Welcome to Podcast Suck, a podcast about starting a podcast, where we dive headfirst into the wild, wacky, and sometimes frustrating world of podcasting. If you've ever sat down with a microphone, hit record, and thought, what on earth am I doing? Or if you're just curious about the magic behind your favorite shows, then you're in the right place. Get ready for laughs, insights, and a whole lot of what not to do advice as we embark on this podcasting journey together. Let's dive in. What's happening, everybody? Welcome back to another episode of Podcast Suck. If you don't have one. We record this show live over on Facebook, YouTube and LinkedIn and now Twitter as well. I know it's called X now, but. It's kind of like Dolphin Stadium here in Miami. It's not Hard Rock Stadium. I mean, technically it is, but it'll always be Joe Robbie Stadium, which is what I grew up with. So sometimes those names just get stuck. I'll give you another example real quick, completely off topic. Houston's, now called Hillstone, because of some partnership breakup years ago. Anyway, great restaurant, great food, will always be Houston's to me. Anyway, just kicking things off with a fun fact here on this episode of Podcasts suck. I promise we're not here to talk about what names should be. Today we're here to talk about how to create some compelling content for your podcast. If your content is compelling, meaning it draws people in and piques their interest, if you will, well, they're going to be more inclined to come back for more. And they're also going to be inclined to want to tell people about your show. That's the idea. Now, I really think that both components of creating compelling content and having interesting conversations with people that you want to build a relationship with, I believe those two things really work hand in hand. together. And the reason for that is that if you've got interesting content that you're sharing on your podcast and you've got interesting people on your podcast that you're building a relationship with, both of those things are happening simultaneously, which is really the goal for any type of marketing or relationship building that you're doing. Let's get into some specifics. If you're taking notes, By the way, if you're listening to this podcast, I appreciate you subscribing to the show. I really, really do. And I hope that you're getting exactly what you showed up for, which is helping you better understand what you don't know that you don't know about starting a podcast. And if you need help starting a podcast, well, then send me a DM. We've got a 90 day program. We run people through to get you launched in 90 days or less with every single thing you need in order to start a podcast. And we also do all of the work. We've got a done with you solution to where we can train your team or maybe a team of VAs on our system and go execute on it. The goal here is to launch a podcast. So yes, it's my show. Yes, that's a shameless plug, but that's what we do here, ladies and gentlemen, very organic, if you will. Another fun fact about podcasting, I think the worst part of podcasting is the cord that comes with headphones. So I'm actually just going to take these headphones off. No, I'm not. I'm just going to leave them on. I'm going to work through it. We're going to work through it here, ladies and gentlemen. You're probably going, well, Sebastian, why don't you just use Bluetooth? Because Bluetooth works when I don't need it to. That's why I don't recommend, I don't recommend anybody messes with anything Bluetooth when it comes to recording your podcast. Cause just like live streaming, it can, it can fail you at times. It can fail you at times. All right. So first step in creating compelling content for your podcast is to understand your audience and understand exactly who you're talking to and who's engaging with your content. Well, how do I do that? You ask them. So when people are engaging on your content, you create a post. Hey, listen, do you listen to the podcast suck podcast? What are some topics that you'd love to hear about? What do you like about the show? What do you dislike about the show? I know, I know, I know. Feedback. Oh my goodness, feedback. That's how we grow. Ladies and gentlemen, that's how we grow. Next step is to make sure that you're telling the story. If you're interviewing other people and you're building a relationship with them through compelling conversations, you, that is a form of storytelling. Do more of that. If you are talking about your expertise in what you do and what your business does, tell stories, give examples of why your business is relevant for what you're talking about, why you are the, go-to for what you actually do, but wrap a story around that process. People connect with stories. I firmly believe that stories are a huge, are huge bridge builders. That's a tough phrase for me to get out here with my adult braces, but they are bridge builders, ladies and gentlemen. When you are creating content, start to focus on when you first start talking about whatever it is you want to talk about, start using hooks, like effective hooks. For example, if I just, if this was a YouTube video, which it kind of is because we stream live on YouTube, I could easily from a cold start, the