Speaker 1:
0:01
You're listening to Podcasting Made Simple. I'm your host, alex Sanfilippo. For this episode's guide and resources, please visit podproscom. And now let's get to the episode.
Speaker 2:
0:15
Hello PodPro, thank you so much for choosing to tune into this presentation. I know you have so many options to choose from. They're all amazing, so I really appreciate you being here. If you're a podcaster who has been considering rebranding your podcast, you are in the right place and before we get started, I just want to clarify what I mean when I say podcast rebrand. So, rather than starting a whole other podcast on a whole other podcast feed, what you're doing is you're essentially just flipping your current feed. So you're going to change potentially your title, your cover art, your show description, your intro, outro and just reintroducing your audience to essentially a new podcast, maybe just a slight pivot from where you were before. Now, most podcasters, when they think about a podcast rebrand, they immediately look at it as like this death sentence, like they think they're going to lose all these followers and they're going to have to start over from scratch. But in reality, at least in my experience, it's actually quite the opposite. A podcast rebrand if it's done right, it can be this really unique, awesome opportunity to really breathe new life into your show and to drive fresh momentum back to your podcast. I want to start by telling you a quick story that I heard recently and I thought it was perfect for this conversation. So I want you to picture two spear fishermen. Every day, the fishermen. They go out, they wade into the water and they spend all day. But each fisherman always comes home with five fish. So they wake up in the morning, they wade out into the water, stab, stab, stab, stab, stab, stab. At the end of the day they come home Next day, go out into the water, spend all day, come home with five fish. Now the first fisherman of course he wishes he could catch more fish, but at the end of the day he's getting all the fish he needs, he's able to provide for his family and he has his systems finally nailed down so that he's confident he's going to get five fish every day. So he doesn't want to do anything to disrupt what he's already built. The second fisherman however he's starting to think maybe I can expand on this and really grow my fishing empire. So he decides to actually take a step back and reevaluate what he's doing. During that time, the first fisherman continues to go out onto the water and every day he catches five fish. So in the short term, it does look like the first fisherman is having a more successful fishing business. The second fisherman, though he's actually working on building a boat and sewing a net and eventually, once he's built his boat and he's sewed his net, he goes back out into the water. He surpasses that first fisherman, he goes deeper into the water and with one cast of his net he gathers 10 times as many fish. And not only does he gather 10 times as many fish, but he saves all those hours in the day where he otherwise would have been spent waiting in the water, spear fishing, and he's able to reinvest those hours back into building his fishing empire. So, obviously, in the long term, the second fisherman even though he took a step back, he ended up being more successful in his fishing business in the long run. So I want you to look at your podcast like this and maybe you're late, more to the first fisherman You're like I finally got all of my systems in place. I know that if I publish one episode a week, I get about five new listeners a month. My listeners are happy. This is working for me. But maybe you're like the second fisherman where you're like my systems are in place. It finally is functioning like a well-oiled machine, but there's some pull in my gut that's saying, maybe if I make a small tweak and maybe define my listener a little bit more narrowly or Maybe try to make some sort of pivot, that'll make this huge impact in my show. Maybe I can go out there and catch more listeners in a shorter amount of time and really grow my podcast a lot faster. And so, if that's you, you may be considering rebranding your podcast. So in this episode I just want to give you one perspective, which is my experience of rebranding, after just under two years and a hundred episodes Under my former title, and I just want to share with you some of the things that worked, some of the things that didn't work as well, so that you can go into your decision about rebranding just more informed and Decide if you do want to rebrand or not and, if you do, how you actually want to move forward with that process. A little about me my name is Angie Griffith. I actually come from over a decade in the music business and I moved into podcasting in 2020, when I built out a podcast division for the company that I had been working for for about eight years, and then, in 2021, I pivoted that department into my own business in the podcasting space. So when I First started my entrepreneurial journey, my first priority obviously was how do I make money? I'm leaving this cushy career with these benefits and a salary. How do I do this on my own? So I had it in my mind, of course because this is what all the gurus sell us I was going to create a scalable group coaching program teaching