385 -Why Your Guest Outreach Is Getting Ignored

0:05 Good morning, podcasting morning chat. Today is Thursday, October 9th, 2025. And today it's Thursday, which means we're playing a clip from another podcaster. This one's all about why your guest outreach might be getting ignored. We'll break it down, share our take and add our own tips too. So if you're listening live on Clubhouse, hit the share button, bottom left hand, side of the screen and share it. However Clubhouse lets you. And if you're catching us via podcast or YouTube, please share this episode with a fellow podcaster. And now give us about 30 seconds and we'll get things rolling. Thanks for being here.

1:21 Good morning again podcasting Morning Chat. I am your host Mark Ronick and currently on stage with me. We have Nick Naul back, producer Ashley Feller, Dr. Faye and Sid Meadows, and I'm sure we're gonna hear and see more of the cast and crew here in just a moment. And as I said, it is the here's the unofficial name. It is Clip Thursday. I don't know it. It seems to work for me, the name. But at the same time, it seems very literal. And I don't want to get too clever either. So I'm just resting here for a moment on that name. We'll see if it sticks or not. Do you want to say something, Dr. Well, I'm a sucker for alliteration, so I'm trying to come up with something that begins with a TH.

2:10 Right. You know, sip Thursday. How's that? So we do have actually 2 clips but we'll see how long we go with this first clip. But if we have extra time we'll play another clip as well. And we have some other stuff to get to 1st yesterday. As some of you know, Wednesdays we do news and comment. We talk about all the headlines around the world of podcasting and content creation, and there was one story we did not get to, and Dr. brought it up to me this morning. And I think I think it's important to at least start the show talking about this, 'cause this is news in the world of podcasting and it deserves a little attention.

2:51 Go ahead, dear. Yeah. So we all knew it was coming, but now it's really happening. WTF with Marc Maron launched back in 2009 and became one of the most influential podcasts in modern history. It was known for its raw, emotional, honest interviews and no holds barred storytelling. The show helped redefine podcasting as a medium for vulnerability, cultural commentary, and deep human connection. Over 16 years and 1600 episodes. WTF featured guests ranging from Barack Obama to Robin Williams, blending comedy, philosophy and pain into unforgettable conversations.

3:40 So he hosted these episodes from his garage, or as he calls it, the Cat Ranch. Marc Maron made the intimate feel iconic. The show ends this coming Monday. I guess a little emotional. I'm sorry, I don't mean to do that. Wow. The show ends this coming Monday not as a burnout casualty, but as a conscious, creative decision to finish on his own terms one more time. OK, It's Legacy is not just for conversations. It's the invitation to tell the truth. Go deep and let the mic hear your heartbeat.

4:21 That was tough. Wow, sorry, I didn't mean to get now. Dr. Are you a big fan? Let's play with this for a second. Why so emotional? I'm not saying it to tease, I'm genuinely curious how why you think it made you emotional? He's so iconic and when I think of him, you know, he's done a lot of acting gigs in the past several years. So I am a fan of whenever I see him, his name on something, you know, on Netflix or any other platform, I will watch. But I don't, I have to. I have to see who's on in order for me to really catch his podcast.

5:08 It's not something I normally would tune into, but when I have tuned into it, he does have the ability to get people talking and saying stuff that they wouldn't normally say on a show, quote UN quote show because of this whole intimate thing that he set up. Yeah, as far as we're concerned in this industry, he is a legend. And so I do understand the emotion behind it and what he's done with not just the industry, but specifically with his podcast. Like you're pointing out, there is something really special about it for a lot of people.

5:50 And it really he found a way to really make these interviews that he did very personal. I get the emotion. And This is why I think it's important to acknowledge him stepping down, walking away. A lot of us can learn a thing or two about interviewing if we listen to him. And it doesn't matter, in my opinion, whether he's talking to big names and celebrities or, you know, Joe Schmo down the street. He finds a way to bring out the best interviews in people. And I think if we study that, I think we can learn a few things about how to do it better. Right. And the copy did say that, you know, it's it's not a commentary on burnout, but he did come out and say he was just burnout. He's lost his spark for it, You know. I mean, how many years has he been doing it? 16, Yeah.

6:45 Yeah, I hear that. And now I do have a couple of questions on burnout here. Do you see them? Which one do you think you would like to ask the room? We'll do one or two of these questions, and then we'll get to today's clip. The first question here I think makes sense to start with. OK, What part of the podcasting process drains you the most? And are you still pretending it doesn't? That is, I think the part that you're for me, I'll start and I want everybody to think about it again, that question. And if you're here live in the audience, please share in the chat. What's the part of the of podcasting that drains you the most? And I like the second part of the question, Dr. And are you still pretending it doesn't?

