As a podcast listener, you understand the value of podcasting. But this episode takes it to the next level. Karen Roberts shares why starting your own podcast can be the growth unlock you've been looking for in your business.

Specifically, Karen shares:

• How podcasts showcase your value and stand out from the crowd.
• Why podcasts are more valuable than social media content.
• The exact ROI of starting a podcast for your business.

Mentioned in This Episode:

• Karen's Free Training

About Karen:

Karen Roberts is a seasoned fitness industry veteran with over 25 years of experience who made a bold leap into the digital space. After successfully guiding coaches through the transition to online entrepreneurship, she hosted her inaugural online summit in 2020. Mintwave Radio recognized her expertise and invited her to launch a weekly show, 'A Coffee with Karen - a cup of positivity with just a sprinkling of wu wu podcast,' breaking free from the constraints of traditional radio.

Having interviewed countless coaches, consultants, therapists, and healers, Karen uncovered a common thread: the power of sharing personal stories to expand influence and audience reach. In 2021, she took charge of the station, founding the Raising Vibrations Podcast Network, driven by the realization that providing a platform was insufficient. Karen identified a need for a comprehensive strategy, leading her to join forces with Evans Putman the founder of Podcast Profit School.

Currently residing in the top 1% of podcasts globally, Karen empowers others with coaching services and comprehensive post-production support through her business, ensuring her clients not only reclaim their time but also achieve a tangible return on investment for their podcasting efforts.

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About Angela

Angela Frank is a fractional CMO with a decade-long track record of generating multimillion-dollar marketing revenue for clients. She is the founder of The Growth Directive, a marketing consultancy helping brands create sustainable marketing programs.

Her new book Your Marketing Ecosystem: How Brands Can Market Less and Sell More helps business owners, founders, and corporate leaders create straightforward and profitable marketing strategies.

Angela is the host of The Growth Pod podcast, where she shares actionable tips to help you build a profitable brand you love.

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Welcome to The Growth Pod. Today on the podcast we have Karen Roberts, who is a fitness industry veteran and she made a bold leap into the digital space.

Having interviewed countless coaches, consultants, therapists and healers for her own podcast, Karen has uncovered a common thread, the power of sharing personal stories to expand influence and audience reach. Currently, her podcast, the Podcast Profits Unleashed is ranked in the top 1% of all podcasts globally.

Karen empowers others with coaching services and comprehensive post production support through her business, ensuring her clients not only reclaim their time, but also achieve a tangible return on investment for their podcasting efforts. Karen, welcome to the podcast.

Well, thank you very much for having me.

I am so excited for our conversation today. Obviously, podcasting is something that we both love and use to grow our businesses.

And today you are going to be sharing how we can leverage podcasting not only for business growth, but personal growth as well. But before we get started, can you share a little bit about why you're so passionate about encouraging business owners to launch their own podcasts?

It's really comes from me starting out podcasting really and hearing people's stories, because I don't know about you, but you can get a bio from somebody or you look at somebody's website and you might have a preconceived idea as to what it is they do because they have this title of a business coach, a mindset coach, and it doesn't really explain specifically what it is they do and how they help their clients.

And it's only when you bring them on the podcast and you ask them questions and by the end of it, you've got a completely different story created in your head about what they do.

So for me, it just feels like this is such a powerful platform because it allows people to not just share their story, but to demonstrate exactly what the transformation that they offer when people come and work with them without a website by itself or social media posts can't do.

I love that. I think in a world where everyone's pushing for short form content, just what you said, podcasting allows this longer conversation to take place.

And the other thing I think is that people have a little bit more patience to hear what you're saying. They're not like, give me my information that I'm looking for in a second or I'm scrolling on to the next video.

So I love what you're saying about not only does it create the space, but it allows you to tell a stronger narrative about what you're doing. So with that, we kind of touched a little bit on this.

But what do you feel is the biggest difference between using that social media versus podcasting for business owners? Is there anything in, in addition to creating that time and space to tell your story that is beneficial only in podcasting?

