Transcripts
1. Introduction: Hey, welcome to the
podcast or pro course. I'm Roger W downs. I'm gonna be your coach. Now, let's talk real quick
about what this course isn't. This isn't about how to
market your podcast. I'll cover that some
other time down the road. This isn't about how to perform an, a
theatrical podcasts. Like you're going to be an
actor portraying a character. What this is as helping you to become a better
podcasts personality. Now that's typically
with a podcast, it would be something
along the lines of one or four or five people altogether on a team
or just one person individually talking
to an audience as if they were having
a conversation like you and I are doing right now. So if that's what
you're looking for, this is the course for you. In the next five videos, we're gonna go
over the basics of becoming a better
podcasts personality. In other words, how to really
hone in on how to be a really great on air host
and how to win people over. Because if they fall
in love with you, what's going to happen then is we're going to
keep coming back to your podcast over and over
and over again to hear you. Content helps a lot. But this course is about how to become a better personality. So they want to come and hear you again and again and again. Why do you think so
many people tuned in to different late-night
television shows. It's not always because
of the guests they have, is because of the people who
are the host of the show. And that's how you
win people over. So you're probably asking, why should I listen to this guy? Who is he? Well, I've worked
in Country radio and news talk radio
for over 30 years. Not only was I an on-air personality and I want
high in the ratings, but I was also a
program director who ran number one stations. So I know how to
be a talent coach. I know what it takes to win. So to develop yourself as
an on-air personality, either on the radio
or on a podcast. It's the same exact formula. So that's what I'm
going to teach you 30 years of experience teaching people how
to become number one in their day part
on a radio station. In other words, either
mornings, mid days, afternoons, over
nights, evenings. And I'm going to lay it all
out for the next five videos. So you can get started in
improving who you are. Because if you're stumbling through your words
or you're like, Where do I go from here? Or I sound stupid, nobody wants to listen to me. We're going to cover all of
that and I'm going to help you become a better
podcasts personality.
2. How To Be Yourself: Great. So you've stuck around and we're going to start
diving right in. So let's talk about the
very first hurdle that most people hit when
they start a podcast. And that is being themselves. It's hard to be yourself because typically when you have set in your head is that you need
to sound a certain way. You need to sound
like Mr. radio or OSU and formed or whatever kind of character
you think you need to be. That's not going to
sell because it's fake. Now of course, if we're doing a theatrical podcast where you're acting, that's different. But you need to be
yourself behind the mic and that is hard to find when you're first
getting started. So let me lay a little
bit of wisdom on you that a radio dog by the name of
Ken Morgan wants told me. And it breaks down like
this because Ken was very popular on the
air and Cleveland, Ohio where I met him. And I always wondered
how he sounded just like he was talking
to me through the radio. How do you make that happen? How do you be you can because Ken wasn't any different than
when he was on the air too. When I heard him
like face to face having a conversation
and he said, Well, I talked to Susan. I'm like Susan, who is that? And he pulled a photo up out of his briefcase because he wasn't in the studio at
that point in time. And there was this framed
photo of this woman. He goes, This is
my friend Susan. Her and I are really close. And when I'm on the air, I put a picture of Susan
right out in front. I mean, I can talk
to Susan about anything and I just talked to Susan now as goofy as that sounds because I thought when I
heard that I'm like, Oh wow, this guy, he just slipped off the deep
end talking to a photo. But he said No, trust me, I know you're thinking
I'm crazy like you're probably thinking I'm crazy
for telling you this. He said get a photo
of someone you trust, put it in a frame so you always have it with you doesn't
get all banged up. And then when you're on the air, talk to that person like you're having a regular conversation. And after a while, it just becomes
natural for you to be talking like I'm
doing right now. Like you and I are having a conversation as if you
were sitting down in my office when I was a
program director having a conversation just
like this about how to be yourself on the air. So a couple of little
tips with that though. So you understand. One, you want whoever the person is that you're gonna
be talking to you, their photo to be
someone you trust, like your best
friend, a brother, a sister, a parent, someone close, maybe
even a cousin, someone you've always had a connection with
that you can tell anything to because
you want that person, because that will help
you connect with them and feel at ease and comfortable
when you talk to them. So don't use a photo of, let's say your dad
if your dad was judgmental or your mom
if she was judgmental or if you have a friend
who's always giving you grief and revenue
for anything you do, you want someone you
could always go to and know that you're not gonna
get a bunch of judgment. Another tip for
that is don't use someone you're romantically
involved with, even if you're tight, don't, because if you have a
disagreement before your podcast or maybe
you're going through a rough patch in a
relationship and everybody has them,
let's just be real. Let's say you're going
through that rough patch. What will happen is
you can't look at them at that point and talk
to them either get an angry, upset, sad, depressed,
whatever the case may be. And if that relationship
should end, then what happens is you're going to have
to come up with someone else to talk to. And that really
screws with your head because you're also trying
to host this podcast. Now think about your
relationship going south. And now you're trying to figure out who else
you're going to talk to because you've always talk to that girl or guy that
you are in love with. So don't use them. And you may unfortunately ruffle some feathers if you ever let your significant
other know that. Well, one can you talk
to me in a picture? Just be like, Hey, I just, I just want to talk
to this one person this is who I'm
going to talk to. Just please try to understand. And they may or they may not. Sorry. That is unfortunately one of the pitfalls of the tray. So be ready to have
that conversation with their significant other. But getting back to it, talking to that photo is going
to make a big difference. And I know it sounds weird. So what you're
gonna need to do is take that photo with you
in the morning when you're brushing your teeth
or maybe you're cooking in the kitchen
or you're sitting down to watch TV and
every you'd like you talk to somebody
you're by yourself and you talk to somebody
about a show, just looked at the
photo and talk to that person in the
photo about the show. And it's going to become more
and more and more natural. You have to train your mind
to be able to do that. It's not natural. Now some people who
are extroverts, obviously you can
do it easy-peasy. They're just naturally talented. And if you're not one of those
people, don't get angry. Don't get angry with yourself. Don't be like I
could never do that. I've known a lot of
people who are amazing, amazing radio personalities
who are introverted. I E, Howard Stern. Now you might think
he's an extrovert, kind of sorted, but he's
actually more of an introvert. Now when he gets
out, he turns on the style and we'll talk about that later, another course. So what you need to do, this is your homework
for this video, go find yourself a photo
of someone that you trust. A five by seven, whatever, four by seven, put it in a frame. You want it in a frame doesn't have to be a wood
frame, but you know, even like those little
plastic frames, the last slide a photo into and carry it with you so it doesn't get all
banged up or tore up. So you can actually look
at them and talk to them and practice,
practice, practice. The more you do that, the better you're
going to get at just talking into a microphone. And by the way, when you
get on your podcasts, put that photo right out
in front of you as well. That's really the main key. Put that photo out in
front of you while you're talking to the microphone
and have a conversation. If that photo was sitting
right there in front of me, I'd be having a
conversation with whoever that was talking about, whatever my podcast was about. So does that make sense? Okay. So that's your homework. Go find the person
you want to talk to. And oh, by the way, little pro tip here. If sadly you don't
have anybody like that in your life and
some of us don't. I'm not making fun of you. Then go get a photo of
some actor or actress. You absolutely adore
someone you think you could talk to and talk to that person. So there you go. That's the solution. If you've just
said, well, I don't have anybody in my
life like that. Well, pretend that you're
friends with Harrison Ford. Pretend that you're
friends with Mark Hamill. Not like I'm a Star
Wars fan or anything. Just some ideas. Get to it.
