It’s our 100th episode and we are very proud to now be “seasoned” (x4!) podcasters. Today, we want to share the things we’ve learned about creating and maintaining a podcast for all those who are thinking of stepping out to be heard on the podwaves.

Here are a few of the tools we use and you might like to use too!

Podcast Hosting https://www.captivate.fm/

Podcast Editing https://www.thewavepodcasting.com/about

Recording Studio https://riverside.fm/

Transcript Creation and Editing https://otter.ai/home

Welcome to The Business Animal podcast. Saddle up for a

gallop to the top of the animal industry, where you'll learn how

to tame your wild business beast, with tips, techniques,

and tools that will take overwhelm to obedience school.

And have you wagging your tail with joy. And now your hosts,

Kim Beer, and Cara Taylor Swift.

Hey there business animals. It's Kim with

Be More Business

and Cara with Fast Horse Photography. Hi, Kim,

Happy New Year. I know we've already had a couple episodes

come out in the new year. But this one we're actually

recording in the new year for the first time. So Happy New

Year,

Happy 2023. I'm excited. It's here. I always

feel like I'm waiting for you know, something to be born on

that January 1st date. Now the new year is here and all fresh

and shiny for us to play with and hopefully it'll be a good

baby and behave itself and not grow up to be a really raucous

obnoxious teenager like the last couple of years have so

I'm expecting nothing but good stuff in 2023.

I'm not Yeah, I'm not settling for anything less.

I need 2023 to be an honor roll student. That's

right.

There you go. Well, what else are we

celebrating today?

100 Episodes. Look at us.

That's right, I can't believe it. Kim, can you

believe that? I don't know four seasons ago, 100 episodes ago,

we decided to start this podcast and we're still doing it.

I can't believe it. But the truth be told this

is our official 100th published episode. But I don't know. What

do you think this is probably like the 125th. One we've

recorded?

Well, yeah, because we've learned a lot of

lessons on the way and we've had to trash a ton of them. And

we've had some technical errors. And we've had times when we just

hated how we sounded and we wanted to redo content. And oh,

my goodness, yes, you're probably right.

Yeah, well, I think we're I think we're past

the 100 mark at this point. And for those of you who didn't

know, it took us a year to get to the point to where we

recorded the first published podcast, we played around with

this a really long time and experimented. And we tried to do

it like the way that you know, people say on social media, you

know that, oh, it's so easy to put a podcast out into the

world. And all you need to do is just push this button or have

this piece of software. And we tried several pieces of software

before we landed on the one that we use to record which is

Riverside. And I can tell you it's not that easy. And we

needed equipment, and we would listen back to them. And we

would go oh my gosh, that's horrible. And we're also a lot

like two year old colts going out the pen for the very first

time we like we're wandering all over the place, we didn't have a

clear vision of a topic, we just simply didn't know what we were

doing. And frankly, I think that we were the two year old colt

with a green rider to I don't think anything, there was no

guidance whatsoever. None whatsoever. So it took us a long

time to be able to figure out this process before we even

started putting it out there. And I can tell you in that

process of learning. I don't know about you, Cara. But I

learned a tremendous amount from the people that helped us in

getting out that first episode and, and getting us started in

the right fashion of getting into becoming podcasters. Which

now I absolutely love. I love being a podcaster I think it's

the most amazing part of my week. Actually, I enjoy I enjoy

doing the podcasts a lot. A lot.

Well, we're podcast consumers too. So we

listen to a ton of podcasts, we have our favorites, we really

have I mean, I have a whole list that I'm waiting for every

single week to pop up. So we're podcast consumers. So for us,

they're part of the reason it took so long is that we would

listen to these podcasts that we loved. We would listen to

podcast sometimes for the first time, I'd be like, that sounds

like crap. I'm not listening to it again. And then we would hear

our show. And we're like, this isn't this is not what we want

it to be yet. And it has to represent our businesses, it has

to represent what we want to put out into the podcasting world.

