MI Rewind: The Business of Podcasting w/ Hala Taha

23:45Oh my gosh. I think everybody thinks it's going to be easier than it is. I remember I was working at HP when I started the podcast and I went into, we had a little meeting and everybody was giving their New Year's resolution and it was like the week before Christmas or something. And I told them like, oh, when we come back into the office, January 15th or whatever it was, I'm gonna have my podcast. And I had just thought of the idea that day. I thought I was gonna launch, create a podcast in like three weeks or less. I didn't end up launching it till that April. It took me like four months to actually launch it.

24:18So it's just the whole process. Like you don't realize how much goes into it. And then like the whole marketing piece, like it's not like if you put up a podcast, you're going to get thousands of downloads right away. There's actually a certain way to market it. You've got to learn about media buying and how to convert social media users to actual podcast listeners. Even just the type of content that you create, the equipment that you use, the hosting that you use, there's so many things that go into it. It is really a craft. And I think that there's lots of people on different ends of the spectrum.

24:48There's people who get into podcasting and they really like just the basics. And they usually don't do that well. And then there's people who are like me and you who are more advanced and know the ins and outs of every single little thing that you need to know. And that's how you succeed in any industry that you're in, is actually being an expert and knowing the ins and outs of the industry. There's lots of people in podcasting who really know nothing about podcasting, but they have a podcast. It's funny because when I first started, I thought it was going to be a lot easier than it actually was.

25:19And I'm actually hiring a host to help me co-host Millennial Investing. And in the job description, I wrote that podcasting is a lot harder than you expect. Whatever your expectations are, at least double, if not triple, the amount of work that you think it's going to take. And I just said, trust me, I'm speaking from experience because it's exactly what happened to me. I came into podcasting and I knew I wanted to have a very professional, high quality podcast, but even then I didn't think it was going to take that much work. And I've quickly realized just how much work it actually does take to have a podcast.

25:50It really does. And I don't know, there's a lot of one-man bands out there who do their audio editing. They do their own show notes. They do their own marketing assets. I have no idea how they do it because like I said, I was recruiting volunteers since episode two. I had people to help me scale. And I think that's key. It's understanding what you're good at, what you're bad at, and trying to outsource the things that are just going to eat up your time so that you can focus on those things that really matter and that you can't actually outsource. For example, maybe preparing for the podcast or coming up with the guests.

26:22That might be something you want to always control. But there's so many things that you can outsource with the podcast if you're smart about it. Did you have high turnover using volunteers? No, I didn't. You know what? I don't know what it was. A lot of the volunteers that work for me are now team leads that are getting paid six figures to help me run my business. So they've all been rewarded and most of them have stuck with me. Of course, we had people that left, but all the core people have stayed. And I think it's just the vision is just so strong. And it's an emergent space that's really exciting.

26:54And we've been on the forefront in terms of being innovative. And I think they just see the opportunity. And some of them are incentivized with equity and things like that. But yeah, I think I didn't have too much turnover. And I think part of that is just knowing how to motivate people and teaching them. Because here's the thing. Here's my rule, at least now. It's like we have an intern program where we still have volunteers. Every semester, we get about 10 interns who now they get a small stipend because we're making money in the past. They didn't even get a stipend. But it's like 200, 300 bucks a month.

27:28It's nothing. And my rule is, as long as you're learning, I don't feel bad if we're not really paying you. If you're learning and getting the experience and we're teaching you, actively teaching you new things, then I don't feel bad to pay. As soon as I feel like that switches where we're getting more value than we're giving you, then you need to get paid. And as long as that balance is kept, you can keep volunteers for very long for very happy. The key is, is that you can't teach somebody how to do videos and then expect them to do the same thing for a year. You can teach somebody to do videos, they do that for three months and be like, okay, now I'm going to teach you how to audio edit.

28:01And you can do that now. It's moving people around so that they keep learning and learning and learning while contributing. But once you keep somebody in the same place and expect them to do the same thing, that's when you take advantage. I've actually been quite surprised to hear how many people who listen to this show are interested in starting a podcast as their own side hustle, or just how many people ask me what strategies to use to grow a podcast. So what are the most effective strategies that you've used to grow a podcast audience? That's a great question. I feel like I was really creative and innovative in the way that I've done it and continue to do it.

