In this episode of Do This, Not That, host Jay Schwedelson interviews Ryan Alford, a successful marketer and podcaster, about his career journey and insights into the podcasting industry.

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Best Moments:

(00:55) Ryan's background and early career in advertising

(02:28) Ryan's transition from agency work to entrepreneurship

(05:27) Discussion on the fallacy of "do what you love" career advice

(11:44) Ryan's journey into podcasting and agency ownership

(16:54) The current state and future of podcasting

(19:32) Ryan's current business ventures and the Radcast Network

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Guest Bio:

Ryan Alford is a marketing expert and entrepreneur with over 20 years of experience in the industry. He is the host of the popular podcast Right About Now and the founder of the Radcast Network. Ryan's career spans from working at top advertising agencies to running his own successful podcast and marketing ventures. He is known for his insights into media trends and his innovative approach to podcasting and content creation.

Ryan's Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ryanalford/

Ryan's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ryan-alford/

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Foreign.

Welcome to do this, not that, the podcast for marketers. You'll walk away from each episode with actionable tips you can test immediately.

You'll hear from the best minds in marketing who will share tactics, quick wins, and pitfalls to avoid. Also, dig into life, pop culture, and the chaos that is our everyday. I'm Jay Schwedelson. Let's do this not that.

We are back for do this, not that podcast presented by Marigold.

And this is part of our new series, My Path, where we have super big people that come on the show that really share with us how they got to where they are, because it's never a straight line, especially in the world of marketing. And always exciting to hear that. So who do we got? We got a big dude Ryan Alerts here. Now.

You probably know him from his podcast right about now, which is the number one marketing and business podcast, for that matter, on the Apple charts. And how did I find Ryan and his show? This is real.

When I started getting the podcast about two years ago, I'm like, all right, well, who's number one? And I went to the top of the charts, and I see this dude Ryan, I'm like, what's his deal? And I went deep on his podcast.

I'm like, crap, I'm never going to be able to do what what this guy's doing. And I was super impressed. And he comes from this agency background, but he wasn't just some big wig at an agency.

Yeah, he worked on all these big accounts, all this stuff.

He worked his tail off way up the food chain, and he has all this cool stuff that he tried to do some work, some didn't, but now he's crushing it in the world of podcasting. He has an agency. He is just an interesting guy. So, Ryan, welcome to the show, man.

Hey, Jay, I appreciate that setup. I mean, I, I think it's, it truly is as varied as it sounds, and Journey has been a roller coaster.

But I, it's all been worth it to, to have anyone at your level say anything positive about me. So I, I, I take that really seriously. Thank you, Jay.

Well, I'm, I'm fired up to have you here, so let's, let's go back in time a little bit, because a lot of people listening, they very well might be an account exec at an agency, or maybe they're a brand marketer, marketing manager, marketing director at a business, and they're like, well, how do I get from where I am to where this guy Ryan is? And you did it. So. So take us through. How did it all get rolling? What was your deal?

Well, you know, I started at an ad agency in South Carolina called Irwin Penland. At the time it was the largest agency in South Carolina. I was a marketing major at Clemson. Go Tigers. Backdoored our way into the playoffs.

Syracuse for that.

Exactly. We'll take it. The paths are messy sometimes and I've been a life.

I was a lifelong marketer so it was a natural path for me to get into the ad agency business. A side story that I don't think I've ever told that I think it's interesting since we're talking path.

An ex girlfriend, my first high school girlfriend of like three years worked at this ad agency and we had a pretty. It wasn't nasty, but no split is great, right? You know, she broke my heart. I'll just leave it there.

In college, it ended up being the best thing ever happened to me because she did it like, you know, first semester freshman year, she did me the greatest favor of all time, you know, like turned me into a single, you know, not terrible looking, just, you know, maybe slightly above average guy in college. And suddenly I'm single and I'm depressed and I'm like, wait, I woke up and anyway, long story short, she got me the job at the ad agency.

Oh, nice.

So she did me a favor. Hey, breaks up. I mean she's done me a lot of favorites that I look on now. So that's an interest path in itself. Went into the ad agency.

Junior account executive, lowest man on the totem pole at an ad agency. Pretty much for account management. And I'll say this, I've always been really ignorant of my shortcomings. It's been both.

I think it's actually a super strength because I think if you're too. It's not that I wasn't self aware of them. I'd say like ignorant in letting them hold me back.