So we were pretty we had some pretty high standards. And it

took us a long time to figure out how the heck to get there.

It did. And I'll tell you for dear listeners out

there, we maintain that high standard, or at least try to aim

for it pretty high. Even now we had a couple of episodes last

month that we had a couple of audio issues on and the upside

to batching episodes where we record multiple ones in a day is

that it saves us time and it keeps us focused and it keeps

the episodes churning out like they should you but it also

means that if you have a mic problem, you've got it on

multiple episodes and we did we had a microphone

and when we listened to it like it's

sounded okay coming out of my computer speakers, but when I

listened to it in the car so we, we listened to what you listen

to the way that all the ways that we think you might listen

to this podcast, we wanted to make sure we sounded good and it

just didn't sound good. So we ditched that work and rerecord

the episode. Because I know as a podcast consumer, if I tune into

a podcast, and the audio is horrible, I will never listen to

that podcast again, even if it is fantastic content, because I

don't want to listen to the audio issues. So it is important

in your listenership. And if you're gonna launch a podcast,

which this episode is all about, and I know that there are people

out there, I talk to them every single day who want to have a

podcast, this is something that you need to consider is how are

your listeners going to respond to your podcast? What's that

going to be? Like? I talked with a woman yesterday about a

podcast, she says I want to be you. I want to have the podcast

kind of situation. Can you help me with that? And I'm like,

Absolutely, I certainly can. But I do want you to know, it's not

as easy as sometimes what people make it out to be Oh, it's just

a simple thing. You you buy some equipment, and just or don't buy

the equipment and just start recording, which is what we

tried to do it first. And I can tell you, you have to buy the

professional audio equipment if you want to sound good. Now, I'm

not going to tell you we bought the highest quality of

equipment, we bought good equipment, but I don't think

it's we could have gone even higher if we wanted to on the

audio equipment. But it's a lot of effort. Cara I proud of us

100 episodes is a lot of work and a lot of effort.