It's massive, and I think even more so now with the rise of AI. Because you, anybody can create a post. You know, you can go to ChatGPT and you can create a post.

It doesn't mean that you have any experience that you are actually capable of helping somebody achieve a specific goal, because you can just put content out there that isn't your own.

The thing with podcasting is that you get to show up as your authentic self and you build on the know like and trust factor through the content that you're putting out. And because it's conversational, it's not scripted, and it's not written by AI, you gotta know your stuff, right?

And so I think that comes across within a podcast rather than, yes, you can write anything on social media.

So I think with the rise of AI, I think it's even going to be more important for people to have their own podcast to demonstrate their skill set and clearly build that know like and trust factor so that people really know that they know what they're talking about and that they can actually help people.

I love that. I think it gets back to, you know, how people were designed to communicate, which was conversating.

You can write something in a social post and even do a quick video, but with this longer form content, you're able to, like you said, showcase your expertise and authority in your niche and create this stronger overarching narrative for your services. So you're somebody who's launched a successful podcast not only for yourself, but for your clients as well.

So what do you think is the biggest driver of success for someone when they're starting a podcast for their business?

If somebody's starting out, I think it's a case of just make a commitment to showing up. As I said, you know, podcasters, it's you build on the know like and trust factor, right?

And podcasters are the most trusted form of content creators out there.

And I think that is because if you make a commitment showing up every single week, you know, however long you've been going, you know, I can look back now, I'm about three and a half years in people, there's going to be that more trust because I have showed up once a week for three and a half years. And in fact, the beginning of last year, I even increased it to three shows A week until I almost hit burnout in July.

So I only did it for seven months and came back to doing once a week. So you've built on that already. So I think for somebody starting out, I think it can be very daunting because you think, who's going to listen to me?

And, you know, all these sort of imposter syndrome issues come into play.

But if you just make that commitment and don't worry about the stats, because the stats are vanity metrics, really, it's about creating the right kind of content that is going to attract or even create your ideal client.

And as long as you just do that, you keep showing up to serve and be somehow, I know it might sound easier said than done in the beginning, but be detached from the outcome. You will grow your tribe, as it were. Because the beauty with podcasting, the way I see it, is that those who aren't interested are listening.

So there's no rejection. You get to show up and serve those who are listening. So it's just a wonderful platform. There's no resistance.

You're not trying to sell anything on your podcast. It's. It's just allowing people to get to know you.

And as I said before, I know we throw this word out there a lot, but your authentic self, because, you know, you might be able to keep up some kind of pretense in the beginning, but over time, it's not going to happen. You know, you're going to show up as you. So the people that do resonate are the ones that are going to follow you.

So it's perfect because you are showing up to serve those who have already resonated with you. So I used to say 80% of it is just showing up. But then I saw a post a little while ago from Stephen Bartlett, and I'm going to take it.

He said 99 of it is just committing to show, showing up. And I do agree with that. As long as you just keep going. Because so many do give up too soon because they're looking for that quick fix.

And this isn't a quick fix. It's a marathon and not a sprint. So, you know, you do you, you keep doing you, and you will attract the right people for you.

I love what you're saying about continuing to show up. When I launched my podcast in January, I did, I think, eight episodes, which most podcasts don't even make it to eight episodes.

And I was in a really busy season in my business, and I said, you know, I'm just going to set this aside and come back to it after I get through this busy period. And no kidding, one month later, two people reached out to my business email asking to be on my podcast.

And so even though, you know, you're not thinking that your podcast is really having an impact in those early stages, I was really just figuring out how to podcast. There is still value that's being created for your audience.

And like you said, by continuing to show up over and over and over again, you're sowing all these seeds not only of trust with your audience, but that consistency and clarity over time when you're podcasting.

Yeah, 100%. 100%. You don't know who's listening.

I mean, I, you know, it's funny, I look at the stats and I think, oh, my goodness, there's more people in the states that are listening to me than in my own country. Like, I don't. I don't know why. You have no control over who's listening, and that's what makes it actually remarkable.