very first thing out of my mouth say, is your podcast lacking compelling content? If so, you're going to want to stick around because that's exactly what I'm going to talk about in this episode. So hooks, very important. I'm not talking about bait and switch type of hooks. I'm not talking about saying one thing and then doing another. Here's an example. This is what chat GPT gave me back when we were creating the outline for this episode. for how to create compelling content for your business podcast. It's kind of cheesy, but I wanted to give you an example. Struggling to keep your listeners hooked? Let's transform your podcast content from boring to binge-worthy. That's a great example of a hook that you're utilizing. Use that in the post for your micro content where you're marketing the episode and the podcast. Use it when you're talking about whatever you would be talking about on the podcast in your social media, in your copy, in your writing, in your emails that go out. This is what actually that a hook does just that. Imagine that it actually hooks the reader, the listener, the viewer into what you're actually saying. It leads them down a pathway into compelling content. Does that make sense? I hope so. If not comment below, I'll do my best to clarify for you. Next, you want to find people that are experts in your field and what you do. Maybe you're the expert. I'm sure you've got peers. Bring those peers in and share examples of stuff that people don't know about, but they want to know about. I like to say a lot, sharing what they don't know that they don't know. Guest experts can help out with that. Next is to make sure your content is relevant each and every episode to what you do and the format of the podcast. Far too many people, I've talked about this before on the show, people want, oh, I want to get together with my friends on Friday night, we have a little bit of wine, we're really funny. You're not. We want to talk about pop culture and politics and how much we hate such and such and like such and such and whatever it may be. And I said, you know, that's a terrible idea. I always joke that Variety shows went out when, well, Johnny Carson's Arrow went out. That was a long time ago. They were effective for a very long time. Saturday nights were full of variety shows. For those of you that I may be dating myself here, maybe may not be clear on what that actually means. It's a variety of different things. Think modern day Saturday Night Live. There we go. You want to stay focused and you want to make sure that your content is you're keeping it relevant to what you actually do because you can you can hook people like that and you can keep them engaged because you're creating compelling content. You can also tune them out like that because you go off on a complete different tangent. I go off on tangents sometimes on this podcast. I do it more frequently in my other podcasts because it's a storytelling podcast in an interview format. This one's specifically focused on launching and growing and producing a podcast. But when I do go on a tangent, it's very short. You got to bring it back in. You got to land the plane. Let's circle back. Let's bring it back to the topic at hand here. If I would have went on and on and on about old names of things that have changed that I still think the name should be the same five minutes into the episode, you would have stopped. listening immediately. Does that make sense? Great example there. All right, let's, I like to keep these things to 10 minutes. So I haven't been doing that as of late, but I also want to make sure that I'm thorough. Another tough word with adult braces in what my message is. I want to make sure that I'm creating compelling content to help you understand why you need compelling content for your podcast. I just made all of that up. This one's big. This next step is really big. You need to be 100% yourself. You're 100% authentic self. There are far too many individuals out there creating content, trying to emulate something or someone that they saw online. I understand human nature. When you're first creating something, you want to say, hold on a second, How can I do it like that? Or how can I do it like that? Early on in my career, I found, I caught myself doing all this. And then I took a step back and asked myself how I actually really wanted to show up in the world. And that was to be 100% my authentic self, 100% Sebastian Rusk at all times. So how was I going to do that? Well, I was just going to be, there wasn't going to emulate anything, try anything. I was just going to show up as myself. There's, there's a quote that I love. I don't know who said it, but I'm sure you've heard it before and it's be yourself. Everyone else is taken. It's the truth. Be authentic to yourself by being your authentic self. Your content is going to be better. Your listeners, your community are going to engage better because of your authenticity. Mix up the format of your podcast. Maybe you're sharing your expertise in one episode for eight to 10 minutes, kind of like what I'm doing right now. And I'm no expert by any stretch of the imagination. I just know more than most about podcasting. Hashtag disclosure. But I mix formats up yesterday, had my buddy Matt on. He does