I think I always sort of put my foot into things that maybe I didn't belong because I just was like didn't really care about whatever established norms might have been. Not because I'm rude or whatever, but I worked my way into meetings and worked my way into conversations and I listened.

I'll tell you this, the path to success is littered with listening and not talking. And most people think you talk your way into success.

I listened and watched my way into a lot of success because again, I was not the world's greatest junior account executive. I might have been in the 10 percentile. I was I was below average as a junior account executive. I'll just say that now.

Here's what I was not below average at paying attention and learning what my clients cared about and how the agency made money. A lot of people get real confused that being good at their job separates them in work. Yes.

Sometimes you either got to be elite good or you need to understand how to help the company make more money that you work for if you're an employee. And I learned that really quickly, kind of watching. And so started in the ad agency business as a junior account executive and went to the highest.

About the highest level I could get. I couldn't be the owner, but worked for 13 years for the same agency.

Wow.

And.

And again went from, you know, Greenville, South Carolina to Madison Avenue in New York, opening up a New York office for the agency and fundamentally built on relationships, ignorance to shortcomings, and willing to take risks.

So then, but. So you were at the agency, Right.

It was all going well, and you could have just stayed on that path and been an agency guy and probably had some big position right now somewhere. But then you said, you know what? I have something I've always wanted to do. I got a passion in life.

And you kind of put all your chips on the table and did this thing in the automotive world, and it went to crap. It didn't go well. I mean, is that. Is that an accurate version of the story?

Oh, I lost a million dollars, so that's crap. Yeah, I made some pretty good money in New York and at the agency and, you know, small investments and things like that.

And, you know, Jay, I worked 13 years, worked on some of the largest brands in the world, somehow turned myself into an above average account strategy, creative guy in the ad agency world that rarely had such. And then, you know, the 13 years was enough. You know, it was time to move on.

It was sort of a mutual moving on, and I needed to get out of New York and back to South Carolina. And so you think, Jay, what is the natural progression? Okay, what should I do? Should I go to another agency and get a.

Probably a bigger raise off the back of everything I've already done.

Right.

Or at wor. Start my own agency maybe? Right. No, let's. Let's go into the car business. That makes sense. Right?

So what was that business?

Gary V. Gary V. Go follow your passion. Oh, go follow what you're good at, but nonetheless, follow the passion. It wasn't because of Gary V.

He was saying it at the time. I just thought, I. Look, I had Carvana before Carvana. But I didn't have, I didn't know how to operate. I knew how to be, I had to do great ads.

I knew how to be a creative, you know, salesperson.

But operating a, you know, semi used car, luxury used car, pre bought ordering, online system, technology, you know, crash and burn a million dollars later, three years later. But a lot of learning lessons. Yeah, I mean I, I learned. Yeah, I became even I said I was ignorant to my, to my shortcomings.

I became very aware of my greatest ones, which ones that needed to be supplemented by other people or doing other things. I also learned sometimes you stay, sometimes you venture out of your lane.

But I needed to get back in my lane and so it led me to start a, my own agency and podcast and all that stuff.

So let me ask something that we is off script, but this is something I believe and maybe you do too based on the, what your experiences were, which is, I think it's a load of crap when people say you should only do what you love, find what you love and you don't work a day in your life or whatever. And I think it takes a lot of young people down a rabbit hole, like, oh my God, I don't love what I do. I'm doing the wrong thing.

And to me I think it's garbage. I mean you could like what you do, you want to be passionate about what you do, you want to feel good about what you do.

But most people don't love what they do or at least doesn't give them the lifestyle that they want. So I don't love what I do. I like it, I'm passionate about it. Is that what you realized after the car thing went sideways?

Yeah, because cars is what I loved. I mean, you know, like I'm a car guy.

I owned even as a look back to the unaware of my shortcomings, you know, as a 15 year old, I owned, you know, I think I got my first car like 15 and you know, my parents gave me my old, my grandmother's old Oldsmobile 98. Let me just tell you, that's not one of those classic cars that gets handed down that you're like, whoa, I'm gonna put it in the garage. This is cool.

No, those cars still aren't cool. So anyway, but I ended up having like six cars in high school. Like I went through a lot of cars.

I was unaware of my own, you know, poor upbringing in, in Easley, South Carolina. But nonetheless car guy ended up even in throughout college and everything else. Always trading in and out of cars, fixing them up, doing things.

And so started the car business. I love the car business. Right. I love cars. Well, I hated that business. Good God. It's not always that way.

