On today’s episode, I dig into my thought process as I consider launching a new podcast—and I walk through the essential questions I ask anyone who’s thinking about starting one. If you’ve already got a podcast, these questions might help you rethink your approach.

Why am I starting this podcast?

I share my background as a teacher and my desire to fight back against spammy guest pitches. I want to educate PR agencies and help fellow podcasters feel less alone in the sea of spam.

Who is this podcast for?

This show is for two groups: PR agencies (so they can do their job better) and podcasters (so they know they’re not alone and can improve how they handle pitches).

How will I measure success?

Instead of downloads, I’ll measure success by how many people utilize resources I share, like PodMatch and PodcastGuests.com. I’ll also keep tabs on affiliate signups.

What are the hurdles?

I reflect on a previous project, Dates from Hell, which struggled because it required audience participation but didn’t yet have an audience. For this new podcast, I’ll need a steady supply of good (and bad) pitches from listeners.

Is this a passion project, hobby, or business?

This is mostly a passion project and a hobby, driven by my desire to make a difference and maybe have some fun. If I can monetize it, that’s a nice bonus.

Why will my audience listen?

Listeners will tune in to hear entertainingly bad pitches, learn how to make their own pitches better, and find solidarity in their struggles with guest booking spam. Plus, I’ll offer educational insights that no one else seems to be sharing right now.

How long will it take to make an episode?

I estimate each episode will take around half an hour to produce, keeping things doable alongside my other commitments. You measure your production time and then choose your schedule.

Do I have time and resources to make this happen?

I’ve already got hosting, gear, and a plan for the website (PitchAPodcast.com). The biggest challenge will be getting enough listener participation to keep the show going.

Key Takeaway

1. I’m considering a crowd-generated podcast to tackle the problem of bad guest pitches.
2. If you’d like to participate, send me your stories of bad (or good!) pitches, info about your podcast and website, and details on your ideal guest.
3. I run through all the big questions to ask before launching, sharing my honest answers and experiences.

Links Mentioned

Pitchapodcast.com

schoolofpodcasting.com

podcastingobservations.com

Captive Media Hosting

Buzzsprout Media Hosting

PodMatch

PodcastGuests.com.

Podpage.com

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If you have your own pitch stories or want to get involved, head to PitchAPodcast.com and share your experiences!

Mentioned in this episode:

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School of Podcasting

On today's episode.

I've been thinking about doing a podcast for a while.

And if you're a new listener to the show, I've always said I wish I would have stopped at one.

So here I am, getting ready to launch another one.

And so I put it down and it came back.

I put it down and it kept coming back.

And so I finally decided a couple things here that I'm going to start it, but I thought what I would do is go through the questions that I ask anybody who is starting a new podcast so you can kind of hear my thought process.

And then if this actually goes, and some of that is gonna be up to you, I will give you progress along the way.

So today we're gonna go over those questions you should be asking yourself before you start a podcast.

And if you've already started your podcast, yeah, maybe you might wanna change some things.

Hit it, ladies.

The school of podcasting with Dave Jackson.

Thanking you so much for tuning in.

If you're new to the show, this is where we help you plan, launch and grow your podcast.

The website schoolofpodcasting.com and so I've had this idea, and part of it is underneath it all, I'm still, I was the youngest of my family, so there's a little bit of hippie in me.

There's a little part of me that always wants to stick it to the man, and I always want to fight back.

I always think there's hope.

I always think we have, you know, let's, let's not go down easy.

Let's go down swinging.

And one of the things that every new podcaster gets hit in the face with, and there's nothing I can do to stop it, or is there is the amount of spam you get from people that are trying to get on your show.

Give you a classic example.

I had someone today that sent me no less than four paragraphs about how great their client was and how they thought they would be a great fit for.

For the show.

Building a Better Dave.

Now, Building a Better Dave is basically my diary.

It's me just loving the sound of my own voice trying to make you laugh, cry, think, groan, et cetera.