3. Defining Your Character: Hey, welcome to the
next chapter and how to define who you're going
to be on your podcast. Now you might already say, well, didn't we just say
I needed to be myself? Yes. But you need to define
who you're going to be and then stick with it because people love consistency. Let me explain. So have you ever watched, let's say Jimmy Kimmel, Johnny Carson, maybe one of
your favorite Netflix series. And you have a
character on there that you absolutely love. Well, if that character
suddenly went from being the good guy to the
villain, right? Well, that's a major plot twist. Like just suddenly
one day the good guy got up and started smacking
the snot out of people, let's say Captain
America when evil and started cutting
off heads, right? You'd be like, oh, it's just all about Captain America
is a good guy, right? So you have to define who you are going to be and then stick with that
and be consistent. Same thing as said for any major radio personality or possibly even late
night talk show host, they are consistent
with who they are. You can't allow your emotions
to get away with you. You need to constantly stick
with who you're going to be. Because we all go
through times in our lives where we
get angry, upset, mad, sad, and we allow
that to just take us over. And you can't allow
that to happen on your podcast because
people are unforgiving. They'll tell you to suck it up. They don't care. You will get trolled. So you have to be consistent. Well, as in broadcasting, there was so many
times people come and say My mom died, alright, take a couple of days off
for my dad died or whatever or God forbid him one time somebody came and told
me their child died. I might take some time off, take as much as you need,
but when you come back, I need you to be you
again. That's tough. That's the problem of
being a personality because people are unforgiving. Because what they're
going to say is I have my own problems too. I'm turning to you for
information entertainment. I want to forget my worries. I don't want to hear
about yours right now. Obviously, if your personality, you can share about some of
the challenges in your life, but you can't come off
being who you are like. You can allow your emotions
to run away with you. So let's say you're
on your podcast. You're a really nice person. You're kind compassionate
all the things. And then something tragic
happens in your life and you're getting your podcast
and you just mean and nasty and horrible. You've lost a consistency
and you're losing listeners. I know it sounds hard,
but it's the truth. That's how it has to be. So you have to define
who you're going to be and then stick with it. Constantly. Trust me, Johnny
Carson, Jimmy Kimmel, Jimmy Fallon, all of them have gone through
tragedies in their life. I can't tell you many times I've been a part of a radio show were some horrible thing happened
to somebody in their life. But they came back the next
day men and they were on there and it was like
nothing happened. That's how you have to be. Obviously, you can talk
about it a little bit, but people already have
their own problems. They don't want to hear about
yours all day long, right? Unless you have a solution and you're going to find
a way to get through it. And you're like, Hey,
this happened to me and this is how I overcame it. People love come back stories, but they don't want
somebody walling around. Forgive me for saying this
in their own ****, right? They don't like that because they already have enough
negative in their lives. So you have to be consistent. Now with that said, there's a worksheet
that goes along with this video where you're going to write down the
traits of what make you up. If you're, let's say, a liberal who really loves the arts, you're going to
put that in there. Like this is who I am and I'm passionate about
this type of art. And you can really find, find it down to a niche. Like, I'm really passionate
about sculpture, I'm really passionate
about photography, whatever the case may be, you need to define
who you are and then stick with
that, be consistent. You remember that 70
show you never saw red ever come off of
being that hard nose dad. He was never like super
mushy towards Eric. He was like dumb ***, right? Because that's who read was. So you have to figure
out who you are, Kitty. But the love mom and
she loves her kids, but she doesn't know
what to do when they act out a line and oh my gosh, eric state and
Donna, very nervous. Nellie, right? If that's who you are, then be that person. Now, I will say, don't try to rewrite
who you are. Don't try to be somebody
different because you're going to fail out and eventually you're going
to lose listeners. You might pull it off for
maybe a month or two. But you're going to lose listeners because
they're gonna be like, Who are you, who is this person? They're going off the
rails and they won't tell you that
typically they just stop listening to the podcast. And then if they stop
listening to podcasts, you don't have the numbers to monetize it and start making a living off of producing
your podcast. So define who you are
and then stick with it. So when you define
who you are is very important to
understand that whatever characteristics
you write down that you're
comfortable with those. A year from now, two years from now, five years from now,
ten years from now. Who knows how long your
podcast and go on. But you need to stick with that. You're passionate about this, you're passionate about
hunting, let's say. Let's say you're passionate
about fishing and the great outdoors,
whatever, right? You have to define that
and then stick with it. So if you're passionate about
fishing the great outdoors, you can't be like, Yeah, I got tired of fishing, never
caught anything anyway. So you know what I did,
I just sat on the couch. I'm going to talking
about Netflix. What have you've been talking
for months or even years? Episodes upon episodes
about fishing in the great outdoors
and what you're doing in the different
people who are experts. You have in mind your
show and suddenly like, Yeah, I'm going to give that up. We're going to talk about
the Cleveland Browns and series on Netflix. People are gone. And I've seen that
happen on podcasts. They go from over here, just suddenly over there, right? So consistency is key. Now let's talk about
amping up those traits. Because from the cradle up, we've been told our entire
lives that we need to be what? Quiet fit in. Just do your job. Shut up. I don't want to hear from you. How many times have