Me too. I'm we're going to keep going as of

right now. So that's pretty that says something, I guess. And it

really was a commitment. And there were some times in the

beginning where I was just why are we doing this? You know, why

are we stressing ourselves out to maintain this schedule. And

to keep putting out this content? I definitely had days

where I second guessed, like and had to recenter and you and I

would have to have a little sit down chit chat and figure out is

it worth still going. And here we are 100 episodes in. And

we're still going and we do see value in it. So what our hope

is, I think today is we're not going to tell you a step by step

guide on how to start a podcast. But we are going to give you our

typical big three that we go through. And then in the show

notes because I know there's gonna be a lot of people

listening, if Kim's okay with it, I will definitely put links

to products that we use, you know how we get our transcripts

done and captivate and you know, all of Riverside, I'll put links

to those in there for folks that are interested. Podcasting for

us has not been a cheap endeavor. So maybe there's

podcasters out there that it has been an expensive endeavor. But

for us, it's you know, we have included this in we have a

budget for this show. So we'll put all that stuff in there for

you. So that hopefully, for you guys, you're not out there

testing out a bunch of stuff and learning and realizing that it's

not right for you like we did in the beginning. So these might be

some great places for you to start. If you're thinking yeah,

and I think that I do think sharing our tools

that we use because the tool box was one of the harder things to

figure out with this. Before we dive into the big three though I

want to talk for just a second about what I feel the value of

podcasting is and for now, and in the future, I was listening

to another podcast. It's the social media marketing talk

show, which talks about marketing and all of the things

that go on and in the marketing community, especially around

social media. And they were having a discussion I listened

to multiple episodes yesterday. And one of the episodes that I

listened to specifically and it got mentioned on the other ones

as well is how important podcasting is to marketing and

to business growth as well as becoming a cottage industry all

on its own. So the younger generations now I realized that

not everybody has a Gen Z as a marketer, a person right now

like a marketing target market, but they are the people that are

growing up right at this moment to become consumers. They're the

ones that are starting to hit the consumer chain at this point

in time. So the light they're like the Hot Topic everybody

wants to talk about is how to market to Gen Z, like 70 to 80%

of them want to listen to podcasts, like they listed it in

their marketing research as the way that they want to interact

with the companies that they purchase from. They want

podcasting and just the sheer number of them. That's the worth

the effort to consider podcasting as an option. And the

fact that pot more and more people listen

to podcast and are like secure and I wear their Serial podcast

listeners, it is such an amazing way for you to be able to grow

your authority as an influencer in a certain target market,

which I will tell you, you may not get direct dollars to to

impact. In other words, you may not be able to trace the dollars

in your business directly back to your podcast as the catalyst

for that because there is not a buy button often in these there,

there may be commercials, but I will tell you, it's had an

impact on my business just because people now view me in a

different light. And they get to know me and then want to work

with me or to buy my book or to come to one of our events that

we do. So there's so much value to this in you building your

authority, even if you don't direct sell on the podcast

itself. And it's just it's such a great medium. I love the audio

medium. I love the fact that I can engage with the businesses

that I want to engage with and the information I want to engage

with in my car, or while I'm on a walk or while I'm sitting here

in my office doing graphic design work if that's what's on

the menu for today. So it's just an A very important I guess

we're preaching to the choir Cara Because our I'm preaching

to the choir in this case, because we have podcast

listeners listening to us.

Well, yeah, and it's, I mean, I don't know,

for me, it's it's content, you can come back to over and over

again, a lot of times it's bite size, you know, I think I don't

know, my attention span seems to get smaller and smaller as the

years go on. So for me to be able to get education from

something or entertainment from something in a bite sized piece

is huge. I mean, there's just so many reasons. We love the

podcast, community, the podcast genre, like there's so many

reasons we love it. But we also now have found this joy and love

of being a part of that community celebrating that 100th

episode.

And it's a valuable community and a

valuable medium for growing a business. Yeah, all of the

above. And it's not going anywhere, folks, it's only

getting bigger and better as time moves on. Oh, yeah, tons of

money's being invested into it is in in terms of marketing,

just tons of money's coming in from big companies, and it's a

big deal. Okay, so let's do our big three, let's get started

officially.