28:36And so I'm definitely the type of person where I just give away all my secrets. I do that on Clubhouse. I do that everywhere. So I'll just be totally open. So I think one of the biggest keys for somebody who wants to grow a podcast audience is to have one platform that you have leverage. Okay. So for me, that platform was LinkedIn. I had put almost all my eggs in that basket. I didn't worry about being on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook. I didn't do that. I just focused on LinkedIn and I dominated. I have more engagement on LinkedIn than Lewis Howes and Jay Shetty and all these huge podcasters because I focused on that.

29:12I learned, I fed all the features. I learned how to hack it. I understood what kind of captions worked. I knew what content types worked. And I really just focused on that. So I ended up growing. Let's say, let me take this back before I was a number one education podcast. When I was still starting, I was getting like 3 ,000 downloads a month, which to some people now is actually really good numbers. But to me, that's when I was smaller. When I was first starting, I was getting 3 ,000 downloads a month, which you're probably looking at me like, that's so little because you had instant success, which we can get into as well that I know.

29:44But I didn't have instant success. I didn't have great SEO. Young and profiting is not something that people search for. I had to spoon feed my podcast to everyone. So back to the story. I grew LinkedIn and I use that as my leverage. So once LinkedIn was about 60 ,000 followers and I had crazy engagement and reach, and I reached out to all the different podcast players, and I noticed that not everybody is listening on Apple. 30 % of people listen on Apple, 20 % on Spotify, and then all the other apps make up the rest of the market. And I said, what about all those apps? I'm pretty sure they want to talk to my LinkedIn following because a lot of my LinkedIn following love podcasts.

30:19That's why they follow me. They love being educated. It's their perfect market. So I just started cold emailing. Hi, Podcast Republic. My name is Hala. I have a huge LinkedIn following. I'll do some contests in exchange for you promoting me in your app. And I just did that game and everybody sponsored me. CastBox, Podbean, Podacy, GoodPods, Podcorn, you name it. Any podcast platform, whether you were an app or a website or a blog, I reached out and I was like, let's cross promote. And all that happened because I had leverage. One thing, LinkedIn. If I had concentrated on Twitter and Instagram and all these other platforms, I wouldn't have had anything because it wouldn't have been a strong sell.

30:59So getting that one platform that's your leverage is key. Then as you grow your podcast audience, you can leverage that. So then I would start saying, Hey, CastBox, you want to reach my 20 ,000 followers on Podcast Republic? I'll do a commercial for you if you feature me in your app. This whole industry called media buying and podcasting that people don't know about because a lot of the podcast networks and bigger agencies, they're the ones doing the media buying. It's not really the independent podcaster that knows a lot about this, but there's banner ad space within all these apps. And every app has a different offering.

31:31Some will incorporate you in their onboarding. When people sign up for the app, and they'll just make you automatically check as a podcast to get subscribed to. Some offer that. Some offer push notifications to everybody who is just on their app, and they'll send a push to listen to your episode. Some are just banner ads. Some are audio ads. They're all different. It's like the wild, wild west. All the subscriber acquisition costs are different. Everything is different. You have to experiment on these different platforms. Now, I didn't have a lot of budget. So like I said, I just traded. And because this is such a new industry, there's still a lot of people willing to collab and trade and do these kind of like archaic type ways of doing business.

32:09And that's how I got away with a lot of it. Now, a year later, I'm like one of the most advanced people when it comes to media buying in this space. And I've got 20 clients who do media buying through me. And I have deals with the podcast players where basically I'm like, hey, give me 20 % credit every time I sell something for you. So now I sell ads for these multi-millionaire and billionaire clients that I have. And then I just get free ads because I have them credit me for what I sell. Instead of taking a referral fee, they just give me the ads. So I do lots of creative things like that to make me basically give me the buying power as somebody who has a lot more budget because I just do creative things.

32:49And I think that's the lesson here. I don't think anybody can replicate what I've done. I think that's hard to replicate. But I think that the lesson here is that you can be creative and leverage what you have. That's how I grew my show. It was a lot of getting sponsored and cross-promotion and leveraging my audience and leveraging other people's audiences. That's the main way. And we can get into social media strategies as well, if you'd like. I mentioned that was one of the most common questions I get from people about podcasting. I'd say the second most common question I get is, how do you land high-profile guests?