you heard people say that your parents told you? Your teachers told you, your boss probably told you, I know I had a boss likes
to go in and be like, Hey, I got this idea how
we can prove things. I don't want to hear your ideas. I'm not paying you for ideas. I'll never forget
that conversation. If he's watching right
now, you know who you are. But with that said, you need to take that attitude you have at work
where maybe your, your personality
because you're kind of pulling back on the
reins a little bit, is between a 35 and you
want to amp it up probably to like a six through
eight, like I'm doing now. Like I'm talking to
you, I'm passionate, I'm trying to lay some wisdom. Anya. I'm using my hands, I'm going crazy here. So you need to be that kind of personality like you have
to be in people's faces. Even if it's emotionally,
you don't have, like I'm kind of this kind of wild kinda of
noxious redneck kind of guy that's who I played
on the air for years. So when I get in
front of a camera, I'm talking in front of a mic. That's typically who I am. But if you want to
be very kind and compassionate and like,
Oh, that's horrible. Oh, what did you do next? If that's who you are, then you need to amp that
up because this is y. This is why it's so important. Because emotion, when you
stir emotion in people, they connect with you. So when you amp
up your emotions, that kicks them into amping up their emotions and
connecting with you in once they
connect with you, they're coming back
time and time and time again because they
love who you are. They're like, man,
they are my person. I love this podcast and they're telling
all their friends, you've got to listen
to this podcast. I love these guys are
I love this person, whatever, because they
connect with you. They feel that they and you are friends now and that they need to listen to
your podcasts like Man, I've had a bad day at work. I'm gonna go listen to the
such and such podcasts. I love these guys are I
love this lady or love this guy because
they relate to you, because you amped up your
emotions you connected with. There's things that they're passionate about just
like you're going to be. And boom, you've got them. Once you stir emotion, it takes a lot to
get somebody to turn off your podcast and not
want to listen again. If you have a podcast that's
your favorite, why is it? Is it because of the
content they offer? Yes, that's probably part of it. But it's also because
of who they are. You feel like you
can relate to them. How many times you
listen to a podcast for the first time
you're like, ah, I don't know, man, I just I'm not
feeling this person. And you turn it off. Or
how many times have you gone to a comedy show or turn on Netflix series or had a talk show host that was on maybe Fox News or
CNN or whatever. And you're like, I'm just not connecting with this person. Boom, you're gone, right? When they can connect with you. Then you've got them. And that's really the key. And then they've come back
again and again and again. And before you know
it, you're monetizing your podcast and you're
making a living off of it, hopefully at least
that's the hope. So what you need to do, download that worksheet,
fill it out completely. Think about, think about
who you're gonna be. It's very important.
It's very important. And then be that person on
the podcast consistently. And yes, obviously, over the years you can change
your views about something, but you can't come
completely off of it. For instance, let's say you have a political podcasts
and you're talking about someone who is
a political player, a politician that
you're really backing. And suddenly they get caught up in some sort of
horrible scandal. You can't keep backing them. I mean, if there's a
lot of proof, I mean, you could you can
take that route, but what you do in that
situation and be like, Wow, I can't believe
they did that. I can't believe that
they had us all fooled. I can't believe I fell
for that because that will draw people
in because they're feeling the same way when
you connect with people, emotionally, connect with you. And boom, you're
off to the races. So get to it, fill
out that worksheet. Go on.
4. Working With A Team: Hey, welcome to
the next chapter. And in this one we're
going to talk about working as a team. So if you have more
than just yourself on the podcast and I'm not
talking about interviews. I mean, someone
who joined you on the podcast on a regular basis. First off,
congratulations, because now you're not going to
need a photo to talk to. You're actually talking
to another human being, which makes it
much easier to do. However, you need to define your roles of who is going
to be what on that podcast. We just got done talking about defining who
you're going to be, like running down the
list of this is who I am, this is who my character
is going to be. And I'm going to
pretty much stick with this throughout the
entire podcasts. Everybody has to do that. Now with that said, you should probably team
up with someone who isn't exactly like you right now. That doesn't mean they can't
have similar interests. Obviously, if you're hosting, let's say a fishing podcast, you're both going to be
interested in fishing, but maybe one of you is single, maybe one of you
as a dad, right? Then that way you guys
can decide like, Hey, I'm going to talk about
the story where I took my son fishing and then the
guy is Single can say I'm going to talk about when
I took my girlfriend fly fishing or whatever, right? So that way, there is some
differences in who you are. And the great thing
about, let's say, like a political
debate podcast is you can have a
conservative and liberal. And that gets interesting
to listen to. And maybe someone in the middle
who's a moderate, right? And I would suggest not going any more than probably
four people on a podcast. If you get any more
than that one, a lot of the equipment
that's out there to do it probably won't give you the ability to because most systems I've
seen her for Mike's. But more importantly,
people get lost and who's talking after four people? So I'm not telling
you if you've got a fifth person to boot
them off the show. That's not what I'm telling you. What I'm saying is you might
want to have your first tier of people and your second
tier like a supporting cast. And I'll give this
as an example. I used to run 98.3 the bowl
out of Ashtabula, Ohio. I was on the air as McCoy in
the morning or skinny and scrawny at a morning
show partner who was my right-hand man
that was scrawny. We had Dave Hatfield along
with dumpy and Dominic, and grand papi and the righteous Reverend Dr.
