In this episode of Podjunction Podcast, host Sadaf Beynon interviews Matthew Holman, the Subscription Doc, about leveraging podcasting to grow a business. Matthew shares insights on content strategy, repurposing podcast content for social media, and the importance of having a strong opinion in your niche. Learn practical tips for balancing content creation and discover why podcasting is a powerful tool for connecting with your audience and showcasing your expertise.

Here are 3 key takeaways from my chat with Matthew:

1. Podcast-First Strategy: Matthew explains how making his podcast the centerpiece of his content strategy streamlined his entire process. It's not just about recording; it's about leveraging every episode for maximum impact.

2. Content Pillars: Learn how Matthew uses content pillars to maintain consistency and relevance across all platforms. This approach ensures his message resonates with his audience, no matter where they encounter it.

3. Repurposing Content: Discover Matthew's tactics for breathing new life into old content. His approach to recycling high-performing posts could be the game-changer your content strategy needs.

Sadaf Beynon [0:06 - 0:33]: Welcome to Podjunction Podcast, a show for podcasters who want to use their podcast to grow their business. I'm your host, Sadaf Beynon, and today I'm joined by Matthew Holman, also known as the Subscription Doc, the host of Subscription Prescription, and a master at using his podcast to drive his whole content strategy. Sorry, I kind of butchered all the names over there, but I'm joined by Matthew, who I'm going to ask to if you would please introduce yourself.

Matthew Holman [0:33 - 0:57]: I would love to, Sadaf. So, yes, I am Matthew Holman. I'm the founder of Subscription Prescription. It's a media and consulting company that helps direct to consumer or e commerce. Brands with subscriptions do a lot of different stuff in addition to consulting, newsletter, podcasts, social media. But yeah, the joke is, you know, my dad's a doctor. I'm not a real one myself. I play online.

Sadaf Beynon [0:58 - 1:04]: Nice. I like that. I like that. Well, thank you, Matthew, and welcome to the show. It's really great to have you back.

Matthew Holman [1:04 - 1:05]: Absolutely.

Sadaf Beynon [1:05 - 1:15]: Thank you, Matthew, I was wondering if you could start by telling us about that light bulb moment that made you realize that podcasting was a great tool to help you grow your business.

Matthew Holman [1:16 - 2:31]: Absolutely. I think podcasting is one of those things where, you know, in the space that I'm in, in subscriptions, it's often not top of mind. I mean, some brands, it's top of mind, but for a lot of brands, they're very growth focused. They're trying to acquire that next customer and then they want to go figure out subscriptions. And so when we had the first for a while, and a lot of feedback we got from people is that they would listen, they would read the newsletter in bunches, right? They, you know, they'd wait for three, four, five of them. They'd get 30, 40 minutes or an hour set aside and go and read a bunch of, like, the ones that they'd missed recently. And so that kind of screams like podcast. Right? The idea is, like, people are using our content as a means of improving their overall understanding of how they can manage their business, to give them ideas. We get a lot of feedback from people who feel like it's a great training. So, like, new hires at companies that don't know a lot about subscriptions, they'll point them at our podcast. So podcast just kind of screams, you know, an opportunity for people to digest content, to help educate them. And also just because sometimes it's difficult to explain complex topics in just writing. Like, some things do well in writing and other things. I think it's better to have a conversation or a discussion, which is, again, a podcast.

Sadaf Beynon [2:31 - 2:44]: Okay, so since you've been podcasting, do you find that being able to talk through different ideas is easier for you now than it was writing it all down in blogs and newsletters and stuff?

Matthew Holman [2:45 - 3:52]: It is. And I think initially it's important to kind of keep. Understand that initially we thought the newsletter and podcast would be kind of separate. Like, the newsletter would be kind of like this style of content, and the podcast would be more like me just talking and occasional interviews. But ultimately we actually ended up changing that to having the podcast lead the content strategy. And so being able to talk through stuff, for me, I think it's also like. So I'm a content creator. I've been doing like, ebooks and social and stuff for years, and it's often difficult. I think one of the hardest things about a content creator is to find the method or process that really resonates with how you like to work. And I've, over the course of couple years, been able to land on, and we've been doing the podcast for about a year now, realize that the podcast strategy, podcast first strategy really does work well because I can talk through ideas on the podcast that I can then put into a newsletter. Right. If I get a question on social or something, a client says to me, it's easier for me to go start talking on camera and recording that than it is to go, like, write down those ideas and then talk about them. If that makes sense.

