In this episode of Podjunction Podcast, hosts Matt Edmundson and Sadaf Beynon discuss the common pitfalls of pod fade with guest Jason Greenwood. They explore the importance of persistence and consistency in podcasting, emphasizing that success takes time and practice. The hosts share personal experiences and advice for new podcasters, highlighting the need to overcome initial challenges and commit to at least 20 episodes before making major decisions about continuing a podcast.
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Timestamps:
0:00 Intro
5:28 Persistence in podcasting
16:33 Seeking feedback
22:57 Long-term podcasting success
28:57 Enjoying your podcast topic
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Key Takeaways:
1. Prepare for a Slow Start
Jason highlights the reality of podcasting, emphasising that initial traction can be slow. He notes that many podcasts don't make it past episode 20 due to low listenership.
2. Trust the Process and Be Persistent
Jason stresses the importance of persistence and consistency in podcasting. He advises trusting the process, even when immediate success seems elusive, as good things will eventually come.
3. Embrace Imperfection and Practise
Jason encourages podcasters to accept that they won't be perfect from the start. He compares podcasting to learning a new skill, where improvement comes with time and practice.
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Matt Edmundson [0:00 - 0:00]: Foreign.
Sadaf Beynon [0:05 - 0:12]: Welcome back to Podjunction Podcast, a show that helps podcasters grow their business. I'm Sadaf Beynon and I'm with Matt Edmundson.
Matt Edmundson [0:12 - 0:14]: Very good. Finally.
Sadaf Beynon [0:14 - 0:28]: Finally. Yes, we've got there. And we're back today with Jason Greenwood as well. And today he's talking about the common pitfalls of pod fade. I can get my words out.
Matt Edmundson [0:29 - 0:54]: Brilliant. What you don't know, dear listener, is. And also dear viewer, of course. But what you don't know is, depending on how Josh has edited this video, it may be that you just heard one introduction to the show where Sadaf went straight into it. It may be that you heard the four or five failed attempts, and Josh has sort of strung them together. And so that's the reason why I'm laughing is we're just struggling right now.
Sadaf Beynon [0:54 - 0:54]: We are.
Matt Edmundson [0:54 - 1:02]: To get the words out. Has it been a long day? I don't understand how it's only caught 12. It's like it's not even afternoon yet. But has it been a long day?
Sadaf Beynon [1:03 - 1:04]: Has it been a talking today?
Matt Edmundson [1:05 - 1:05]: Okay.
Sadaf Beynon [1:06 - 1:20]: Okay. So anyway, we are talking again with Jason. He's talking about the common pitfalls of pod fade and the necessity of being persistent and consistent in all of pot.
Matt Edmundson [1:20 - 1:20]: Fade.
Sadaf Beynon [1:20 - 1:23]: Pod fade. Is it my accent, Matt?
Matt Edmundson [1:23 - 1:25]: Yeah, maybe. So pod fade.
Sadaf Beynon [1:25 - 1:26]: Yeah.
Matt Edmundson [1:26 - 1:27]: What do you mean by pod fade?
Sadaf Beynon [1:27 - 1:31]: Where you kind of get tired of podcasting, you kind of fade out.
Matt Edmundson [1:31 - 1:34]: Okay. So you just disappear into the.
Sadaf Beynon [1:34 - 1:35]: Into.
Matt Edmundson [1:35 - 1:39]: 98% of everybody. Everybody does this. 90, 98% of people do this.
Sadaf Beynon [1:40 - 1:40]: Something like that.
Matt Edmundson [1:40 - 1:45]: But fade just disappear, never to be seen again. Yeah, I'm never doing that podcasting thing.
Sadaf Beynon [1:46 - 1:46]: Yes.
Matt Edmundson [1:47 - 1:51]: Yeah. Okay, so that's what we're talking about. Brilliant. Well, should we get into the clip?
Sadaf Beynon [1:51 - 1:52]: Let's do it.
Matt Edmundson [1:52 - 1:53]: All right, here's Jason.
Sadaf Beynon [1:53 - 1:59]: What advice would you give to someone who's starting a podcast to grow their business?