David Hall, Esquire. I digress, but a lot of
those people were pretty much like second
tier and scrawny and I were the ones
who ran that show. You have to define that on your team because people
get hurt if you don't. Now, you can have one
person who is a lead. I, II liked the
Howard Stern Show. Howard is the star of that
show is the Howard Stern Show. And it's him. Now he's got Robin and other cast of characters
there that are with him, but they're second
tier to Howard, right? Or you can be something
like the Bob and Tom show. If you remember that
from years ago, they were Iraq Morning Show. It was two guys are like skinny and Schoning
like we used to do. It's two guys who hold down
equal parts to a show. And typically you want
them to have like a Ying and Yang feel
to them if you have like a two-person to
people who are the leads, because you want that kind of back-and-forth
banter and makes it more entertaining to
listen to if they're, if they're the
same exact people, it's kinda boring
where let's say, Joe says, Well, this
is what I think. And then Tom says,
You know what, You're right, Joe, you want are the smartest people
on the planet. Right? Now. You can have similar views, but you need to
have somebody who, let's say is kinda the
wildcard on the show. Maybe in someone who's
more of straight laced, you need a Ying and Yang kind of feel to it if you're going to run with two people
as the leads. Now we there supporting
cast of characters. They can be whoever, but you need to
define who they are. And you also need to let them
know you are second tier. Not that you're not
important to the show, not that we don't
want you on the show, not that we don't
love, you know, not that we're not
gonna let your shine, but understand your
role on the show. And it is not going to change. Because again, once you
define who your team is, changing it up and having one of your second tier people out
shine your lead or your duo, or even if it's three
people, whatever, whoever, whatever you come up with, that becomes a problem. Like if there's three
people, let's say on a team who are equally
sharing the limelight. And then you have someone
who's a second tier outshine one of those people, then there's kind of
a battle royale cool on there and feelings get
hurt and it gets kinda crazy. So you have to define who
they're going to be now a good way to decide
who's going to be second tier and
who's gonna be leed? Is that how dedicated are
they to that podcast? Can they come every week or every day and do that podcast? Or are they can be like yellows. I'll pop in and be
on the show up from time to time if they're
going to pop in and beyond the show from
time to time there, second tier, right? Then after second tier is desks. Now we're gonna get into how
to do interviews because when a guest on the
show that you bring in to talk about a certain
topic or whatever, you need to allow them to shine. Don't step all over them. Ask a question and
then listen and allow them to shine because you brought them on
the show to talk. Don't step all over them. Now let's talk about
responsibilities. It most of the time what I would suggest it's whoever
the leads are. If it's just one person
or if it's two or three, then you need to make sure you distribute the show prep
amongst those people. The second tier folk, obviously if they're going to
have a segment on the show, let's say they're going to
talk about Country News, or they're going to talk about nascar for doing a sports
show, for instance. Have them come in,
but they have to have all that stuff prepped
and ready to go. Now the trick with PrEP is it everybody needs to know what everybody else is
going to talk about. Like, hey, we're going
to cover this topic. This is what we're gonna do. This is what we're going
to discuss, right? Because you need
to be ready to ask some follow-up questions like if your second tier
person comes in, they talk about nascar. You need to know what
they're going to talk about and then have some ideas of what you
want to ask them about. Hey, well, what happened
after that wreck? Who won the race or
anything like that? You want to have that ready to go so you're not
stumbling through your words and your conversation gets drawn out as
long and boring. There it is. So get to it. Your homework is figure out what everybody's role is
gonna be on the show, who their character
is going to be, and also who is going
to be in charge of doing what 01 pro tip. Make sure that it is
equally distributed, especially amongst the leads. If there's just one
lead and there's the supporting cast,
a second tier. It's okay to distribute
some of that work upon them because they want
to be on the show too. And they should help you to make the show a little more fuller and more
exciting to listen to. That is how you
really make it work. But the find those roles
defined the responsibility. Make sure that it's equal
across the board for everybody. If it's the leads, if
you've got three leads, they all have the same amount of responsibility and
getting things done. And then that way everybody
knows their role. Those are responsibilities
and there isn't bunch of
infighting later on. Like, well, I did all
the work for this. You know what I mean? You don't want that, alright, get to work.