people how to start a podcast. So in my mind, I was going to be the how to start a podcast girl. So I was thinking okay, if this is my end goal, I should obviously have something out there in the podcast listening apps so that if someone searches the podcast apps how to start a podcast they'll find my podcast, they'll listen to an episode, they'll download my freebie, they'll enter my funnel and then eventually they'll enroll in my coaching program. That's the dream we're sold. So when I first decided I needed to have something out there in the podcast listening apps, I knew it wasn't going to be the podcast of my dreams. Yes, I wanted to have the podcast of my dreams one day. I was so excited to do that, but it wasn't the right timing. I needed to get clients first. So I decided in about five minutes. Barely thinking about it, because I was never even planning on sharing this podcast with the world, I said, okay, I'll title it four things for your podcast and I'll do short episodes. Four things for your podcast in four minutes or less. Surely I'll be able to do this on the side. It won't be that big of a deal or that much more work for me to do on a weekly basis. But because of the intention behind why I started my podcast and the timing of when I started my podcast, it actually ended up feeling like way more work than it should have. So this was the most draining, grueling process. I hated every minute of it. I did publish a four minute episode weekly, but it was really, really hard for me and it did not feel in alignment at all. And I think really the reason for that was because the energy behind my podcast was what can my podcast do for me? How can I get clients through this four-minute episode that I'm sharing out there with the world? Why isn't it working quickly? What's going on Rather than hey? How can I actually build a community and serve others through my podcast content? So I had it all backwards. So, on a whim again, it was in January of 2022. So this is nine months after I had started my podcast. Originally, I decided, hey, I need to switch up the energy here and I want to eventually have the podcast of my dreams. I have a podcast. Why don't I just pivot this podcast into something that I actually will enjoy and get something out of showing up to week after week after week? And so that's what I did. I started to take my podcast more seriously. I started releasing full-length episodes, mostly guest interviews, and to fit the title that I made for myself for Things for your Podcast, I decided to recap at the end of every episode what my four takeaways were from whatever the episode topic was. Now, that served me for some time In the stage of business and the stage of my creator journey that I was in. This was helping me to develop myself as a better podcaster, as a better interviewer, and I really think this was what I needed to be doing in that time. But eventually, about 13 months into doing that, I started to build up this resentment for my podcast. I felt like I was fitting myself into this box of this title that I created for myself back in April of 2021 for Things for your Podcast and I had this whole extra workflow step of recapping the episode at the end, which I didn't want to be doing, but I was doing it just to fit into this title that I made for myself. And not only that, but I felt like the former podcast was speaking to a completely different podcaster. So, like I said, when I first started my podcast, I thought I was going to be the how to start a podcast girl. What I realized after almost two years of podcasting and developing this craft and developing myself more as a creator and a business owner and serving clients and working with clients, what I realized was I don't really enjoy the how to, and that's not really what I want people coming to me for. What I enjoy and where my skill set lies from coming from the music business, where I was managing high profile clients and their careers and putting together these big deals and working on this like upper level kind of scale is where I can really serve podcasters is taking them from having a podcast as a hobby to really building this thriving brand and business around their podcast. And so I started to think, hey, I'm actually talking to the podcaster who's already out there sharing their message, making an impact, they're influencing people, they're building a business. And so I was thinking, okay, the influencers of podcasting, podcast influencer. The word pod fluencer just came to me and I was just so excited about this term and immediately when I came up with this word, I was like this is the title of my podcast, this is who I'm speaking to. I need to immediately rebrand my podcast. So this was on February 2nd. I had the idea. I was so on fire about it. The very next day, I started the process of filing the trademark for my podcast title. About a month later, I reached out to a good friend, lauren Passell, who you may be familiar with. She is just this genius when it comes to podcast promotion. So I asked her if she'd want to come on board and help tackle some of the promotion and outreach for me, and she did, which was awesome. And then, on April 18th, I relaunched my podcast under the new title Pod Fluencer Society, along with a new description, a new intro, new logo, branding, cover art, everything. So if you want to talk