Kajabi Edge Podcast - Sunny Gault
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[00:00:00] Hello everyone. And welcome to the Kajabi edge podcast, where we talked to real entrepreneurs to give you an edge on Kajabi. I'm your host, Jared Loman, vice president of customer experience. And today we're joined. Sunny gall podcast, coach and mentor of independent podcast network. How's it going today?
[00:00:31] Sunny. Lovely. How are you today? I am wonderful. Thank you for taking the time to join us. I just realized I didn't even bother to check with you beforehand to make sure I was pronouncing your name. Right? You did a wonderful job. You did it exactly right. So, thank goodness I kudos to you. Yeah. I got lucky.
[00:00:47] I got lucky um, well in traditional form, like maybe just kind of give us your, your 15, second ish elevator pitch. Tell us a little bit about who you are and what you do. Yeah. Oh my goodness. I feel like there's so much I could say. So, uh, like you said, I'm sunny. Um, podcasting is my jam. That is what I do.
[00:01:04] That's what my primary focus has been really for the. Ooh, at least 15 years. Um, which sounds crazy cuz people are like podcasts have been around that long. Yeah, they have and I wa I didn't even know I was an early adopter. I mean, there's, there's people that have been podcasting longer than me, but, um, over the years I've been able to kind of refine my craft and everything and, uh, I'm just.
[00:01:25] I'm just really passionate about it. Um, I listen to a lot of podcasts and, uh, yeah, just help people start their own shows. And, uh, I now have a podcast network, like you said, so I mentor shows and it, for me, it's all about empowering other people. Uh, we're giving them this amazing platform to tell their story and to connect with people all over the world.
[00:01:45] And to me, that's really empowering. So any role that I can play in that is really exciting outside of my work and what I do. I'm a mom, I have four lovely young. In I'm married. I live in Southern California in the San Diego area. I have a crazy dog. I dunno how far you want me to go? Um, hopefully she won't be barking during this interview, but her name's Sadie.
[00:02:06] She's a golden doodle and she loves to participate and pretty much any interview. I do love, I'll see how that works. Bring her on, in, bring her on in. Yeah. Um, Is the, these are like my favorite episodes because I can kind of be simultaneously selfish and I wanna learn all about all of the, the skills and the tips that you provide to when you're training people or teaching people about podcasting.
[00:02:28] But this is also hugely beneficial for all of our listeners. Like podcasting is I think one of the, a fairly like, kind of low hanging fruit way to kind of start the creator journey. So, yeah, I think it's, I, I'm just excited to learn more, but I guess, uh let's um, I guess take a little bit of a look into your Genesis, like how you you've been here for a long time.
[00:02:52] I, I, I also didn't know that podcasts have been around for 15 years. Yeah. So like, what was that journey like for you? Well, my background is in more traditional media. So I went to college. I went to school for broadcast journalism. So that's what my, my official degree is in. And I started working at TV stations, right outta college, like I, you know, graduated.
[00:03:13] And then like a few days later, I was a news anchor and reporter at a very, very, very tiny station in the middle of, uh, the upper peninsula of Michigan. If you guys know a lot of people don't even realize there's an upper peninsula. , that's where I was. With, like all the snow and everything, they call it God's country.
[00:03:30] And I'm like, yes, because that's, you know, it's only God up there. Nobody else is up there. So, um, yeah, so, you know, that's kind of how I got my start. I was a news anchor and reporter, and I would go out during the day and I would. Um, you know, find stories in our local community. And then I would put all the stories together.
[00:03:46] And then for the five and six o'clock news, I would anchor that and then I'd go home for the day. And that's kinda crazy when I think about it now, because I was 23 years old when I was doing that, which no one should ever give a 23 year old, that much responsibility , you know, was like, oh my God, what were they thinking?
[00:04:03] But that's how the smaller we call 'em markets. Right? That's how the smaller markets work. It's like, well, you know, you're not gonna make very much money and you're gonna work your tail. Off, but the stuff that you learn is just incredible. I mean, I applied all of that later on, you know, when I was doing podcasts.
[00:04:20] And so that's kind of the, the Genesis of it. I started, um, at one TV station and then the whole nature of it is. You know, you kind of, you complete one contract and then you're like, oh, okay. Now what market am I gonna go to next? How big of a city? Because cuz that's the whole thing you're trying to get to the big cities to actually make a decent wage and have, you know, enough people watched besides, you know, your mom and your dad.
[00:04:43] Right? So that's kind of the whole goal. And so I moved around, which is some different cities, still doing the same type of work. And then, um, it was, uh, let's see, what was the year? I would say around 2004, um, I started dating my husband remotely. Like we were on opposite ends of the country. He was here where I'm now in San Diego and I was in Washington.
[00:05:06] State. I was at an NBC affiliate up there and we decided we were gonna get married. And so we got married. I moved down to San Diego. I started doing some freelance reporting down here, but it was a huge market jump. Like markets are rated according to like numbers, right. So I was like at a market, 1 25 and San Diego's like a 25.
[00:05:27] So jumping. Those like that many markets is pretty much unheard of. At least if you want to kind of have the same position, it's like a lateral kind of move. And I was like a main news anchor. There's no way that I was going to become a main news anchor in San Diego and market size 25. So I had to start kind of thinking outside the box.