7:31 I might be a little more rare than a lot of you listening because not everybody does a daily podcast, but for me, it's the prep. The prep drains me and it's hard to do for me because I am also running a business at the same time. So carving out the time during the day is challenging for me because I, I've got clients to work with new clients to bring on bored or and try to find new clients. I mean, there's all sorts of stuff going on And sometimes I put the prep until the hour or so before, as Dr. knows very well, it's draining. It does make it more challenging for me.

8:14 That would be my answer. And am I still pretending it doesn't? Absolutely. I because there I definitely go through a few times a week that oh man, what am I going to do? And then I get a little stressed about it leading up to the 7:00 AM hour. So yeah, I mean, I try to pretend it's not a thing, but it's absolutely a thing for me and one that I would like to try to improve upon in 2026. For me, it would be the notes. Now I use AI on my notes. I do, but like any good AI, What do you call us AI users, people, users, There's got to be a special name for us. Like any good AI user, you need to come through a copy of what it gives you.

9:07 So my philosophy of what I do with AII always do this. I always ask for more than what I will be using. So it gives me a, a good choice of things to use and I always, I always have to find stuff to throw out. So for me, that's especially because I'm, I have to stop editing. I love editing and I have to stop editing in order to do the notes. And that probably is starting. I'm becoming a little perturbed about it. I get that. I'm becoming a little resentful. That's the word.

9:49 Let's check in with Nick. Nick, do you want to answer this one? What part of the podcasting process drains you the most? And are you still pretending it doesn't? I was thinking about this a little bit differently than you guys were. OK. I would say the most draining part for me of podcasting was always doing the interviews. And I don't mean that in a bad way. I've gone like as I was scheduling and trying to come up with a good interview schedule for the 95 podcast, there were some days that I would do back-to-back, sometimes 3 episode interviews, back-to-back to back and just staying on for that long and trying to keep that high energy.

10:33 I would get done with those interviews and I would just be absolutely drained. Like I would just be done for the rest of the day. But. I still enjoyed it. That mean a draining part of the process once or something like dripping that part. It was just bringing the energy out of Hewa. The lines of pieces of podcast and for me would have been on the marketing side of balancing how much effort to put in episodes that are already behind you that that marketing effort going and getting traction on the older episodes while also trying to make forward progress on the episodes that you're have yet to release or are releasing currently.

11:15 That to me was always a a struggle and something like that. I hear that and that first part there about getting drained after doing interviews. I totally relate to that. I mean, really, I know my limit and it's one a day and, and really I don't know that I've ever done more than say two or three in a week, right? But after one in one day, I am pretty drained. Maybe drained is actually not the right word for me. I think that I think that it really gets my adrenaline going after I'm done, especially if it was a really good interview. I'm really upbeat and I don't know if it's the ADHD or just human nature, but once that adrenaline's running, I find it's hard for me sometimes to just go back and focus on my regular day-to-day stuff. I'm too much on a high to get myself to refocus sometimes. So it takes me a while and then I think I get drained after that.

12:11 Then I just, once I let that adrenaline do its thing and run its course, I tend to hit the wall at that point and feel a little bit drained. So it's hard for me personally to do more than one in a day. So I, but you know, you interviewed me and I know that you did some really extensive research when you interviewed me. So I think your extensive research that you do on the people that you interview, it's like it's stirring the pot, you know, then the interview is like eating the meal and it's like, Oh my God, I'm so. Yeah, yeah.

12:52 I think especially now with AII, actually don't feel drained doing the prep. I find it fun. Maybe that's just because AI is still relatively new to me in my world of even though it's been a few years now. But yeah, I think I enjoy the prep process and I do usually. Unlike what I shared earlier about prepping for the day-to-day show when it's an interview, I do prep more in advance for it. And so those two things coupled together, it doesn't feel draining to me as much as actually once I'm done with the interview, then I'm just then it's just, I think maybe it's all it all comes at me at once.

13:34 It all kind of settles and I'm like, OK, now I need to take a deep breath and relax. Anyone else want to share or shall we move forward? Go ahead, Sid. Good morning. Good morning everybody. So we had a similar conversation earlier in the week about this and my answer then was editing, which will always be my thing that I hate the most about doing podcasting, but I don't edit anymore. So that's good thing for me and my show and my listeners. But I will say the thing that's really the most frustrating is the marketing of the show and getting the show out there, getting it discovered, talking about it, posting in all the right places, doing all the right things or things. But just the marketing of it can be really frustrating to grow your reach.