So it is a case of just, just keep going because you don't know who's listening and you don't know who you're. You know, you can be changing lives.

Anything that you can do, if you're inspiring people to create a change, if you've made a difference in one person's life, then it's been all worth it. So just keep going.

I love that. So we've talked a lot about the impact that your podcast can have not only on yourself, but also your listeners.

And now I want to learn a little bit more about the impact that it can have on our business from an ROI perspective. So how does a business owner get ROI from their podcast? You mentioned it's not necessarily a place to sell.

So at the end of the day, how are we going to use this as a driver of growth for our business?

Depending on the business, I mean, there's different. There's different ways. So I know a lot of people, when they start a podcast podcast, they just want the numbers right?

They just want to grow their downloads. And yeah, maybe eventually they can have ads inserted and make a little bit of side bunny for just showing up.

And yes, of course, that is possible, but again, that's not going to happen straight away.

Now, for others, the way, the way I teach it is if you're a coach or an expert, rather than having ads inserted, I mean, admittedly, I do only at the end, the very end, because my intro and my outro really is an ad for my business. So I want people to come through into my world. So it is about thinking about the content that you're going to create for each episode.

That's number one. But also how are you going to turn the listeners into leads? Because like I said, you're not selling anything on a podcast.

Nobody's going to buy a high ticket offer direct from your podcast. Nobody's really going to book a call direct from your podcast.

However, if there's something that you can give the listeners that's of value, obviously, and not a cheat sheet, not a PDF, not a downloadable ebook, but some kind of immersive experience that the listener will get a little bit more of an idea of what it would look like to work with you. So there is no resistance. You can turn the listeners into leads and bring them into your world. So it's, it's twofold, I suppose, some of it.

You're going to get an roi, some directly from the podcast. Yes. If you have ads inserted, yes, that's a definite thing.

But indirectly, I know that I wouldn't have made a lot of my sales if I hadn't had my podcast. Right. So again, the podcast is building on that know like and trust factor. And it's validation that you are in business.

You've been in business for years, you know what you're talking about. So indirectly, you're going to get an ROI as long as you keep bringing people into your world.

I love what you're saying about using the podcast as a way to get people into your world.

In January, when I started my podcast, I was reading Expert Secrets by Russell Brunson and also Traffic Secrets and he shares about when he first started his podcast, he had no way to check the statistics and so he had no idea how many people were actually listening for the first three years.

And what he found out is that a lot of people who joined his high ticket mastermind program, they all came from his podcast because they were able to create that know like and trust factor with him.

And the way that he explained it is somebody would come in and listen to an episode that really resonated with them for whatever reason, and then they would go back and binge his entire library and really listen to what he was saying. And then they would take the next step because of course his whole thing is sales funnels.

And so he would direct the traffic just like what you're saying to get them off of your podcast and into your systems.

And so even though, like you said, there might not be a direct roi, a crazy ROI in terms of like the Ad revenue that you're generating, the longer term play can lead to those high ticket sales, which is where that growth comes for your business. So if somebody is looking to launch a podcast this year, what are some of the trends that they should be looking out for?

Oh, I don't know. I'm not really sure about what the trends are. I mean, the, the trend is it's all going up.

There's never been a better time than now to launch a podcast, as I said, because I think the shift in everything on social, social media, everyone's fighting for attention. You see, they're fighting for attention, but what are you doing on social media? You're scrolling, you're not really paying attention.

You might, you know, hit the like button. But everybody's looking at those stats, they're irrelevant.

It doesn't matter how many likes you get on social media, they don't necessarily convert into sales. So the difference is with a podcast, you get to hold the attention.

And you said something earlier, which I want to pick up on is the fact that people then will binge listen to. And this is the, the beauty of a podcast, because it's evergreen.

If somebody does find a particular episode that resonates with you, that's exactly what they're gonna do. They're gonna go back, but it's not you putting it, putting it in front of them. They've chosen to go back and binge watch.

