432. Your Podcast Workflow Isn’t Broken…Until It Is

0:04 Good morning podcasting, morning chat. Today is Friday, January 9th, 2026 and today production workflows. Too many tools and the moment that you realize your process might be slowing you down, we're unpacking when to visit your setup and when to stop chasing the next shiny thing. 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, chatter, YouTube, Facebook, all the things, please share this with a fellow at fellow podcaster. And now give us about 30 seconds. We'll get things rolling. Thanks for being here. Good morning again podcasting, Morning Chat. Thanks so much for being here.

1:24 I am your host, Mark Ronick, and currently on stage with me, we have Dr. Faye Ralph Estep, producer Ashley Feller, Sid Meadows, Matt Bliss and Nick Nallback. Shout out to those of you who have joined us bright and early this morning, maybe even not so bright looking out my window. Tim Abbey, Kathy Austin, thank you for being here. Appreciate you guys showing up right when we kick off the show. Nice to see you. So today, yes, I've shared already. We're going to get into some workflow and production tool overwhelm thanks to producer Ashley. I'll explain in just a minute.

2:05 Pod Fest is coming up next week. I'm really looking forward to it. Sidebar, I'm a little nervous now about my presentation. I'm actually very confident over all about it, but I need to practice more. I know once I'm there and on stage a certain switch goes off of my head and the there aren't the nerves go away and I'm just happy to be in front of a group of people and able to connect with all those people. But currently, you know, the anticipation leaves a little bit of nerves. But if you're not able to come and not able to be see that presentation or join our happy hour. I know that some of you were probably feeling a little bummed about it. And I think for those of you who are what I want to share with you, this may help a little bit.

2:50 You can now watch the entire Empowered Podcasting 2 Conference on demand. It's 25 plus sessions from many of the same voices that you'd expect to hear at Pod Fest. People who are actively building, growing and supporting podcasters every single day. You'll hear real lived experiences, practical strategies that you can actually use, and thoughtful conversations around podcasting, community growth and sustainability. So if you're missing out on Pod Fest, but still want high level insight, inspiration, maybe some clarity for your podcast in 2026, this gives you a lot of that value at a fraction of that cost. And if you waited until today to get your podcast tickets, by the way, they went up again.

3:40 So get all the details at ironicmedia.com/courses slash EPC 2025 and remember that's that Ironic is spelled IRONICK. So that's Ironic media.com/courses slash EPC 2025. Let's dig in to today's show. This is one of the posts in our Facebook group the other day that stopped me in my tracks and felt very real and very important to dig into here on the show. And then we'll get into our wins from the week, as we do every Friday. So earlier this week, producer Ashley shared a post in the Facebook group about production workflows. She was digging into how often we revisit our workflows, how we know when it's time to make changes, and what it looks like to work across multiple editing tools at the same time. And really, we can even open that up. It doesn't even have to necessarily be editing tools. It can be any of the tools that we're using in our production process, pre post, etcetera.

4:50 She talked about using though Descript, Da Vinci Resolve, Cap Cut and Audacity depending on the job and what the experience has been like for her. So the post surfaced questions around efficiency, comfort, skill, growth, and how our work flows tend to evolve as our experience grows. This is something a lot of podcasters and producers are actively thinking about. And if they're not, they're probably just tearing their hair out trying to figure out why things don't feel like they're working well. How your process supports your work, how your tools shape your speed and confidence, how intentional your workflow actually is. These are the things that those podcasters and producers are thinking about.

5:35 So today, we're going to spend some time unpacking all of that. We'll talk about revisiting workflows, choosing those tools, and what it looks like to build a process that actually works for you. And like I said, since it's Friday, we'll wrap up things by sharing wins from our past week. So if you haven't been thinking about your wins, shame on you. Just kidding. But start thinking about them now. So let's dig in and really start with, I think the best question to start with is when do you know it's time to revisit your workflow? I know that this is a question I've asked myself before.

6:16 I've been using Trello for my company and my clients for our workflow. And I know Dr. can attest 'cause she's one of the editors on our team. It works really well overall, but I feel like I've actually felt like over the past really, honestly, if I'm being genuine about this probably past two years, I know that we've outgrown it. It works enough to where I don't feel like, oh, I have to change this. But if I don't change it soon, I think it's going to be a problem. And we're working on that actually as we speak, finally. Do you remember what it was that made you say? I wish I could do that.

7:01 I think it's really just seeing the flow and seeing the holes in the process. I don't know that I can point to one thing and even if I did, it might not make a lot of sense to everyone else unless I give you the whole process. But I can say like I would, I would just notice small holes in the process. Maybe Dr. maybe there's something that you might notice about our process. But yeah, I think that's just like. There's I'm a Trello girl through and through. I mean, I love, I love Trello. And I do too. And with the cool thing is, is that what we're the new software we're moving to? If you're interested in checking out, go to Webbie WEB i.e. dot AI.