14:21 And there's so many different places, I mean different things, different options, clips, no clips. And so it can get, it can get a little bit heavy at times in trying to put all the stuff out there. Yeah, I think I saw Ashley agreed. I agree as well. I think that part, yeah. And I think that's because, well, for me, it's because I do all the other things for the podcast and by the time I get to the marketing and promotions stuff, I'm drained. It's like, oh man, I just feel like I got over the hump and now I've got another mountain to climb. So I relate to that so much. Sid, thank you for sharing that.

15:01 OK, here's what we're going to do real quick. I do. Before I play today's clip of the day, I'd want to let you know about Matt Bliss. You know Matt Bliss, our one of our fine Co hosts from, well, originally he's from Australia, now living in Ireland. I believe he put out an episode this week of Rethinking Podcasting. That's his podcast on the harmful obsession of podcasting as a discipline, which kind of goes along with a lot of what we were talking about. So I just wanted to encourage you to go check it out. I'll give you a description and there's maybe a little bias as to why I'd like you to check it out the description says.

15:44 In this episode, Matt gives a few reflections on how too much podcasting specific research can become a problem when building your show. It doesn't help when podcast optimization means your own unique perspective and content takes a back seat to the growth hacks. He talks about Inception Point A is cheap content system that's a company that creates podcasts, all with AI, including hosts. I believe why it took him so long to make Rethinking Podcasting and mentions the Podcasting Morning Chat where our community and our unique perspectives help us steer clear of a lot of the typical hacks and tactics.

16:28 And I think what he means really there is that's what he appreciates about the podcasting Morning Chat, is that we all share our different opinions and we don't necessarily share one way as the gospel. We want to give that podcaster listening the opportunity to hear what others are doing and find what resonates most with them and take action on that first. So I think that's what Matt's talking about. So go to rethinkingpodcasting.com. It's episode 14 and as I said, it's called the episode's called on the harmful obsession of podcasting as a discipline. Check that out.

17:10 Let's give him some analytics, shall we? Let's go and press play. Listen to that show and help Rethinking Podcasting with the their analytics, help them grow. Thank you, Matt Bliss, for the mention and talking about what we do here at the Podcasting Morning Chat. All right, we're going to play our first clip of the morning. And this comes from Dare to Care podcast. It's about a year or so old and we found it on TikTok at Dare to self-care Pod. That is the TikTok handle and I believe OK, yeah. And yeah, this that I was just going to tell you about another clip.

17:53 This is a different clip. So we'll play this clip. She's talking about guesting and ghosting. Why? You may reach out to guests, start the conversation, then all of a sudden you don't hear from them. Or maybe they just say, sorry thanks but no thanks. I've decided I don't want to be on your show. So let's hear her opinion and then I want to hear how you feel about it. And I have some additional questions after that. I've had some major guests come on my podcast and I'm going to let you in on the secret. If you're struggling to get a response from where you're getting ghosted by potential podcast guests, you're probably asking too much of them. I cannot tell you how many times I've had people ask me to come in their podcast and I say yes, and I'm intrigued and then they're like, great, let's get on a 30 minute call schedule that here and we'll talk about what we're going to talk about on the podcast and then schedule the podcast episode and we'll do that for about an hour. And no, immediately, no ghost in sorry, it's not intentional. I just like I, I literally can't keep up with the scheduling. When you're a small podcast, they're doing you a favor. OK, so here's the trick.

18:54 You're going to want to put everything in that initial DM or e-mail so that when they first see it and they're first intrigued and they're first interested and you have their attention, they can schedule the recording right there on the spot and they're done. Goes directly on their calendar. But a Bing but a boom. Within 5 seconds, they saw the e-mail, they scheduled it, and it's on their calendar. OK so there you go. That is from Dare to self-care pod on TikTok and I see Janae wants to come up and join us as well for a response. So let's just start with the broad question to begin, and then I'll get more specific with some questions for all of you. And again, if you're listening in the audience and by the way, we got a full house in the audience today. Welcome, everyone.

19:36 Thank you for being here today. If you want to join the conversation, by all means, hit the raise your hand button here on Clubhouse and come up and join the conversation. And if you're feeling a little shy, which as a podcaster, why are you feeling shy to come up and talk? But if you are, go ahead and put it in the chat as well. And I do recognize there are other reasons why you may not be able to join us up here this morning. So I will go to Janae first since he's joined us. Janae, do you agree that small podcasts often ask too much from guests or potential guests during the booking process? And have you ever been guilty of that? Let's hear from you. I love this topic because this is something that I've done in the past and you know, continue.

20:25 I don't know if I'm continuing to do it anymore even though I have all of the information providing to the guest that I'm inviting. Hey, this is what I'm about. So I used to do the previous interview calls and then book the episode to record and sometimes they were booked two months later. So you'd really sit down with a guest to book them and you tell them, OK, we're going to do this, but it's not until December. Exactly. OK, exactly. And it's kind of crazy because as the time approaches, guess what life happened, How do I have to cancel?

