Latest / Matt Has A Podcast About Podcasting / How to make money as a podcaster

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How to make money as a podcaster · Matt Has A Podcast About Podcasting

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome back to another episode of Matt has a podcast about podcasting.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_00: If you have a podcaster friend in your life, share it with them and let them know that they should listen to Matt Has a Podcast About Podcasting.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: In today's episode, we're going to talk about one of my favorite topics that is how to get paid as a podcaster or how to get sponsored as a podcaster or YouTuber in the case of today's example.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_00: This is just all off the cuff.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_00: I had a wonderful comment on my YouTube channel, and it really spawned.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, I got to get this off my chest for the next episode, but I do want to go deeper on this topic.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_00: This is why I put out the previous episode.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: Was it two episodes ago?
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_00: Might have been last episode.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: No, it was two episodes ago when I put out the uh the video and the and the blog post about the funding tag and why the funding tag is so important, I think, for getting paid as a podcaster.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_00: You can learn more about the funding tag at fundingtag.link, uh, which is a landing page that helps you understand what the funding tag is.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: It's really just a link for you to put in your Stripe, your Patreon, your PayPal, and that'll show up in podcast apps that support it.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_00: So we have to really make people uh aware of that to support the funding tag.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_00: So this comment came in on my YouTube channel on a video I did for Buzz Sprout, which was a sponsored video.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_00: And this person asked, Hey, how the heck did you get sponsored with 150 subscribers with a few hundred, if that, views per per video, per episode?
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: How did that work?
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_00: How is that even possible?
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_00: I love this question.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: Um, this is a long one, but I'm gonna just give you like the high-level thinking of how I approach this.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: By the way, we're up to like 175 subscribers on the podcast setup YouTube channel.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, if you're not following us there, go ahead and follow us there as well.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_00: I treat the work that I do as a media business.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_00: And just again, for backstory, I also publish another podcast, a network of podcasts, and what I call a publication at the WPMinute.com.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: This is where I cover WordPress and professional web development, including AI and all this other stuff.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_00: And I've been doing that for as long as I've been a podcaster.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_00: It's how I got into podcasting for about 18 years.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: And I really and this that the WP Minute started about five years ago officially.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_00: Before that, it was another podcast called the Matt Report.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_00: And I looked at five years ago.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: I said, I need to remove myself from the brand, which was Matt Report, and create a standalone brand that could be a true publication because I wanted more people to contribute to this, right?
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_00: I wanted other writers, I wanted other podcasters, all of which I have now at the WP Minute, people that I actually pay to do the content, create the content, edit the content, and help me with sales and marketing.
• 2:53
  SPEAKER_00: It is a true business.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: It's uh I couldn't do it, I couldn't quit my day job at Gravity Forms to do it, but it is a true operational business, and that's how I look at it.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_00: I do the same thing here at the podcast setup.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: I treat this as a publication, as a business.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_00: And I keep harping on that because that's how you have to look at this stuff.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_00: You can't fall victim to what the platforms and what the large advertisers and the typical algorithm tells you.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: Like you need to have 10,000 subscribers, 100,000 views per video, you need to have 80,000 people on your newsletter in order to make$100.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_00: That is sort of like uh the I'll call like the industry average.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_00: I own it, it's not the right phrase, but I call that the industry average because the industry likes to say that big numbers, you need big numbers to get big money.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't agree with that.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_00: And it might make sense in very broad topics.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_00: So if you're a podcaster or a YouTuber and you're covering, I don't know, pop culture stuff, news stuff, sports stuff, tech reviews, car reviews, food, these are big, big, big categories where there's big money being spent and they'll never, you know, I'll say air quotes, they'll never pay attention to you down the bottom.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_00: But there's also so many creators that do it.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_00: So, yes, in maybe those particular categories, if you're just coming at big, broad subjects, then you're going to get classified in a broader category where they're going to look at you and say, no, we're not going to sponsor you because we can get this other sponsor over here, or this other creator over here that has 10 times more than you for the same price, let's say.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: So it really depends on your category that you're picking as well.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: Like I love talking about podcasting.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_00: I love talking about WordPress, open source.