[00:05:46] I did some freelance work for some stations down here and I really didn't like it. I, I don't know what it was. Um, I know part of it. You know, when you're a freelance reporter, they'll just kind of call you the day of and be like, can you be here in five minutes? I didn't like that kind of schedule . I mean, that's crazy.
[00:06:01] Right. And so, um, I started thinking, well, what else can I do? And this was kind of the, you know, the, the time my husband and I were, we were talking about starting a family and I thought, okay, well maybe there's. Something that I can do from home and YouTube had just come out. Okay. I know I'm going, I'm really dating myself here, but OK.
[00:06:21] here we go. So YouTube had just come out. People are, you know, creating videos and putting 'em on this site. And I'm like, what in the world is this? But what I loved about it is it wasn't limited to your market, right? So in TV stations or radio stations, the only people that can really see your reporting or your anchoring or whatever you're doing are people in that market.
[00:06:41] And that was always frustrating to me. I wanted more people to be able to see. I mean, I was working my tail off, right. So I wanted as many people as possible to be able to see my work. So I'm like, oh my goodness. With YouTube, I can create whatever content I want. I'll put it on this site. And then I just have to send someone a link and then anybody in the world can see this.
[00:07:00] I know it sounds crazy now because we do all this, like, you know, with our like smartphones and everything. But back then, that was like a new. And so I started just kind of messing around with YouTube. I was like, well, how does this work? You know, I didn't really have a, a webcam, even I had a laptop and I had this old video camera that my mom got me when I graduated college.
[00:07:22] And I'm trying to figure out how did Jerry rig this? You know, video camera to my laptop to create a digital signal. I'm like, what? No, I don't even, I dunno what I'm doing. I had a background in media and I still didn't know what I was doing. And so I just kinda messed around with that enough, figured out how to, you know, record using that, you know, camera recorder, whatever, get the digital signal.
[00:07:46] So. Stored as a digital file on my computer and I knew how to edit, right. So I, you know, was able to find some programs online and pretty quickly, you know, figure out how to do the editing side of it. But that was kind of my first journey into creating content online was through YouTube. And then I thought, well, if I'm already doing that, Why don't I turn it in, you know, I heard this thing, you know, it's a podcast.
[00:08:10] Well, well, okay. So that's distributed through an RSS feed. More people can see my work. Okay. That sounds good. And at the time video podcasts were kind of becoming a little bit of a thing and then it kind of went away now it's coming back. But at the time it was like, yeah, I'll put my stuff up on YouTube and then I'll have a video podcast and, you know, I'll put that out through RSS feed.
[00:08:30] So it was just me like playing around as much as possible. You know, media and, and just trying to figure out, you know, what can we do now with this now that everybody can see what we do. And so, um, I started playing around with that. I found other people that were doing podcasts. Again, those, those were early adopters back then.
[00:08:51] And so I talked to them, um, I started working on some other people's podcasts that were in my area just to kind of figure out how they did stuff and how I, I, you know, I would just say, okay, you seem to be successful at this. What's your story. Right. And I. You know, kind of learn that way. And then we got to a point where I, you know, I mentioned my husband and I, we wanna start a family and I'm like, okay, I think I can do this on my own now.
[00:09:13] And I knew that I knew I didn't wanna just launch one podcast because I knew I wanted to make it a business. And while there are podcasts that are businesses that are just centered around one podcast for me, I thought the odds of that happening were kind of slim. So I wa I wanted more. Gets to put my, you know, uh, my funds in, you know what I'm saying?
[00:09:34] I wanted more, you know, to, to get revenue in different ways. So I actually launched with three shows. They were all focused on pregnancy and parenting, cuz again, that was my stage of life and that's what I had the most questions about. And so I thought, well, I, I can interview people. You know, I did that all the time for the news.
[00:09:50] I'll just find the experts and I'll learn how to, you know, go through my pregnancies. I'll, I'll learn how to be a parent and maybe I can make some money at this. And so that's really how, you know, that's, that's how it all got started was just kind of a need just playing around and then eventually making a little bit of money, making a little bit more money, figuring out a little bit more so, you know, and then you go from there.
[00:10:12] Amazing. Amazing. You answered. Five of my questions on that journey that I was going to ask, made my job easy. Um, oh, good. I guess like the one thing that kind of stands out to me, this is just my curiosity coming into play. But like, you kind of, you mentioned like talking about maybe babies, like what was like, what was the, what were the topics.
[00:10:30] That you found, like, I guess resonated. Did you like explore a number of different podcasts like that were completely different? Or did you have kind of a plan of attack that you, one thing you wanted to achieve with your podcast? Well, I did research to see what was already out there. I knew enough about business to know that you needed to do some market research, right?
[00:10:48] So I knew the type of shows I wanted to create because I wanted them to answer the questions that I had in my life. So, uh, we were just at the beginning stage of, you know, having our. I think I mentioned this earlier, but I have four kids now. So I was at the very, you know, beginning part of that whole journey.