21:05 Either the guest has to cancel, then you have to reschedule. I'm like, this is very, this is a lot of toll because there's a lot of people waiting. And so I've got a new idea that I'll share later. I love this, you know, being better on what she says. You know, you book a time, but even if your calendar is full, just what's happening, you're still booking two weeks ahead, which is probably not as bad as two months. It's a big deal. And we all know a solution that helps a lot of these things together, like pod match and aligning with the guests that you're looking for and aligning with the host that you're looking to be a guest of. Thank you, Janae.

21:49 So do you agree with the idea of not because I I didn't quite catch this from you. Do you agree that maybe it's best to skip the pre call the pre interview because that's what she was talking about, she doesn't like the idea? OK, go ahead. Yes, I agree that to skip the pre interview called because again, if you're inviting somebody to your podcast, you got to be very specific on what you want from them so that they know exactly they're in their zone of genius as opposed to hey, come be a guest on my show. What's your podcast about? It's about this. What can I talk about? You know, so having that DM filled in with, Hey, here's what I want from you based on your expertise and they're more comfortable as supposed to who's this random person looking or looking to take my time and and record a podcast with me. OK.

22:46 Thank you, Janae. I appreciate that. And I know that we've talked about this even maybe somewhat recently, just that idea of do we or don't we do the pre interview and I know I've shared and I'll just say it quickly, I'm not going to go into a whole spiel about it, but I personally prefer to do it. I like I like building rapport with my guests and I like getting to know them a little bit, getting to know getting to on the same page as them and vice versa before we ever hit record. But I do hear what this person in this clip was sharing that it may be annoying to people that they don't want to keep having to sit down with you and they just want to if they want a one and done. I get that that's the case.

23:33 She does kind of imply or actually she might even directly say this is specific to smaller podcasts. And she did even say something about guests are doing you a favor by coming on your show. So you have to be courteous of that. And that I don't know if it really applies to small podcasts, big podcasts, or any podcast who's off mic somebody's morning. Everybody. I've been on podcasts where I had the pre interview and I've been on podcasts where I didn't. It just depends on what's in the pre interview. I think that's the key if, if it's a quick, you know, getting all the semantics out, seeing if there's any questions, that might be pretty good. I've also been on podcasts and I know I've done this myself. You know, can you meet like 10 minutes before or whatever, minutes before, half hour before, just to make sure everything is checked, you know, all your stuff is checked. And then we kind of do a pre interview. Is there anything?

24:36 So I mean, there's a lot of different ways you can do it when you're booking out, like Janae is so far in advance. Like you said, life happens and their message might be different. So that's always a good thing to have as well. It's what really works for you, don't you think? It's what you and your Co host or slash interviewee. It's like, what's the perfect length of a podcast? And we're not going to go down there. There is no perfect length. I hate to break the news to you. It's what you like. And I think that's the same thing with this kind of stuff, unfortunately. I was just going to say I I always liked the pre interview just because I framed it as a way to basically see if it was a good fit for the show. Like I never came in and was like, Hey, you're going to be on the podcast. This is what's happening.

25:20 Like let's have a conversation, see if like your experience and what you bring to the table is going to be a good fit for the show because I don't want to waste your time. You want to waste my time. Like that's kind of how it is. So it would always be a quick 10-15 minute get in, get out. All right, let's do it. But when I was hearing Janae talk, I, I was thinking this kind of takes that what I just said out of it. But you could also lock them in for the interview and then a week or two weeks prior to the interview, get them on a quick call to kind of like brief them and kind of give them the rundown on it. That way you're not saying, hey, let's book a quick call. OK, now let's book the interview and like just kind of overwhelming them with scheduling type stuff.

26:05 You, you lock them in for the interview and then work out the details from there. And if you can't make it happen for the pre interview, Oh well, at least you got them booked for the actual interview but you're not overwhelming them. Yeah. I like that Nick. I like that a lot because then yeah, like you're saying, it's not a lot of overwhelm. They you've asked them. I hope that most people at the very least with whether they're doing a pre call or not that they are at least getting some questions answered from that guest so that they can get on the same page. But yeah, basically not telling them in advance you'd like to do a pre call, waiting a week or so before and then saying, hey, would you be open to getting on a quick call so we can talk about the interview beforehand.