7:43 But the cool thing is, is that we've set up a workflow process that we're still testing, but it seems to be working well that mimics what we were doing on Trello, but it also fills in some of those holes for us at the same time. I'm really looking forward to that. But I saw some other people wanted to share a little bit answering that question. When do you know it's time to revisit your workflow, Dr.? Since you're already unmuted, I'll start with you. I have a reputation for loving my app Sumo. Yeah, that's an understatement. And whenever I purchase a new toy, basically a new tool, I try and fit it in. Whenever I buy it, I want to test it out because not to give Appsuma more, more advertising, but you can return it within 60 days if you don't like it.

8:39 So I want to try and get on board with it within those 60 days. So I change it up quite regularly if I have a new tool that's going to join the group basically, and if it doesn't work I go back to the the workflow that does work. OK, that's fair. I know that, you know, look, some people, they may not because I don't ever get the impression that all of these apps that Dr. digs into, I don't get the impression that she gets very overwhelmed by all of them. But I know that there are a lot of us out there that if we just kept going for that next tool, we'd probably really start to feel overwhelmed. And I know I'm really speaking mostly for myself, but I've seen it happen in other in others as well.

9:25 You have the right kind of brain, I think, to be able to do what Dr. does. Sid, I'm going to come to you and then I'll go to Ralph. Hey, good morning everybody. I think that to answer your question, when do you know it's time to change your workflow is when you change. It really is boils down to when you change something about your product or your show. So are you adding YouTube to it? Are you adding additional segments to it? Are you adding sponsors to it? Are you, you know, doing different things? And then it's time to look at what what is working and what's not working. It can also be where you just feel like there's some inefficiencies that you want to try to streamline, especially with the continuing advent of AI.

10:09 How can you leverage AI to make your workflow easier for everybody and also faster? Fair enough. So, but Sid, I mean, how do you know if something I, I appreciate what you're saying, right? As you're evolving, you may need a new workflow, new tools, etcetera. But what if, yeah, you're evolving, but what if they're? How do you know when something isn't working right anymore that you have to address? I think frustration is part of that, Like, oh, this takes me so much long, so much time to do. Oh, I wish there was a better way. I think that's certainly a key sign that, hey, you need to change something. But I also think it's about, like, making it easier.

10:52 Like I'm looking at the things we're going to be doing in Season 7 and my head is spinning with all the things we've got to do. And I'm asking myself, well, how can without creating an AI agent, which is probably the right thing to do, but how could we make this easier and faster for all of us? Because we're going from 2 shows a month to four, in some cases, 5 shows a month. So we're increasing, which means we should look at the workflow to see what we could do to streamline it and make it easier and more efficient for everyone. Yeah, there you go. Thank you, Sid. Appreciate that. I'm going to keep it going and check in with Ralph and then Matt Bliss. So go for it, Ralph. Good morning. Good morning, Mark.

11:33 Yeah, I think we should take a step back here because one of the things that I noticed as I'm working with podcasters and content creators is a lot of people don't have a workflow system in the first place. And I think that maybe is a better place to start the conversation. Actually, Abby is my, I'll call her my executive producer. She's actually in the audience today. And with doing all the content work that I do, we had to really spend a great deal of time building a system. And what I see a lot of content creators doing is they don't have a system in the first place. And the problem is if you don't have a system in the 1st place, that's a sure way to get burned out. You know, like James Clear says, you're going to fall to the level of your systems. And I think as we're having this discussion, I think it's great evidence about when do we change it? But how many content creators, Mark, don't have a system in the 1st place?

12:22 Those systems are going to keep you from burning out. They're going to keep you from getting frustrated because you're going to have a methodology, even if it's something like a checklist. You know, with each show I do this, or with each post I do this. I just see that as a huge gap. Yeah, Thank you for bringing that up. I think that is important because as independent podcasters, yeah, a lot of us are winging it. We, we are learning as we go and sometimes not, not pausing and documenting the process. So that, I think is that first step for those people who are kind of winging it. Start writing down. Just write down the things that you're doing as you go next episode, from from the process of planning to the process of publishing to the process of promoting.

13:13 Write each step down as you go, at least to get started. It's also going to show you where your time is being spent too, which a lot of people don't realize how much leakage of time they have. And when you do what you just said. Mark, I took the Dale Carnegie classes and one of the things we learned in Dale Carnegie is to measure your day, Manage every part of your day so you know where your time is going. What you might find is the stuff that gives you better return on investment. I know maybe it's a jargon wheel item, but the things that give you the most return on investment are the things you need to spend more time doing. But as content creators, I think sometimes we fall into the trap of doing those low value things because we enjoy doing them, but they're not helping us build what we're trying to build. Thank you, Ralph.

13:56 I'm going to check in with Matt Bliss and then we'll hear from Nick as well. Go ahead, Matt. The key thing isn't constantly substituting tools to fill holes, because that's when you end up with a massive tech chain. But at the same time, if you recognize a hole and you can fill it with tech, then I think that's a really good first step to get to the stage that that Ralph and Sid are both talking about, that you recognize the frustration, it fills that frustration gap. But the stage after that is figuring out what the tool does for you. If it can be resolved with something you already use, that's a big player in your setup and if you can gradually eliminate the use of that tool over time. So a perfect example for what I'm doing right now with color grading.