But I love that you brought this up, because I think it's the Bill's biggest fallacy in sort of guru talk of following what you love. Yeah, you fall in love what you're good at, or you. You get excited or jazzed when you're good at something.

And it might not be what you love, but when you contribute and you feel gratitude plus pride, it. That's what you love. People and work isn't meant to be what you love. It's what you do to empower what you love.

I agree.

And so I love freedom. And so being an entrepreneur and having four boys and being involved and, you know, do.

Caring about some possessions, you know, I work my ass off to have freedom and to not be controlled by time. And I love what my job enables. I don't always love my job.

I could not agree with you more. You love the lifestyle it gives you, not necessarily every moving part of it. And I think it's.

I think it's important for young people to hear that especially, all right, so now the car thing goes sideways, and the natural next move for you would be like, all right, I'm gonna just go and start an ad agency, because that's my jam. But that while you may have an agency now that's an outgrowth of something, that's not what your next move was.

Why did you steer towards what you did next in podcasting and all that?

Yeah, well, I mean, I actually worked.

Went to work for another agency for just a chief marketing officer for a couple years, and while starting my podcast behind the scenes with there and tried to convince that owner. So it's interesting how these paths work. My. It was not immediately. It was. I went to cmo. I was telling him, podcasting is it.

This is how you build new business, how you generate all these things. And we just did not see idea. He. He had had success. It was actually an automotive ad agency. Go figure.

But was back in my lane as the chief marketing officer. And so we had some success. We had some wins with Lexus, some big things, but we were just on two different planets. And what I.

And so I started my podcast there because I saw where that was going and tried to talk him into like, okay, let's make this a company thing. Let's go all. You know, he wasn't buying that vision. And I was like, I think still had the itch, kind of entrepreneurial.

And then started the agency and so started the agency with the podcast, kind of just getting off the ground. And then, you know, again, day one, you know, months one through six, my first employees were creative, helped with the podcast and all that.

So I was over investing in the podcast.

You know, this is seven, eight years ago, well before it became what it was, you know, from, you know, the first clients that we had at the ad agency.

So why did you not especially back then. Podcasting is now everywhere now. But back then, it wasn't as huge of a thing, you know, six, seven years ago. Whatever.

I am guessing that when you started the podcast, it wasn't like, out of the gate. You had a lot of listeners. You're crushing it. You're number one. Everybody wants to come on your show. Why did you not just stop? Why did you.

I mean, doing a podcast for as long as you have is not simple. Why did you not stop?

I think, again, I have not always been the most disciplined person in my life. I'm. I'm structured. I've been successful. I. I am fairly. I work out five days a week. That's like the one thing I've been disciplined at probably.

But I've. My life sort of been ruled by, you know, taking chances, working hard, but not necessarily structure.

But when I started the podcast, I knew where this was going. I always have vision for every, you know, every stock that's going to break or all that.

I wouldn't call me a lifelong visionary, but I do have some intuition that's pretty damn good. And I saw where media was going and where podcasting was, and I said, you know what? At first it was like, I got to just stick with this.

And the first two years, so doing two a week after, you know, it was about first years, one a week, then went to two a week the second year. And I thought, okay, just sticking with it, that, that, that discipline and cons and consecutive.

Doing it over and over again, that that consistency would be enough, right? But I did it for two years, and I was proud of that. But then that wasn't enough either because, you know, I had a thousand listeners.

I've told this joke a lot. I'll tell it for years, you know, 999 of them were my mom hitting replay. You know, you know, like, I'm like, thanks, Mom. I appreciate it.

She's like, I'm trying to get your downloads up. I'm like, okay, thank you. Appreciate it. Thank you. Mom.

But what I realized, though, two years in the consistency and the discipline alone wasn't enough. I needed to go bigger, I needed to be better.

I, I was doing it, but I was just sort of checking the box and so I was, I was, I was consistent, I was going to stick with it. But then I said, look, Ryan, you've done some of the biggest things. You've worked with some big people. You've got a Rolodex I. E.

Contact list on your phone for your younger listeners. And I need to go harder at my, my resources to get bigger names. I need to invest in better equipment.

You know, it sounded okay, but wasn't like, truly professional.

And so I went bigger and I started spending money marketing the show and doing the things that you need to do and really focused on how do you grow a show. Making the show better, working on my craft. And lo and behold, you start to get traction and traction and traction.

