801 – Great Publicity is available: Tom talks Podcast Agencies

Episode 801 – Podcast Agencies
[00:00:08] Welcome to Screw the Commute. The entrepreneurial podcast dedicated to getting you out of the car and into the money, with your host, lifelong entrepreneur and multimillionaire, Tom Antion.

[00:00:24] Hey everybody, it's Tom here with episode 801 of Screw the Commute podcast. Today, we're going to talk about hiring a podcast agency, the pros and cons and the alternatives, both cheap and free. Now I'm a big proponent of being on podcasts for great publicity and warm introductions. So also you want to listen to episode 211. That's how to be a great podcast guest. So screwthecommute.com/211. All right. Hope you didn't miss Episode 800. We are in Vetpreneur Month. September is Vetpreneur Month where we highlight our wonderful veterans and wow the comeback coach Richard Kaufman just blew it out of the park with what he had been through and how he turned it around. I mean, he wasn't even supposed to be alive. And and he's here now helping other people. So that was episode 800. 211 is how to be a great podcast guest. All right. Make sure you check out my mentor program at GreatInternetMarketingTraining.com and grab a copy of our automation ebook at screwthecommute.com/automatefree. You will thank me for it because it'll save you hundreds of hours fighting with your computer. Screwthecommute.com/automatefree. Follow me on TikTok at tiktok.com/@digitalmultimillionaire.

[00:01:52] All right, let's get to the main event. We're going to talk about how great an opportunity it is for entrepreneurs to get on podcast. You can be in front of thousands of people that never heard of you before with a warm introduction from the host.

[00:02:09] I mean, this can mean hundreds of thousands of dollars of free publicity and sales of your products and services. Now I'm going to be talking on this episode of the pros and cons of hiring a podcast booking agency and cheaper and free alternatives to doing so. Now, there's there's been an ad running around the Internet with a guy telling you he's going to show you how to have influencers promoting you for free. He makes it all, ooh, big time. Well, guess what? It's just a fancy way of promoting his podcast booking agency. All it is. All right. So hiring an agency. What are the pros? Well, they book engagements for you. And this can be good if you are legitimately too busy and I emphasize the word legitimately. All right. I see so many people who think they're too good to do the lowly work of booking themselves and and they over emphasize their own importance in the world. All right. So so when I say if you are legitimately too busy, I mean, you are working 14 hours a day at something with little or no time to even go to the bathroom. That's what I'm talking about. That's the kind of busy. All right. Back to the pros of hiring agency. Well, they already have relationships with podcast hosts and they are always gaining new relationships. And if you're their client, they're always watching for and researching podcasts that are right for you.

[00:03:52] Now. Good agencies will help you prepare your pitch. Now they're going to be doing it for you most of the time, but it's good for you have to help them. Tell them your benefits and what you bring to the table and all that stuff. But they put it together for you in a way that podcast hosts can consume. They might help you make a one sheet web pages and all the stuff necessary to make you look good to podcast hosts. All right. So what are the cons of hiring an agency? Well, I've never seen an agency that guarantees the quality of the shows they put you on. You could be on a new show with one listener and they fulfilled their obligation to you. The next con is they can be very expensive. I had one guy tell me they charged him $11,000 for 20 shows to get him on 20 shows. And none of the shows were top tier shows. So it can be very expensive. Now the next con is you still I mean, it's not a con because this is to me a plus that you're involved in this, but you still have to do your part to be a great guest. As I've outlined in episode 211, which you must listen to. For instance, one of the tips in that episode is to listen to a couple past episodes of the show. You're going to be on to note the following things.

[00:05:29] How much does the host talk as opposed to the guest? Sometimes. You're just an ornament on the show because the host wants to look like a big shot and no more. No, no at all, you know? And so they're going to talk, talk, talk. And then if you had a four minute story prepared and they give you 30s to tell it, I mean, you know, you're just it's going to be a mess. So you need to know this going in. I teach my students to have several different lengths of their story ready to go in case they run into a host like that. Another thing you need to pay attention to when you're doing your homework on the show is are there any regular segments that you need to be aware of? For instance, a lot of shows have these five questions. They hit you rapid fire with. Well, the questions are the same every time. So if you didn't know about the segment, you're there. Hum. You know, hemming around him, hopping around to find answers on the spot where you should have known ahead of time and prepared your answers. So that's just two of the things that you still have to do. Your homework, which could be considered a con from hiring an agency. They're not going to do the show for you. All right. You've got to do the the actual show. Okay. Next thing is, they are probably not going to do as thorough a job of researching potential podcasts as you or someone working for you would have done.

[00:07:02] In other words, you will probably miss opportunities because of just turning it all over to them and expecting them to do it all. All right. How about some cheaper or free alternatives? Well, the free alternative would be to book yourself. Other than time. I mean, it's easy to research podcasts and pitch yourself. You should have a web page with your topics and all the great things you'll do for the host and his or her audience. An example of that is one that I have at Screwthecommute.com/podcasthosts. So you can see I show them all the benefits to their audience. I give them topic selections and I even tell them about they could be an affiliate so they could make money because I'm on their show. So that really is a is an important one. Also, after you have completed a bunch of shows, you put another page on your website, I call mine recent appearances screwthecommute.com/recentappearances. This is impressive to host if they seem you've been on a lot of other shows so you can also make up a one sheet a printed one sheet. But honestly in over a thousand appearances on radio and TV and podcasts, I've never used a printed one sheet ever. All right, so the web page is suffice. All right. So that's free.

[00:08:26] Now, you could also relatively cheaply. Hire a PR student or anybody really that's enthusiastic and a good researcher to find shows appropriate for you and pitch for you. And like I said, with the agencies, you still have to do your homework after your person secures a booking. But hiring your own person is going to be way cheaper and more thorough with better control of the quality of shows that you pitch. They can really find the best shows for you. The agencies are just going to take any show to fulfill their obligation to you for, you know, if they owe you 20 shows, they are going to take anything to get that obligation done. And that could be an expensive waste of time and money for you being on shows that you don't belong on or that have no reach. All right. Now, there's another alternative that's kind of in between. It's a podcast matching services. Now I'm a member of PodMatch.com. But there are others. But these places let you buy a listing as either a guest, a host, or both. And they're relatively inexpensive and can be a good alternative between full blown agencies and doing it all yourself. But again, I got emphasized that you still have to do your homework on each show you get booked on or you may struggle because you didn't know what to expect on a particular show and and or you find you shouldn't have booked that show in the first place because it really didn't fit your topic and agenda.

[00:10:10] See, I get asked all the time to be on shows because I'm somewhat well known in my field. Right. But the show doesn't really make sense for me to be on because I wouldn't be doing any kind of service to their audience or to myself. So anyway, get yourself on podcasts. I mean, listen to that episode 211, screwthecommute.com/211 and I do have a one on one course where I can run you through all the stuff that gets you on podcast and makes you a great guest. And you also, as part of the deal with me, you get a special episode on my podcast and and practice sessions where I put you through your paces and let you try and improve yourself while you're not on the real airwaves because you don't want to go out there and bomb because this podcast hosts know each other and we tell. Oh no, don't have that guest. She or he sucked, right? Don't do that. So anyway, I'll put you through practice sessions and and you also get a special Oh and help you develop all those materials and all that stuff. Anyway, check it out at screwthecommute.com/greatpodcastguest. All right. That's my story and I'm sticking to it. Want to hear you out there on those podcasts. All right. We'll catch you on the next episode. See you later.