podcast marketing, podcast online ads for podcasts, helps them increase their listenership, their downloads, their traction, et cetera. Complete compliment to what we talk about here on podcast sucks. So why not have them on the show? Mix up the format. It's not always me talking boring. I mean, not that I'm boring, but it could be. But when I mix it up and bring some other conversation, had my buddy Carlos on a couple of weeks ago talking about authenticity and business. That was kind of like a scheduling mistake, if you will. I had him scheduled for Beyond the Story, which we recorded for. The team produced it as Podcast Suck. That's still relevant because you want to learn how to be authentic when it comes to business anyway. Next, you want to ask engaging questions to your listeners through your email lists or your social media posts, getting feedback. We talked about that earlier, but engage with them to let them know that you are there and you are available. You're not just some talking face or talking head through the podcast, that you're an actual Cuban being in a business and you're there to help. Provide actionable tips with the content that you're sharing is the next step. Actionable tips. I'm here teaching you exactly what you need to do. I'm not just talking to you about creating compelling content and why you should do it. I'm giving you 10 things literally of what you should be doing. Hopefully you're taking notes so that you can stop this episode when you're done, when it's done and go do something with what you just got done learning. Does that make sense? actionable tips. And then last but not least, include a call to action. Hey, listen, if you've enjoyed this content, let me give you a quick example. If you've enjoyed the content of this episode, talking about creating compelling content for your podcast, and it's really impacted you and you're like, you know what? I don't have a podcast yet, but I want to start a podcast. I don't have the time, nor do I have any remote interest in learning or figuring out how to do all of the work on my own. I need some help. I need a company like Sebastian's to come in and help me better understand how they can get us launched in 90 days or less and then support us ongoing. So the only thing that you're focused on is recording new podcast episodes and building relationships. All the works handled for you. More information on that and the link in the show notes here. All examples aside, if you do need help launching your podcast, go to podcastlaunchlabnow.com. That's podcastlaunchlabnow.com. It's included in the show notes of this episode. If you're listening to the podcast episode, if you're watching the live stream on Facebook or on LinkedIn or on YouTube or Twitter or wherever, I'm going to include a link in the archive place in the comments here, podcast launch lab now dot com. You can schedule a call with myself or somebody on my team to better understand what's possible, see if you're a fit for our launch program. We are undefeated when it comes to launching podcasts and we can get yours launched as well. It will radically change your life and your business if you let it. So that and add here and call to action here. That's a great example of a call. That's a great example. Actually, now that I think of phenomenal example, I get partially. great example of a call to action during a podcast episode. You want to share, you want to give actionable steps, give people something they can actually go sink their teeth into and go do something with immediately. But you also want to help them better understand that there are resources available to help them get to exactly where they want to go. Most people are not do-it-yourselfers. Most people are, how could I hire to get this done? sometimes you're a do-it-yourself. If so, well, keep listening to the podcast, read my book, go to my YouTube channel. It's got everything you need in order to go and do it. You just actually have to go do all the work. And then after I've done all the work and built the podcast, and now I've got to record episodes and then I've got to edit episodes and then I've got to post them. And how does it get to that Spotify thing? And there's a lot, there's a lot of dots to connect here. So anyhow, I hope that, um, you're leaving this episode knowing at least one or two things that you did not know about how to create more compelling content for your business podcast, for your podcast, whatever it may be, questions, thoughts, ideas, concerns about this episode, any episodes on the show, please comment below. If you're watching this live somewhere, send me a DM on Instagram at podcast suck or on Facebook and LinkedIn is exactly where I hang out. And, um, I'm here to help. I hope this episode really helped you. Happy Wednesday to you and until next time. Thanks so much for tuning into this episode. We sure do appreciate it. If you haven't done so already, make sure you're subscribed to the show wherever you consume podcasts. That's the way we get updates as new episodes become available. If you feel so inclined, please leave us a review and share the show with someone you know should start a podcast or may already have one. And remember, podcasts suck if you don't have one. Until next time, friends.