14:42 For a long time I have thought to myself, like, I've got Davinci Resolve, I've got the paid version. There must be an upscaling, auto current color correcting AI thing, right? Because Zoom video tends to suck. And as much as we we want people not to use Zoom for recordings, they do. And we want the our products as podcast editors to be the highest quality they could possibly be and make us look awesome. But there's only so many different AI regenerative websites you can look at with exorbitant costs and high computer resource requirements and time requirements that you just don't want to explore it. And I've seen a good quality AI version of that once, but it really wasn't worth the investment.

15:29 So instead, what I've done is seen someone that I follow on YouTube who's an excellent video editor and I followed a bunch of stuff that he edits for. He had a very simple color grading guide. And now I'm going through that step by step in Da Vinci to be able to try and improve the video that I have. But the only reason I can do that is because that I've I've explored the additional tools, haven't used necessarily, but there's only so much they can do, explore the tools, realize the gap, know the limitations. And now I'm filling those limitations with learning in a tool that I use regularly for other things.

16:09 And automatically I could tell all of you are saying, well, Riverside, you've got Riverside, you can use their color grading tool. It's great. But when you know enough, you realize that it's a web-based tool that adds time based limitations to what you're doing. It adds an extra step back into another application in the process that doesn't necessarily comparatively worked with what I already used. You can already see where my brain process is going here. But I think the the important take away from that example is what I'm what I'm trying to get at is taking it to the level above replacing the process, learning what you need and then figuring out how to get there with what you already have or if the tool gives you what you need to optimize your time and your goals. Really like if you don't care about learning stuff. And I know there's a lot of podcast editors that are like this.

16:59 They just go plop money, increase prices, people pay me 50 bucks more a month and I get a couple more things into script and I just, I just cut out all the words that way. That's fine. That is a perfectly acceptable way to go about it as well. But I think the editors that stay above the rest, and this isn't just people who do it professionally but who edit for themselves, are the ones who sit down and learn the process. Precisely why in whatever episode I was on last time I went to BC and I said, hey, it wasn't a waste of time that you went to broadcasting the school for 10 years. You know, stuff that the people who are replacing with tools don't know. And that's what you learn when you take that process to the next level and figure out what you needed, how you can do it yourself, and filling that knowledge gap.

17:45 But the only thing that becomes a consequence of that is time. And there's some stuff I want to talk about in some point in future about transition costs. I think that's a really important thing to consider with all this stuff that I'm mentioning. Hopefully that makes sense. Yeah. Thank you, Matt. And curious if you would share who, who's that video editor that you found on that you follow on YouTube that gave you those tips? Short answer, great edits, video. Thank you, Matt. And a quick hello to Dominic Lawson, long time community member who has of course also many time award-winning podcaster as well. Dominic, good morning to you.

18:26 Welcome back. Good morning, everybody. I hope everybody is well. Glad to be back. Yeah, we are talking about workflow this morning. So feel I know you have you have lots of workflow incorporated in the different projects that you do. So I'm sure you can chime in here and there. Let's keep it going and go to Nick. Nick, I think you had something you wanted to share. First and foremost, I wanted to throw out, as we're talking about processes and everything like that, throw out some tools. You just mentioned documenting processes and taking basically inventory of what you were doing.

19:07 And there are tools out there that help with that specifically because I know that's a daunting process in itself. And there are tools out there like Scribe and Tango. It will literally record. You basically start it and say, I'm starting the process and it will record the actual step by step with screenshots with the, OK, click this button. OK, go here, OK, do this. And it records step by step for you those processes. And now with AI and everything that's going on, you can take a document like that and feed it into AI and say, hey, this is my current process.

19:51 Where are there inefficiencies or where can I be more efficient in this entire process? Are there tools out there that can streamline what I'm doing? Or is there a better way to do what I'm doing? And all it takes is you just kind of going through that process to document it. And I think that that's a much more efficient approach to going about some of this stuff. Matt in the chat said my learning developer brain wants to yell at you, Nick, Matt was Can you, would you elaborate, please? Yep, it's it's an instructional design thing. Similar tools to that are being sold to corporations and big organizations that need learning development content.

20:37 And these apps purport to say, hey, just put in your process documentation and you've got SO PS for days. You don't need to hire, you know, an 100K per year instructional designer with years of experience learning developer knowledge and the ability to construct things that allow people to learn appropriately. You just put in a bunch of PDFs that suck and it'll create all the content for you. This kind of instructional design snark is showing through a lot on the Internet, and I think a lot of the opinions coming out of that. The tools aren't great, but they're not great for learning development in large organizations. That's not to say that they aren't great for other purposes.

21:18 So that's why the learning developer wanted to yell at Nick, not the podcaster. OK, cool, cool. And Nick, I know you can't say anything, but aren't you kind of working on something that would be appropriate for this conversation? Now you don't have to get into too many details if you're not ready yet, but I know you've been posting a little bit on LinkedIn about it. I was thinking about this when we started diving into the conversation and yeah, it I've been in works of developing an app. Basically what what the app is right now is a project management tool, a task tracking tool where it looks at the tasks you're doing. And it will at this point give you some very basic analytics on as to when you are being most productive and how long it's taking you to do specific tasks. And the idea is to take that to the next step and say like inject AI into that to take a look at what you're doing to give you suggestions on how to be more productive and things like that.

