Latest / The Daily Writer / Secrets of Personal Branding (with Mike Kim)

Transcript

Secrets of Personal Branding (with Mike Kim) · The Daily Writer

• 0:05
  SPEAKER_00: Hey friends, this is Kent Sanders from Inkwell Ghostwriting.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to episode 154 of the Smart Business Writing Podcast.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_00: This is the show that helps you grow your business, amplify your authority, and increase your impact through the power of writing.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks so much for joining me on today's episode.
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_00: One of my favorite communicators is John Maxwell.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_00: Several years ago I came across a quote of his that I really enjoyed.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_00: He said, Educators take something simple and make it complicated.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_00: Communicators take something complicated and make it simple.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_00: Now, as an educator and a professor at a college, and I've I've been teaching college for a long time, I don't actually take any offense of this.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_00: And if you're an educator, I hope that you don't either.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_00: It's because there's a nugget of truth to what he's saying.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: Those of us who teach, write, or create content can easily take things that are relatively simple and just explain them to death.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: It takes a great communicator to take something complicated and actually make it simple and easy to understand.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_00: That's why I'm thrilled to have Mike Kim on the show today.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: Mike is a business coach and marketing strategist who specializes in personal branding, product launch strategies, and copywriting.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_00: Mike's core philosophy of marketing is very simple, and it's this He says marketing isn't about closing a sale, it's about opening a relationship.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_00: Mike is one of my favorite communicators.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: As a writer, speaker, podcaster, and copywriting expert, he has an uncanny ability to cut through the noise and say things in a straightforward and memorable way.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_00: I've been following Mike for a number of years, but I finally got to meet him in person a couple of years ago.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_00: I was attending the tribe conference that Jeff Goines ran for several years, and Cliff Ravenskraft invited me to lunch along with Mike and several others.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: And I have to tell you, I definitely felt like the odd man out at that lunch because I was surrounded by all these really cool and successful people, and I'm still not sure how I got invited to that.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, but I really appreciated Cliff's generosity, and that was so much fun.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I asked Mike to come on the show today and talk about personal branding because it's a vital topic for every entrepreneur and writer.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_00: You'll learn what a personal brand is and why you need it.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: You'll learn Mike's journey from being a worship pastor to a branding expert, which is really fascinating.
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: And you're also going to learn some of Mike's predictions for personal branding in 2020 and so much more.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: I also want to encourage you to follow Mike on social media because he adds a ton of value, but he's also really, really funny.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_00: I love his sense of humor.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_00: It's a little bit goofy and wacky and just so much fun.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: So make sure and check out Mike on social media and listen to his podcast, which is really excellent.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_00: It's called Brand You, and it's all about personal branding and marketing.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: Really, really good stuff.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm excited to bring this episode to you.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_00: Well, after the interview, make sure and check out the show notes at KentSanders.net slash one five four.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_00: That's KentSanders.net slash one five four.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: All right, let's get to the conversation with Mike Kim.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_00: Well, Mike, welcome to the Smart Business Writing Podcast.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_00: I'm so thrilled that we have been able to do this, and I appreciate you taking time to do this conversation in the midst of lots of journeys and traveling.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_00: So thank you.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, it's a total pleasure, and it's an honor to be here and honor to be with all of you who are tuning in, hope to add some value to you today.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_00: Awesome.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I am anxious to talk about some uh questions related to personal branding, of which you are obviously an expert and have been doing this for a long time.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_00: But I have to to give readers or readers, I have to give listeners a little bit of context about how uh how I met you in person a couple years ago at Jeff Coins Tribe Conference.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_00: We had a lunch lunch with Cliff Ravenscraft.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_00: That was so much fun, and I just really enjoyed meeting you and so many other folks there.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_00: So that was uh that was really cool.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, um, Jeff's become a good friend.
• 4:06
  SPEAKER_01: Um I met him probably the same event I met Cliff back in 2013, and that was when I was getting my start in the online business.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_01: Up until that point, I was marketing and uh at a company, I was the CMO, and of course, writing had a big part to do with what we were doing.
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_01: And I wanted to step out and start my own business, be on my own, call my own shots, and here we are, like what, seven years later.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_00: Now I learned something very interesting about you.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_00: This has been a year or two ago because you used to put on, or I don't know if you still do, but you put on the Influence and Impact Summit.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_00: Is that correct?
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: Do I have that name right?