Alright, so the first of our big three,

which you've probably gleaned already is, take it from us. If

you don't know what you're doing, get help. And don't waste

your time, like we did for months and months trying to

create something, just just get help. Like there are people out

there that know what the heck they're doing, and they can get

you started on the right path. The second of our big three is,

you've got to have some patience. And you need to

understand that podcasting. It takes time. It takes time to do

it. It takes time to grow it. And it really does take time out

of your day in your your week in your life, your life, it takes

time. And then the last of our big three is keep the faith even

when it feels and looks like no one's listening. They are there

are people out there listening. And we'll talk a little bit

about what that looks like for us, and how that shows up in our

lives. So Kim, do you want to jump us into big three? Number

one real quick get the help you

I do so yeah, get help. First, I'm a big person in

trying to figure things out from YouTube videos and reading

articles. And I tend to go to the library of wherever that

information is whether it's online, or the actual library or

Amazon and order some books to figure things out. And a lot of

times I can get it done. But this was not one of those areas

where I could just read or study or watch a YouTube video my way

out of the situation. It was where we needed somebody who had

an insider track that wasn't going to scam us that was going

to be focused on us alone. And who was going to really get us

started in the proper and correct way. And here I found

the golden goose where that's concerned and her her name is

Jazz. So jazz was the first person that we came across that

was a guide for us and she knew exactly what she was doing. She

knew exactly what to tell us to do. Now, I'm going to tell you

she didn't come out and say you need to record your podcast on

Riverside and you need to use the whatever the heck mics we

bought. It's some kind of a Rode mic. She didn't say that. What

she did is she told us the basic parameters of what we needed to

look for. And we did try a variety of tools before we found

the right things with the software with the hardware

component with the microphones. We picked those out with a

little bit of audio help from a friend of mine that gave me some

base ideas. And then we all bought the same

microphones and I mean by all is that we drag our friend Phyllis

along for the ride eventually. Yes, I think road should

actually for our second podcast. So road and Scarlett the scarlet

USB Deely I think they should probably give me like I don't

know some type of a kickback I don't know how many of these

setups that I've sold since we've started doing this because

it's been a lot, because I've given other postures, everybody

who wants to start a podcast, I'm like, This is what you

should buy. Right? That was the beginning was that was helpful.

We started learning how to use the audio equipment, which I'm

going to tell you is probably in my personal opinion, is the

biggest frustration in this whole process is this microphone

and the setup, things can go wrong with it. And you just

don't know. Because you you just don't know until. But from the

get go guys, you have to find somebody who knows what the heck

they're doing. Or you do spend a ton of time spinning your

wheels, and then you get the stuff back and you listen to it.

And you're like, that's just not good enough.

Yeah, and you know, Jazz, she helped enlighten

us to things that we didn't even think about to yet she sat down

with with us and said, Okay, step one, this is what you need

to do step two, because she was really clear, like you need to

create a trailer. And you need to submit your trailer because

you've got to submit your show for approval, because it has to

be approved to be a podcast and, and to get on all of the big

listening platforms. And she really kind of had like a guide

through that process for us. Now, just so you guys know, we

haven't talked about Jazz in a while because she eventually

fired us and went on to bigger and better, more amazing things.

And we still love her and we appreciate her. And if she ever

listens to the show, she should know that. But if it wasn't for

her, I think kind of getting us rolling. Lord knows where we'd

be today because she really was she really was someone who we

hired. And I will put that out there we hired to did help us

consult at the early stages to get rolling. And she was

wonderful for that.

She was and by the time she had gone on to

bigger and better things. We knew enough about what we were

doing to be able to move on to we could take out training

wheels off his guess I guess is what I would like to say, by

that point, we knew enough about what we were doing how to get it

done, that we could work with a different editing company. And I

do want to be clear about this, we do not edit this podcast,

somebody else we give it to another company that they go

through it. They're the ones who clean up the audio, they get it

ready, they get it ready for us to publish, we do publish it

using a software that we have. So for those of you who wonder

about the mystery of that process, neither Cara or I have

the time to edit audio in the way it needs to be edited. And I

will tell you from what it sounds like from when we record

it to what it sounds like when you guys listen to it is a

different thing. It's a different, it's a different

experience. And even though it's good, I think when we close the

can so to speak, having a podcast that's edited the audio

editing piece is important. And that's one of the pieces that I

don't think Cara or I either one had a clue about now I've edited

a ton of video in my life care as edit a video. But editing a

straight audio podcast is different. And there's a lot

more latitude to it. And it's it's an amazing process that

people specialize in doing. And it's a point where you do need

to understand all of that to be able to get it to the right

place. And if you don't have that guide to help you find

those resources, it becomes super different. So in jazz when

she left us did give us this company we work with now.

And I was going to just go ahead and give

them a shout out real quick since we're talking about them,

The Wave, it's thewavepodcasting.com They help

women start and grow podcast so they can leave their unique mark

on the world. And they have been wonderful for us, they were able

to grab us up real quick and get started. And we appreciate the

work that they do. So I put their info in the show notes.

For anyone who's looking for a great podcast editing company,

it does say they work with women, which I love. So that's

always my girl power go. I love that. So definitely check them

out as well. Their information will be in the show notes.

