When do I use podcasting or branded events to get ROI versus make relationships? How do I use LinkedIn to distribute my media if I'm in a B2B business model? Who is best for starting a podcast? Should I be doing video, events, or podcast? What's the strategy for sourcing podcasts guests? Aaron Watson, CEO of Piper Creative, host of the Going Deep with Aaron podcast, and creator the Going Deep Summit discusses all this and more with us on Outcome Studio Podcast episode 025. Show highlights: 01:00 - Aaron Watson, CEO of Piper Creative, host of the Going Deep with Aaron podcast, and creator the Going Deep Summit. Aaron graduated college in 2016 and shortly after graduation he started his podcast to find his career path since he was uninspired by the traditional career options. A mentor of his showed Aaron the power of digital media. Now he helps businesses achor their brand presence by storytelling either through video, podcast, and other media creation to capture a niche. 06:00 - What was Aaron's strategy for sourcing guests when he got started with his podcast? For him, it was easy cold outreach effort compared to cold outbound sales. It was more fun and he embarrassed himself as he started. As a host, Aaron learned to be conscious and empathetic as a communicator, and to modulate his tone and questions. He used the podcast to critique himself as host and to ultimately become a better professional. 11:00 - "Who do I want to learn from?" is the question Aaron asked himself to fuel the fire to the 400 episode mark. A question that comes up about podcasting, "Be niche or no?" or "Record the episode in-person or remote?" Aaron then discusses why he thinks listeners gravitate towards a specific host's style. Aaron says to stay interested, chase topics you're curious about that may seem like they don't fit a niche thread, but actually do. For example, Aaron talks about his podcast episode 396 with Kristy Knichel on Going Deep with Aaron. She's 22 year President and CEO of 3rd party logistics company, Knichel Logistics, but the real story? Kristy is now transforming her family business as a woman-owned, organically scaled strategy with employees and customer service is bar-non. 17:00 - How do podcasts make money? How do business owners tell stories in a way that builds relationships and trust with an audience of target customers and partners? Aaron frequently turns podcasts clients away. Why? Especially solo entrepreneurs and emerging business owners don't understand the costs to hire out the production work. Whereas, Aaron suggests that they start with video and text. The best podcast candidates are the firms that have an existing marketing budget and they need to reallocate dollars, in which case to podcast is best if there's a good company spokesperson. This scenario gives Piper Creative the opportunity to speak to the project champions at the company to start the podcast. 22:00 - Start with video first and dominate keywords in a niche now. Audio keywording and SEO won't be as relevant in search engines for 36-mounts. While the business spokespeople develop "media creation muscle", video can hide flaws more easily with jump cuts, which is great practice for raw interview and monologue style of the podcast. 27:00 - Is podcasting dead? Aaron discusses how Google is indexing voice for search algorithms and SEO. Plus, in podcasting it's still a wide open opportunity to capture a niche audience. For example, instead of the "Pittsburgh Podcast" it could be the "Restaurants of Pittsburgh Podcast" or instead of "Strength and Conditioning" it could be the "High School Football Coach Strength and Conditioning Podcast". The ability to go narrow and own a corner of podcast real estate is big. 31:00 - What is the power of a physical, branded event and bringing people together in person after doing something like digital media and the podcast? Aaron discusses the Going Deep Summit 3.0 (3rd Annual) which is March 2020. 37:00 - Why do panels at events sometimes suck? Aaron talks about "Design Thinking" that needs to be applied for panelists so that one person isn't dominating. Aaron gives the Pittsburgh nonprofit "Hello Neighbor" example. Aaron then describes how Design Thinking can be applied to create a robust Q&A. His host on stage prompts the audience by saying, "Now open for Q&A, and this time is to inspire our guests to share more of their perspective, not for you to provide your monologue on the topic. Thank you." 43:00 - What are your thoughts on LinkedIn for B2B content and distribution? Video is not required to be successful on LinkedIn. Add value, don't pitch. Take a whitepaper or an informative PowerPoint and upload it to your LinkedIn feed as a PDF. In 2019 and 2020, avoid posting external website links on LinkedIn because their algorithm devalues those posts. Remember the 90-9-1 rule for LinkedIn users, which is that 90% of LinkedIn users don't engage, 9% engage sometimes, and only 1% are actively creating. Aaron poses the question, how do you evaluate success if a post? He reminds us to treat your audience of any size, big or small, with the utmost respect because you never know who is listening. 51:00 - sign off.