And in the, I don't know, 10 plus years of me doing that show, I have never, ever had a guest.

And stuff like that just drives me nuts.

I just want to scream, do your homework.

And I was on a call on a mastermind, and there was somebody from a PR agency.

And I was talking about starting the show and it made them nervous and I was like, I might be onto something.

And so the idea is to.

Well, there are two ways we could have done this.

And one explains kind of my first knee jerk reaction.

And that was I was going to name the show Podcast Pitch Slap.

You know, it's a kind of a play on words there, and it's definitely got a snarkier tone to it.

And I was really contemplating figuring out how do I throw these people under the bus who are just not doing their job or at least not doing it well, how can I throw them under the bus without getting sued?

And I was like.

And then I thought about it a bit and I was like, let's not do that.

I don't want to get sued.

And also, I am an educator and I. I don't want to kind of be known for the guy that's always attacking people in a way.

Some people saw my podcast rodeo show like that.

I would grab a random podcast and see how long I could hang on.

And in the end I was like, this is really not helping my brand at the school of podcasting, because who wants to work with the jerk that just picked apart their show, even though he might have had a point?

And so I put it down.

I'm like, nah, nah.

Plus, again, I don't know if you've noticed this.

There are only 24 hours in a day.

What?

What?

What?

And while I could have this show up and running in literally an hour, right, make some artwork, make a quick trailer, submit it to Apple and Spotify, be done, that part is a breeze now.

But there's still only 24 hours in a day to promote.

So I was like, well, wait a minute, let's go over the questions here because here's the deal.

I am recording this at 7:30 at night.

I'm getting up at 5 in the morning to fly to Orlando, and I get back late Monday night.

And this is my ego.

Let's just be honest.

It's my ego.

I don't want to miss a Monday.

And when I get back on Monday, I may not have a voice.

And I thought, well, this would be a fun episode.

So let's coach Dave.

Like as in, if I was coaching me, what would I do here?

And I would say, well, number one, why are you starting this?

So here's the answer.

Number one, I am a teacher.

That is my background.

I've been teaching people I go back to.

I used to teach people how to send email.

That makes me sound like I'm 4 million years old, but it's true.

And I unfortunately then think everything can be fixed with education.

You know, it's one of those things, give somebody a hammer, everything looks like a nail.

And so every problem you put in front of me as a teacher, I'm going to go, oh, I can just.

We just need to educate people and that'll be solved.

So that's part of it.

That's why I'm doing it.

I would like to make some money with this.

I think there's an opportunity here because there are two platforms that I use.

One is called Pod Match and the other one is called Podcast Guests.

Com.

Both are great places to find guests, but you got to know how to pitch yourself.

So my.

Why am I doing this?

I want to push back.

I want to have somebody go, this is not how you send pitches to podcasters.

And I think the PR agencies can learn.

But I also think podcasters will enjoy the show just knowing they're not alone in the gallons of spam.

So that brings us to question number two.

Who is this for?

Well, I just named them and it's weird because normally you want to focus in on one, you know, genre, one niche, as they say.

And this is for PR agencies so they can do their job better and for podcasters, so they don't feel alone in their misery of opening up their inbox for the first time at, you know, 8, 10 in the morning and seeing, you know, 15 pitches.

All of which start off with Dear name.

We love what you're doing over there with insert name of show.

Right.

So that's the who.

And when it comes to how am I going to measure my success?

Well, I just said my goal is to get people to use podmatch and podcastguest.com and I thought about that.

An easy strategy is to have a resources page where I can send people to one resource.

They can see both those services there instead of having just one.

So that is going to be how I measure my success.

Not by downloads, but by that.

But here is something you have to think about.

What are the hurdles here?

And I have done this before, many, many moons ago.

I did a show called the Dates from Hell show and I started it on a dare.

And it was myself and my now ex wife and we both had about three or four stories each.

We blew through those stories.

And it is an audience based show.

There was only one problem.

We didn't have an audience.