33:24For me, it's Lewis Howes and Kevin O 'Leary and people like that. You've had guests like Matthew McConaughey and Seth Godin. What are the specific strategies and tactics that you use to land high-profile guests? I think the key is realizing that you just have to ask. You'd be surprised how many people would just say yes, if you put something compelling that's thoughtful and not like cookie cutter out there and just ask. For me, I think LinkedIn was huge because it gave me that social proof. So even before my podcast was big, having that platform as social proof was really key because if I messaged them off of there, they'd see my engagement.

34:01And even though my podcast wasn't so big, they were more inclined to trust that there is potential for people to see this content. I think the other thing is to see who's already on podcasts. So it's a way harder sell for somebody who's like, Matthew McConaughey, I got him. He was doing rounds on the bigger podcast, right? If I went after Ben Affleck, it would be a lot harder, even though they're maybe same star power, let's say. But Ben Affleck might be a lot harder because he's not promoting anything. He's not comfortable on podcasts. He's never done it before, maybe. So one of the things that I'll do is look at my competitors and I'll have like 10 podcasts that I look at who they're interviewing and we'll scrape them.

34:40We'll see who's Jordan Harbinger interviewing this month. I'll scrape them and I'll be like, okay, these are people who are actively going on podcasts. They might be more inclined to say yes than people who are not actively already on podcasts. So that's one way. Lots of authors want to be on podcasts. Now when books launch, one of the main strategies is for the author to get on like 40 podcasts a week of launch. right? So you can basically look to see what the most highly anticipated books are. So that's how I got Seth Godin. I saw that Seth Godin has the practice of creativity coming out. And so I proactively reached out to him and I said, Hey, I see that you have this book coming out in November.

35:15I reached out to him about three months before and he said, perfect timing, Hala. I would love to be on your podcast. And then he put me on the train of the other 15 major podcasts that he was going to be on. And it was a huge look that I was one of the first podcasts to come out with his content. So I think those are some great strategies to kind of target guests that are more likely to say yes. Let's take a quick break and hear from today's sponsors.

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39:00All right, back to the show. What impact has that, any big guest really, had on your podcast? For example, with Matthew McConaughey, that is, I guess, such a big name that people just can't shake it out of their heads where now I'm introduced as like, hey, this is Hala, host of Young and Profiting Podcast, cover of Podcast Magazine, January 2021, and interviewed Matthew McConaughey. It's such a big part of what I'm doing now because it's just has so much star power. So I mean, in terms of bragging rights, it's huge. But at the same time, just because they're a big guest doesn't mean that it's a better show or episode.

39:38Some of my most popular episodes have just been really great content from a sleep scientist that nobody knows about or a human behavior expert that is just so good and so well-spoken, but not the biggest name in the world. So I think it's understanding that it's a balance. You do want the big names, the star power, that always helps. In the case of Matthew McConaughey, he actually reposted my content, which was huge and really helped. But a lot of these bigger guests actually don't repost content and don't support the cross-promotion. And then And it's kind of like, well, you spent all this time and money trying to get this big guest and then they don't even help support it.

40:15So you need to make things as easy as possible for people to support. So one of the tips that I give people is when you're creating content to promote your podcast, do it in story size. Do it in that vertical story size because a big celebrity is more likely to do that with a swipe up to your link rather than an infeed post that's going to stay there forever. That's not in their brand. And you really want to make sure that you have really professional looking assets because that's going to also make sure that they support. So if you do get a celebrity, you've got to go above and beyond to make sure that you give them content in a way that's really easy for them to support.

40:52And then the other thing I do is DM people a day of launch and ask them like, Hey, can you share this? Here's the link. Reach out to them on email. If you have their text, whatever it is, you want to reach out on multiple angles and know who their social media person is. Because most of the celebrities aren't even managing their own social media. So that's not even the person you want to talk to. So it's like, get all that information upfront so that you can make it worth it when you actually have a celebrity on the show. What are the different ways that you monetize a podcast? How can a podcast be an actual revenue generating business?