22:16 So it doesn't necessarily play into the exact workflow that you're using, but basically tell you if what you're doing is in an efficient manner or not. Thanks, Nick. Appreciate it. And I know we have Janaid on stage as well, and Janaid's also working on a tool. We're going to come back to you, Janaid, and because I want you to share a little bit more about what you're up to as well. But I do want to also keep this conversation going. And since we're talking about tools, let's keep that going. But I want to take it in a slightly different direction. There are lots of all in One tools that are out there. Does anyone believe in the all in And, you know, maybe it's right for some, not right for others.

23:00 It depends, as with everything, but I think the key question with an all in one solution tends to be how much time do you have and how much budget do you have? And if budget is low and something like Riverside comes out as an all in one that gives you everything, then it makes sense to dedicate your time to that. If you have infinite time, potentially infinite money as well. You can try a bunch of different things, but I think it depends on each person. Again, like what I said before, someone who isn't interested in learning everything about podcasting and every part of their process may have a big budget, but if they have a low budget then the all in one becomes a lot more attractive.

23:42 It comes with lots of limitations too, but maybe you write them off just in your own context. Is not having enough money to piece out your own workflow. I'm the type of person that the all in It really has to solve those problems though. It really has to be an all in one. You know, I don't want, you know, 1 area that it's particularly strong in and another area where it's not. But at the same time, as long if it's got multiple solutions that it's, or multiple ways that it's solving my problems, I'm still going to be very open to it. And Riverside and I, that's kind of the relationship I have with it. It does have all the things now and I would say I probably use 50 to 70% of them.

24:31 It's helped speed up a lot of my process for me. A quick example is when I'm creating video shorts from our episodes, I used to do it where I pull it out from, you know, export it from Riverside and then go into another tool. At the time it was Minvo, but for those who may not know, Minvo, similar to Opus. And then I would put it in there and do all my editing and export it. So that that was an felt like an extra step. And then I think at one point I really over complicated it. I think I did a first pass of editing in Riverside, then pulled it out, then put it into Minvo, and then did more production in Minvo because it had extra tools that Riverside didn't have or it didn't like the tools that they had.

25:21 But since then, Riverside has really evolved and now I'm for the most part, with the couple of exceptions, for the most part, I'm making my shorts just all in Riverside. It just makes it easier and less overwhelming. I'm not having to go back and forth, export, put it in this folder. Then I got to go back to the folder and import it into another application. And then I got to export that out of that application when I'm finished. It's just a lot. So I, I'm a fan personally. And again, I agree with Matt wholeheartedly. I think that this comes down to the person and how how how well they work with a tool like that.

26:03 I saw some others wanted to comment as well and please forgive me because I kind of went on a tangent and and didn't write down who I saw. Dominic, I'll go to you. I really wish I could find all in one tool, but it's just one of those things where the type of content and and shows that I create is like it's just I'm not hopeful that I'll ever find one, but that that's OK though, like like Matt was saying, is kind of teach his own. It's just one of those things where it really is about the art for me. And so it was like, I'm not a starving artist, but it is one of those things where it's like I don't mind going through that process because at the end of the day, the quality of the work really does matter. And I'm pretty sure we all know have that same type of standard for whatever it is that we're doing. But for me it's it's just the necessary battle scar. If I have to go to Riverside for this and the script for that, and Opus for this and Adobe Audition for that, then so be it.

27:08 It just is what it is. I'm with you, Dominic. Over the years I've gotten used to having to bounce around between different tools and I've, I think I've just come to accept that I'm going to have to use different tools for different things. And if I can like Riverside, if I can find that one tool that I can do multiple things within, and then it makes the other apps that I need to use, the other tools I need to use a little more tolerable, a little less of having to bounce around. I think most of us as content creators have gotten used to, whether we like it or not, we've gotten used to the fact that there are multiple tools we have to bounce around. Ashley, I know you had a question. You want to ask that now?

27:49 So part of what sparked this conversation is I feel like I'm on the cusp of progression, but I'll admit and say I'm a little scared. And I'm not even sure what I'm scared of. And part of it is I'm just so set in my ways with how I do things. And I know that I need to break up with a certain tool that I'm using, which is descript. And I was wondering, in any of y'all's experience, when do you know it's time to start phasing it out? How long does it take you to phase out a tool? And what does that process look like going from you're gradually, we'll say weaning yourself off that old tool until you're finally, this is the new thing in the chain. I think for you, Ashley, the big thing is I know you're throwing around a script and possibly going other avenues for editing and things like that.

28:44 Edit an entire episode with another platform. Learn the platform, don't necessarily pull the pin on the script as a whole just yet, but basically take a look at what this other platform can do for you. And once you edit an episode, you kind of get a feel for it. You added another episode, you get more of a feel for it and you can kind of gauge at that point like is this going to be a better tool for what I need versus what the script can give me? But you're not necessarily throwing away the script and just saying, all right, I'm I'm all in on this other tool that I don't understand. You're giving time to practice and play with it. I mean, think of how much time you've spent with this script to essentially master it to the point where you can just get into the platform and start doing the things that you do.