[00:11:03] So I knew I, I wanted to show focused on pregnancy because when I woke up in the morning and I had different symptoms, I wanted to be able to reach out to an expert and do a whole episode. Cause I thought, well, if I have these questions, somebody else has these questions too. Right. So I knew pregnancy needed to be part of it.
[00:11:18] Um, I also breastfed my kids. I had a lot of questions about breastfeeding, so I started a breastfeeding podcast. And then I thought, well, you know, after my kids are a little bit older, you know, past the, the newborn stage, then, oh my goodness. Then you've got the terrible twos, toddlers and all this stuff.
[00:11:32] We gotta have to a show about that. So those were my first three shows. Um, so I did research to see what else was out there. And I li and, and this is, this is advice I give podcast just today. I always say, before you start your own show, you know, go on whatever podcasting app you. Subscribe to five different podcasts, at least five, but five seems to be a pretty manageable number.
[00:11:53] Try to make them in different genres. So not just all like pregnancy and parenting, not all fashion, not all tech, but pick different genres. And then, you know, for a month, if you could do it for a month, Listen to those podcasts and listen to just from a listener's perspective, write down what you like, write down what you don't like, especially what you don't like, because that's great information to take into planning your own podcast.
[00:12:17] Right? You don't wanna do stuff that ticks off your listeners. So first just start to, you know, take everything in as a. You know what, what's their voice like? What's their cadence. Like, you know, were you completely confused when you went to the episode? Because they're talking about stuff, you know, their episodes build upon one another and this is the first time you've listened, you know?
[00:12:36] Do they tell you how to find the show, how to connect with them? Oh know all that kind of stuff. Do you like their guests? Do they take commercial breaks? Do you hate commercials? You know, all of that kind of stuff. Just write it down. And that's essentially what I did in the beginning. I just, you know, wrote down what I liked and what I didn't liked.
[00:12:52] And, you know, then putting all this together and thinking, well, we have to have commercial spots, you know, coming from a traditional media background. That's how you paid the bills. So I, I kind of structured my shows to allow quite a few commercial breaks and, and, you know, podcasting was so new at the time.
[00:13:07] I, I could have asked a hundred people, you know, how long should commercial breaks be and where should I put 'em? And I would've gotten a hundred different answers. Right. And so I just kind of went with my gut with a lot of this. And piece the format together. Some stuff works. Sometimes stuff didn't work.
[00:13:21] I tried to, it's what I call rolling with the punches, right. It's like, okay, well, if that doesn't work, then we'll try something else. And if that doesn't work, we'll try something else. And I just kind of had that, that mentality, but that's how it came up with, you know, the, the overall topics for the show.
[00:13:34] Right. And, and when I launched these shows, the idea was you start with one show and then you kind of graduate to another show, right? And then you graduate to another show. And my goal was to keep people in this. Like mommy community for as long as I could, you know, cuz it takes a long time to like be able to grow an audience.
[00:13:52] And then, you know, if, if they're only listening, like if I just had my pregnancy show and they, they're probably not gonna start listening on day one of their pregnancy. Right. Which means I have less than nine months, but like lifespan per listener, that's not enough yeah. Right. It was just me with my business mindset going, how can I keep them in this community?
[00:14:10] You know, I wanna reach out to advertisers. I wanna, you know, build this up and I need to have them for as long as possible, but that's how I kind of came up with it. It was just what I wanted based on my needs. It was kind of a very selfish way of doing it, but it worked out really well. I love it. Is scratching your own itch.
[00:14:26] Um, I guess, uh, I usually like to kind of drill into some of the challenges, but like, I wanna. Start off the bat. Like you kind of touched on advertising, let's just let's stick into monetization. Like I can only imagine what that may have looked like 15 years ago when nobody, I knew what a podcast was. Yes.
[00:14:42] Um, tell us a little bit about like your journey there and like actually monetizing your podcast. Um, I'm, I'm interested in the history, but also kind of like even just fast forwarding to today, like how you advise your customers mm-hmm on the journey of monetizing their podcast. Yeah. It's always a scary process.
[00:14:58] I'm one of those people I don't really like to talk about money. Money is one of like those necessary evils in life for me personally, but you gotta have money in order to live your life and do the things you wanna do. So, you know, in, in me doing these shows pretty much, you know, I didn't do all the shows by myself.
[00:15:13] I had other parents helping me, but I was like, you know, Scenes doing every, you know, wearing so many different hats. It was ridiculous. Right? So the idea of approaching people, advertisers for money was, um, very intimidating for me. But one of the first things that I did is I knew that if I could get in front of people, I would have a much better, uh, more likely, you know, um, opportunity to actually make some sort of a deal.
[00:15:39] What I didn't wanna do is just sit behind a computer and send out emails because you know, the game with that. Just like was anyone opening these marketing emails, what is going on? You know, but I really love people. I, you know, that's why I became, you know, journalist, I love talking to people and sharing their stories.
[00:15:57] So I'm able to connect with people really well. And I thought if I could get in front of these people, they'll get to know me and they'll realize I'm not like everybody else. They'll wanna work with me. So what I did is I found like the largest mom, baby expo in the us, and I went to it every year and I was so excited.