And so on one hand, there's a part of me that goes, every podcaster gets these horrible pitches, and they don't have to be, you know, outstanding.

Just any bad pitch, I want you to send it to me, I want you to explain why this doesn't work for you, and then I also want you to explain who your perfect guest would be.

So not only am I serving the PR agencies that are doing these horrible pitches, but I'm like, there's something in it for the people that do contribute, because hopefully somebody will hear the show and go, oh, they're looking for people that do this so that people that can do this, can do that, and they can benefit.

That's exactly me.

I think I could be a good guest.

And then based on the show, they will know how to pitch that podcaster.

And I was like, okay, it's a win for the PR agency.

It's a win for the podcasters that are listening, maybe.

And it's a win for the podcaster who shares the good, or I should say bad pitch.

Either one.

If you have a really good pitch, we like to hear that too.

So those are the ways I'm serving the audience.

And then in theory, if I can, you know, maybe I'll throw out a buy me a coffee or something like that, or maybe I'll put it behind a paywall so that after, say, the first 10 episodes, you have to pay something ridiculous, like $5, $3 to hear the other episodes.

If this is evergreen.

But here is the thing.

This is a crowd generated show.

And I thought, huh, been here days from hell show.

And it's one thing to make a mistake, it's another thing to make the same mistake twice.

And I have also been involved with groups that go.

That's a great idea.

I have started many newsletters at many of the jobs I've had, and everybody contributes to the first issue, and then a few contribute to the second.

And by the third one, people are like, oh, are we still doing that?

And so I thought about this and I said, all right, I want a decent stable of good and bad pitches.

Again, doesn't always have to be bad, but let's face it, the bad ones are so easy to find.

But if I don't get 20 bad pitches, meaning I can do 20 episodes, and then what I will do is we'll.

We'll get into the other questions, but that's it.

So the domain is pitchapodcast.com.

so in other words, how do you pitch a podcast?

Well, just go to pitch a podcast.com and you will See there that I will have a place for you to upload your audio with your, you know, story of the bad pitch.

If you want to send in one via text, you could do that, but it would be so much better if it was something.

And again, it's.

It's just like you're talking to me, and I will have a.

An item there.

I'm going to make it very easy for you to know.

Do exactly what I'm looking for, because again, I want to hear about the pitch.

I want to hear about why you think it was bad.

I just gave you the one.

Why was it a bad pitch?

Because I don't take guests on my show.

And then you could say, oh, this is, you know, Jill or Gary or whoever from the blah, blah, blah show.

My website is blah, blah, blah, because, you know, you have a website.

Right?

Right.

If not budpage.com and then my perfect guest would be somebody who does this.

This is what I'm looking for in a guest.

And so that's one of the big criteria of if the.

Is this going to work or.

Because if I don't get a bunch, I'm going to be like, I thought this was a good idea.

I think we all want to create a resource for PR agencies to learn from and for podcasters to not feel so alone drowning in a sea of spam.

That's it.

But there are other questions that I have to ask, and I'll tell you about that right after this.

The school of podcasting.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

All right, a couple more questions I have to answer.

Is this a passion project, a hobby, or a business?

This one would be a hobby.

Well, it's a little bit of both.

It's a passion project and that I really want to try to make a dent.

And I'm actually kind of maybe dumb enough to have hope that this could help.

Again, educator, but it's a hobby now.

Can I make some money with this?

That would be great.

But because I'm using Captivate as my host, I don't have another fee.

It's the same.

That's one of the reasons why I really like Captivate, like Buzzsprout, too.

But the one thing I really love about Captivate is I pay $19 a month for as many shows as I want.

And as long as I don't go over 30,000, my bill doesn't go up.

So.

And also, if I do decide to do that, because I've never used that model where X amount are free.

And then after that, it's 23 bucks to get the rest of them a month.

So we shall see.

So it's a hobby and it's a passion project.

I have no way of saying, oh, yeah, I'm going to retire on the money from this.

So.

And then what do my audience want to hear on this?