26:46 I like that idea cuz if they're free, they'll probably do it because let's be real, a lot of guests, not all guests, but a lot of guests might be feeling a little nervous about it. This might help break that ice a little bit for them. I like that idea. And that would also help alleviate the issue where Janae was talking like you get them on a call and then they can't do the interview for two months afterwards. Like you've had so many conversations since then. Do you even remember that quick little pre interview that you did with that person? Like it? It kind of brings everyone on the same page. Absolutely. And Chris Baker's on stage. Chris, good morning. Welcome back. What did you want to add? I've never almost never done pre interviews, although sometimes maybe there's even a 5 minute exchange before we start.

27:32 I will say though, I've you know, at about 370 shows now, I have actually just scrapped a few because they were so bad. One case, the guy just had such a bad accent that I just said I was repeatedly asking him what I do think sometimes, you know, I wish I would have a pre conversation just to go over things because every once in a while, you know, I'll, I'll get somebody awesome on the chat on stream where I said, can you do something about the dog or the guy who was a documentary filmmaker who didn't have enough sense to turn off his phone when we were talking. Every once in a while I just like to do a pre call just to go over stuff like that. That stuff that I thought was obvious but isn't, you know, put your dog someplace, turn off your phone.

28:15 But usually there's enough back and forth an e-mail where where we end up talking about these things and, and most cases too, you know, it's always a question of, you know, hey, what time zone are you, what time zone am I? You know, that kind of thing. As I pointed out, an empowered podcasting and the most mind boggling and the most head scratching thing for me is I will have these guests and I've had them with 300,000 Twitter followers and there is nothing from them on Twitter. I mean, I realize they've already done me a favor by coming on the show, but I'm just like, can you at least do this little 15 second favor of sending out a? Tweet. But they don't. Sometimes it's just laziness.

28:58 I send them a link to the tweet. I mean, you can click on the tweet and I don't know what to do. I I've thought about, you know, like sending out like a little workflow sheet, you know, just like something yes, we, we do this on stream yard. We do, you know, this will be audio and video because Suzanne and Gracia have came on and she didn't. Oh, I didn't know we were doing video. Well, I would have, you know, fixed all my makeup. I was actually waiting to suggest that I think giving a checklist to all of our guests ahead of time can only help us and, and the things that you listed, I would absolutely put those on there, you know, make sure your dogs, small children and noise making people are out out of the room, door closed, etcetera.

29:38 And let me go to Yvonne and thank you again, Chris. Yvonne, please. I, I think you wanted to respond a little bit to that. And I know you're up here because you just wanted to share as well. So go for it. Good morning to you. Good morning. First of all, I want to talk about this idea that they're doing us a favor. I wrote that down. I'm glad you want to bring that up. Go ahead. Yeah, because it's come up a couple of times. And here's the thing, it's it's an exchange. It's an exchange of favors. We are doing them a favor by giving them a platform to come on our podcast as well. And I I do love doing a pre interview, but I have to say it depends if I'm trying to get somebody who I already know that they have media experience, that they have been on other podcasts, that they are good at talking about what they do.

30:33 I don't need a pre interview if I feel like I have a really good handle on why I want them on the show and what I want to talk about with them. Don't need the pre interview in that case. But if it's somebody who has, I have found out something about them, I don't know if they have any experience even coming on Zoom. I don't know what their tech experience is with being able to get hooked up properly to make sure they're in a good space. All the things Chris was talking about. So in those cases, I think a pre interview is essential. I'm with you, Yvonne. And great points too.

31:14 And yeah, let's talk about that for a second. The whole idea of doing a favor. And you know, that wasn't just Chris's language, like that was in the clip itself that that this woman was suggesting that the guests are all doing us a favor. And I agree with you, Yvonne, that it is an exchange. And granted, some of these guests might have much larger followings than we do, but I but that's they're still they don't have to come on your podcast, especially if they don't know you. Why are they quote UN quote, doing us a favor? There's clearly something behind that, right? They're joining us because maybe they want to promote something. They want to help spread the message that they are trying to share. There's could be a plethora of reasons. And I think that we might be hurting ourselves if we are looking at the guests as doing us a favor because I think then we and some people will cower to the guest. And, and that doesn't feel like a natural conversation to me. I don't like giving the power to the host. I don't like giving the power to the guest. I like it to be a shared power.

32:19 That is the most constructive conversation. Yeah. But it comes down to knowing how to be a guest and doing the simple things. And I think a lot of times, just like, oh, I'm going to start a podcast. It can't be that hard. I just press record, which he is and it isn't, you know, people learning to everybody wants to be a guest. Nobody wants to host a lot of times because it's just easier. But because you show up, you do your thing. But there is some work. And to your point, if you send out that pre e-mail to say, you know, for tech issues and, and all the other stuff, if you lay the groundwork early, I mean, I know I, I don't know who it was maybe Ashley or somebody else years ago or months ago or whatever talked about, you know, they give out a, they give out a media packet and they still don't even, all they have to do is click and they still don't even forward it to their people. And people don't read.