5. Conducting Interviews: Hey, welcome to
the next chapter. And in this chapter
we're going to talk about how to conduct
an interview. First and foremost, you always want to ask the questions who, what, where, when, and how. Again, who, what,
where, when and how. One more time, who, what, where, when and how
that's important. Write that down. Who, what, where, when and how. I'm not trying to be obnoxious, but I want that to sink in. Okay. So when you actually have
someone sit down with you, maybe across from a table, or they're on one
of those streaming services that you can use
to record podcasts with. You want to allow
your guest to shine. Right now we just talked about who's in charge of the show. Who are your leads, who
are your second tier? And then you have guessed
after second tier. But when the guest comes on, they super seed everybody
else, even the leads. The leads are now hosts and they are
supposed to ask questions. Second tier, people obviously can ask questions
from time to time, but it should be the leads
who are asking the questions. And you want to be
careful not to ask questions that don't pertain
to why your guest is there. Maybe they have status
like a celebrity or maybe they're there to inform people because they're
knowledgeable, whatever it may be, you don't want to ask
questions that have absolutely nothing to
do with why you invited them on the show that I've heard so many times
where let's say it's a sports podcast and
they bring someone on to talk about fishing. And they start asking him like, Well, what do you think about
the nascar race last night? What I thought I
was you're talking about fishing and I'm
watching nascar race. I don't watch nascar. And now you're down a
rabbit hole, right? And you're talking about, why don't you watch nascar? Who's your favorite driver? And maybe they do like nascar. And suddenly you're
going down this rabbit hole of talking about nascar and your
listeners are getting ticked because they're like You brought this guy to
talk about fishing. Or if it's a mom and
me sort of podcasts. You bring a mama
who specialized in raising children
with special needs. And he started
talking to her about, well, what do you think
about this Netflix series? What, and even if she or he
or whoever likes it again, you're going down a rabbit
hole that your listeners like, Why are you talking
to them about this? I wanted to know about what they specialize in or who they are. So make sure whatever
questions you ask and they stick to
the subject matter. And also don't out
shine your guest. Don't outshine your guest. Don't try to be like, I'm going to want them. So in other words, like
if they're telling you a story about
something they did, that was kinda cool and
funny and exciting. Laugh with the story. Be a gracious host
and be like, oh, that's awesome, I can't
believe blah, blah, blah, or if it's a sad story, cry along with them or whatever, but don't want them up. Like how many times you've had somebody who sat down
with who's like, Oh, this happened then if
somebody tries to be like, Oh, this happened to me, even if you're not trying to turn them up or like you're trying to
beat them and their story. Maybe you're just
trying to relate. Nobody wants to hear about that. They want to hear
from your guests. Your guest has limited
time on your show. Focus on them. You might be able to relate
to that later after you're done recording your
podcast, are doing it live. You can then tell them
later on OEM and I love that because I happened to me and you can share
that with them, but don't do it
while they're there. Talking. People want to hear from
them at that point. Not you don't try to be
bigger than your guest is. Your guests should
be like this big, like on top of the
mountain person and you, and your cast of
characters should be like, No Cool, I brought
two listener, right? That's what you want. I know it sounds kind of goofy, but really that's how
you want to portray it. So with that said, when you ask questions
of your guests, makes sure that they're
open-ended questions. In other words, you don't want to allow
them to answer it with yes or no or just
simple responses. For instance, if I
was interviewing, Let's say George Lucas
who wrote Star Wars, I think everybody knows
who George Lucas is. I would say George, the Space Odyssey of our
lifetime, Star Wars. I mean, what inspired
you to write this? What was it? Was there another piece of work out there
that you grew up watching or listening to or reading that helped you to go, You know what, This
is, what I'm gonna do. What was it that inspired you? And that allows George
then to start telling the story of how he came to write Star Wars and
put it together. And one thing led to another. You don't want to again, ask questions that are
yes or no answers. So if you have to write
them down, that's fine. And actually, a lot of guests are probably
gonna want to see the questions before they get on a podcast with you so
that they're prepared. I usually tell when guests, when I have them on okay. Here's a basic questions I'm
going to ask you and I'll probably ask follow-up questions
based on your answers. Is that cool? And they're
like, Oh, yeah, that's cool. You know, I always
tell him Look, it's not to make you look bad, is only to delve deeper
into what you're doing. Unless of course, you're a political podcast or maybe
like a Hollywood podcast. We're talking about celebrities
and their craziness. And obviously you're
going to ask them questions that might be a little algae for them to answer. That's different. But you understand what I mean? And by the way, by the way, if you are running a podcast where you're gonna
go out you with someone, you never send them
the questions. You just say, Hey,
well, we'll cover it. You'll be fine. Come on the show, right. You don't want to send them
questions so that they can be prepared to sidestep
whatever you're gonna say or just denied to
be on your podcast. Alright? So if you're running a podcast that's a little
bit more in your face, where you're trying to get to the truth or expose
what's going on, don't send them the questions. Alright, fair enough. There are some exceptions to
the rule there. But again, when you
ask those questions, make sure they're open-ended. And then this is very important. So important, you need
to listen to what they say and you can jot notes
while they're talking, right? That's okay. Jot notes. Because you want to always think in your head
while they're talking. Oh, well, that's interesting. So when did that happen or
who did that happen with? Or maybe it can explain a
little bit more about that. You know what I mean? When they get down saying something because you
have to think while you're listening
because they may explain it more in depth. And if you're not listening, you're gonna be totally
sounding stupid. If you ask a question
that they just answered. It is a real skill sets. So you get a practice
that a bit, right? And that's why editing
a podcast is great. Because if you goof up and ask a question that
they just answered, you can go back and cut that up and take that question
out and move on. Learn your editing software. I would suggest Adobe Audition. That's what all the pros use, and it's relatively
inexpensive and you can get that every month from Adobe.com. No plug there. I received nothing from that. I'm just saying
that's what I use, That's what I would suggest. So again, make sure that you listen and have those
follow-up questions ready to go and have
a conversation. You want it to be conversational
and try your best to ask questions that
are open-ended. And that's how you have some
really cool conversations with guests that come on the
show and also try very hard, especially if you
get someone who's had a lot of interviews, go through and watch
some interviews or listen to them on other podcast. And make sure you're not
asking the same questions. Because people are gonna be
like, I just saw this on YouTube or I just heard
this on another podcast. This is the exact same question. The real trick to
having amazing, amazing interviews is asking questions that other
people haven't asked. For instance, if I had
George Lucas, again, going back to Star
Wars, I've had George Lucas on my podcast. I would say George, What was it like
for you growing up? What inspired you mean
were you always into like sci-fi and outerspace mean
where you that geeky kid, or are you more like the guy
who's out playing sports? And later on in life you
just kinda stumbled into it. One that question. Help people relate to George no matter
what his answer is. He's like, Well, yeah,
I was a kid who was always dreaming about going
off into the star is. And I watched Flash Gordon
as a kid and actually, I think I heard
him say that one. So needless to say, if he says it a lot,
don't repeat it. If he's only said it
once, maybe an interview, then you can probably
touch on it, especially if you can
elaborate a little bit more. That's another way
you can do it too. I know I'm digressing here, but if you've seen, let's say someone
who's going to come on your podcasts talk
about something briefly and they don't
really elaborate on it. You may want to ask
that same question, let them talk a little
bit and then ask your follow-up questions, right. Which by the way, you don't have to send
to the guest at all, but ask your follow-up
questions to really delve deep into something you thought sounded
pretty interesting. But the previous
host that you were, either watch it on YouTube or on TV or on the radio or
on another podcast. Didn't ask and you're like, Why didn't you ask
that question? You can ask that question. So that's how you
conduct an interview. So hopefully you
took some notes. If not, just watch
this video again, alright, get to it.