Jason Greenwood [2:00 - 5:28]: Be prepared. For a long, long, long, long period of not much traction, be prepared. This is a very, very easy industry to get into, and it is a very difficult industry to succeed in. Meaning that. And this is why pod fade is a thing. This is why most podcasts never get past episode 20, because most people, if they get to episode 20 and they don't see much traction and they're only getting two listens an episode, by episode 20, they give up. And they say, well, this is. This is a waste of time. Why would I put all this effort and energy into a podcast that's not going to go anywhere? Right. You have to trust the process. Like Gary Vee told me 10 years ago and he was pounding in my ear every single day, every single episode of his that I watched or listened to, he was just pounding into my ear. Trust the process. Good things will come. You may not know what those good things are when you start, but trust me, good things will come. But, you know, grit, persistency, consistency, these are all traits that in our short attention span world today, people don't like. They want to. They want to go viral from the first episode, they want to go viral from the second episode, the fifth episode. They want to have a million followers tomorrow. They don't want to do eight hours a week of content production for years before they find success. And this is more often than not, unless you just get lucky. Unless you just happen to have a guest that has a million followers and they put it a. Post it out to their million followers and you automatically, you know, draught off of their success. Or, you know, you, you may hit a home run on your first episode, but it's unlikely. And you may be very good from a production quality and from an interview quality or from a writing and, and, you know, copywriting perspective. You may be amazing from day one, but most likely you won't be. And that's okay, because the reality is your audience will grow alongside your skills and your capability. So people tell me, aren't you afraid? You know, weren't you afraid when you first started putting content out to LinkedIn every day? When you're afraid that people would make fun of it or they would, they would challenge you in the comments or they wouldn't agree with you or whatever it might be. And I'm like, no, I had like 500 followers. Why would I care? Like, nobody's gonna see it. So I practised and I practised and I practised and I practised when I had no audience. And then as I got better, as I became more consistent, as the quality of my content got better, so did my audience size grow. And so I think that people worry too much. You need more at bats, you need to practise more. It's like going to the gym. You are not going to be fit the first time you go to the gym, but the hundredth day in a row that you go to the gym, you're probably going to see some gains in the mirror and you are certainly going to feel better, your biomarkers are going to be healthier. When you go to the doctor and you get your blood pressure taken, it's probably going to be better, but I tell you, it doesn't happen after the first day at the gym, your first post, your first episode, your first whatever. Just assume that you are going to suck because you will, right? It's like anything in life, we suck at anything. If we take on a new sport, we are going to suck and we have no expect. It's so weird. It is so weird. People have this expectation that their content is going to crush from day one. And I'm like, what do you do for a living?
Sadaf Beynon [5:28 - 5:29]: You play sports?
Jason Greenwood [5:29 - 7:10]: Do you have hobbies? Were you amazing from the very first day? You know, did you go to university? Like I personally didn't go to university, but I know lots of people do. Were you amazing at that thing before you went to university? Probably not. Why do we have this expectation? And it's the same with E commerce. People think they can set up a shopify store and be successful overnight. Why do people think that with content it's different than any other thing in their life. They will need to practise, they will need to refine, they will need to try things, taste things, try different formats, try different styles, try different tools, try different channels, try, you know, image posts, long form text posts, short form text posts, videos, carousels. They will need to try and taste lots of things before they figure out what even they like to produce. Because, because some people like to do an audio only podcast because they don't want to have to have this video interaction. And they go, well look, I can sit in my PJs and there's no camera and nobody cares because I'm doing audio only. And they're more comfortable with audio only, right? And in the beginning my podcast was audio only, right? But I realised a couple of years ago, I realised the whole world is moving to video and I was like, if I'm going to create shorts for short video platforms, I need the raw video to start from. So I converted from an audio only podcast to a video and audio podcast. So you know, you are going to need to experiment, you are going to need to play, but above all just do shit you enjoy. Because if you don't enjoy it, you will never stick at it anyway. So why start? Just do shit you love.
Sadaf Beynon [7:10 - 7:21]: Yeah, what you're saying is really valid. You'll get better at it. You just need to start. And I think that's some of that. Sometimes the hardest thing, starting because you want to be perfect at it from like straight out the gate.
Jason Greenwood [7:21 - 8:37]: But just know you won't just admit it to yourself, you will not be. It's going to take you probably if you do a podcast it's going to probably take you 50 episodes before you even remotely feel comfortable hosting a podcast. Like. Like I was a little bit lucky. I've got an abnormally outgoing personality. I was never nervous, I was never shy and I never didn't like my own voice. But that doesn't mean that somebody who isn't like me can't be absolutely awesome at putting out content that people love to consume, because my personality is very polarising. Some people love me and some people hate me. Some people can't stand me. And that's cool. That's totally cool. I want them to self select out of my content and they will self select out of yours too. If they can't stand you, let them bugger off. Let the people who are true fans be attracted to you like moth to a flame. That's the foundation of your community. And they're out there because there are people just like you out there. You represent certain strata of your community or your potential community and you will find people out there to resonate with. You will find an audience. If you stay at it long enough, you will find your tribe.
Sadaf Beynon [8:42 - 8:50]: If that got you curious and you want to catch the full episode, be sure to subscribe to the show. We've got plenty more great conversations coming up.
Matt Edmundson [8:54 - 8:56]: Welcome back.
Sadaf Beynon [8:56 - 8:57]: Welcome back.
Matt Edmundson [8:57 - 9:14]: Well, he was, he reminded me. He got really into that, didn't he? This is a passion of it. He reminded me of like an old school evangelist kind of, you know, the, the sort of veracity of which he was talking about this obviously deeply embedded into his thinking. Naturally. Entirely accurate, I thought.
Sadaf Beynon [9:14 - 9:29]: Yeah, Yeah. I felt like there was so much to, to pick out from, from what he was saying. So it was actually kind of hard to. Can't get my words out. I've been talking too much to narrow it down to that segment.
Matt Edmundson [9:30 - 9:37]: Yeah, it, it, it fascinating listening to him talk. So what? One piece of. You're gonna suck, I thought.
Sadaf Beynon [9:37 - 9:41]: This is a reality, isn't it?
Matt Edmundson [9:41 - 9:47]: It is. It's very much a reality, I think, and it's an obvious statement. I mean, we're on. Episode. What episode are we on now in this show?
Sadaf Beynon [9:47 - 9:50]: I don't know, is 65.
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