29:34 To me, that's where the kind of the fear sets in is like, I've spent all this time to understand and really know the process to where when I get in the platform, I know what I'm going to do next and jump into a new tool. It's like I don't know what I'm going to do next because I don't know how to necessarily use it to the best of my ability. The only thing that you can do is take one step at a time, do 1 episode. It might take you a little longer than it used to, but you're going to understand it better that time. And it's getting that repetition to the point where you're like, you know what? There are ways that I can use this more efficiently than I'm using the script or I'm taking more advantage of Davinci Resolve over the script because I use these tools and I don't use these tools in the script. It's just a matter of spending the time with it, which I know most people don't like to hear.

30:21 They're like, I don't have enough time. That is what it comes down to. And I think that's the challenge, at least for me, I'll speak for myself, but that's the challenge is the time. Because let's say like we're thinking about Ashley here for a second and the fact that, OK, if the script is one of her main tools for editing and she knows she wants to move on for whatever her reasons are, she wants to move on to something else. That means it's going to take her time. There's a learning curve, it's going to disrupt that workflow, right? She's, you know, like with with the podcasting morning chat, although I think I'm very liberal with when it actually needs to post.

31:02 I don't give Ashley a deadline. It must post by then. But what we do try to do is post the show, get it all edited, polished, ready to to go before it turns 12:00, right, because it's the podcasting morning chat. So the goal is, let's get this out in the morning just for integrity, right? And it's not the end of the world. The other day, we had issues on Monday and it didn't get out till like 2 or 3:00. And so be it, right? But there's a lot of pressure. So Ashley can't just switch from, say, descript to Riverside if she doesn't have a lot of experience with Riverside because it's going to slow her down probably considerably. And I'm not just saying that because it's Ashley.

31:42 That would be for many of us. I think that's the big challenge. Go ahead, Janae. Hey, good morning everyone. I love work flows and systems. And one thing that I keep coming back to in my mind is which stage of your workflow are you in and which stage needs which tool? So for example, there's 4 stages in my, in my perspective, there's pre production, there's production, post production and then distribution. So look at which stage you're in and which tool fits that stage because that's going to help you understand. OK, I'm swapping out this tool for this stage and it makes sense. And that's where Dominic was saying, you know, he he likes the different tools because he like the creative aspect, but maybe other tools don't have these stages defined. And that's what makes a difference between the all one tools versus the tools that are dedicated for one aspect alone. Yeah, Thank you, Janae.

32:41 Appreciate that insight a lot. And I should probably have also offered, Well then how do you deal with the situation that I just described using Ashley as an example, the way I personally do it, especially with an editing tool, let's be specific, right, With editing tools, how I've done it in the past. I will continue to edit in the the app that I normally use. So let's take today as an example. This show ends. Let's say I'm going to go right after and start editing. I'm going to go to my go to editing tool. I'm going to do the whole thing that I normally do. And then I'm going to carve out some time, ideally later today to go use that new tool and try to recreate what I just did a few hours ago.

33:28 I think that's your best bet because now you have that familiarity with the episode. You know how you edited it and then you can go in with this new tool and do a practice round. Yes, it's annoying, right? Because it's time consuming to me. That's how I learn quickest when it comes to a new editing tool. It's taking the time to edit the way I normally would and then instantly moving into that new tool and seeing if I can recreate that process. And I make mistakes along the way and I learn from those mistakes and eventually then I get there. Ashley in the chat says she likes that suggestion. I'm I'm glad Ashley. OK, let's go to Dominic. And we got to start wrapping up this part of the conversation to move into something else wins from our week.

34:13 But first, let's check in with Dominic, and then we'll see if anyone else wants to chime in. Ashley, as you meet, you know me and you are kindred spirits were artists by nature, right? And and so I think as we start to evolve our artistry, I think sometimes the tools just have to subside and grow with us. Like right now. I was just having a conversation with my wife last night and it made me realize that I'm going through a breakup with Adobe Edition at this moment as I transition from podcaster to documentarian and really using more video with the storytelling and stuff like that. Adobe Edition may not be the right tool anymore.

34:55 So now I'm going through that learning process as it relates to, we're going to go with cap cut, am I going to go with Adobe Premiere or whatever the case may be. And so I think if the art that you're trying to create or that you're trying to evolve to requires different tools, I think that's probably the biggest indicator that maybe it's time to transition to something else, if that helps. And also that learning piece is critical because now I'll go and say, hey, let me go check out Ken Burns's American Revolution to see what that looks like. Oh, how can I recreate that for myself or whatever the case may be, not necessarily to take from, but be inspired by. And then just try to find the necessary tools that relates to what you're trying to do.

35:42 Hopefully some of them have not a steeper learning curve as others, and as long as the art is the most important thing at the top of that funnel, at least for me, then the tools kind of follow that arc if you will. But hope that helps at all. Yeah, well, I think it was because I saw Ashley throwing some hearts at over your way. So I think that did stick. And I appreciate what Ashley said also in the chat, what I was saying about the different tools and how to practice and all that. She says it's like learning to play a song on a different instrument versus one. Yeah, I hear that. Just playing back to the what Dominic said about the two of them being artists. Yeah, that's a good analogy, Ashley.