Absolutely. And curate when it came to talking

with Jazz. Jazz didn't just give us basic equipment advice. There

were a lot of things that we hadn't like completely prepared

for. And you made a beautiful list of those things that I

think everybody needs to take a look at. If they're considering

starting a podcast. These are questions you need to answer and

probably you should answer them before you even go find that

guide because it'll maximize your time and impact with the

person that's going to help you so

Oh, yay. Tell us a lot of that stuff. Because you remember way

more of this than I do.

Yeah. So when we first got started, the big

thing was is we knew we wanted to have a podcast, it was so

casual. We were sitting around a table chatting, and I want to

have a podcast, I want to have a podcast too. So okay, well,

let's have a podcast. So we sat down, and we had to, first of

all, we had no idea what we're getting into. But we knew we had

to have a goal. So like, what is the goal of the podcast? And

that has for us, it has shifted over time and will continue to

shift, I'm sure. But we had to really determine like, what is

our endgame with this? Is it just to hear ourselves talk? Or

do we actually have a purpose and for us that was serving

animal based business owners. And that was our goal. That was

where we started from our starting place. And within that,

we think about things like, are we trying to build an audience?

Are we trying to build credibility or authority in the

field? Are we trying to grow a network? Are we trying to add

another income stream, we sure hope one day that this show can

have a monetization piece of it, but just so you know, we've done

100 episodes free, like we're not making money on the show.

And then or maybe you just want to have fun, like, there are

definitely shows out there that are friends getting together

talking about movies, or, you know, they're having fun, and

that's okay, too. But you do have to have a goal in mind. In

the first place. The second piece of this that I'm thinking

of is we had to sit down and actually think about who our

intended audience was. So who did we envision listening and

what would be important to them? So we came back to the animal

based business owners, and for me, it's the small business

owner like that solopreneur out there, maybe someone who has a

really small team, but they're an animal based business owner

that is trying to learn and grow their business. And then we had

to sit down and think about okay, so what are we going to

talk about? What's our content going to include? We need to

define topics, we need to have a structure. So each show has a

consistent structure, like for us, that's the big three on the

show, we then had to think about well, okay, so what type of show

are we going to be like, we have a co host conversation, that's

the way our show was run. There's two of us on the show.

But occasionally we bring on guest speakers, we do

interviews, these are all different types of shows that

you can have, you can run a show by yourself, and it just be you

talking and sharing information. You can have q&a, where you do

questions and answers on the show. You can be a storytelling

show, or you tell stories, you could tell fiction stories,

nonfiction stories, you can also have interview shows. So there's

so many different types of shows you can have. But I do think

consistency is really important. And there's one thing that Kim

and I know really know is that if you're going to do a co host

show, you have to like the person and be able to work with

the person that you're gonna do a show with. And Kim and I have

had, I wouldn't say we've had a lot of growing pains. But we've

learned so much about each other because we spend so much time

together, creating the show. And Kim, the very early days,

remember you made us go through that personality. What was the

personality test,

I made Cara take the Keirsey Bates to typology

sorters. So we would know better how to work together, which I'm

going to tell you is has I think, been one of the keys to

us, keeping our friendship and a podcast. First of all, you

should know that Karen, I really didn't know each other that

well, when we started this podcast, we'd been to some

workshops together, we'd we'd shot alongside each other, we

sat next to each other at the big table at the powder horn.

And we knew that we could get along in that context, but we'd

never worked together and it's always my experience that the

better that you know how the people you work with navigate

their world, the better you can work together and Carrie and I

are very opposite as far as that typology sorter. She's an

introvert I'm an extrovert she's an S which means she likes

things well organized and researched. I'm an in which

means that I show up and fly by the seat of my pants. We're both

f so we feel into things and then carries a j which is highly

organized and I'm a P which is more again fly by the seat of

your pants kind of deal sort of spontaneous instead of that

highly organized. So we had to figure out systems in order to

accommodate both of us. And I honestly believe if we hadn't

have done that we would have struggled a lot longer or we

would not have come up with as good of a system as we came up

with so the big three is nice because it's very much guidance.