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_00: Um so I listened to uh watch the videos or listen to the autos, I don't remember which ones, from a year or two ago.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: And I remember you talking in one of the sessions about how you started out as a worship pastor, which I had no idea.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_00: That's my background as well.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm curious for everybody listening who is from a church or ministry background.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_00: I wish there will be some, but not everybody.
• 5:14
  SPEAKER_00: How do you go from being in that world to then being involved in marketing and branding and business and in the realm that you're in now?
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_01: Wow, yeah, there was no easy, there's no easy answer because every person's path is a little bit different.
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_01: But my story really started Father's Day 2009.
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_01: It was my second year on staff at a church as their worship pastor, church in New England.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_01: And I didn't know anyone who did my job full time, if that makes sense.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 5:45
  SPEAKER_01: So I reached out to this guy in Colorado who was on staff at a really big church and emailed him and asked him for an hour of his time and said, I would be willing to fly out there for an hour of your time just to pick your brain, because I don't really know if I'm doing things right.
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_01: I know there's no model for this, right?
• 6:08
  SPEAKER_01: And I on one hand, I'm leading a team of creatives and trying to fill some volunteer slots and all that sort of stuff, and uh create a good quote unquote product.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_01: And on the other hand, I'm dealing with a lot of organizational leadership issues, sure, which are hampering my ability to do what I am supposed to do in the first place.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_01: And I, contrary to most creatives and musicians, am pretty organized when it comes to you know production and schedules and logistics, and I'm pretty good with that, all things considered.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_01: And I've always loved organizational growth.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_01: I just didn't grow up in a business, so I channeled all of that energy through a church.
• 6:50
  SPEAKER_01: Flew out to meet this guy, Kent, and sat in his office.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_01: This guy was figuratively and almost literally at the top of the mountain in this industry because went into his office, 20,000-person church.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_01: Look out the back windows of his office, you see the Rocky Mountains.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_01: Oh man.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_01: I made it, right?
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_01: Um, albums, uh contracts with you know, uh record companies, big conferences, you name it.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_01: Had it all.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_01: The guy was probably 43 years old at the time, and I was I was 30, and I sat there and I went back to my hotel, and I thought to myself, if everything breaks right in my life over the next 13 or 14 years, would I want this guy's life?
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, No.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_01: And that started a whole chain reaction of questions, me picking up the rock, looking to see what's under it in every area.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_01: And I started to say, I don't think a life of impact for me, not anyone, but just for me in particular, a life of impact is not going to be me leading songs for the same 800 people every weekend for the rest of my life.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_01: That's I'm that's not what I want to do with my life.
• 8:06
  SPEAKER_01: And it completely reframed the way that I saw my life.
• 8:11
  SPEAKER_01: And sometimes we need to see someone who's at the top of the mountain we're climbing to make sure that we're climbing the right mountain.
• 8:18
  SPEAKER_00: Wow, that's powerful.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_01: That was what that experience, yeah.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_01: That's what that was for me.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_01: And it set in motion a series of uh decisions that eventually led me to step away from vocational ministry, not out of heartache or burnout or anything like that, but I was just like, I don't want to do this, so why would I keep doing this?
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_01: And that's that's what happened, really.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_01: Um and long story short, I think people who actually do that kind of work are probably the best equipped people I've ever seen for the online personal branding kind of teaching space, thought leadership space, because so many of the skills carry over.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_00: You know, it's funny because I I um I still teach at a Christian college in my day job and have been in the the church ministry world for, well, really, since I was a teenager in many ways.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_00: And it's so interesting because I've always thought that pastors are uniquely positioned to do those kinds of things because they're producing content, they're they're creative many times, they're organized, they have so many transferable skills that they could do in in other fields if they wanted to.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_00: And of course, you know, many people do feel called to that type of work permanently, which is awesome as well.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, it's just fascinating.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_00: It's really, really fascinating.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_01: Well, yeah, you're absolutely right.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_01: All of that comes to bear, you know.
• 9:44
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, if you're good at that industry, right?
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_01: If you're good at communicating, um, you're gonna be good at communicating every in every other industry.
• 9:53
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, most people are terrified of public speaking.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_01: Well, for people who are in ministry, that's their life, you know, and so creating content, being in front of people, learning to hone your craft, all of that carries over.
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_01: And it's it's really an unfair advantage, to be honest.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_00: I've been fascinated with John Maxwell's journey for a long time, and I know you've done some work with him.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, different points in my life where I've had felt really discouraged or have wondered, Am I am I on the right path in my life?