6. Developing Topics: Hey, welcome to the second
to the last chapter. Again, I'm Roger W. Downs. And now what we're gonna do is discuss how to
flush out a topic. Because everything you
want to talk about on your podcast is
gonna be a topic, even if you have a guest that
is a topic of conversation. And each topic should have
eight talking points. Now, I will tell you this. If you have a guest, it's much easier to just fill out the
questions you want to ask and allow them to
fill in the blank, right? So you ask the question. You allow them to talk
like we discussed in the interview segment
of this course. If you haven't seen that, go back and watch it. So if you're gonna
be on the show by yourself or if
you're going to have a team and you're
having a conversation, or maybe you take callers. Are you take e-mails, whatever the case may be, or you allow people to dial into the show through one of the different services
that you can do that with. You need to know what
your talking points are going to be and how you're
going to cover them. And there should be eight, just like a spider. Spider has eight legs. So think of every
topic as a spider. Now if you hate spiders, I'm
sorry if that triggered you. But think of eight legs, eight strong legs for you to stand down with
each topic, right? Spider is missing
one of its legs. It wobbles in, it falls. It's not used to run
it on seven or six. You need to have eight, okay? Because if you want a
topic to last a while, especially let's say your
podcast is 30 minutes long and you want to talk about
this one topic specifically, you're going to need to have
different ways to break off. So if the first talking point or the first leg
starts to falter, you can then move on
to the second one. When that starts to
run out of steam, you can run onto the
third and then onto the fourth and write
down the list. And that helps you to keep the conversation going now
sometimes just get lucky. And one of the topics excuse me, one of the first talking
points that you have, maybe the first
or second spirals often this great
conversation with just yourself because you're
very knowledgeable about what you're talking
about or your team. And you just stay on
that one talking point, but you expand on it. And sometimes that happens and you never get to the other ones. So don't worry about that. So when you list
your talking points, what I would suggest
you do is list them strongest to
weakest, right? Like this is gonna
be the talking point that really makes a point or drives home what we're
trying to discover here. The second one is
going to be just a little less than the
first and so forth. So the strongest to the weakest. And the reason you want
to do that is because if you have a really
strong beginning and you may not have to go to the second one or the third
one or the fourth one. Now mind you all eight
different talking points or legs should have
strengths on their own. But you're going to know which ones are stronger
than the others. So you want to start off with your strongest ones first and then follow up with
the weaker ones as you taper off that topic. So you can use that
literally is like, here's the strong
talking points, pow, pow, pow, pow. And then hey, we're
going to wrap this up. And here's the last two we want to hit real quick and you're onto the next thing or
onto your next show. So again, download the worksheet that comes along with this
course for your topics. So that way you can fill it out with each topic you're going
to want to cover. Now, how do you determine if a topics even worth talking
about in the first place? Well, is it trending
right now that's the first question after
you're asked herself. Is it in the news? Is it really a big thing? And making people jump all
over social media, right? Like people are
posting about it. Or if you see it
on the headlines across CNN and Fox News, The Washington Post, or
whatever publication you may be reading that is
relative to your podcast. Maybe it's a wildlife
magazine and maybe it's a cooking
magazine, whatever. Maybe it's about sports. It's just trending
everywhere like an ESPN, Sports Illustrated its website, whatever the case may be, if it's something's
really hot, of course, you want to talk about
that because it is a hot topic that everybody
is talking about. But, but you want to make sure to put
your own spin on to it. You don't want to have the same talking
points that everybody else is talking about
when a topic is hot. That's the one thing you
want to be careful with. So when someone is on ESPN talking about some
big sports story, yes, of course you want to
cover the facts of the story and maybe
some opinions, but you don't want to have this same conversation
that that article has had. Or unless you want to expand on the article a little bit
like you're going to have a guest on to talk about
whatever that story is, someone who specializes in it or maybe the sports
athlete themselves. But you want to be able to expand on that because the
great thing about podcasts, that radio doesn't
always allow podcasts. You can run it for two hours. And if it's great content, people will stay
tuned to be like, Wow, that was a great podcast. Typically I suggest
podcasts run anywhere from 30 minutes to an
hour at the max, but sometimes some of
them run two hours, three hours depending
on what the content is, but it has to be super-strong. So again, when you find something that everybody
is talking about, before you jump on your
podcasts to talk about that, think about what is
my angle going to be, or my angle of attack, or my opinion about
this story going to be. Who else can I bring
in onto this show? Then? Maybe talk a little
bit about it, maybe an expert or something
along those lines, right? So that is how you're gonna be able to build out
your topic a little bit. And sometimes you don't
even have to worry about the talking points because
are going to be like three talking
points and be like, and we're going to
talk to this guest. So then we're going to go in and send them a
bunch of questions. And it's going to be
based on how we want to take our angle on that
story. Do you understand? You don't want to just
be repetitive and say the same thing over and over and over again because
that's boring. Nobody's going to want to
listen to that, right? Nobody wants to
hear your podcast. Say exactly what the big dogs were just saying last night. You have to have your own take. So that's the challenge
of coming up with really great topics and
being able to drive it home. Because also when you do that, then people say, Man, that guy or that girl or whoever was right on point.