36:24 OK, so I'll ask this one last question and you can apply this to workflow. You can apply this to tools, whatever however you want to. What would you simplify if you rebuilt today? What's an area that you would look to simplify, improve, maybe replace a tool? If you could snap your fingers and know that it would be a smooth transition today, where would you go first? Would it be your editing? Would it be somewhere else? I think for me, it's probably it is always workflow and Sid's going to chime in. So I'll I'll say something after that. Go ahead, Sid. I was going to say, for me, the the first thing that I would look at trying to simplify is anything that's like a mundane task. So sending a sponsor contract out, having them fill in the blanks and you know, is that all these tedious little, I hate to call them administrative tasks, but that's really what they are. If I could simplify all those tasks, man, that's the first place I would start.

37:23 Yeah, I feel that, Sid. I'll keep it going and go to Ashley. Ashley, did you want to chime in too? Yeah, I think it would be my order of operations. That's the thing I question the most is am I doing things in the most constructive order? I'm like, am I really doing this in an order that's great for the overall project? And if I could find a way to streamline if that's effective, that would be awesome. Cool. Thank you, Ashley. Appreciate that answer. And OK, we're going to transition. Oh, here, I'll do this. We're going to transition into wins from the week in a moment. So I'm going to ask if you're in the audience right now, come up and share any win that you've had this week.

38:05 We don't judge the size of the wins, so don't don't let that stop you. A win's a win in our opinion, and they're all worth celebrating. So come on up if you want to share any of your wins. Extra bonus points if they are podcast related, but don't have to be. This is a community and we like to share each other's wins, no matter what stage, what arena, what area of your life. So come on up and do that. But first, I just want to quickly go to Janae because I, I mentioned it earlier, Janae's been also working on a tool that I think fits some of this conversation. I don't know if it's ready for everybody to start playing with yet, but I do want to give Janae an opportunity to share if you would like Janae. So there's been a problem that I've been facing that I've been wanting to solve for the past three plus years and I've interviewed agency owners and how they do the thing. So I was like, what if there was a tool that could solve all of these problems?

39:03 And I had plenty of in a free time last four weeks that was able to build that tool for me. So that's something in Alpha Stage right now that I've been testing and cleaning up and getting ready for Beta Stage, and I'll be announcing it next week at Pod Fest. So cool. There you go. Nice Janae, way to go. So you want to wait until pod Fest? Because I know that you had you were taking some beta testers, but you want to wait to share the official link until next week. I mean I can share here too you. Don't have to, I'm not trying. To. I'm not trying to. I've got a pretty big backlog to Phil, but I'm happy to share the link in the in the notes right here, OK. Cool, he'll put it in the chat.

39:47 We'll put it in the show notes. Unless you don't want us to. Janae, you let Ashley know. OK, let's do it, gang. So let's do it. Let's share some wins from this past week. I guess the best way to do it is let's just go down the line and I'm going to encourage. I know I did it in the chat, but I'm encouraging you in the audience right now, listening live here on Clubhouse or if you're watching on YouTube or Facebook or elsewhere, it's time. Share your wins. If you're on, if you're on something other than Clubhouse, just go ahead. Even if you're listening on the podcast via Spotify, share them in the comments.

40:29 Share your wins. But if you're in the audience, come on up and share any wins. Thank you. I see it. I love it when I say it and then somebody heeds the call. So that's how we're going to start. We're going to go to you. Meg, please share some wins from your week. Good morning. Good morning. Happy New Year. Yeah. So today, today was the first day that I aired as an expert contributor on iheart syndicated to Boston, Springfield, Worcester, Cape Cod, Providence. So I'll be every week I'm going to be on an I heart show and they're going to do a segment every Friday on health and nutrition.

41:11 And today we did. Are you a supplement nut case? And that was our our topic. My my wife might need to listen to that episode. Meg, do you want to share the actual show that you're doing this on? It's called the Jim Polito Show. He's a syndicated person in New England. He's very, very popular. So I'm really blessed to get this opportunity. And at the same time, I get to change the way you think about food. That's what I was put on this earth to do, so I'm really excited. I love that. Meg. Congratulations. That's awesome, really exciting. And I will, I'm, I'm not kidding, I will absolutely make sure my wife listens to that particular segment.

41:53 Is it already out there or did you just record it this morning? We just recorded this morning, but I'll, I'll, I'll bring it at some point. OK, awesome. Please do. Please do. And if you want to put a link to that show in the in the chat here and we'll put it in the show notes. All right, let's keep it moving down the line. And again, come on up live audience. I see all of you there. Come up and share. Don't be shy. This is the fun part. This is where you get to you get to really be proud of yourself and and have some people cheering you on along the way. Dr. Would you share a win with us? As much as I love having downtime and vacation days, and there was a few days that I didn't even come into the room where the computer is, as much as I love that, I still crave some kind of routine and I'm just so happy to be back in that routine stage. For me, the whole world kind of shuts down between Halloween and the first Monday after the first of the year of the new year. So now that we're past that, we're getting back into the routine and that's I'm, that's me and my happy place. Nice.