[00:16:15] I remember that first year I went to it, I thought, oh my goodness. I thought I was gonna walk away with a million sponsorships. This was like gonna be the easiest thing. Um, like you said, most people had still not even heard of what a podcast was. So not only was I trying to sell them something, I. Sell them something that I had to explain what it was.
[00:16:35] There was like a lot of education. Right. But I remember going to this expo the first time and I, like, I bought a bunch of new clothes cause I wanted to look business professional, you know, because at home I got babies hanging all, all over me. Right. And breast milk all over the place. But when I'm going to an ex.
[00:16:50] Bo, I gotta look presentable. Right. And I made one of the biggest mistakes. I've never made it since, but it was, uh, looking. I like I wore these high heeled boots because I thought it looked really cute. And I had this like little tiny suitcase and I was walking around the expo floor and beforehand I had printed off.
[00:17:08] Um, this is before like USB cards and stuff were really popular for marketing purposes. I had printed off, oh my goodness. How many? It was at least a hundred CDs. And they had special covers and everything on it was basically the demo for the shows. Now that sounds ridiculous today because you know, we've got these, you know, little USB drives.
[00:17:28] We can give people, or maybe we just give them a card that has a link. They can go visit the link whenever they want. And so. That stuff kind of did exist, but, um, I don't know why I did it that way, but I had this huge, huge, uh, like, I mean, I guess the suitcase wasn't that big, but it was so heavy and I'm dragging around in these high heel.
[00:17:45] By the end of the first day, I could barely walk. I had like these gashes on my heel. Walking around. And I was like, how? Cause this is my goal. I looked up how many vendors were gonna be there? And my goal was to put a CD. I mean, I was a hustler I was like, I'm gonna make the most of this conference. And so, um, I wanted to put a CD on each of the vendors.
[00:18:12] You know, they're tables. And I, I, I remember I had a friend who was also a vendor and I realized by like day two or three of the conference, that there was no way I was gonna be able to go through and personally talk to all these people. But I was not gonna take all these CDs back with me. So I asked my friend, I said, can I borrow your badge?
[00:18:33] Because if I have your exhibitor badge, I can get in there an hour before, and I'll just go around like a mad woman putting. CDs on everybody's table. And I, I mean, you know, the downside to that is you don't get a, you know, opportunity to connect with them that whole face to face thing you're gonna lose.
[00:18:51] But I thought, well, it's better for them to have something than nothing. Right. And so that's exactly what I did. And I don't think I was able to distribute all of them, but I distributed at least 75% of all of those CDs. Um, and would you know that I don't think a single person reached back out to me afterward after that whole thing, not.
[00:19:11] Single company did anything. Um, and I was heartbroken, but what I did have is I had a list of all of the vendors and the contact information because I was registered as media to attend because I had a podcast. Right. So I basically took what I learned that first year. And honestly, it was a couple years of doing my podcast.
[00:19:33] Before I made any money with it, any money, but that was okay. Cuz my stage of life was I'm a mom, I've got babies at home. My husband wasn't expecting me really to bring in a lot of money at that time. So I was in this like testing phase with a lot of stuff. So it wasn't the end of the world. Of course. I was bummed, you know, my, I, my ankles were bleeding , you know, but I learned a lot.
[00:19:54] And then like, I would go back each year and every year I would try something different. Uh, one year, um, I brought all the hosts with me that were, you know, cuz I hosted one of the shows, but you know, I, you know, would, would uh, have other hosts and sometimes a couple different hosts for each show. And so I remember one year there were like, Six of us that went and we, oh my gosh, we interviewed people.
[00:20:14] Everyone had their own little mic lips and stuff. And we had little teams that went out to interview people. Um, we did live recordings from the event, meaning like we had a, we had a recording room, which was set up for like a podcast. So people would come to us. Um, I printed out all these media kits and I was very, very.
[00:20:30] Specific on who we would invite to be part of these episodes. So let's say I was doing a, um, an episode. This was one of the ones we did about baby strollers. Okay. Well, I have all of the top baby stroller companies at this place. So one way for me to get in the, my foot in the door with them was not to be like, oh, will you sponsor my podcast?
[00:20:49] It was, Hey, we're gonna do a recording. Wouldn't you wanna be part of our recording? We're gonna set up in this room. This is what the podcast is about. You know, the only thing that you have to do to be part of this is you have to, um, give us something to give away to our audience, so you don't have to pay for it at all.
[00:21:03] But, you know, again, I was trying to grow the audience and giving away stuff is like a really good way to grow your audience. So, um, you know, and then when they were there, I would give them the media kit. And now that started some relationships. Okay. Cuz they're like, oh again, I got to see her in person.
[00:21:17] You know, she was interviewing me, you know, and, and it kind of grew from there. My first major sponsor came from one of those events. It was a small mom and pop company. I never would've thought it would've turned into anything. This is why you've got it. Like you just have to be so kind to everybody cuz you just never know when you know someone's gonna give you a little bit of a break.
[00:21:36] And it was, um, two sisters started their own company and they had breastfeeding, um, like bras and tanks and, and a whole bunch of stuff like that. But they were, they were a small company and I. Some one on one interviews with them and they called me afterward and they said, we, you know, we really love how you're supporting the breastfeeding community.