about the exact steps, I took is casting one net and just like being really clear with who I'm targeting and how I'm serving them, and then I went all in so I could have just kind of flipped my assets in the background and just like quietly soft announced it and didn't make a big deal about it. That was one option, but I really made the decision to put together a full marketing plan because what an opportunity to get new momentum around my show. This is like a once in a lifetime opportunity, and so, if you want to know every single thing I did, I actually recorded an episode on my podcast with Lauren. I brought her on as a guest and I go through every single thing I did to promote my rebrand, and that episode is it's episode 100 and it's titled Unveiling the Secrets Insider Access to my Podcast Rebrand Promotion Strategies and that was released on May 9th 2023. So, if you're curious, that episode does exist for you. There is zero chance I'd be able to cover it all in this presentation. So what I decided to do for you is I thought about if I had to pick the top three things I did to promote my podcast rebrand, what would they be, and here's what they would be. So I'm going to work from number three to number one, which is my favorite. Okay, so number three is I actually put together a press release. So for the context of this, the context of a podcast rebrand it's not really about having this whole campaign because that is going to. First of all, a formal press campaign usually takes about 60 to 90 days lead time and I didn't have that. I wanted to move much quicker than that and also to hire a formal publicist. At least where I come from in the entertainment space they're on a retainer for like five to seven grand a month and that's just not extra cash that I had lying around. So I did want to have a press release, but it was less about having a campaign around a press release and servicing it. It was more about just consolidating all of the key information about my rebrand so that I could effectively communicate the announcement on the day that I launched it and also for years to come, by hyperlinking it when I mentioned the rebrand to people. Also, if you have a partner on board which isn't going to apply to everybody, but if you have, let's say, you bring on a sponsor to share in this momentum, or if you sign with a network to share in this momentum, or whatever it is Putting together a press release it actually makes it so much easier for that partner to help you to cross promote. Because if you think about it let's say you have a sponsor they have so much going on Like they're happy just to like give you a check and trust that you're going to meet those deliverables. So they're not really going to go out of their way to really research all of the details behind your rebrand. But if they're given a press release, that's something that they can easily like pull little things out of and send it out on their social media or they can just send it out to their newsletter. There's so many things that your partner can do if you take the time to give them something that they can actually work with to promote quickly so that you're actually doing the work for them. And then also, if you have a partner and they're included in your press release, that press release is going to make it easier for you to secure future partnerships because it looks really clean, polished and professional and your future partner can know that you take your brand that seriously. So the third best thing I did was definitely the press release. Second best thing I did is I stepped out of my comfort zone because I hate asking for help. I'm a one person show. I do everything on my own. Of course I would love to outsource, but the reality is like I'm very particular and I don't have a budget, so I end up doing a lot of things on my own. So asking for help is something that's really challenging for me. But I knew that if I really wanted to make a splash I would need help from my peers. So I did send some requests out to about 15 friends in the podcasting industry who have podcasts speaking to my target audience, and I asked for their support. I also went back to all of my previous podcast guests and asked for their support as well. So third best thing was press release. Second best thing was requesting support from others. And then the final thing, which is like something I almost didn't do because I was like what's the point is? I actually bought a billboard. So in Nashville there's this area called the Gulch which is right outside of downtown, high traffic, beautiful area, and there's a big billboard there. So obviously in my mind I'm like people driving by aren't going to like see this billboard, pull over, follow my show, like, and I wouldn't want them to anyway. That's like kind of dangerous. And also they're not going to like go home and then remember to go back and follow my show. But in my mind it was less about the action of the drivers and more about again going back to like market positioning. So in my mind it was all about the picture of the billboard that I could share online. So I bought the lowest priced package, which was $250 for 30 minutes on a rotating screen. So in total my podcast would get eight minutes of screen time. I showed up to that billboard, I got that picture within that 30 minute window and that ended up being