43:11 I like that. Thank you, Dr. Congratulations. I'm going to keep it moving, Ralph. Good morning again. Please share a win or two with us. I've got 3. So first when I hit 200,000 subscribers on my untruth unveiled YouTube channel which I'm just over the moon about. Second, when my new channel, the content creators Accountant, I hit 20,000 subscribers. And the third win for me is I've really leaned in this week to LinkedIn and I am building a ton of connections over there. So those are my three wins for the week. Congratulations. I have seen you making efforts over on LinkedIn. That's really cool. And I have to follow up that, that YouTube channel with 200,000 subscribers.

43:51 Awesome. Congratulations. And is that the same channel that just recently, maybe a month ago you were at 100,000 or? Yes, that's correct, Mike. Yeah, it was about 28 days ago, maybe 35 days ago. I was at 100,000. Yeah, it's really taken off and it's a spiritual channel, so it's not for everybody, but it is definitely growing. So yeah, just great. Humbled by the whole thing to be honest. Ralph, amazing. And and I want to make it clear when I yeah, yes, it is an impressive number. And I also know that we, we here try to encourage people not to worry so much about those big numbers, right. But what I'm really focusing on is that jump. He went from 100, it was like a month ago 100,000 and already he's now hit over 200.

44:36 That's really impressive. Yeah, 55,197 in the last 28 days. I just popped up my stats here. That's amazing, Ralph. Congratulations. Really. All right, let's go to Ashley. Ashley, you want to share some wins with us? The first win for this week is the start of this year. I decided to stop neglecting my health. I went for it to the doctor for the first time in five years and that was a win. All of it itself, just getting some medical attention. And my other win for the week is actually a client win. But I'm just so proud of her. I can't not share this. She's got 2 new national sponsors, one of which is American Home Shield and the other one is Pepsi, so I think that's a big deal.

45:20 I'm proud of her. Which show is that? If you if you can share. So it's my happy ass life. Oh, yes, that's right. That's one of her other clients. Very cool. Congratulations. Please send our congratulations to her as well. Sid, you're up. Gosh, I have so many things. I got my podcast page updated. I created all the outline for our community page. I got it updated and it's live about joining our what I'm calling our insider community, which is a paid community for my podcast listeners. I recorded episode 170 with my guest. I recorded twice. Unfortunately, my energy was not all that great. My new trailer that's coming out on January 19th for season 7. So yeah, it's been a really, really busy week, but grateful for all of it.

46:10 And I will say I am in the I'm actually hiring a marketing coordinator. Have a full job description. If any of you know someone who does podcast marketing, I have a full list of things. So please reach out to me. It's probably about 10 to 20 hours a week. I'm not sure exactly, I'm guessing that, but I do have a job description. If you know anybody or if you're interested, please reach out to me. Thanks, Mark. Yeah. Congratulations on all of that. Sid, please put that link here and we will share that out with everybody. And shoot, there was one other thing I wanted to ask you. Come back to me, please. All right, I'll have to at some point, Sid, we need to talk again and get a new update and really go through all the different things that you've been building. I know we kind of got that preview as you were planning before the new year.

46:59 I'd love to catch up with you here on the show and do that with you sometime soon that. 'D be my pleasure. Awesome. Very cool. Matt Bliss, you're up. You want to share a win or two with us? I guess my win for this week is probably that I'm taking it slow. This is my first week back to podcast work and I'm going to be transitioning to a different kind of a different way that I help podcasters in the future. But it's super easy, especially when so much is in front of you to take on and plan to do a lot and then get like 10% of it done and then feel horrible about yourself. So I'm trying to get out of that habit and just easing my way into into getting things going.

47:47 But this is a big year for me. I'm not sure if I've mentioned it on this show before, but I did a yearly theme with someone I met through the podcast and through the YouTube space Valentine Fakash last year. And my yearly theme is the theme of rebuilding. I'll be breaking down a lot of stuff and building up some better habits in all aspects of what I'm up to like health, habits, work, all the good stuff. So watch this space. Yeah, congratulations, Matt. You definitely have piqued my interest as well. And kudos to you for recognizing it's time for your rebuild and looking forward to watching you rebuild and grow. Yeah, and if obviously anything I can do to help, please let me know.

48:30 And Nick, I'm coming to you now. Share some wins with us. Mine for this week, we kind of talked about it in a little bit, but the the app that I'm building right now, I mean kind of a big breakthrough in that for a while was really struggling with some major bugs that basically broke the entire thing and I could not figure it out. And finally just before the we took a break, I figured it out and got through that and now it seems like everything is kind of coming together with it. Everything's, I feel like progressing in it. So we implemented a lot of new features into the application, which is awesome. And I'm going to be opening it up to more beta users next week actually. So that's that's my big.