It keeps me reined in and it gives Kara research points that

she can go look at which satisfies both of our

temperaments and then

And yeah, it's just been, it was a big boon to do that. And I

will tell you, I feel like Cara has become one of my best

friends over the last couple of years. She's one of the people

that I call when I need somebody to talk to. So this podcast has

become where her and I have become good friends. And we do

get to know each other and work. We'd love to sometimes just get

on Zoom and work together, because it's that we feel like

co workers and buddies. So that's been a huge gift from the

podcast is that relationship?

Oh, definitely. And I think it was

an unintended gift, like it was just a really nice, bonus piece

of it, definitely. And I will go out and just say if we hadn't

have spent that time learning about each other at the

beginning, and how to work together, we probably wouldn't

still have a show today. Because we are too different. I think we

would have frustrated the heck out of each other and probably

throwing our hands up and went our separate ways in terms of a

podcast. So that was essential. And it has just done nothing but

strengthen, strengthen, I mean, across the board. So yeah,

absolutely. I'm gonna just continue on with this real

quick, because I can't help myself. So the other piece of

this is you've got to spend some time doing a little research. So

what's already out there in terms of podcast shows that are

similar to yours. When we first started doing the show, there

wasn't anyone else talking about animal based businesses,

specifically, animal based businesses in the business

world, there were a few Nisha pieces around maybe equine

photography, or around dog walking like so really niche.

But we wanted to talk about the animal based business owners in

general. And there was there wasn't anyone else out there

doing that. So do your research. It doesn't mean if the topic

isn't out there already. If the topic is out there already that

you want to talk about it, people are already doing that,

it doesn't mean that there's not spilled still space for you out

there. It just means you want to take a look at what they're

doing. And bring your own flair to it, bring your own ideas to

it, bring your own style to it, because you will then find your

audience. The last piece we've talked that I have on here,

which we've already kind of spoken about is you do need to

get good equipment, we're not going to listen to anything that

sounds like crap. As listeners, we just if it hurts your ears,

if it's hard to listen to, if you have to turn the volume up

and down to hear different conversations that are

happening, you're not going to keep listeners that way they'll

move on to there's enough shows out there now that they will

move on to a show that sounds good, and that they can enjoy.

So thinking about things like that you're going to need right

off the bat, you're gonna need a computer, you're going to need

internet, you're going to need microphone, headphones, a way to

record you're going to need editing and hosting software,

you're gonna need a transcript generator, you're gonna need a

hosting and streaming service, you know, podcast platform,

these are things that you have to think about. And I am going

to put in the shownotes links to a lot of the different things

that we use right now. So like the way podcasting, we just

spoke about his editing team, we're going to put a link in

there for them. So don't hesitate to jump to the show

notes when this episode goes live.

Absolutely. And there's so much in there. And

we'll even put a link to our microphones and equipment. If

you want to know about that. There's a direct link we buy. We

of course bought it from a photography company in New York

that we both want to use called b&h. But yeah, and I did, I did

a lot of research. And also we got suggestions from other

people. And we did try several different types of software for

various things. And I can tell you, I cannot be more pleased

with two of the tools that we picked Riverside and which is

how we record and captivate which is how we distribute the

podcast. I believe Riverside has saved our butts numerous times,

because of my internet. My internet is horrid. As you may

hear us complain about that occasionally. I don't know if we

always record the complaints, but we have a lot of them when

we're not recording. And it gives me the ability to be able

to do podcasting with terrible internet, which is fine, which

is great. Although we are hoping someday it will be better

because it frustrates Cara Because it there's a delay

between what I say and what she when she hears me and we can

respond. So it's an obnoxious thing when you're trying to have

a conversation online. And then Captivate which is the tool that

we use for distribution. I can tell you when we started with

Captivate, it didn't have a ton of options. But over the last

two years, every time I turn around, Captivate is doing

something new and improved, and they've done so much stuff we

were even talking just this morning, we need to go in there

and look at some of the things that they've added because

they've added things that really will help us as podcasters grow

and monetize our podcast. So they're a really great team to

be able to do that. I love all of our tools I feel like are

really good tools. They're not free tools, though. I think that

Cara mentioned this and then it means bears mentioning again.