[00:21:56] We wanna be aligned with people that are producing that kind of content, hardly had any conversations about how many downloads I was getting. Like they had an idea, but the conversation was never, never focused on that. It was more about what kind of value can we bring to this community? And that's exactly the type of advertisers I wanted to be aligned.
[00:22:15] So, yeah, so going to that, that conference was just that expo was just huge. And, and it just goes to show you, like, if you can get in front of people, instead of sending those emails, just from your computer, that's fine to follow up with. Of course, you, you have to do some of that, but you know, that, that made a huge difference for me to, to break through and to, um, really get these people more involved with our shows.
[00:22:38] I'd actually argue that. Uh, that, I mean, that was maybe even a little bit more commonplace then than it is now to like get in front of people. And I think because of that, it's all the more valuable when you are able to get in front of people today and not just be another email and the masses of the hundreds, if not thousands of emails that show up on someone's desk.
[00:22:57] Like the opportunity is there. Um, yeah. Well, and it, it was also nice too, because I'm a big advocate of if you're gonna promote something on your show, don't just say you like it. If you don't really like it, right. That's a great way to completely burn bridges with your audience and make them not trust you anymore.
[00:23:15] So when you're at these events, I could feel the diapers. I could push the stroller. I, I could test things out firsthand. And I was a mom with young kids at the time too. At one time, one year when I went to. Conference. I was, uh, one month out, uh, from giving birth to twin girls. And I was, I was so big and every time I went to a booth, they were like, are you OK?
[00:23:36] Do you need some water? I'm like, this is like the, but you know, because people were like walking up to me constantly and I was like, man, I don't even have to go and track you guys down. This is the best way to, uh, get connected with these brands. You just have to be pregnant, have a big belly walk around.
[00:23:49] They'll give you stuff to eat and drink. And it was fabulous. So, yeah, there there's something. And I know we haven't been able to do a lot of that over the last couple years, but we're all human, right. I mean, I, I think most of us would rather just talk to people and be real than, you know, have to, you know, figure out how to structure something online and, you know, just wanna be as personable as possible.
[00:24:09] Yeah. I feel like we could, we could talk about this for hours on end yes, but I wanna, I I'm, I'm interested. And as I'm sure all our listeners are also interested in, like, where did this kind of transition to Kajabi? How. Find it like, can you tell us a little bit more about that? Oh yeah. So I was getting some, I was part of a, an online group, um, a business group, you know, of, of entrepreneurs.
[00:24:32] Right. Um, and I decided to sign up with them and I was trying to get kind of more organized. With the network. I had already launched my first podcast network by that time. And I was trying to get more organized and, you know, I'm doing everything on my own. Right. So I really needed things to be as simplified as much as possible.
[00:24:49] So I actually came in through Kajabi, through a group account with, with this group. Right. I mean, and it was nice because they actually had someone as. Signed to just answer Kajabi questions and stuff like that. So I was like part of that group quite a bit, just asking a ton of questions and, um, they would help us format emails.
[00:25:07] And so I felt like it was like a really nice way to get into it. And then, um, I was with that group for about a year and I was paying more to be part of that group than what Kajabi would charge. And so I got to a point where I was like, I don't really feel like I need all of that. So I kind of made the switch and I moved everything over just recently, actually about a year ago to my own account.
[00:25:26] Through Kajabi, but everything pretty much I do. My, my website is separate. That's a WordPress site, but everything else I do is done through Kajabi. So all of my marketing emails are done through Kajabi. Uh, I do have an online podcasting course, um, that I launched actually. That's what I did at the start of the pandemic.
[00:25:44] I'd always wanted to launch a course and I thought, well, this is perfect. I'm stuck in my house. So let's launch a core so that was my first podcasting course I did. So that's on Kajabi and, um, I, I also use Kajabi. I think that, you know, I was, I was, uh, consulting or someone was from Kajabi, was consulting with me and I was telling them how I was using Kajabi was like a coaching call.
[00:26:03] And they're like, oh, that's really interesting. I dunno if a lot of people are using Kajabi that way. So one of the things that I do, like if you wanna be part of my podcast network, uh, there's certain things that are included as part of your membership plan. And so I created product. For each of those plans.
[00:26:17] And then I give them access to those plans. So if they have any questions about what is part of their membership plan, it's actually listed as a product and then they can go in and then everything is itemized. So this is included. And then this is what you do. If you wanna be part of this and, oh, we've got a cross promotion program.
[00:26:35] You wanna be part of this, here's the link for that. And, and so, um, I set it up that way. So all of my plans run through Kajabi. I have two different communi. That are run through Kajabi. One is, uh, they they're both for the podcasters on our network. So one is just in general, if people have general questions, instead of them just emailing me, like I could answer those emails all day long.
[00:26:57] Right. But you know, people usually have the same type of questions about podcasting. So that's how I use one of the communities. It's just poster questions here. You know, we put out content quite a bit, uh, through our YouTube channel. Um, I've got a new podcast that I'm launching. And then, um, what's the third one.