41:24That's such a great question. And if you had asked me this last year, I would have given you a completely different answer. But now I really know the ins and outs of everything after having an agency. And one of my mentors is Jordan Harbinger. He's the biggest OG in the game and has taught me so much. So there's lots of ways. The first way, I'll tell you, let's do evolution from starting a podcast to having a bunch of downloads. So when you're first starting podcasts, you don't have downloads. You don't have an audience. All you have is your show and whoever's listening and your guests. So one way to monetize your podcast is actually through your guests, lead generation through your guests.

42:02For example, my marketing agency caters to celebrities, CEOs, and bestselling authors. Those are the same people who come on my podcast. And when I first started my marketing agency, all my clients were former podcast guests that ended up being curious about our marketing and how good it was, and then ended up becoming clients. So that's how I initially started monetizing my podcast was through my guests. The people who would come on my show were the perfect marketing clients for me. So anybody out there who's thinking of a podcast, if you have a business, if you can think of a way to interview your ideal clients, that is a great way to network and talk to people who otherwise might not want to talk to you.

42:41It is a lot of people that I know monetize their podcast in this way. I've got a friend, Adam Posner. He does HR recruitment, and he interviews HR recruitment influencers in the space. And he gets so much business doing that because it's like the perfect thing for him. So that's one way. Another way is affiliate marketing. So when you're first starting out with your podcast, you can become an affiliate marketer for things like Audible or Fiverr or ClickFunnels, whatever it is that's relevant to your content or relevant to your audience. You can become an affiliate partner. You don't need a certain amount of downloads.

43:14And the one thing I'll say is you're not going to make a lot of money doing that. It takes a lot for a podcast listener to convert and follow a link and all of that. But if you want to make a couple extra bucks a week, 100 bucks a week or less, you could try affiliate marketing. Again, I think that's a really tough thing to try to scale as a podcaster. I don't want to put people down the wrong path, but technically, it's something you can do. You can also do commercials for your own products and services. So before you actually have enough downloads for a sponsor, you can just have commercial space, a mid-roll, a pre-roll, a post roll, 90 seconds or so that you can promote your own products and services and try to sell.

43:51And then lastly, it's CPM advertising model. So once you get to, let's say, 5 ,000 to 10 ,000 downloads an episode, some agencies have 15 ,000 as a minimum. It just depends what the platform is. You can start selling ads on a CPM basis. So basically what that means is for every 1 ,000 downloads, you can charge anywhere from$15 to$45 per 1 ,000 downloads. And you can start to layer on commercials on your podcast. So you don't just need one commercial, you can have four commercials in your podcast. So let's say you're getting 20 ,000 downloads an episode, you probably get like 800 bucks a commercial, the ad agency might take 15 or 20%.

44:35And then maybe you're left with$700. And let's say you do four commercials, that's$2 ,800 an episode. You do two episodes a week. You're making almost six grand a week on your podcast. If you just have a small team, that's great. And so that's one way you can monetize as well as through like CPM. And the way that you would do that is you could sign up to platforms like AdvertiseCast. They're great. I can highly recommend them. And then there's other podcast agencies like AdResults and Red Circle and all these other different agencies. There's probably like 40 of them that sell ads for podcasters.

45:10But the key in the beginning is to focus on growing your show. Focus on growing your show. That is your number one goal because none of this is possible, especially that last business model, CPM. If you don't have the downloads, you're never going to get there. And so focus on growing your show, having great content, a great social media strategy. Maybe do some lead gen with your guests if you've got a relevant side hustle or business, that's, I think, beautiful when that all works out. Because now I'm monetizing in so many different ways. I'm monetizing with my guests. I'm monetizing with my ads.

45:42I'm monetizing through just my own... I'm going to launch a course eventually. So I think that's the smartest way to go about it. I get asked about how to find mentors all the time. And you just mentioned that Jordan Harbinger is one of your mentors. How did you come to be affiliated with Jordan? How did you gain that mentorship? Podcasting is a great way to get a mentor. So Jordan was a guest on my podcast. And he came on my podcast. And I think he thought he was never going to see me again. But I made sure that that wasn't the case. So what I would do is, like I said, I used to do all these cross promo things.