Podcasting is not a free endeavor, especially if you take

it on seriously. It does cost some money it costs

monthly money, it costs an upfront fee as well. So yeah,

absolutely.

So I think that takes us into number two

big three. Number two, understanding that podcast takes

time, time to do time to grow. For us, that looks like a lot of

things. We have weekly meetings, where we discuss the show, we

plan for the show, we have recording time that we spend

recording, we have troubleshooting time where we

have to troubleshoot issues, because we're 100 episodes in

and we still make mistakes. And so we have all sorts of that

kind of time. But we also have to plan our content. And Kim and

I, we spend a lot of time thinking about episodes and

laying them out in an order that makes sense. And Kim always

comes with so many great episode ideas. But a lot of times we've

got our next two seasons of episodes like listed out, we may

shift them around, we may move around, we may bring in guests

for certain things. But we pretty much know what we're

going to talk about well in advance of when we're recording.

And some of that's for me, because I need to be able to

prep and plan that's that was the J in me. Is that what you

said the SJ, the s of the jet? Yeah, so I have to prep and plan

but we plan those episodes out way in advance, we schedule our

recordings, and we've tried several different things we've

tried weakly recording, we've done batch recording where we

record up to four episodes at a time, we've attempted recording

on the road, we've done recording in our offices, we've

done recording from hotel rooms, I've sat with Kim while she sat

in a laundromat parking lot one day, and we discussed episodes

when she was on the road, because I know you got a lot of

you that are listening know that we have full time businesses

outside of podcasting that we run. And we each have a heavy

travel schedule. So for us figuring out how to fit not just

one show, but we have a second show now into our busy

schedules. All of this double really is a scheduling issue, we

have to schedule those recordings, you have to plan for

problems, we learned that the hard way, you have to plan for

problems. So what that looks like for us is we always try to

have episodes in the cache. So we've got backup episodes, we

try to be scheduled out so that we've got one or two episodes

that at anytime can be dropped into the listening audience.

Because there are times when we have had I mean, we've we're

four seasons in so we've had things like health issues come

up where somebody wasn't available to record. We've had

traveling mishaps where we've had planes not go out when

they're supposed to go out and we've missed recording times.

Gosh, we've had just tons of stuff we've had internet outages

and power outages and hurricanes and all sorts of things happen.

So if you're gonna keep a consistent schedule, which is

essential, your audience is expecting the show a certain

time, every single week, if that's your schedule, or if

you're a monthly show or twice a month show your audience is

expecting it. And when you don't show up, we didn't think anyone

would notice it. Because we did. We missed an episode once you

guys and people let us know. Hey, did I miss your show? It

didn't show up on Tuesday, when I pulled up the show. It didn't

show up. And we we had this idea that no one would notice. If we

missed a show. Okay, we've done 80 episodes, and we've not

dropped the ball. And here we have nothing. we've messed up.

We've had crisis happen. We don't have a show. And guess

what people noticed.

Yes. It's like what happened? Are you okay,

Notice?

people were texting us. And they were

worried? Yeah. Is this show gonna keep going? And so what we

learned from that is, you know, what, people are expecting the

episodes to drop consistently. So we had to plan for that we've

had to plan for problems. Yeah. So life happens. And but the

show must go on is what we have learned. And we have have to

prep for that. Absolutely.