Sadaf Beynon [3:52 - 4:02]: Yeah, yeah, definitely makes sense. So you were saying that your podcast leads your content strategy. Can you tell us a little bit more about that?

Matthew Holman [4:03 - 5:06]: Yeah, absolutely. So I think, you know, as a marketer, everybody's trying to find that formula, that process of, like, you know, how you create everything you create. So just to kind of like, run through how ours works. The podcast essentially leads the schedule for all of our content. So each week, you know, or, I mean, we're recording in bunches. So it's not like we're recording week after week, but they're getting released every week. So, like, we're recording this on a Wednesday. We had an episode that dropped yesterday. We'll have an episode that drops next Tuesday. So what happens is the podcast is first. So like, we did a podcast episode. Say it's like an interview with the founder of a subscription brand. So then the newsletter then becomes like, learnings or gleanings or insights from the founder of that subscription brand. And then the social media becomes talk is talking about the newsletter and podcast about, like, Past issues and upcoming issues. And so it leads all of our strategy, how we create it. Podcast newsletter social is kind of like top down how that works.

Sadaf Beynon [5:06 - 5:16]: Yeah. And so just, I'm just curious about the social platform. So newsletter, is that just an email thing or do you do that on LinkedIn as well?

Sadaf Beynon [6:26 - 6:39]: Oh, that's really helpful to know. I've started doing hours on Beehive as well, but I didn't realize it was just a quick copy and paste. I thought there was more involved on the LinkedIn side, so I just haven't looked into it. Okay, thanks for that tip.

Matthew Holman [6:39 - 7:25]: Absolutely. So you asked about social too, so yeah. So we're on LinkedIn and Twitter. I've tried some of the other platforms especially like we'll take. So we do video clips off of the podcast episodes as well. And it's just been difficult to try to like get really good at each platform because each platform is a little bit different. Twitter, we have a good strategy and LinkedIn, we have a good strategy and that's where a lot of our customers are. So we've stayed focused on those things. And then again, the content strategy is we sometimes are pushing for people to check out the newsletter, the podcast, or we're just doing value driven content. So like, you know, here's the three things you can learn from subscription, brand, founder, or here's the top mistake I'm seeing around Black Friday Cyber Monday sales for subscribers. You know, we're doing content like that on both things.

Sadaf Beynon [7:25 - 7:30]: Yeah. Okay. And why, why Twitter?

Sadaf Beynon [8:26 - 8:29]: How do you do that? How do you find where they're active?

Matthew Holman [8:30 - 9:27]: I mean, if it's an industry you work in, hopefully you're already aware of that. Right. Like, I think it's difficult if you're a new salesperson and you're trying to like break into say like automotive sales and then you're trying to figure out where, where people that, you know, run auto shops, what social media platform they are, if they're on one. Right. I think it's a lot easier when you're in the space. So like I've been in D2C for a long time, so I've known about. It's called DTC Twitter. Like it's a thing like even everybody on there calls it that refers to as that it's somewhat insulated in the sense of like, you know, it can be hard to break in, but once you do, it can be really, really successful. So I think there's research on that obviously, like just, I mean it feels, it feels kind of cheesy just to mention like very obvious stuff, but like interviewing people, trying to get a handle on where people are living where they're consuming content, where they're spend their time. So you have to interview people, interview your prospects and your ideal customers to figure that out. And experiment a little bit too, I think, is always a good idea.

Sadaf Beynon [9:27 - 9:43]: Yeah. So for something like, say, Instagram, would you experiment and put some content on there just to see what happens? Or do you not go there because you don't think your target audience is there? Do you know what I mean?