[00:27:13] Oh, we've got a. On our site. And so I'm constantly, you know, posting stuff, you know, bits of information, Hey, we've got a new article on this, or, Hey, there's this new opportunity I just posted today. We're doing a partnership with a podcasting app to cross promote the shows on our network. So I was posting today about that.
[00:27:29] So that's one of our communities. And then we have another community for people who are interested in cross promoting with one another. So I've set up different communities. Um, like I said, all the marketing stuff goes through Kajabi. So it, for me. Just, it simplifies things, right. There's one place I need to go, you know, in order to do all of this stuff, all of my, um, my members, all their contact information is in Kajabi.
[00:27:52] Right. So that's helpful as well. So yeah, I pretty much use it for everything except the website. I I'm just amazed that 15 years later, you're, you're talking about a new podcast launch. Like what areas haven't you covered? Well, it's so interesting. So the parenting shows are still live and well, I still get advertisers reaching out and we're, we're actually talking about making it bigger and better.
[00:28:13] That's not the stage of life I'm in anymore, but I still love helping parents that are going through that because that literally was a lifesaver for me at, at one point I mentioned, I have four kids at one point I had four children ages three and a half and younger. So. If I hadn't had my own podcast that I was doing, I probably would've gone crazy.
[00:28:33] So that, that whole, you know, um, group of, of people and that audience is still very important to me. So still running all of that, um, the podcast network is, is the main thing that I focus on now, and that is, you know, helping other podcasters as much as possible as far as, um, you know, oh, you're launching another podcast.
[00:28:52] I am always experimenting. I, I am, I'm not scared to try to find something because. I'm probably going to have one of my clients or someone on our network is going to ask me a question. And I don't, you know, I want to have experimented enough to give them some sort of an answer, even if it's not, you know, exactly, you know, what they wanted.
[00:29:11] I, you know, wanna be able to find out the answer. So I've always just playing around with stuff and figuring stuff out. I've launched numerous shows that have been around for two months, and then I pull it off cuz it's just not working. But I have that information to tell people don't do a daily show, a daily show.
[00:29:26] Probably a really bad idea. And let me tell you why I tried that for three months and this is what I discovered. Right. Um, so, you know, and sometimes things work and sometimes they don't and it's kind of a fluke thing. Um, but the reason I, I have a show in July, so it's, it's. It's June now, middle of June and in July, I'm launching another podcast, but this is the first time I've launched a podcast about podcasting.
[00:29:49] And it's specifically to help businesses that want to launch a podcast, an association with their business. So the podcast exists to promote their business in one way or another. And so it's called podcast, your business. It's available on Kajabi. And so, yeah, that's, that's the show and, and it's kind of funny that, you know, now it's more than 15 years.
[00:30:08] It's probably closer to 17 years now since I launched my first show or kind of got into this space, but you're, you're always learning, at least you should be, in my opinion, you know, you're always growing and, and that's how I help other podcasters because the scene is always changing. Podcasting is always changing.
[00:30:22] So if you're not adapting and trying to figure stuff out, you know, You're not gonna be as helpful to your clients. I cannot wait to listen to this. Like, I will be one of your early subscribers. Yay. and I'm sure a lot of, uh, Kajabi customers as well, like for anyone who came to us, not everyone, you know, we do offer our courses package, but many people, I think the vast majority came to us.
[00:30:44] Um, or I don't, I may have messed that up. People came, didn't come to us through podcast. They came to us with their courses. Yes. Thinking about starting a podcast. So yeah, I'm interested like both for like any current customer listeners, as well as anyone who maybe just hasn't started. Maybe what's some of like, kind of the early advice, whatever you're willing to share, um, in terms of like, kind of just getting up and running and getting.
[00:31:05] Started, like, where do you, where do you look first? Yeah. Well, right now there's over 2 million podcasts out there, which is nothing. When you look at it compared to blog post. Right. But it's a lot. Now those shows aren't releasing new episodes all the time. I mean, only a fraction of that. Right. I think it's less than 200,000 shows actually release content on a regular basis, like at least every two months.
[00:31:26] Okay. But that's still not a content to go through. Right. I mean, I always like to picture. As the listener, you know, earlier we were talking about that, like do some research with shows, you know, have your listener ears on and, and try to figure out what do I like about this? What do I not like about this?
[00:31:41] So I always like to approach things from the listener's perspective and one of the things that throws me off completely with a brand new podcast, if I'm out there, you know, trying to find new shows is. Poor audio and video quality. I just, I don't even put up with it. There's far too many podcasts out there for me to waste my time.
[00:31:57] I know that sounds really harsh, but we are all limited with our time every day. And so, um, that's the first thing. So I always tell people, listen, you don't have to break the bank. You don't have to take out a second mortgage in order to get equipment that is gonna work for your podcast, but you're gonna spend probably a couple hundred dollars.
[00:32:13] And that's okay. And do that in the beginning. And don't skimp on that. Like, don't try to, you know, get the $50 mic as opposed to a hundred dollars mic, like just do it because it's, it's become so easy to start a podcast. What's harder is to continue doing it and to maintain it and to grow it. And if you really wanna grow your audience, They're just not gonna put up with production quality.