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_00: I always go back to a specific message that he that he put together for his Enjoy Life Club years ago.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_00: And it was called When to Quit.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_00: And I know that that one teaching has impacted so many people's lives as it has mine.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_00: But he's fascinating because, you know, he was used to be a pastor and then transitioned into more of a writing and speaking and coaching and training kind of a business.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_00: So it's just been fascinating to see his journey over the years as well, taking those skills that he owned in a church environment and then expanding those, not leaving ministry, but really expanding his ministry in many ways.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and chances are he probably had to improve his communication because when you get out into the business space, so many people are vying for attention.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_01: And um his his, you know, I've spent time with him, you know, one-on-one and working on his content with him and um doing production meetings and all that kind of stuff.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_01: And he definitely has a presence about him, but the key to really the way I see it as a as a writer and as a communicator, the key to his success is that he started speaking in tweets before Twitter wasn't around.
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_00: Man, that is so true.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's just zingers, it's one-liners, and that's why he gets quoted so much.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_01: It's short, it's pithy, it's understandable, it gets to the point.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_01: And if you read a book that's that he writes, all all all you're really doing is sifting through for one-liners.
• 11:48
  SPEAKER_01: And that's what he and his team create so well.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_01: Um, his content creation process is very, very interesting.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's really what worked, and it's why he's stayed relevant even till his seven to in his seventies, because he speaks and communicates in this certain way.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_01: And yeah, we can learn a lot from him in that regard.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_00: I know you have addressed this this elsewhere, at least I I think you have.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_00: You you talked about it maybe in one of your newsletters, which I love so much, by the way.
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for having an an email newsletter that is so legit and so much fun and so easygoing.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_00: And it's not like, and I know that that you you're selling stuff and you know you have different things that you're promoting, and I've and I've bought at least a couple of those, I think, um, that were so helpful, but it's just so much fun.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_00: And I wish more people would have a a newsletter that was so much fun.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_00: So so thank you for that, by the way.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_00: That may be where you were talking about when I'm getting ready to reference, which is you address somewhere how you actually came to work with John Maxwell.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm curious if you can detail that out a little bit of how do you get connected with someone at that level and someone who is so successful and is impacting so many lives.
• 13:01
  SPEAKER_00: How does that something like that actually happen?
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's it's funny.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_01: People ask me, I I've been really, really fortunate to have so many unique opportunities come my way.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_01: And if I look at it in retrospect, I all I know that I did is that I positioned myself to for opportunities to come my way.
• 13:25
  SPEAKER_01: I was just ready for opportunities.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, I think one of the things John says, I don't know if it's a quote of his or something like that, or if he quoted it from somewhere else.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_01: But there was a line he I had heard from him, so I'll just attribute it to him.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_01: He said, um, like by the time the opportunity comes, it's too late to prepare.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_00: That's great.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_01: And what happened with the John Maxwell in um situation was I um I got a call or an email from a guy who is a videographer.
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_01: Excuse me, I gotta cough for a second.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_01: Got a call from a videographer who get this back in the day Kent shot a video for a song that I'd written with a friend of mine.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_00: Oh wow, that's crazy for church.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_01: And we recorded this this video and we got to know each other there.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_01: We had a lot of mutual friends, and he watched my transition in my business, my life happen over all these years, didn't really consume any of my content, but just saw it, just knew that I was up to something different when he and his wife ended up working with the folks at the John Maxwell team, and he overheard them talk about how they could use an overhaul in their marketing and so on and so forth.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_01: This this guy, Andrew, said, You need to call my friend Mike.
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_01: And like, who's that?
• 14:58
  SPEAKER_01: Like, well, he's my friend, and he's really good at this stuff.
• 15:01
  SPEAKER_01: You need to talk to him.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_01: And I Andrew reached out to me and said, Hey, I talked to the John Maxwell people about you.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_01: The president of the organization is gonna call you.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, Hey, I really appreciate this, but in all honesty, you're the video guy.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, they don't make they don't make high-level decisions to bring in an outside consultant listening to the video contractor.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_00: That's hilarious.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_01: And so I just kind of dismissed it, and I was like, Yeah, whatever.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, sure, I'll take the call.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_01: I said yes, right?
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_01: I said yes to the call, and we we had a call and talked to this guy, Paul Martinelli, and I you know didn't know who he was either.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_01: And I think I'd heard his name thrown around a few times, but I didn't know who he was, and we talked, and the timing didn't work out.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_01: He's like, Hey, I'm about to travel for the summer, why don't we reconvene in the fall?
• 15:51
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, sure.