33:13 Well, that's all another issue. To your point, Yvonne, Yeah, they don't read, they don't want to. They just want to show up, do their thing and leave. Well, there is the devil's in the details. That's the sad part. But training guests as part of being a host? Thank you, Alex. I'm going to go to Sid and then Lindsay, you're on deck. Thank you for being patient and waiting here on stage. We will come to you in a moment. Sid, what do you want to add to all this? Yeah, lots of thoughts about this topic. I do agree with what Yvonne said that it's a two way St. we're doing for them what they're doing for us. I do have a pre call with every one of my guests and you know in that pre call I try to schedule the recording and all that. But you know, the thing that I don't want to just kind of highlight is it's not their show, it's your show. And I think that we have to release any preconceived ideas that we have that our guest is going to help make our show successful.

34:12 It's our show and it's our responsibility to market and do it. And I think we just have to let go of, well, they didn't, they didn't repurpose the content, they didn't do this, they didn't do that. And I just think we have to let that go because it's not their show, It's our show, It's your show. And it's your responsibility to do the marketing of it and not rely on someone else to do it for you. So that's a little bit of a contrarian position, I think, Mark. But again, it's your show and you're responsible for it. So that's my thoughts on it. Yeah, I'm with you, Sid. Thank you for sharing that perspective. I think that's, yeah, it's important. Let me bring up Renee as well. Renee, we will come to you in a moment. Let's check in with Lindsaya. Good morning, Lindsaya.

34:54 Thanks again for your patience. What do you want to add to this whole conversation about that clip? Yeah, good morning. And I love the conversation has LED towards energy exchange too. And I do believe that each position I love said that you said like the sovereignty and ownership of the of the podcaster. For me, I think it's important to have many different pathways, so many different funnels, systems, automations set in based on how the guest is coming in because it is different. Like if you apply to be on the show, that's a much different scenario than if I am seeking you out and requesting for you to join everything from if you're asking to be on the podcast and essential to get covered.

35:47 There's also a marketing agreement that must happen. You're agreeing to do certain things. One of them is something that I don't really need you to depend on you reposting. It's all about the world of collaboration. So I'm going to make you a collaborator on post. That's different than if I seek you out because someone who has a much bigger following, whether we like it or not, they do have a, they have, they are giving more in the way of exposure. So when we think about energetic exchange, it's the same as if you pay for advertising. The bigger the audience, the bigger the spend. And so if you have a smaller audience for your podcast and your marketing isn't going to bring a big audience or exposure to them, then they're giving more generously, which means if there has to be some energy, some way in which they're getting something. Otherwise for me, like, you know why? I'll use myself as an example.

36:45 And I'm far from a big influencer. However, if you invite me onto your podcast and I want to share my message, that doesn't necessarily mean that your podcast is something that I would seek out or that your audience is my ideal target market. I may want to practice, I may want to spread my message and hope to reach more people. And so there is a reminder that like it for me, it's really how we the the origination of how that person is coming onto the platform. But then that discerns how they're going to be treated, what it is that they're going to be, you know, what they're going to be asked to do or what's going to be quote on quote expected. And then for me, I think it's all about the position and the vision of each podcast.

37:35 If you're the kind of podcast that you're long for maybe or you'd like to have more, you know, front loaded information, a pre interview can be amazing. If you're someone that is doing something more short form or more off the cuff, you want it to flow more in that way, I think the pre interview can impact that energy. So I think it's never one or the other. And I love that that was said more times than once today that it really is about what is it you're trying to bring to life? And then I do think, you know, again, having those automated pathways and understanding the difference between someone asking to come on the podcast versus you ask. Lindsay, bring in it.

38:16 Thank you. Lindsay, I'm I'm with you. And the one point that sticks out of, of many is that that idea of really having a, an honest conversation with the guest about how you would you would like them to promote the episode. You want to ask them, in my opinion, if they're willing and comfortable to repost or share the content from the episode that you're producing and putting out there. Talk to them about your expectations and ask them if they're on board and I find that a pre interview call or if it's before the the actual interview minutes before. But to carve out a little bit of time to actually look them in the eye.

39:02 If you're doing this, say on Riverside or in person. But to be able to look them in the eye and tell them what your expectations are, tell them the intentions and ask them are you cool with this? Are you comfortable? Will you do this? And please share why you may not want to do this? I want to hear, I want to understand because if you have resistance, my other guests may have resistance and I want to learn why this isn't working for you, why you don't want to do this. I think having those conversations and doing them as opposed to just putting it in an e-mail, asking them to check a box or sign off that they're going to do this thing, it's so less personal. Area 1 donor and So what also comes up for me is that when you're asking someone to do advertising on your behalf, to me it is more than a conversation. If they have a larger audience than you like, it cost someone money if they want me to cross promote anything. Period.