[00:32:34] That's not good, but it's easier now than ever to be able to do that. So I don't want that to discourage anyone, but that's the first thing I tell people you're gonna have to invest a little bit of money. It doesn't have to be a lot yet a good microphone. Make sure, you know, if, if you have to record in the closet fine, right.
[00:32:49] Or, or pad your walls, or just grab a blanket and put it over your head, but make sure. It's not like super echoy in the room. Obviously you're only gonna do this. If it's an audio podcast, it would look a little weird if you're doing video . So maybe don't do video in the beginning. just focus on audio at the beginning.
[00:33:07] Um, I always tell people too to repurpose their content as much as possible, because again, you're spending a lot of time to come up with this information. People process information in different ways. Podcasts are one way, but there's times that I don't wanna listen to a podcast. Now, you know, I'm a huge podcast advocate, but there are days I'm not interested in listening to a podcast, but I would watch a YouTube video.
[00:33:29] I would read a blog post. So I always encourage people when you're, when you're thinking about the content that you're gonna create, think about how it can be repurposed start, maybe with audio and video, and then maybe you strip the audio out and that becomes a podcast. Maybe, you know, you get it transcribed.
[00:33:45] There's a lot of podcast host providers today that will, uh, transcribe at least your raw content for free. Right? So if you have it transcribed, give that to someone, you know, you could do it yourself, but , I'd probably give it to someone else, have them create a blog post out of it, have them grab some quotes and turn that, you know, into some graphics that you can use on social media, get as much out of this whole thing as possible.
[00:34:06] And then, you know, you're gonna connect with more people as a result. So those are, those are a couple things I always tell people, you know, Out the gate, um, for people that are really interested in monetizing their shows, I always talk about dynamic ad insertion. So if you want, I can explain it a little bit.
[00:34:22] It can get kind of techy, but it's basically what radio and television have been doing for years. But it's the ability to, through technology put an ad or promo or whatever it is that you wanna get out to your audience, into your show and to take it out whenever you want, as opposed to you recording something, live into your show, or even recording it separately, but editing it into your show.
[00:34:45] Sometimes we call that baking it into your show. The problem with that is promo codes, expire links, expire. And then again, going back to how your audience feels and. Thinking about your audience, how would you feel if you're listening to this great episode? You're not even realize it was published a year ago.
[00:35:03] You're listening to this episode. You're like, oh, that sounds like a fantastic product. You know, I, I wanna, I wanna buy that product. So you go to the website. Oh yeah. I got this promo code and I go to enter this promo code for 50% off. And it says, sorry, that expired. That's that looks horrible for the podcast.
[00:35:18] That looks horrible for the brand. And now you're mad as a listener and you may not even go back and listen to that podcast. Right? Cause your time is valuable. So I always tell people with dynamic ad insertion, like not all podcast host providers offer it, but if you're serious, if you're at that stage where you really wanna monetize, find a provider that does.
[00:35:35] That. And then when I did this originally, cuz originally I didn't have a podcast host provider. It wasn't really being done when I first started it, but I always had the mindset of commercial spots. You know, this is how we're gonna make money working with advertisers. So even though the technology wasn't there, I was smart enough based on my TV knowledge to leave room for where it could be in.
[00:35:55] Started, you know, and I like write down my little time codes. Okay. If I have a commercial and then if it's gonna play in the Midroll number one spot, this is the time code for that. And so I had a, a Google sheet that ha had all this information in it. And then when the technology came around, it was much easier for me to, you know, start putting those spots in there.
[00:36:12] But when I, when I switched from just putting like a baked in ad, you know, into one episode, let's say it's my most recent episode. When I switch from doing that, to being able to dynamically insert it into my podcast. Though that it went out on all, let's say 200 plus episodes. I literally 10 Xed my podcast revenue by doing that amazing.
[00:36:31] So I was like, oh my gosh. So this is how you can make money with podcast advertising. this is how it can work. So that's, if I were to point to three things, that would be the third thing is that when you're ready to monetize. You know, go with dynamic ad insertion, and hopefully you'll 10 X, your podcast revenue too.
[00:36:47] Yes. Yes. I'm amazing. Uh, I loved, I think it would be really cool if ironic, if in your second tip, this, this actually ended up on YouTube or ended up in a Kajabi blog blog post, right. Have some inception here. Absolutely. Why not? Yes. So I, I, I'd love to just kind of, I guess, wrap this all up and just as maybe like, just on the personal note, like what for you has changed.
[00:37:12] You know, a result of you taking this path, like taking this journey, maybe stepping out of media and moving into this. Uh, I guess, I don't know if you even, do you even consider it a career or how, what do you call it? Oh, absolutely. Oh, absolutely. I mean, yeah, it, the line has become blurred. Right. And especially, you know, after the last couple years, so many people working out of their homes, but their careers, you know, they have the same career.
[00:37:32] They're just now doing it at home. So yeah, I, I, I always have my hand in multiple projects. I just have that entrepre. Spirit. Um, but I always go back to podcasting and, um, for me it's been really interesting. Obviously I've seen the progression of it over the years. It's really exciting now, cuz more and more advertisers are getting involved and more and more people, um, are saying, oh, I know what a podcast is or I subscribe to a podcast.