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_00: They both converge as open publishing, getting your message out, getting your word out, whether it's an audio podcast, a video podcast, or a website or an application that you build with AI.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: It's about sharing in that educational and entertaining moment with my audience.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: So I choose to pick podcasting and WordPress as my two niches.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_00: And even that is pretty broad.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_00: So, how do I make it work for air quotes a business?
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_00: So the unfair advantage is that I've come from a place of sales.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_00: Like I've ran an agency, that's how I got into podcasting.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_00: It was to sell myself, to sell the work that we did, to connect with others and connect with clients.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_00: So I come from that background of sales and not pushy sales and not making people buy things that they don't want.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_00: That doesn't work.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_00: But it's about presentation, about packaging, about finding value with a sponsor.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_00: So even with smaller numbers here at the podcast setup, I'm able to package a great solution for places like BuzzProut to say, I'm going to do a video for you.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_00: That's going on the YouTube channel.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_00: It's also going on the audio channel because I'm hosting a podcast with them.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_00: That's part of the deal.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: So they get an audio podcast as well that they can point to.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_00: And it's going on the website, thepodcastsetup.com.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_00: So there's a blog post there, you know, SEO.
• 6:27
  SPEAKER_00: It's always, it's always referenced there, which is great for, you know, nowadays AI, of course, and SEO.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_00: And it's going through the email newsletter that goes out from the from the website.
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_00: So it's hitting people directly in an email newsletter that goes out when I hit publish.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_00: So this is not just about the video, it's about the collective approach to the podcast setup.
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_00: And when you marry that to like the personal brand, folks at Buzz Sprout know me because I used to work at a competitor for three years at a podcast hosting company.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_00: And we were like, you know, we were competitors, but we were friendly.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_00: Like we knew each other, we talked to each other online every now and again.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but now that I'm independent, it's a great way for them to have somebody who has authentic experience in the field to talk about the stuff that they're doing.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_00: And that's the other part of this is I love creating this content.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_00: I am not making content to just push to the algorithm.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_00: I know plenty of people that do that.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_00: I talked about this in the last episode of this podcast.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_00: Plenty of people approach creating a YouTube channel as creating a YouTube channel.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_00: So it's about finding the content that's gonna hit and pushing that out for the sheer fact to get more clicks, get more views, to add more subscribers, and then to turn on the ad network.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_00: But I don't want the ad network.
• 7:55
  SPEAKER_00: That is something that I totally avoid.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_00: So I put out content that I want to put out, I cultivate an audience that I want to cultivate, and then the harder work is roll up your sleeves and find a sponsor and knock on the door.
• 8:09
  SPEAKER_00: That's what I did with the WP Minute, where once I had a few podcasts, excuse me, a few sponsors to the WP Minute, it was okay, it's working.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_00: I've got some sponsors.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_00: Now let me rinse and repeat that knock on the door of another WordPress hosting company.
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, this is what I do.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_00: These other WordPress companies are sponsoring me.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_00: What do you think?
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_00: Here's what I have to offer, here's how I package it up.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_00: It's Omnichannel, it's a podcast, it's a YouTube channel, it's a community, it's a blog post, it's a newsletter, it's courses, it's all this stuff, and you'll be front and center with all of these other sponsors that help us get this workout.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_00: So it's not just let me get you this one video.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_00: How do you want me to make this video?
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_00: It that doesn't work for me.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_00: It could work for you in your particular business.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_00: I'm just sharing like my approach to this.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_00: So when I get these questions, these comments that are like, How did you get sponsorship with so little uh subscribers?
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_00: You you gotta flip that on its head for for our own sake as as podcast creators or or smaller YouTubers, you can't let the industry dictate what the what the rate should be, what your value is.
• 9:15
  SPEAKER_00: There, you know, depending on the content that you're putting out, again, if it's more niche, more focused, I I am of the belief that your your content is way more valuable because that buyer is looking to you for the answer, let's say.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_00: Here's a perfect example.
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_00: Hyperlocal is really popular in podcasting, still you know, has been for the last five years, especially since COVID hit.
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_00: But this is your opportunity to win in a local market.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_00: So many of us want to just publish online.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_00: We see these big creators, we see these big personalities, and we go, I always want to be like them.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_00: Let me go after their numbers, let me just do it like that.