40:06 If I'm not involved in it, it costs money. If you want me to put it in my newsletter. If you want me to put it on my social medias. If you want me to send it out to my text list. If you want me to put it into my Facebook group. If you want me to add it to my app. Like each interface in which I am going to promote something that isn't directly derived from my creation, there is a fee unless I unless I have sought it out and I'm Co collaborating with somebody. So someone asking me to be on their podcast doesn't mean that you and you get access because my face is on your podcast to me promoting it like it's something that I have in my marketing scheme that's going to fit my messaging, that's going to fit what I'm promoting. Even if the message is aligned with what I share, it may not be in alignment with all of that unless I've considered it and there's an it's advantageous. And so I think we must consider that it's more than like requesting that really is again, like what's in it for them. If it isn't money, it must be something that's my my belief. And so like that.

41:05 What could that be? And I just wanted to add that in as an example. Thank you. And yeah, again, bringing it to this morning. Thank you, Lindsay. And yeah, their reasoning may be that your content that you want to put out there isn't on brand with them. And you might stop now and say, but Mark, it's them talking, so it's got to be on brand for them. They're sharing their message, but there could be lots of other branding issues. It may not look and feel like the content that they're working so hard to create, create of their own. It just may not fit well with what they're doing. And even adding you as a collaborator, they may not want to hit the accept button because it just doesn't jive with their content. There are legitimate reasons that we have to think about. And especially, like I said, if they're bigger creators that have taken the time to build up this brand, they don't want to messy the waters, muddy the waters. I'm with you there.

42:04 Let's check in with Renee. Renee, thanks for your patience. What do you want to add to all this? Yeah, I come to this from a marketing standpoint, having placed myself on podcast or placing my coworkers or placing my clients on podcast. So what what I see happening is, you know, I'm judging this whole thing from the very first e-mail and what's going on. You guys talked about that earlier like what how are you presenting yourself to me and are you giving me a little bit of bullet points on what's going to happen in this Like first we're going to do this, then we're going to do this, then we're going to do this. OK, that's wonderful do we get past that?

42:45 But then where I get super impressed and nobody's done it. So I'm going to tell you what is missing because I backtrack and do this myself. I go back when we've I've been on YouTube because I can't, I know how to optimize YouTube. I know that platform. I don't know how to optimize for podcasts, but assuming it's the same but for YouTube, I will go back and I will go tell them to put all of these things. I want you to optimize our our everything from the title. I'll give them the whole new title. I'll give them the keywords, I'll give them all the descriptions and everything. And we've gotten ourselves from from nothingness to like #5 on a really good podcast because we went in there and then I went back and did it again and I edited it again and they didn't care.

43:29 He just sent it to his team guy and re edit it. That's our best success story with that. But what what I want is, I would love it if you said, what keywords do you want us to optimize for? OK, now I know you're thinking because you're thinking for me, you're thinking what's going to help me get in front of my audience. So if you ask me that and make that optional, optional if you want us to really drill down into your niche, what keywords, what descriptors would you like? But the other thing, if you want to impress me, tell me that you're going to be sending me social squares. We could, we would call them a square, but they're not a square anymore. You know, we're going to have to do a 3 by 4 for Instagram or a four by 5, but you're going to send me the social art and give me 5 versions because how hard is that? And look at my brand, Have your artist look at both brands. Give them something that's going to look good on their grid or on their walls and make them the social square. Nobody's going to if you do all the work for them and give them, give them the content bytes, give them 3 or 4 choices for what the content should be underneath. Now you are sending that say we will send you all of the that you can send it to him beforehand. Hey, I'm going to be on this podcast. Probably they're probably not going to post that one, but then after it is, here's everything.

44:44 Pack it up, send it to him or give him a little Google Drive link. Here's everything. Pick from it. They're going to think you're the best thing and you're going to be the best experience podcast because you did the leg work for them. And that is only if you want them to market and do the push for you. If you don't want them to market for you, don't do that. But if you're expecting that and that still doesn't guarantee they're going to do it, but if you've done 80% of it for them and they like it, they might even come back with a tweak. Hey, can you fix this something, something, I don't know, they want to fix something the colors off a little bit here or here's our hex colors. Can you please make it totally a brand? Do it. I mean, this is all worth it. The amount of time you put into that to get a push in into their audience, worth every penny as far as I'm concerned.

