getting your message across, and then there's a call to action.
[00:22:46] Even if it's a subliminal call to action.
[00:22:50] Chris: And engaging and engaging with your viewers and engaging with your, your listeners or your subscribers is, is key. You know, talking to we've got Sandy and Chris has commented and Pam and engaging with your, your listeners, you know, maybe getting their feedback.
[00:23:05] Maybe they getting their comments going back and touching that base is, is very important when it comes to building. Building that relationship because that's what it is. You know, back in the day we called up radio stations and requested songs, you know, that was I, I listened to some, I drove to Dallas last weekend and I was up early and of course the girls had burned up all of our internet or all.
[00:23:35] Downloads on YouTube on my phone. So I was stuck listening to the radio for three hours. And one of the shows, some people were supposedly calling in and requesting music. I was like, no, come on. This is fake. Nobody calls in and request music still, but apparently they do, or they have. Yeah,
[00:23:56] Veronica: they do. It's funny you say that.
[00:23:58] So you know, Chris is in radio, obviously. That's thanks to my, you know sure. Mike care. Absolutely. He had to comment on the mic, but he actually made a comment one time to someone in the industry and he said, I'm the truth is terrestrial. Radio is just different. You know, we've got satellite radio in the car.
[00:24:15] And one of the things we love doing on family trips is just getting out there so far out there when we're cross country and to listen to that terrestrial radio, because it brings back all of the memories of how we used to wait for a song to come on the radio. Now we live in an on-demand culture. If we want to listen to a song and we got satellite radio on, we just put the, you know, put the app on and we get to listen to the song we want on demand over and over again.
[00:24:39] If we want. Yep. We'll
[00:24:41] Chris: let it go over and over and over again until we have to say baby frozen doesn't work on daddy's car.
[00:24:52] Veronica: See, that's brilliant. That's absolutely brilliant. Yeah. Well, as we're wrapping up, Chris, is there any other last minute tips you want to give to folks who are thinking about going.
[00:25:02] Podcast space. And we taught tech. We've talked about the importance of finding your audience and all the different ways you can monetize or get on the other side of it and connect with podcasters. What other tips do you think people need to know?
[00:25:14] Chris: YouTube plays a big, big role in it. Definitely. You don't have to have a bunch of expensive software.
[00:25:21] If you can get a good microphone. All right. The good microphone helps you with editing in the fact that you might not even have to really do anything, put a song on the beginning, w put a rolling credit or rollout. And, and you're good. A lot of times maybe you might have to tweak some audio from a guest, but that.
[00:25:41] Microphone investment. We'll save you a lot of work in the long run. And I highly recommend somebody dumped some money into a good mic. Most programs that you can get for editing are able, you can, you can use something online, you can download it. I like the Adobe suite. Adobe edition. I do have a subscription, so I have the full Adobe package.
[00:26:07] So if I need to do video or audio pictures, whatever I need to do, I can do it there, but it's, it's very important to have the right tools and they're out there for everyone.
[00:26:21] Veronica: Yeah. And, and I remember one thing you told me when we were getting started and that was being consistent. And, and I've never forgotten that.
[00:26:27] And again, with my husband being in radio, he's always talking about consistency and and how important it is to stay on message. So thank you so so much, Chris, this has been a fantastic episode.
[00:26:39] Chris: Thank you. Rock. I thank you for having.
[00:26:42] Veronica: Yep. Thank you. All right guys, we are wrapping up this episode. We were talking podcasts.
[00:26:48] If you caught the very end of it, then you need to go back and download the podcast so that you can listen to it on demand at your pleasure, or just go back to your, our YouTube channel and watch the whole thing. Chris did a phenomenal job. These tips were fantastic. Don't be afraid of podcasts. But when you get a chance to be yourself and you get a chance to talk about the things that you know, that you love and that you're just on fire about, and when you can connect with other people and that way you're just going to be super successful.
[00:27:15] So thank you for tuning into this episode. Make sure you're give us a little a little bit of love there in the comments. So we can up our engagement and put hashtag replace. So Chris and I can go back and comment with that. I will wrap up and I will send you lots of positive energy and light.