I can't believe that. I never even thought
about that of how they talked about that sports story, the way they did, or
their angle on it, or their opinion about it. I love these guys are
I love that lady? I love that guy. That's where they're
gonna get super excited about your
content, okay? Now, that's where you find it in the headlines
on social media. Those are the big dogs, right? Other great places to find
content or on Reddit. Now if you're not
familiar with Reddit, you're going to take some
time to go look through Reddit. I'm on Reddit. I know a lot of the
people who are on Reddit jump on there and
find out what people are talking about when
it comes to like sports or whatever,
whatever subreddit. Now if you're not
familiar with Reddit, subreddit means a topic that
people are talking about. So find a subreddit based on the topic you want to discuss and see what
people are saying. Now mind you if
there isn't a lot of conversation about it, then it's probably not a super
hot topic now obviously, I would look and see how many different posts
through the out about it. Find the ones that have
a lot of interaction because sometimes
somebody puts up a post and it just doesn't hit. So go look at the posts that have a decent
audience size, right? If it's on fire
with conversations, read through a lot
of those and you're going to find different
talking points based on what people
are saying that you can bring into your show
and you can expand on. So that's just one
way of doing it. Another way is
trends.google.com. Now, this is more about topics you are going to cover like
on an evergreen basis, maybe not like this is hot and
what's going on right now, but like an evergreen basis
you're going to talk about, let's say, let's say you have, try and come up with an example here that
would make sense. Okay, let's say that you had a cooking podcast
and you wanted to talk about the history
of pickling beets. I know it's really vague, but let's say that's what
you're going to talk about. Okay? You can get on trends.google.com
and find out if people are actually
looking up pickling beats. And the great thing
about trends.google.com. And by the way, the
video after this, we'll explain how to use
that is that you can find out where that
topic is really popular. So if it's within, let's say your state and
your estate podcast, then that's a great topic
for you to discuss, especially if it has people regularly looking
up pickled beats. And that's what
trends.google.com is good for, is finding out what
people are googling, what phrases are using, and what they're interested in. That also comes into play too. When you want to
hit like let's say hot topics that are going on
right at that point in time. Because let's say you
see a big news story, but you're like, Yeah, I can't touch it
this week because a podcast doesn't
happen until Monday, but that just
happened on Tuesdays, so we get a whole week. So let's say your
record your podcasts on Friday because it
gets released on Monday, you can still go back on to trends.google.com
and find out if people are still googling
that story and if they are, then you have a pretty good idea that it might actually
be worth covering. Other ones that I use
are Facebook groups. I jump in Facebook groups about groups that are based on
the theme of my podcast. And I tried to figure
out if they are actually talking about something that would possibly turn
into a topic like I don't go in there specifically looking for topics
like I don't say, okay, I want to talk about this. Like you cannot read
it and type it in. I go in. What are people talking about
in these groups right now? What's hot? And then I tried to find out if people are responding
to that because sometimes you get one person in a Facebook group is just
hot about something. You get two or three
people and they correspond back-and-forth and
it goes on forever. If it's just two or three
people chit-chat and it's probably not gonna be a real
good topic for you to cover. But if you see someone
posts something up and it just has a ton of
people commenting, then that is probably another
good little source to find out what it would be a good source to say that's
a topic that I can use. And here are all the things
people are saying about it. So I can break that down
into talking points. Now, I'm going to wrap
this up by saying this. Once you get your
talking points, now you need to go research
the talking points. I know it's a lot of work, but if you want to
really great podcast, you have to do the
research or you have to be an expert on whatever you're gonna be
talking about, right? So you have to do the research on each and
every talking points. So the talking points are just
sort of like if you will, an outline and then you
take notes somewhere else. You're gonna be able to refer
to during your podcast. So you're going
to be like, okay, here's talking point number one. Here are the notes. Here's talking point number two, here are my notes. And you're also going to want to come up in your notes with like, I want to say this. I want to say that I want to make sure that I push
this point home, right, and then refer to your notes before you
start your podcasts. You know where
you're going to go. That's how you really put
together some great show prep, because that's what that's
called Show Prep when you research things like a topic, it's about show prep that
you can then hammered out. Now you're gonna
have to find out where your comfort zone is because it depends on what
you're talking about, right? Because sometimes if you're already very knowledgeable
about a certain topic, you're just going to want
to touch on the basics of what the topic you want to discuss is like if there's an overall theme to your
podcasts, let's say it's sports. I'm just going to use
it for an example. And something
happens in the NBA. You're going to want to
go read up on that story, come up with your
talking points, and come up with some research
on each talking point. But it doesn't have to
be a full-out book. It can just be basic, like bullet points that you can then elaborate on
because you already know about the NBA and you
can talk about how that might affect things and
what your take is on it, and what your theory is on it, and what you think the outcome
is going to be, right? That's where you get to
really express your opinion. So your homework is download
the talking points worksheet and make copies of it because
you don't want to just fill it out once because
you're going to need it again and get to work.
7. Bonus Video - Trends on Google: Hey, welcome to
your bonus video. So here we're going to discuss trends.google.com
because I'm going to assume already that
you know how to use Reddit and you know how to use Twitter and you
not, I use Facebook. So you can use all those social
medias and even possibly Instagram to do a
little research to flesh out your topics
with the talking points. But you're probably not familiar
with trends.google.com. And if you are,
then you probably don't need to watch this video. But what we're gonna do is
jump over to my computer right now so that you
can get an idea of what you need to do next and how you can use it effectively to really flesh out all those talking
points of your topic. Now this is the website that allows you to find
out what topics are really singing along that people are
researching on Google. Or if there's a topic
you want to talk about, you can find it in
here and decide, is this really going
to be worth me talking about on my podcast. I've already thrown
in a few of them just for you to kinda look at. For instance, let's
take a look at Taylor Swift and Kim
card dash in here. Now this is interesting by subregion in the past
seven days United States. So who is really hot right now? Well, you got Taylor in
blue and Kim and red. So as you can tell, Kim car dashing over the last seven days has hit 100 here because
people were researching her. So she was very hot. And again, here and here. And that's because
