In this episode of Podjunction Podcast, Rob Brown shares his journey of using podcasting to grow his business and personal brand. He discusses the challenges he faced, including adapting to video formats and building a podcast team, as well as the lessons learned along the way. Rob offers valuable insights on defining podcast success, the importance of being bold in content creation, and how podcasting can enhance one's reputation and network.

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Timestamps:

0:00 Intro

5:36 Podcast's impact on business growth

16:15 Overcoming podcast challenges

32:07 Achieving podcast goals

37:02 Outro

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Key Takeaways:

1. Leverage Your Podcast for Personal Branding

Rob Brown highlights the importance of using a podcast to enhance your personal brand rather than focusing solely on direct financial gains. He explains that a podcast can position you as an influencer and thought leader, which is invaluable for building credibility and reputation. This approach can open doors to new opportunities and elevate your standing in your industry.

2. Adapt to Technological Trends

Rob stresses the necessity of evolving with technological advancements, particularly the shift towards video content. He notes that more podcasts are now consumed on platforms like YouTube, which requires podcasters to adapt by improving their video production quality. Staying current with these trends ensures your podcast remains relevant and accessible to a broader audience.

3. Be Bold and Captivating from the Start

Rob advises against playing it safe with podcast content. Instead, he suggests starting with a compelling hook to immediately capture the audience's attention. By being bold and sometimes controversial, you can engage listeners more effectively and differentiate your podcast in a crowded market.

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Rob Brown [0:00 - 0:00]: Foreign.

Sadaf Beynon [0:05 - 0:59]: Welcome to Podjunction Podcast. I'm your host, Sadaf Beynon. And this is the show where we Explore how entrepreneurs, CEOs and business leaders are using their podcast to grow their businesses. On the Podjunction Podcast, I get to talk to inspiring podcasters who share their strategies, challenges and visions for the future. So whether you're just starting out or looking to take your podcast to the next level, you're in the right place. So today our special guest is Rob Brown. Rob is a dynamic event host, keynote speaker and podcast pro with an impressive background as a math teacher, accountant, and even a Kickboxing Bell. A TEDx speaker with over 400,000 views and the best selling author of Build Your Reputation. Rob helps professional firms. Sorry. Shine through storytelling, leadership and growth strategies. Rob, welcome to the show. It's great to have you.

Rob Brown [0:59 - 1:05]: What a blessing we are here and we're rocking the free world. Sadaf, great to join you.

Sadaf Beynon [1:05 - 1:22]: Thank you. Well, today we're digging into how your podcast grows, helps grow your business, what you've learned along the way, and where you're headed next. So without further ado, let's get to it. First question, Rob, how did your podcast journey begin and what was your goal for it at the start?

Sadaf Beynon [3:09 - 3:17]: Wow, thank you. So you started it to network, establish yourself as an influencer, thought leader. How did that go?

Rob Brown [3:17 - 5:01]: Very successfully. People are vain. If they're not super world famous, then they have egos. And they're all looking for an opportunity to tell their story, to tell the world how great they are, to sell their products and services, to shine a light, to stay relevant. And podcasts were fairly new back then when I started, and so people were curious too. What's a podcast? There weren't many podcast apps. YouTube wasn't particularly well established and podcasts were not on there. So it was very much try it. What have we got to lose? So I reached out to people and carefully crafted my messages. I've started a new podcast. It's called this. Would you like to be a guest on the show and share your stories? And that's a vanity plea, isn't it? It appeals to people's vanity and it's really hard to say no to. Another phrase I used a lot was, would you be open to being a guest on our show? And I positioned it that way that not quite that we needed them, but that it would be a benefit to them and it was an honour for them to be invited. Would you like to be a guest and share your story? Would you like us to give you a platform to talk more about what you do so that it wasn't so desperate? And I made a point when I was having guests on to ask them off recording at the end. Who else do you know that might be a good guest? Yeah, and you get a domino effect too. I'm sure you've seen this, where if you can land one big guest, you can land other big guests by mentioning that name. We've already had this person on our show. Oh, really? Okay, well, I'll be on your show too.

Sadaf Beynon [5:01 - 5:02]: Yes.

Rob Brown [5:02 - 5:14]: So it did work. Yes, it definitely did work. It achieved its objective of building my reputation within this game, which gave me much more credibility to continue to do the things I wanted to do and at a much higher level.

Sadaf Beynon [5:14 - 5:23]: Yeah, yeah. I think there's really something to be said about the vanity plea, as you called it, and also the power of name dropping. It really does go a long way. Doesn't.

Rob Brown [5:25 - 5:32]: Certainly does. You've got to, you've got to get out there as much as you can. It's no use being a well kept secret. Yeah, you probably know that a lot.

Sadaf Beynon [5:32 - 5:36]: In what ways then did your podcast help grow your business?

Rob Brown [5:36 - 9:17]: The podcast channel can be used in a number of ways. And when you say grow your business, for me it was grow your personal brand. There's a few ways to make money from podcasts and you'll explore them a lot on your show. And your, your viewers, listeners will be looking at this and saying, which way do I go and what am I doing this for? So some people make money from podcasts with sponsorship, so they develop such a big audience that people will pay to be in front of that audience. Some people run their podcast for personal brand and awareness and exposure to let the world know what they're doing so that they build a community, they build a following. Some people run a podcast commercially to sell their products and services off the back of it, and so they effectively use it as an advertisement platform for their own products and services. And these are all really legitimate reasons. Some people actually have a burden. I want to get this off my chest. I want to talk about true crime, I want to talk about this, I want to talk about dogs, I want to talk about accountants. And so they do it for their own mental health and state of mind and they have a crusade and they just want to talk about things even if they're just broadcasting to nobody. They. That's their objective release. Yes, it's a release, it's a burden, it's a cause, it's a crusade. So when you say, how does it help your business? There are lots of different ways it helps your business. And I wrote a book a few years ago called Build Your Reputation. It's on Amazon. And a mentor once said to me, when you write a book, unless you're J.K. rowling writing Harry Potter books, and you can make a million billions from your book, it's not what the book makes for you, it's what it makes of you. So let me explain that with the podcast. It's not what a podcast makes for you generally in terms of money, revenue, business opportunities, it's what it makes of you in terms of the influencer and the expert and the interviewer and the thought leader that you become. It's what it makes of you in other people's eyes. It puts you on a pedestal, it puts you in the centre of the storm. It positions you very well in your market as the expert in a particular field. So you might not make money from your podcast and most don't. They're a vanity project that the podcast host funds from their other things. But in terms of what it makes of you in other people's eyes, that becomes valuable because you can't really put a price on influence and reputation and personal brand. You might down the line if you're using it to leverage products and services and courses and webinars and books and everything else that you're doing. That's definitely a route that many podcasters go down. But ultimately it's what it makes of you. And you become the collector of stories, the interviewer of interesting people. And your personal brand melds into your business brand and it works well in the fight for attention. We're all in the fight for attention. Yeah, we have small attention spans these days and there's so many marketing messages and so much noise out there. We are fighting for those eyeballs and those ears and that screen. Time for a little bit of somebody's brain and somebody's attention. And a podcast is such a great vehicle for that. In terms of what you can do with it, you have every chance. It's no good being great at what you do, but a well kept secret, because being anonymous doesn't serve anybody's purpose. Your message stays a secret, your products and services stay a secret, and your bank account stays small. Yeah, we can't afford to not shout about what we do. And podcasts are great for that.

Sadaf Beynon [9:17 - 9:28]: Yeah, for sure. I really liked what you said about it's not what a podcast makes for you, but what it makes of you. That's really quite insightful. How did you land on that?