And that's very, very important because like even when I say, when you bring people into your world, ideally I suggest to people now there are other opinions, right? Not just my own.

But even if you're going to say send them a sales video or a webinar, say even a 30 minute webinar, you're asking them to do a lot, to sit there for 30 minutes. However, even if you broke that up into five minute, a video series of five minutes, it still could be the 30 minutes, like six five minute videos.

But because you've broken it up, you've given the listener control of whether they binge watch it or not. And more often than not, they will binge it because the power is with them. They are in control. And I think that is massively important.

When we say that, when I say that you're not selling on a podcast, people are listening in the comfort of their own home, car or the treadmill or whatever. They are in control.

So if you give them an immersive experience where they opt to binge listen or binge watch, you're going to have a much better Result because they've made the decision themselves rather than you telling them to go and watch a 30 minute video. Does that make sense?

Yeah, that absolutely makes sense.

And it goes back to this concept that I like to teach about, which is creating psychological safety in everything that you're doing in your marketing. And I think this really takes that concept to the next level because you're giving the power back to the person who's listening.

And so instead of, like you said, framing it up like this 30 minute webinar, that you have to watch the whole thing, otherwise you're not going to get all the value out of it and breaking it up into those chunks. Now they're saying that was valuable. I want to listen to the next part.

And it's giving the control back to them and creating this greater psychological safety in your marketing, which goes, you know, on to creating that know, like and trust factor and improving those conversion rates in your funnels.

Yeah, definitely. Definitely.

Well, Karen, you are somebody who is very deeply entrenched in the podcasting world. You have a very successful podcast. You help clients with their podcasts. I'm curious to know what's next for you.

Oh, what's next for me is really to grow the network. I was very passionate about when I started, and I initially, I was just interviewing, so I wasn't doing any solo episodes. It was all about the guest.

I'm very, I'm very good at bigging other people up. Right. And my sort of the guests were coaches, consultants, therapists and healers, from the conventional to the more woo, woo.

And I used to think, look, everybody's got all these different tools in their toolbox. There's somebody for everyone.

And I wanted to create almost like this platform where the public could come and choose the right fit for them because they may not need a business coach.

Maybe they need to deal with their money mindset, you know, money management, or maybe they need to do some inner child work, you know, you don't know.

So I was actually offered a radio station initially because I started on radio and I thought, wow, now I've got a platform for others to get their message out there. Now, admittedly, it became a little bit too much for me, so I just continued with the podcast network.

So really my mission now is to grow that network of lots of different types of coaches and consultants so that I can achieve that vision so the public can come and find. Oh, look. Oh, I've never heard of that. Oh, I'll be interested in that.

Because you don't know, you know, for me, my audience say on Facebook, my friends, they're not interested in starting a podcast.

However, on our network we have this other coach that does something that they would be interested in and that the whole point of collaboration rather than competition has always been sort of my thing. So the beauty of having the network is that every host gets introduced to everybody else's audiences and vice versa.

And that's how we grow rather than trying to do it all by ourselves.

I love that.

If somebody is considering starting a podcast and they want to learn more about your podcast network or just keep up with you in general online, what's the best place for them to do that?

Well, I do have a little bit of a free giveaway to your listeners.

And this is not even if you're not not looking to launch your own podcast, but maybe you'd like to be a guest on other people's podcasts and you want to know how to show up and shine. I have a freebie that I'd like to give away.

You can find it at podcastprofitsunleashed.com that which is the same name as my podcast forward slash free.

And you can either go straight through the video training and do it yourself, or if you need a little bit of help for me to pull out the right story for you, then you can book a zoom meeting with me if you need to.

Amazing. So if you're listening and any of that sounds good to you, it will all be there for you. Karen, thank you so much for joining us today.

I really enjoyed our conversation. Thank you so much for listening to this episode of the Growth Pod. If you enjoyed it, leave us a review. I look forward to seeing you in the next one.