In other words, why should they listen to this podcast?

Well, in theory, right, they're gonna want to listen because I'm going to tell them how to tweak a pitch to make it better.

They're gonna want to listen because some of these are so bad it's entertaining.

And the other thing that I think I did a quick search on this.

Nobody else is doing this topic now, as I do this, somebody might start one up, but I'm not worried about that.

And so, couple other questions I'm gonna ask then.

And these are the ones I can't answer right now.

How long does it take to make an episode?

And so for me, I'll have an intro.

Welcome to the Pitch, a podcast, how to pitch a podcast show, you know, etc.

Etc.

Where we help people make better pitches to get more bookings, something of that nature.

And then I will say, today's pitch is from, you know, Cheryl from the Blah blah Blah podcast.

It's from, you know, Gary over at the Such and Such show.

And here's his bad pitch or here's her good pitch, whichever one it is.

Because on occasion we do get someone that is like, wow, where's this person been hiding?

And then it's, here it is.

And then at the maybe I'll do two an episode with a break in the middle for my ad at the end.

I'll be asking you how, you know, hey, if you have a bad pitch, feel free because I'm gonna need that bucket to keep getting filled.

I can't go, ooh, Great, I got 20.

It's just going to be like, keep filling in that bucket.

And then I thought about it as while we were taking a break, I went down and threw the clothes in the laundry.

If I'm using PodPage for this, every person that submits a bad pitch, I can treat them like a guest.

And so you'll get a page on my website, and I also have a page that shows everybody who has contributed.

That's kind of cool.

So that's another thing I can do just to give back to people.

And this is one of those things, you come up with an idea and then you go, oh, and I could do this and I could do that.

So in theory, if it's one of those shows that takes a half hour.

Do I have a half an hour a week to do a show?

Yeah, yeah, I do.

Now, do I have time to promote it?

Well, again, part of it will be talking about it on this show.

Like, hey, we launched it last week.

Here's how many episodes we got the first day.

Here's what we got the first week.

So you can see kind of what to expect.

I usually tell people that first episode probably is gonna get about maybe 20 to 30 downloads, depending on how many cousins you have, and we'll just kind of follow it through.

So that's another kind of part of my why is it will give me content for this show, but potentially.

But I need to know how long is it going to take?

And that I think I have answered a half hour.

It's not going to cost me any more money.

It's not going to cost me any more gear.

It's not going to be video.

Not that there's anything wrong with video, but it doesn't really work in this case.

And I expect these to be fairly short.

And so that's the other thing you have to figure out.

And the big hinge to this will be you.

I need you.

You are the audience.

This is an audience participation kind of situation.

And if I don't have those examples, well, then it's going to make the show hard to produce.

And when the show becomes hard to produce, I'm going to stop it.

And so my first hurdle is I'd like to get 20 people who want to help educate, people who want to let podcasters know they're not alone in the crap that we go through and go over to pitch a podcast dot com.

You can add your stuff there.

I'll have it right on the front page as I record this now.

Later, it might be in the navigation bar.

But that's the thing.

I was like, well, am I going to do this show?

I want to do this show.

I think it'd be fun.

I think it'd be entertaining.

But.

And I probably could do the show just by bad pitches to me, although I think some people have figured out because I very.

And I do.

I go, hey, this is not.

I even tell them sometimes this is not a good fit.

This is who I'm looking for.

And the problem is they're not representing anybody that I'm looking for.

So we'll see what happens.

And here's the thing you have to think about.

Well, Dave, what if this doesn't work?

Then I can check it off the list of ideas that I tried that didn't work.

And then I'll find out, why didn't it work?

But there's only one way to find out.

I always use the weird example of chocolate covered fish sticks.

I've never had them.

I like chocolate, I like fish sticks.

I've just never tried them together.

And if I want to know what chocolate covered fish sticks taste like, there's only one way to find out.

And it will either be the beginning of my new favorite snack or something I will never eat again.

There's only one way to find out.

