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Who better to inspire fledgling podcasters than a podcaster at the top of their game!
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But for seasoned podcasters who want to get better, the value of playing
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follow the leader can quickly fade.
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Hello, and welcome to another Podcast Pontifications with me, Evo Terra.
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There's an old saying that I like to repeat and it's "Never meet your heroes."
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Especially if your heroes are celebrities.
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Generally speaking, that may also apply to podcasting celebrities as well.
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At least, that is, if you're trying to become a better podcaster.
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Many podcasters want to get better at podcasting.
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The fact that you're listening to this episode of Podcast
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Pontifications likely means that you want to get better at podcasting.
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Certainly, if you are engaging with the Advancing Podcasting community on
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my Discord server, then you certainly want to get better at podcasting.
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So who do you learn from?
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The people who mastered the craft, right?
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That's the obvious idea.
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Those who have made a successful, if not extremely successful, podcast
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in line with the type of podcast you want to make seems the logical
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choice of someone to learn from.
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Why not learn from the best?
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Well, because that's likely the opposite of what you should do.
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Wayne Gretzky, arguably the greatest player ever to lace up the skates
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in the NHL, he coached the Phoenix Coyotes, professional NHL team, for four
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seasons after he retired as a player.
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During his tenure, that team lost more games than they won.
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He wasn't a great coach.
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He was a great player.
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Stephen King's book On Writing is often quoted as a must-read by many authors.
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But, in reality, it's a memoir.
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It's not a write-books-the-way-that-Stephen-King-writes-books
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book.
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He's a great writer, but great teacher?
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I don't know.
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You can go down to your local guitar center or any other music store, and
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you can buy a book and sheet music and videos that'll teach you how to play
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guitar just like Yngwie Malmsteen from Mr.
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Yngwie Malmsteen himself.
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But when you're done, you're not going to be able to play
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guitar like Yngwie Malmsteen.
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Sorry.
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Great player.
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Teacher?
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You could even sign up for a masterclass taught by an actor who has won multiple
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Academy Awards, and you will likely not pick up any actionable technique that
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propels you towards a career or furthers your career in motion pictures because
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they may be a great actor, but they're probably not a great teacher at all.
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In most cases, the pros who try their hand at teaching find out that
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they are much better at being pros than they are at being teachers.
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Now, for people who are just starting out or who are happy to continue to
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dabble in a certain thing, hey, then the advice offered up by the pros are
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great for them because they can copy some techniques, try on a few styles,
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and I'd go so far as to say that many of these dabblers will actually show
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some improvement after taking a class or a workshop or watching a video series
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from someone at the top of their game.
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But that's for beginners.
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We're talking about marginal improvement at best, and one that
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clearly shows diminishing returns.
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It's really no different in podcasting because at some point,
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you go from dabbling in podcasting or just starting out in podcasting
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to getting serious about podcasting.
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And then studying those podcasters, at least the information they put
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out - they're at the top of their game.
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That becomes a lot less valuable to you.
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For a few reasons, but one is that the instructional information that these pro
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podcasters put out isn't aimed at you.
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It's aimed at the beginner, and you're probably not a beginner anymore.
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I know you might feel like a beginner sometimes, might feel like you
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don't have all of the tricks and the tools and the techniques down.
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And you don't.
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None of us do.
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But going back to the information pros give on how to get started in
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podcasting isn't going to help you.
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So what does actually help you, the working podcaster who's been
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at this for a while, get better?
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That's the real question.
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That's, you know, it's not a trick question, but there are
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lots of ways to answer that.
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It's something that I want to dig into a lot more this week
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on Podcast Pontifications.
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Look, I don't have all of the time in this episode to get into "Here's exactly
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what you should do" because here's the other trick - there's no one right way.
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We know that.
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But, there are some good right ways that I would like to expose to you for
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the rest of the episodes on this week.
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Now, if you have personally any recommendations, any that you've used,
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any resources, any classes, any workshops, any ideas that you have personally
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used as a working podcaster - not to started, but actually propel your career
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forward, I'd love to know about them.
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Go ahead and share it with me, evo@simpler.media, or hop into that
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Advancing Podcasting community that I mentioned advancingpodcasting.xyz,
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and share it over there.
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And if you found this episode enlightening and you wish to return
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some of that value, please visit podcastpontifications.com/support for
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many ways that you can make that happen.
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That's it.
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I shall be back tomorrow with yet another Podcast Pontifications.
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Cheers!
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Podcast Pontifications is written and narrated by Evo Terra.
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He's on a mission to make podcasting better.
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Links to everything mentioned in today's episode are in the notes
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section of your podcast listening app.
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A written-to-be-read article based on today's episode is available at
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podcastpontifications.com where you'll also find a video version and a corrected
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transcript, both created by Allie Press.
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Podcast Pontifications is a production of Simpler Media.