Yeah, I think that we were lulled into this

sense of the fact that we had created so much and that the

people had this whole cache of things that they weren't up to

catching up with us in one episode wouldn't matter. But it

did. Which tells me a couple of things. It tells me that people

do engage with what we are putting out into the world,

which is important, which is another reason for us to keep on

going which I think is our which is our big three, the next one,

which is keep the faith because even when no one it looks like

no one's listening to you, they really are. So I rarely look at

the analytics for this show. What I judge the success of it

by is the messages that I get from people and in general, the

universe is really kind because when I'm in a moment of

thinking, oh my gosh, this podcast is a lot of effort and a

lot of investment. Do we really want to keep on doing it? And

then inevitably, like that day, I will get or the next day I

will get a message from a listener that says, Wow, that

episode that you guys just did it was exactly what I needed to

hear. I am so glad you brought up that topic or that was

something I was wanting to

Learn and now you've given me the catalyst to be able to do

that, or I really resonated with what you said. So our listener

feedback, by the way, you all that is so important to us, it

is the gold in all of this process is being able to hear

from you, dear listeners in telling us how this podcast

affects your life. And we do get those text messages and items

and DMS relatively often to have people say, this is what it's

doing. And and I'll tell you, every one of them is cherished

by both Cara and I, whoever you send it to, we share it with the

other. And it's just an amazing way for knowing what the impact

is. And that's the truth of the matter is that this like

anything entrepreneurial, because it's basically like

having another business, it truly is like having another

business to support.

Any time that you get feedback, or you feel like you're doing

things out into the right direction, it's so much easier

to keep on going and keep that faith when you know you're

making a difference for people out there and small business

owners because that's the truth of the matter is that we built

this podcast for people like us, these are the things that we

would want to know or to want to know, as small business owners

in the animal based industry where we have unique struggles,

and then also the same struggles as other businesses across the

map. And it just is nice to be able to have that conversation

to feel that community to know all of those people are out

there that are able to listen to this and be impacted by it and

impact us as well, in the things that we can place out there that

we would have wanted to know. So this is the podcast, we want to

listen to, as much as we want you to listen to, I guess is the

bottom line to that.

Yeah, absolutely. And then, you know,

like Kim had mentioned, you've got to treat the show like it's

a business and you really do. So you've got to build the brand of

the podcast. And you've got to do all the pieces that come with

that. So just like we've talked about in the last 100 episodes,

for running your small business, we have to do all those things

for the show, too. And it's things like having a website,

having social media channels, you've got to think of it like a

business that you're growing, and you got to do all the

things. And I will just say the last part is try to make it fun.

Otherwise, it's not worth it most likely. So have some fun

with it. It isn't fun all the time, I will tell you that it's

a lot of work. There are times when you know, I have been

sitting at my computer at 11 o'clock at night waiting for an

episode to be finished editing so that it can be ready to be

released a few hours later. So there are definitely those

moments that we have had. And those are not fun. But in

general, I think that Kim and I both can agree that what we have

gotten out of this podcast in terms of it being you know,

we've we've educated ourselves, we have built so many amazing

connections out in the world, the friendship that we've grown

between the two of us and with the new guests that we've had

come on, that has been worth it for us. So Kim, I don't know if

there's anything else that you want to add. But I would just

tell anyone that is out there that's thinking about having a

podcast, there's no reason why you shouldn't do it. But you

shouldn't jump right into it. Take your time, plan it. Think

about some of the things that we talked about today, check out

those resources I'm going to leave for you in the show notes.

And gosh, we wish you the best of luck out there. And hopefully

we'll be listening to your show soon.

Absolutely. I have nothing to add to that.

Except just, you know, podcasting is a great medium.

And I'm hoping that I like Cara that I'll be listening to your

podcast soon. If you start one and any of this found useful,

please let us know so that we can tune in and follow you and

support you like you've supported us. With that being

said, you can find us online at thebusinessanimal.com You can

find us on social media at The Business Animal and we would

love it if you would let us know that you heard the episode and

what you thought about it. Thank you guys so much. Good luck out

there.

Thanks for listening to this episode of The Business

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more. Find us at thebusinessanimal.com We'd love

to hear from you. Until next time, keep your business well