46:16And people would, for example, write a blog about me. And in exchange, I would do a social post promoting that blog. So I started featuring Jordan in my blogs. Who's your podcast inspiration? And I would mention Jordan. And then I'd message him on Instagram like, hey, I mentioned you in this vlog. I got on the cover of Podcast Magazine and it had a sidebar of who's your favorite podcasters. And I put Jordan and I was like, hey, I featured you in Podcast Magazine. And then I would just ask him really, really smart, in-depth questions on Instagram and things like that. And then Jordan started to get to know me a little bit better.

46:51And he basically approached me and was like, hey, my producer is sick and I need somebody to write a new ad copy. Can you help me? And I was like, sure. So I started writing ad copy for free for him. I didn't ask for any money. I just did a favor. And then he was like, wow, you're really good at this. And then I started asking questions about media buying because I knew who was in the media buying space. And then one thing led to another. Now he's in my Slack channel. He's like an official advisor. I talked to him every day. We're doing deals together. He's basically my business partner. And it's all because I was willing to give him some free value.

47:23And he realized that she's new, but she's doing stuff really different. And I'm old. But maybe we can learn from each other. So he's teaching me all traditional podcasting stuff. And I'm like, well, have you thought about it this way? Because I have no formal training. And I just figured it all out on my own. And I've got my own things that I learned along the way. So just I think realizing that the mentor-mentee relationship is give and take. You don't want to just keep taking and taking and taking from your mentor. Actually, you want to give, give, give, give until they're like, oh my gosh, I need to give something back because this person has just given me so much.

48:01What has been the most impactful thing you've learned from guests on your podcast? I think one of the most aha things that I learned was from Scott Adams. And so he's the creator of Dilbert. It's one of the most syndicated cartoons in America. And he taught me the concept of skill stacking. And this is something I talk about all the time because I just feel like it's so relevant for what I've done with my life and where I ended up. And basically, he is a decent drawer. He had business experience. He's funny. And he's a good writer. And so he's not the best at any of those things, but he's okay at them.

48:39He put them all together and then became the world's number one cartoonist and is now like a millionaire and out of the stratosphere in terms of success. Everybody knows what Dilbert is, right? But he wasn't the best at any of those. He stacked up his skills and put together a unique offering. So I feel like I'm the same. I don't think I'm the best podcaster in the world, but I'm really good at marketing. I'm super creative. I know how to build teams and lead teams and scale teams. And I'm a good host. I'm a good researcher. I put all those things together. And now I'm one of the biggest female podcasters in the game.

49:13And it's because I had stacked all those experiences. And so just understanding that every experience that you have is actually preparing you for the future you and knowing how to pull those bits together and tie them together to put out an offering is just really, really impactful. So that's skill stacking. And that's one of the biggest takeaways that I've had so far. As we get towards the end of the show, I like to ask the guests three questions that create what I call an action plan for listeners to do when they're done with this episode. So the first question gives listeners something to actually implement in their life.

49:48The second question gives them a resource to go learn from. And the third one gives a specific action item to take right now. So the first question is, which habit or principle do you follow in your life that has had a big impact on your success that not enough people do, but should? How you do anything is how you do everything. That is something that if I had a tattoo or had to tattoo myself with a phrase is what I would do. How you do anything is how you do everything. Give your 100 % effort and every little thing that you do. What has been the most influential book in your life? And it doesn't necessarily have to be your favorite because I know that maybe it's not your favorite, but it's been the most influential or most impactful.

50:31So what is that book? That is The Like Switch by Dr. Jack Schaefer, who is actually on my podcast three times already and incredible book that helps you understand how to become more likable and have better first impressions. And to me, the strategies that I learned in that book has helped me in almost every situation that I've been in, every high-stakes situation and every good thing that has happened to me is because of the things that I learned in that book to become more approachable and more likable. When this episode's over, before the listener quickly jumps to the next podcast or to your podcast, what is one action they should take that can really help improve their career, life, or business?

51:12What I want you to look at is if you're trying to achieve something, and the reason why you're not achieving it is because there's some sort of a gatekeeper telling you no, is to step back and realize that you have more control of your future than you realize, and that you can create your own thing. And you don't necessarily need to wait for someone to open a door for you. I think I would have been a lot more successful in my life had I opened that door for myself earlier rather than always wanting some big brand to open that door for me. So realizing that if a gatekeeper keeps telling you no, don't try to find the next gatekeeper.