45:31 But those are the things that you can do to to interest me as a marketer when I see you coming because I'm going to judge you from that first e-mail. I'm sorry, I'm judging. I'm judging. Renee, you know what, you mentioned a lot of the stuff that I do, but you also said some of the stuff that I might be stealing from you. So right now we do for each episode that goes out for my clients, we do three shorts and we do three, what I call Q&A's. And that would be a horizontal and it's the host asking a question and the guest answering the question. It could be two minutes, it could be 8 minutes, it could be however long it takes them to answer that question.

46:18 So we do three of those. We do three shorts in the e-mail I also send them, they can do a copy paste because I send them like a a little blurb that they can put in that they could just do a copy paste or they can use that as a template. But I think I'm going to start sending them some keywords as well. I think that's a great idea. Yeah, I like that too. I love the collaborative suggestions, right. It was to really sit down and talk with that guest and using and showing them that you know what you're talking about and that you know what may be of interest to them when you're having this conversation about collaborative sharing of your content.

47:00 I love that. Thank you. Let's see, Sid, I know earlier you had your hand up. Did you want to add anything else? Yeah, I will. Thank you, Mark. So one of the things I love about podcasting is you get to do it your way. There are really no rules. They're not really any guidelines. You get to do it your way, whatever type of show you want, however you want to do. And everybody's brought up really valid points. Lindsay and Renee is this amazing things that I think are great tips and potentially great takeaways. But for me, what I think about is the experience that my guest is going to have with me.

47:41 And it's not just being on my show. It's with me in general from the first time that I reach out to them till the thank you afterwards. And I think about what's the experience that I'm curating for them so that they want to. I want them to be in a place that they've had such a great experience with me that they want to do things that they want to share it, not that they have to or made them sign. This is me that they have made all these assets for them or made them sign a contract or whatever it is. None of those are bad, but I want them to have such an experience with me that they want to share my show, that they want to share that they were on my show, that they're proud of that fact. And so that's where I come from and thinking of starting with gratitude that they're on my show and how can I curate an experience for them that they want to help me grow my show because that's what they're doing.

48:30 It's helping you grow their show. So again, nobody's wrong. Great tips today, but I just look at it a little bit differently and trying to curate an experience for my guests that they want to, they want to participate and they want to share. I agree, Sid. I think it does all start with curating that awesome experience for the guest. And I think if you're good at what you do, if you're a good interviewer, if you're a good listener, if you are bringing out the best in that guest, if you then that they're going to be more likely more interested in sharing that experience with their audience. I think that they're.

49:10 Before you go on, yeah, I'm sorry. Before you go on, so I heard a guest speak on this guy speak on Katie Brinkley's podcast about artificial intelligence, and I was just blown away. And he says in the episode, hey, if you'll send me an e-mail with this in the subject line, I promise I'll respond to you. So I did it and I said, hey, I really enjoyed what you said. I'd like to talk to you about being a guest of my show. Here's the link to schedule. Or I didn't even put the link. And I did put the link and I know I don't even remember now. Anyways, I reached out to him about two weeks later. He responded. And so we got something scheduled and we had a fabulous call about what he's doing and AI and all these crazy things.

49:54 And then he talked about scheduling. And I said, well, you're going to be the one of the first or second episodes of my new season, which is not going to launch until late January. So let's just delay the recording until December and I'll reach out to you in early December to get you on the books. And he goes, that's great. And when you were done, can you send me the video file? I'll send it to my team and they can do with it. I said, absolutely happy to do that for you. I'll share a Google folder with you and, and listen to him. I heard what he said, I followed his action steps to get a response. I got a response, he had a great call, and now a stranger is going to be a guest of my show. And I just keep thinking about how do I make the experience with him that his experience with me is the best podcast experience he's ever had?

50:38 I love that. And yeah, I was thinking about that earlier and I forgot about it, so I'm glad you brought it up. Just that idea of I'm OK with it. If my guest wants to take the whole long form recording or maybe my edited version of the recording and break it all down into clips of their own and use them as they wish, I'm OK with that. If it means that they're going to share the content. And as long as they're tagging or adding me as a collaborator to the content that they're sharing, I'm, I'm, I'm pleased as punch as they say. I'm very happy to do that. So that's a, it's a great strategy and a great story too.

51:19 Thank you, Sid, for sharing that with us. I think we're at a spot. This is a good time to wrap up. I would love to remind you to come back and join us tomorrow at 7:00 AM Eastern. We'll be talking more things podcasting and of course we're going to be sharing our wins from this past week. And if you want to learn anything more about the Podcasting Morning chat in this awesome community and why we have such great chats as we do, go visit our website podpage.com/PMC to learn more about us. Until Friday. Make it a great day everybody, take care.