So pitchapodcast.com if you've got a bad pitch, every time you see a bad pitch come in your email before you throw it to spam, you know, maybe I'll set up an email you can forward it to.

That would be easy.

I'd rather hear your smiling voice or not so smiling voice.

But I want you to think, ooh, I gotta go tell Dave about this.

And then also tell me about your show, tell me your website address, and tell me your ideal perfect podcast.

And so to kind of wrap this up, originally it was gonna be this snarky, let's take it to the man kind of thing.

It was going to be called Podcast Pitch Slap.

And I went, eh, you know what?

That's not really my thing.

And plus, maybe not everybody knows what a pitch slap is.

What is that?

But a show called how to Pitch a Podcast.

It's pretty obvious.

What do you think the show's about?

If I said that to you?

Hey, I'm doing a show called how to Pitch a Podcast.

What do you think it's about?

I'm pretty sure you'd say how to.

How to Pitch a Podcast.

And I'd be like, that's it.

Congratulations.

Tell them what he's won.

And so that's the other thing I've done.

I made sure the URL was available.

Pitch a podcast dot com.

Easy to spell, doesn't have any weird words in it.

Easy to say, could I have gotten how to pitch a podcast?

Yeah, but let's make it shorter.

That's still kind of obvious.

And we will see what happens.

But right now, before the dryer is done, I got to set up that page on Pod Page.

So until we get back, hopefully I'll have a voice if I see you, if you're listening to this.

Let's see if you're listening to this.

Podfest is over.

So hope I met you at podfast.

Hope you came over and said hello, I Always love meeting new people.

And I just.

Thank you so much.

I'm excited about this because I don't know where we're going, and that's kind of fun.

That's how you learn stuff.

You do things outside of your comfort zone.

So if we look at those questions again, that you should be asking yourself, number one, why are we doing this?

Because I want to push back.

I want to educate, and I want to entertain.

Is this a passion project, a hobby, or a business?

It's a.

It's a passion hobby.

There we go.

Who is my audience?

Podcasters.

Sure.

And PR agencies, hopefully.

What do they want to hear?

They want to hear how to pitch a podcast so they actually get booked so that they don't waste their time.

I'm solving a problem.

Hopefully, you know, that's what they want to hear.

And they're not alone in having to put up with this slop.

Many of it AI generated.

Now, how am I going to gauge my success?

Well, I will measure topics by downloads.

I will measure success via how many people sign up for the affiliates that I use as sponsors.

And then I've looked at how long is it going to take to do this and if so, how?

What's the schedule?

I pick my schedule.

After I see how long, I think it's going to take a half hour.

When I get some submissions, I will do some examples and I will time every single element of that so I can confidently say, yes, I have enough time to sustain this podcast and move forward.

So if you want to get involved, go over to pitchapodcast.com, submit your good or bad pitch that you got for your podcast, tell us a little bit about your show, tell us your website so we can link to it and tell us who your preferred guest, if you're doing guests would be like, what's your perfect guest?

The perfect guest would be somebody who can talk about this.

And I will see you over there@pitchapodcast.com I'm Dave Jackson.

Been helping podcasters for over 20 years, and I love to help people.

I really do.

And that's really at the soul of this.

This new podcast is going to be about helping, hopefully podcasters get less spam, help PR people send better pitches, and I can't wait to see if you're looking to start a podcast.

We can go through these questions.

I've got tutorials to walk you through an even deeper dive in launching your podcast.

So you've crossed all the T's and you've dotted all your eyes and I can't wait to see what we're going to do together.

Go over to schoolofpodcasting.com join use the coupon code Listener when you sign up for either a monthly, quarterly or yearly subscription.

And of course, if you're worried about it, it's a 30 day money back guarantee that comes with that.

And I can't wait to see what we're going to do together.

Until next week.

Take care.

God Bless.

Class is dismissed.

Know please share it with a friend if you like the show Pretty pretty please share it with a friend right now.

Yeah.