51:49Try to do it on your own potentially. And I don't mean to say that everybody should be an entrepreneur. Everybody should have a side hustle. But if there's something that you really, really want and you're passionate about, don't let anybody tell you you can't do it. That's my advice. Become the gatekeeper. Exactly. Before we hand off to where people can find you, the last segment of the show, I like to wrap up by turning the tables and letting the guest ask me a question. So what question do you have for me, Hala? So Robert, I know that you have a very popular podcast. And I know one of the questions that you asked me earlier that you said is a question that you often get is, how do you grow your show?

52:29And I know that from talking to you in the past, that you don't really have a huge social media following. You didn't have... Me and you took totally different approaches. I had a huge LinkedIn following and leveraged that. You didn't. So talk to us about why you think your show has grown so fast and what strategies you took. you're right about social media. I had no social media. I didn't even exist on social media. When I started the podcast, I had one small Facebook page for friends and family, but that was it. I didn't have Twitter or Instagram, or I don't think I even had LinkedIn at the time.

53:00But what I did was I partnered with a podcast company, a company that already had a podcast that existed, and I leveraged their brand. And so people listening are very familiar with the show We Study Billionaires. And so that gave me a little bit of initial traction, but I don't want people to get lost in saying, oh, it's only successful because of the brand, because we've launched two other shows that no longer exist. If you're listening to the show for a while, you might've heard of Silicon Valley and The Good Life. Those are two other shows that we launched and they've been shut down because they didn't grow.

53:30And so the brand helps, but it's not everything. And so what I really found that helped was finding these great guests that are in the middle in terms of size. So you talked about having big guests, and you explained it almost exactly how I would. My biggest guests were often my lowest downloaded episodes, and that is because they don't share it. And they don't share it across their social media platforms. They don't share it on their website, etc. But if you find somebody that has between 10 ,000 and 100 ,000 or 200 ,000 followers, that they're actually engaged and they're willing to share it, getting that share on their social media site or on their website, or even just in a story if they can, that has always led to a lot more downloads for me.

54:15So you focus on that size of guests and it just continues to lead to growth and growth and growth from there because you get everybody that came from the last person that did that is now listening. And then that next guest that does that, you have all those people still listening. So it compounds from there. And that has been the biggest, biggest thing for me. And then also, I mentioned this last time we chatted, but titles. I think a lot of people focus on SEO and SEO is really important, but it's not as important in podcasting. I find that being an eye-catching title is really important for podcast episodes.

54:45So those two things, you combine those, that has been the biggest impact on the growth. Super interesting. And I think the name of your podcast is really good too, because I think people actually started, it's called Investor's Podcast, right? Or Millennial investor. That is so good. So many people searching for stuff like that all the time. So I think also just your searchable name is really, I think, helpful as well. You did mention that last time we chatted in. For those listening who are familiar with Stig, Stig recommended the name Millennial Investing. And at first, I was hesitant. I didn't really like the name.

55:21I didn't think it was a good name, but then clearly it has been good. And you even mentioned that it's a really good name. So I guess I can admit that I was wrong on that. and it's been helpful. Where can the audience go to connect with you? Where can they find your podcast? Maybe your agency. Where can they follow you on social media? Where they can find you? You guys can find me on LinkedIn. You can search for my name. It's Halataha. I'm also on Clubhouse. So if you guys are podcasters out there, I do podcast office hours and always kind of doing educational events on Clubhouse for podcasters.

55:52So you can follow me there, Halataha. I'm on Instagram at yapwithhala. Young and Profiting Podcast is everywhere. Apple, Spotify, CastBox, you name it. So you could just Google Young and Profiting and find a million links. And then youngandprofiting.com if you can't remember any of that. I'll be sure to put a link to the website, all your other resources in the show notes below for anybody that's interested in checking them out. Hala, thanks so much for joining me. Thank you so much. This was so much fun. Thank you for listening to TIP. Make sure to subscribe to We Study Billionaires by the Investors Podcast Network.

56:27Every Wednesday, we teach you about Bitcoin. And every Saturday, we study billionaires and the financial markets. To access our show notes, transcripts or courses, go to theinvestorspodcast.com. This show is for entertainment purposes only. Before making any decision, consult a professional. This show is copyrighted by the Investors Podcast Network. Written permission must be granted before syndication or rebroadcasting.