49:15 Win for the week. Thank you, Nick. And I have to pause and say, you know, look at that. The the lesson that I just got out of that is the fact that, you know, Nick said he was ready to give up on it. And he kind of had for a period of time. I don't remember if he said it was probably a few weeks at the very least, maybe a little more. And it's just interesting because sometimes that's just all we need. We need to walk away. And even if we're saying, OK, we're done, I'm, I'm not looking at this again. You're creating space to walk away, to stop beating your head against the wall and to focus on some other things. And, and your brain is processing in the in the background. And if you just stop once in awhile and listen, once that brain is done processing, you might find a new way to go about that thing that's been giving you trouble. And I think that's a great lesson to apply to all of the things we've been talking about today. Dominic, you're up, my friend.

50:09 Please share some wins. Recently I just released my short film In town Forever, which basically was just like a a city reel of Memphis. It just showing some of the great shots and and stuff of Memphis that I love and choose nine O 1, which is a big organization here in the city. Reposted my video, my film, which is really cool. And the cool thing about that is that like, not only do they have a large following, but many of the people who follow choose nine O 1 are civic leaders. And so some of those civic leaders have already reached out about, you know, a possible sequel to the film and maybe throwing some money behind it. So that's always cool. Very cool.

50:51 That's my win. Congratulations, Dominic. And I know I've shared before, really loving the content that you've been putting out on social media. That drone footage stuff is so cool and it definitely makes me, it piques my interest in curiosity about a drone. My dad has one, nothing like the ones that you have, but we did fly it a couple months ago when I went to visit and it is a lot of fun. So, yeah, I you never know, maybe I'll have one of these things at some point too. Dominic, congratulations. Looking forward to continuing to watch your journey. And now let's go to Yvonne. I don't think we've had a chance to talk yet since the new year.

51:31 Please share some wins. I am currently on my way to go to PT for my broken elbow, which is healing up, but I feel like I've been in an in an in between time quite a bit and it, you know, it's uncomfortable being in that space. But I had an article go out about that on Cool on the Cool Life platform today, and it also applies to this week's episode on Late Bloomer Living about curiosity. The whole month of January is devoted to the idea of how curiosity and playfulness go together.

52:12 And you are going to be part of that series Mark episode and your journey into testing out improv and all those things. So I'm really excited for this month's programming on the podcast. And the big thing that happened is that I, I got a, a crazy idea for a novel and I am not, I have never considered myself to be a writer, but this thing is, is just really intriguing me. Since I decided to dive into it, I've been doing little bits every day on thinking about world building. It's sci-fi.

52:52 I am a sci-fi girl. And I'm really excited to be stepping. You know, I'm just, I'm gonna, I'm leaning into what I talk about on the podcast, which is it's never too late. And so I'm like, what am I, Why am I limiting myself? Why am I telling myself that I am not a writer? I am just going to lean in and see what happens. And this could. I have no idea how long it'll take, but I'm excited about it and it's fun so far. Yvonne, thank you for sharing that and congratulations. That is so cool. And yeah, I love when our own words of wisdom come back. I'll say to bite us, right? It's like, oh, yeah, I am preaching that. Let me try it. And I feel the inspiration coming out of you.

53:34 It's really exciting to hear. And it's so funny, this world of podcasting. And I'm thinking about Dominic here because, you know, we come into podcasting and we, you know, first some of us takes a while to wear that hat, right? Like, oh, I'm a podcaster. But then we have a lot of us then eventually evolve and embrace the idea. And, but we don't think this is going to turn into anything else. We just look at it solely for what it is. And you know, I, I look at Yvonne, who I, I'm going to already say is now becoming a writer. And Dominic, I know look you, he's podcaster and I know he's becoming a video document documentarian now as well. We evolve the creativity doesn't contain to just podcasting it. It starts to spread as we explore the the world of podcasting.

54:25 So it's just cool. It's exciting to see how you all continue to grow and evolve, how we all continue to grow and evolve. Thank you for sharing that, Yvonne. I will quickly share my wins. They are community style wins, both Podfest related. Earlier this week I hosted the third and final Podfest speaker call. As some of you know, Podfest asked me if I would lead that charge and build some community around all of their 200 plus speakers. And we did a lot of great virtual networking over the past, say, two months. And I had a blast doing that. And then the following day, I think I did that Tuesday.

55:06 And then on Wednesday, Podfest had a virtual town hall. And Chris Kremitsos really gave me multiple times, spent time giving me high praise for what I do and for what I've been doing for Podfest. I was really touched and honored by that and in that, well, maybe not surprisingly, but just it's taken me back a couple of times. This is wasn't the first time that he's done that and it was really an honor just for somebody like him putting on such big powerful events with tight knit community. It was just cool to get that recognition. So I'm celebrating those wins this week and we are back next week with all new shows.

55:56 Thursday and Friday I will be around but not leading the charge because as I just said, I will be at Podfest and I've got commitments in the mornings and I just don't want to rush around and try to make everything work. I've got to give myself a little bit of breathing room. But we've got some stuff covered for you on those days that I'm not here. I also next week want to maybe do a Podfest preview and really talk about. We do this at least once a year where we talk about really preparing to go to these big conferences. What, what can we do to get the most out of them as attendees, some of us are speakers, so we'll even talk about as speakers, how do we prepare, what do we, what should our expectations and goals look like, etcetera. So we'll do that as well next week along with our usual themed weeks like news and so on.

56:51 So until Monday, make it a great weekend. Everybody take care.