the single thing that drove the most momentum to my show, just because of how cool it looked. Not only that, but I put my sponsors logo on there and it made them look really cool. So to everyone that followed me it looked like hey, angie has this awesome sponsor and they put this money behind her rebrand. But like, in reality, I bought the billboard and made my sponsor look cool, but it was my highest engaged post across all my social media platforms, like I'm talking like ever, I think, not just around the rebrand, but like at least 400% higher engagement than all the rest of my posts. And again, it just like made my whole rebrand just look more polished and looked more professional and look like I had this massive support behind me, when in reality it was just hey, I paid $250. So obviously I couldn't have known the billboard was going to have that kind of impact, but it was such an amazing promotion strategy that ended up being awesome for my podcast rebrand. So press release asking for support and then the billboard. If I had to say, if there was anything I did wrong, definitely it would be this. So I'm sure you're aware you can submit to Apple podcasts for promotional support to get on like new and noteworthy or whatever. There's just a simple air table form that you can fill out. You can do this anytime, doesn't have to be for a launch or rebrand, but I decided to take the opportunity to ask for promotion support from Apple podcasts for my rebrand. What I did was I told them all of my plans. I was like, hey, this date is really important because this is when I'm rebranding. This is everything I'm doing. I literally listed out for them every single marketing strategy that I was going to do, including the billboard, including the press release, including all the asking for support, and I thought surely they would take me seriously and, of course, want to promote this for me. But then I heard crickets and then later on I was thinking about it and I realized I was just moving too quickly. I didn't really think about this good enough or hard enough, and really what I should have done is, instead of asking for a favor from Apple Podcasts, I should have presented it as a win-win situation. So I should have presented it as a co-promotion, co-marketing, team effort strategy Like, hey, if you promote my podcast, I will, for instance, direct all of my listeners around my rebrand promotion. I will direct everyone to Apple Podcasts, so I'll only service an Apple Podcast link if you in turn, feature me on Apple Podcasts, something along those lines. I think that would have had a bigger impact. Now, I don't know for sure if that would have made Apple Podcasts look at me any differently who knows what the Apple Podcast promotion gods do but at least I think that would have given me a better chance. Now, if you're someone like me and you're a one-person production team and you're wondering how the heck you're going to stay organized through all the different moving parts of your podcast rebrand because I know it can feel overwhelming just do what I do. I always go back to my time in the music business and the things that I learned, and whenever I had a client who was maybe announcing a tour or putting out an album or even putting out a single, the first thing I would do is just pull up a simple Google sheet and create a timeline for myself so the date on the left side and then the description of whatever it is on the right side, and then just work through the list. Having things in writing makes it so much easier to digest, especially if you have deadlines. So highly recommend creating a timeline for yourself. I actually have. It's totally free. It's a podcast rebrand checklist. So just some of the things to consider if you're going into a podcast rebrand and then linked in that checklist is an example of a timeline so you can see exactly what I mean. And if you're interested in that, just go to podfluencerproductscom forward slash rebrand. To wrap it all up, let's talk about the results. Obviously, podcasting results come in time for the most part, so we're going to see how this goes in the future, but I can say in the immediate, the month that I went live with my rebrand, which was April, was my highest downloads ever. Nothing again to write home about, but definitely higher than every other month Zero negative feedback, all positive. This has been super beneficial for my brand. I feel totally in alignment now with my purpose and with my community and that allows me to be more competent, be more creative. I will say my podcast, thankfully, is always growing and evolving. So by the time you're watching this video maybe I've already made another big change. Who knows? But thank you so much again for tuning into this presentation. I hope you found it helpful. Again, you can find the podcast at podfluencersocietycom. You can get that checklist for a podcast rebrand at podfluencerproductscom forward slash rebrand. You can find me on Instagram at the Angie Griffith and I have a Facebook group called Podfluencer Community. So again, thank you so much for spending your time with me and I hope to talk to you again very soon.
Speaker 1:
21:20
If you enjoyed this episode, please visit podprosecom, slash 254. Then share the link with one person that you believe it would add value to. Until next time, thank you for listening.