[00:37:53] Like whenever my husband and I are out and someone's talking and they talk about a podcast, like he always winks at Manda just me because he knows in those beginning days, I was like saying, okay, this is what podcast is. This is how you subscribe. You know, this is how you do all of this. And now it's becoming more and more, you know, acceptable, commonplace, you know, you hear it all the time.
[00:38:11] Like a TV show will also have a podcast. And like, I just get that little warm, fuzzy feeling inside cuz I'm like, I remember, I remember when yeah. You know, they, they had no idea what a podcast. So, um, absolutely. I, I think it's a career. Um, you know, my, I think my life is totally different because of this. I didn't have to, like, I was able to be home with my children, raising my children, um, not missing a single step, a single miles.
[00:38:37] Stone. I mean, I was literally recording podcast episodes while I was breastfeeding my kids. I mean that they grew up in that kind of environment. And so not everyone can say that I've done plenty of episodes with moms. We just recorded one a couple weeks ago about returning from maternity leave. And moms had all of this guilt, which is horrible.
[00:38:55] We should never have to feel, but so many moms feel like that, that struggle. Right. Um, I didn't have to go through that. I mean, again, I've got pictures. I, I won't show 'em, but I got pictures of me doing all this kind of stuff while you know, my kids are right there. Room, you know? Um, so it's totally changed that I think it, you know, it's, um, the, the, the bond that I have with my children is stronger just being able, um, E even like during the pandemic, my kids, you know, school was closed.
[00:39:21] I mean, they were doing online learning and literally, I mean, I was in the same place that I'm recording right now. I set up a table over there for my kids. My day was the same, except every five seconds. They were like, mom, can you help me with this? Can you help me with that? I don't know how. And dads made it through that time period without having a flexible schedule.
[00:39:40] So that, that's what I point so much of this too, having that flexibility to, you know, be present in the moment and to, to lead your life without feeling like, oh, it's my nine to five job I gotta go in. I gotta do that. You know? Um, so having that flexibility has been, has been huge for. And then I always really like, you know, when it comes to, uh, you know, revenue and how much money you're making, like, I don't like feeling like there is a, a ceiling, a cap on what I can make.
[00:40:06] So traditional jobs don't really work well for me. I like, well, we wanna take a trip. You know, our family wants to go take a trip. I'm gonna work extra hard this month and get more sponsorships. So we can afford, you know, first class or we, whatever it is, right nowadays it's just to get on a plane, cuz the tickets are so expensive, but you know, I like having that kind of flexibility to be able to, um, just, just do what we wanna do and feel like we're living life as opposed to just, oh, we gotta pay the bill though.
[00:40:35] You know what I mean? So many people are in that grind and um, I I've been able to, you know, I have those days, I wanna make sure, you know, I don't wanna make it seem like it's all gum drops and rainbows. Like I have days where I'm like, do we have to record another podcast? Us wanna sleep. Right? I mean, it happens.
[00:40:50] It doesn't matter what your job is. You're gonna have days you feel that way. But I have far fewer of those days, and my days are spent more with helping people kind of fulfill, you know, they're doing their podcast for, uh, their business. They, they love what they do. So they have this. Spark in them. And I get to help them share that with the world like that.
[00:41:07] That's very rewarding and that's what keeps me doing it day in and day out sunny. This has been an absolute blast. Uh, you already kind of teased out like what's coming next to the new podcast launch. So I guess we'll just get, like, let's just get down into like where they can find you, where do they find out more?
[00:41:23] Maybe. Do you have like a pre-sales page or, or maybe not? Pre-sales. Interest form. What do you got to find out? I do. I do. Well, one thing we, we didn't talk about, which is coming out, hopefully sometime this month in June, possibly in July. Um, but I am doing a podcast course for Kajabi university, so yeah, so that is.
[00:41:42] Coming up. Um, we don't have an official date for that yet, but I built out a landing page already for people that kind of go through the course and then, oh, how can I work with sunny? What, you know, what can we do together beyond, you know, Kajabi university? And so I'll promote that page if you don't mind.
[00:41:57] Yeah. So it's independent podcast.network. Cause that's, that's my main website slash Kajabi. And if you go there, uh, there's a free download and, um, you can actually subscribe to the podcast, your business podcast already. Cuz I have a promo out there even though the first episode hasn't dropped, there's a promo.
[00:42:17] And if, if I ever coach you we'll go through this. How you need to release your promo before you're actually ready to release your first episode. So you guys can actually search for podcast your business on any podcasting platform and it will pop. Subscribe to it, and then you'll be ready to go when the show launches in just a bit.
[00:42:31] I can't wait. I'm gonna do it as soon as we get off here. Uh, just so I can get ahead of the game. Um, yay. Awesome. Thank you again, sunny. This has been an absolute pleasure. Can't even speak to enough. All of the value that you've presented, we will of course have all of your details in the show notes. And also can't wait to see your KU course.
[00:42:48] Yes. This should be a fun one for everyone. I love it. Thank you so much for having me. This has been a blast. All right. Well, that's all we have for you this week. We will look forward to seeing you all next week on the Kajabi edge podcast.