recently Kim said some things that
ticked people off, but that's not a big
surprise of the Kardashians. They know how to use shock
factor to grow their brand. Meanwhile, Taylor Swift is
just kinda ticked along. Now if you look at the
different states below, it will also show you
the comparison of Kim Kardashian and Taylor Swift. Kimmy has done very well
and all the other states, while Taylor has dominated
in Tennessee or at least broken even with Kim
and has done better in Utah. More than likely, she's probably been in concert in those states, I'm going to assume. So. That's probably why
they're really hot, right at this point in time. Meanwhile, you got Taylor
Swift here and it shows you the sub-regions of where
she's been really hot. Utah, of course, North Carolina, Tennessee, Pennsylvania,
while she's from PA. But it also shows you some
related queries which might be some talking points
as we discussed with developing your topics
with the eight legs, like exact Wilson,
Jets quarterback, actor Arnie, hey, our army
hammer and so on and so on. Like Pastor Bill Johnson, Bethel Church, Taylor
Swift's goat meme. There's different things that
you can click through them. Taylor Swift is my wife, shirt. Taylor Swift song from where the crowd dads and these
are different subtopics you might be able to get into what Taylor Swift or when they can jump onto and then
expand on from there, Taylor Swift, screaming
goat, Taylor Swift, goat, Taylor Swift song in
where the crawdad sing, and so on and so on. Over here with Kim
Kardashian and we can see the related queries as well. Ben ruthless burger,
Kim Kardashian. With their salary there, we can go through car
dash in season two. Who is Kim Kardashian
dating now, these are all subtopics
of your topic of Kim Kardashian that
you could talk about one of the legs
if you wanted to, but you're going to
need to flush that out, do a little show prep to
find out what's going on. So you have to Google those. But that's a good
place to start. Now let's say you wanted
to get rid of Kim cardiac and just read
about Taylor Swift. Let's remove her from what we're looking up and here
we have everything. Taylor Swift, let's say we don't want to talk
about Taylor Swift. You get rid of Taylor Swift. Let's say you want to
talk about Star Wars. I'm just going to
type that in real quick and bring it up. And now you have this
crazy up and down session, which looks like it probably
hits every Wednesday. So apparently there's
a series on Star Wars, maybe I'm not sure or maybe they're
releasing something every Wednesday that would hit that
little high there, right? So then you can go
back down and see what the other
related topics are. Homophobia, I'm not sure why, but you'd have to research
that a little bit. Puppet Star Wars,
republic commandos, Star Wars, Jedi Knight, *****, Star Wars
drama, Star Wars, puppet TikTok, ***** Star Wars. You're going to find out
what that's all about. Star Wars, puppet controversy. All the things that
you could bring into Star Wars or actually make a topic and then break
it out from there with the eight legs as
we discussed earlier. But that is what Google
Trends is really great for. The other thing you
can do as well, especially let's say if you're in North
Carolina like IMUs, you can click North Carolina. And you can say, okay, here in North Carolina where things really
hopping about Star Wars. So you can go over here and see Greensboro, Spartan, Berg, and Asheville,
technically where I live and also Anderson, South Carolina, there was 91 Interests. Charlotte was 86,
Florence was 64. But you can find out, especially if you're
in these areas, that maybe if your podcasts is specific about those areas, about Star Wars, you can say, well, Star Wars is
really hot right now. And why is that? Well,
here's the breakdown again of what different topics. Steven Spielberg's Star
Wars, republic commando. When did Disney buys Star Wars, Lego Star Wars, the Skywalker
saga, Star Wars *****, and all the different
things that are Star Wars that people
in this region, this state are talking about, which really kinda helps
you break it down. You can also look through
here and get an idea. That certainly helps. And I would suggest
the past seven days if you want a really hot topic. Now if you're looking for an evergreen topic,
in other words, podcast is gonna be up for a long time that will
stretch throughout time. I would go 90 days
and see how it looks. Right. And that kind of gives
you a breakdown like it really spiked right here
because that's May 4th. That's also may the
force be with you. That's a Star Wars holiday. So obviously it's
going to spike. But you're going have to
watch for the sum of those. Like if there's a real
super high spike, that could mean there's a really good topic going on there. Or it also could mean that's something happens on the
calendar on a regular basis. So you'll have to research
your topic a bit. And again, it breaks down. Here you go. May 4th date. And or television
series which is coming out on Disney
plus Star Wars, Knights of the Old
Republic to and all the different related queries that will help you kind of understand
what topics are hot. And now let's say again,
you wanted to compare it. Let's say Star Trek, right? Which is a different
property owned by Paramount. So you click on that. And Star Wars is much
hotter than Star Trek. But if you look here, I mean Star Trek is at
20, which isn't bad. It's at 15 here, but Star Wars is still hitting
right around 5654, 45. And that helps you to determine what you should really
be talking about. So that is Google Trends. You can break down what
locations are in what state. Don't forget. You can also
look at countries as well, which you can go back into
by backing out of this. Like, like if you want
to go to metros too, by the way, real quick, you can go into the
metros and Fort Bragg, Bethel and Boone, Wesley
chapel, Lily Wellington. There's all the different cities here which will help break
it down for you seeing kind of get an idea of what's
hot and what's not, right. So there it is. And again, like I said,
you can go back up here to Google Trends. You can, Hey, Taylor
Swift and Kim car dash and again and look
at the United States. Or you can type in Star Wars and Star Trek and look at
the United States. So it gives you an idea of what to talk about,
what to research. And that really helps
to fill out a topic and makes you sound much better when you're
talking about it. Does that even work much better? It makes you sound better when you're talking on your podcasts. Unlike when I'm
trying to talk in this lesson, apparently
much better. So bad. Alright, now I've
said, there you go.
8. Your Assignment: Hey, congratulations, you have completed the podcast
or pro course. Always this mini-course
anyways on how to be a better podcasts
personality. Now obviously there
is more to it, but this was just a mini-course
to give you the basics. But your assignment
now is to put together a 10-minute podcast based on all the things I've taught
you and love to hear it. Along with that, I
will critique it, not them to be nasty. I'll tell you what your positives
are and your strengths, and also positively tell you
what your weaknesses are and how to overcome
those and become better. So I'm not here ever
to beat you up. I'm not going to condemn you. I'm not going to tell
you you sound like crap. That is not my job. My job is to help you
to become better. Someone did that for me once and I want to pass that
along to you as well. So do your 10-minute a podcast. And if you're already
cranking out of podcasts, take everything you learn
from me here today, execute your next podcast, and then give me just ten
minutes of the best part of it and post it below
so I can listen to it. Alright, Thanks so much. Appreciate you for
watching this course. And again, I'm Roger W. Downs, have a great day and God bless.
Roger Downes, Professional Multi Media Producer