But that consistency is the biggest thing because again, as someone that's not always the most disciplined person with structure. Yeah, that is one of the key things though, because pod fate is real. A lot of people just give it in like seven, eight episodes.

Oh, my downloads aren't, you know. Yeah, everybody, everybody needs like validation of their success so quickly now. I mean, look, Amazon has spoiled us to death.

Not everything is two day prime and free.

So let me ask you something, because out there listening right now, someone's like, well, I missed the podcast train, right? There's millions of podcasts. If I start one now, it's, it's too late. Should I be doing the next thing?

So do you think that the podcast train is too late? You're too late to the party if you want to start one today? Or is, is it still something that you would suggest to people to, to do now?

Jay, I'm gonna say this not only with my conviction of a vision in media that's been proven a lot more right than wrong. I, I'm the only one that panned the metaverse and NFTs at a time, whenever, for the record, we can go play that record.

So I, I'm pretty right in media space with when I do make sort of prognostics when I'm guessing what's going to happen or pushing ahead anyway. So let me tell you, I look at all the research though. So this isn't just Ryan's opinion and vision.

I've been watching this research because I come from the agency business. You make decisions, great marketers make decision on creativity, intuition and research. And I've been watching the research from trusted people.

Sample size reflective of the U.S. we are just. We just now cross the mainstream with podcasting.

Wow.

More people, just as of the study this last quarter, listen or watch podcasts than those that don't. Which means over 50% of us just now. And that genie is not going back in the bottle.

18 to 34 year olds watch and listen to podcasting more than they do television.

Wow.

Replay that in your head. So it's the here in the now. And I don't know about you, Jay, I haven't gotten it. I haven't figured out the time machine or how to anti age myself.

18 to 34 year olds are the future of business and growth and they are, they are today watching podcasts or listening to podcasts more than they don't. So all of the data points show that we are just now even still below the bell curve for podcasting.

Combined with the fact that there are a lot of people that talk about podcasting, but active podcasts are actually at a low point for the last 24 months.

Wow.

So active. There's, there's a lot of them that, you know, kind of pop on, pop off and all the sorts of things and you have named ones.

So the time has never been more right for high quality, unique content. And that includes podcasting.

I'm fired up. That's good. That's very motivating.

Yes.

All right, before we wrap up here, we're gonna put this all in the show notes, but tell everybody what's going on in your business, your world, how do they follow you, how do they get involved with what you're doing? And we're going to make sure everybody checks out your show 100%.

Yeah. The rat Cast Network. We, we spent, like I said, six years plus two years of kind of meandering doing it structure, but sort of half ass.

And spent the last four plus years just going hard and going bigger. And we build a playbook for how to grow, how to monetize.

We've, we've done over eight figures in revenue from, from our show and we've built the playbook for it's. There's three ways to monetize a show. Everybody thinks it's ads, everybody thinks it might be sponsorship. It's both of those things.

But number one is direct business to another business. So those are the three. So we built a platform and then we've got the Radcast network at about 10 shows on it.

We spent the last year slowly adding shows and Integrating and learning and sort of paying attention to what the industry is missing. So we're building two things.

One, a platform for community within the podcast network within so a true platform where shows come together, share knowledge, we're informing them and educating them on our secret sauces while also integrating them. Because again, shows elevate shows and the high tide raises all ships. And so true community platform for shows that are in it to grow.

And then the second thing is the future of podcasting is multi platform audio, video, social media. All of the metrics are centered around, all the ads are centered around audio.

The RSS feed, we are putting together a dashboard and putting together analytics to show that some of the most popular shows might not look like it on audio that have social media followings of the host and the show that elevate them way past just their audience, their audio numbers and so. And YouTube is the number one fastest growing platform for podcasting and it's the number one discovery place.

The Radcast network has the largest YouTube channel of any independent podcast network.

And we are elevating shows through strategies on YouTube, social media and audio and building a platform and analytics so that people can see the true picture and so that marketing and advertising can be sold for the total value of the impressions that are happening across all of those media. No one else is doing that.

That is awesome.

I am telling you, it's not like every other podcast. It really is great stuff. We're going to put all in the show notes. Ryan, man, can't wait to talk to you again soon. Appreciate you being here.

Hey Jay, really look up to you and what you're doing and you know, can't wait to collaborate more.

Totally, dude. All right, talk to you soon.

See you, brother.

You did it. You made it to the end. Nice, but the party's not over.

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