• 9:57
  SPEAKER_00: But you could be winning on a local level and making more money than having to compete with what the industry dictates.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_00: So I don't know about your area, but there's a bunch of like food reviewers here in my local area, and they're, you know, they're on Facebook, TikTok, Instagram, of course, and it's a perfect marriage for restaurants that you know struggle to get people to come into their restaurant.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: They get somebody who comes in who has a bunch of followers and they review the food and they post it on social, and I'm sure they're charging for it.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_00: I'm sure they have a package that they that they offer.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_00: And this is great because they don't always have to be the same food review.
• 10:37
  SPEAKER_00: Number one, like that is the great thing about being a food reviewer, is if you're actually reviewing the food for what it what it what it is, you you're giving your taste of the food, your breakdown of what you thought about this dish.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_00: And it will always vary between the next.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_00: So that is great for that call it market.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_00: There's if there's a bunch of food reviewers and they all have a different taste, well, now you're getting a different angle for each piece of content that goes out.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_00: And after a while, you've dominate that market, and there's plenty to go around.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_00: So you now you go to the restaurant that you went to two years ago, you back to that restaurant from two years ago, okay.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_00: I'm here to try another dish.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_00: What do you got for me?
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_00: And you get to build this whole media wheel in a local setting.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that that's a that's a fantastic example, and I think that you can do that with your own content, but you've got to care about what the content is that you're putting out, right?
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_00: You have to care about it because sponsors will see that.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_00: And I think sponsors potentially see that in me.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_00: I hope they do.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_00: You have to present it well and package it well, right?
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_00: And you have to say, like, here's what you're getting for value.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: This is value for value.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_00: Here's the value I'm giving you.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_00: Here's the value I give my audience, which is the content.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_00: And now for value in return, you pay me, right?
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_00: Or you pay me and you maybe you pay me less, but you cross-promote me.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_00: So, okay, you don't want to pay me the full thousand dollars.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_00: Can you put me in your newsletter so I can get greater reach with this content?
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_00: You have to be able to negotiate that.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_00: That's the part where you have to think about this stuff as a business in order to get to get paid.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_00: Because I am of the firm belief that your content is more valuable than ever in this AI world.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_00: Because as AI compresses the amount of eyeballs to a website, brands, how how do we do marketing different than somebody else?
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_00: Everyone's rushing to AI marketing right now.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_00: It all looks the same, it all feels the same.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_00: Everyone's having a great time with it now because it's not that saturated.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_00: But in a year, two, five years, ten years, that differenti that difference, that different make difference maker.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_00: Boy, that was a tough one.
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_00: That difference maker will be more human interactions.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_00: And brands will turn to creators like you and I to create content for them.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_00: And we will see an increase in our rates because they're going to want to get the right person to create content for them, and it's going to cost them more money.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_00: It's inflation, but people are thinking of it in reverse.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_00: Like, you don't look at us and say, well, you only have a small YouTube account, then we're only paying you for we're only going to pay you 25 bucks.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_00: And I say, no, it's 2,500 bucks.
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_00: And they go, I don't know.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_00: How is that?
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_00: Because I have a valuable audience that trusts me.
• 13:25
  SPEAKER_00: And by the way, our content, when we produce it, it lives out there in eternity.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_00: And AI is training on all of this content.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_00: So it's going to get influenced by a real human reviewer, which is invaluable for these brands.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_00: It's more valuable than just putting it on the on the YouTube channel.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_00: So this is a long sort of like rant, but how to get paid as a podcaster, you gotta care about the content that you're putting out, you gotta care about the audience, you gotta think about the business, or you gotta think about your podcast or YouTube channel collectively as a business, as a media business.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's not gonna come easy, it's not gonna come fast, but it can be dictated on your own terms.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_00: Even with a small channel, you can get paid.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_00: You just gotta put in that effort uh to get paid.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_00: That's what I have for you.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_00: Thepodcastsetup.com.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_00: You sign up to the newsletter, you'll see a sponsored by Buzzsprout when I send you an email.
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks to Buzzsprout for sponsoring uh the newsletter till the end of the year.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, we'll after that, we'll be looking for another sponsor.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's Buzzsprout, maybe somebody else.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, we'll find out.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_00: But go to thepodcastsetup.com, join the newsletter, leave a comment below.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_00: How do you get paid as a podcaster, especially if you have a few downloads or a smaller YouTube channel?
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_00: Let me know how you do it in the comments below.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_00: See you in the next video.