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_01: So we reconvened in the fall, and he and his team flew up to DC from Florida to just meet with me.
• 16:01
  SPEAKER_01: And I took the meeting because I was living in DC, and I was flattered that they flew the whole team up there.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_01: And he said, Look, we want you, we we want to work with you.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, I am very flattered, but I'm two days away from buying an around the world ticket and living on the beach for six months because I had just gone through a divorce and my personal life was in upheaval, and I just wanted some time off.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_01: And I said, I just want to go scuba diving and drink scotch.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_01: And he's like, You can do that in Florida, and I just laughed.
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_01: And he, you know, he was a good salesman, and so I said yes, and I felt like maybe this is just a really good transitional, you know, thing for me.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I told him very clearly, I don't intend to stay there for a long time.
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_01: I don't want to be an employee, I'm there as a consultant.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_01: But they said, please move to Florida, we'll we'll get some stuff set up for you.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_01: And I figured there's worse places to spend winter than Florida, and that's how it happened.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_01: And honestly, I know that behind the scenes they've probably did a lot of background checks and scoped out my blog and my podcast and my social media and saw what I was about, and that was helpful, I'm sure, because they had months to do that.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_01: But every big name contract that has come my way has found me through some sort of odd opportunity like that, a referral.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_01: And it's because I branded myself in a way where I just I people felt like I knew what I was doing, and I had this stuff to look at, you know, and I had that publicity piece that is so important, you know, and so that cemented my authority.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_01: That's that's really how it happened.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_01: It's incredible, it's it's crazy to me that that's how sometimes it works, but that's how it was.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_00: Now, what's the what's the lesson in there generally for those of us in the I guess for lack of a better term, the personal brand space, and maybe that is the best term, is there's the lesson just being on being really clear with what it is that you do, being clear with your messaging.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_00: Is that kind of the main takeaway from all this?
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_00: Do you think?
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_01: I think actually the main takeaway is you have to have a body of work.
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_00: Oh that's great.
• 18:19
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, love that.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_01: Like every every every high profile client who has found me has come through a referral through another friend of theirs who has found me because of my body of work.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_01: Years ago, I worked with Donald Miller.
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_01: I he never knew who I was.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_01: And uh he's an author, he's the founder of Story Brand, very, very successful marketing company.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_00: Love his stuff.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_01: And yeah, and he called me and he filled out my form on my blog.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_01: Like he filled out my intake form.
• 18:50
  SPEAKER_01: That's awesome.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's hilarious to most people that I think they're like, well, no one fills out an intake form.
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_01: I'm like, excuse me, I'm okay.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_01: I guess I don't know what I'm talking about.
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I'm like, just do what I say, have this stuff set up.
• 19:02
  SPEAKER_01: You you know, you're asking for opportunities, and what are these people gonna do?
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_01: Just email you randomly, they don't know who you are.
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_01: You know, look like you have your stuff set up and filled out my form.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_01: He had heard of me through Michael Hyatt and through Ray Edwards, these are other guys that I that kind of learned some stuff under, and they saw my body of work, and so they recommended me to him, and then he checked out my body of work and he filled out my form.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_01: And he he we talked and he said, Hey, I don't know who you are.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_01: You came with a recommendation of some friends of mine, and I've read like every blog post you've written on your blog in the last two days, and I'm like, Oh, cool, thank you.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_01: I've heard of you, and uh, I'm gonna tell you right now, I've never read a single book you've ever read.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_01: I've never read a single word you've read.
• 19:48
  SPEAKER_01: So if we work together, you know I won't be blowing smoke up your butt.
• 19:51
  SPEAKER_01: It's like if it's bad writing, I'm gonna tell you.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_01: And he he just I think he just appreciated that I wasn't really a fanboy, you know, and um and and that's that's what it's been like.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_01: These I I really had a body of work even before I met these kind of clients, where honestly can I can honestly say that I didn't need them to elevate my brand.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_01: And so I was in a position where they really wanted me more than I wanted them.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_01: And it's because I had the body of work, I always knew that there was an out, even though I was paid well for these projects, uh, I could have made more money on my own, but I invested the time and the energy to helping them as clients because I knew it would be good for me as well, but it wasn't really more of a it wasn't a monetary thing, it was just more, you know what?
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_01: I this is really cool.
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, if you told me back in 2009 when I was sitting at that church in Colorado that within 10 years I'd be working with Donald Miller and John Maxwell, some of the biggest names in the industry with zero experience, I would have thought you were crazy.
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_01: And so for me to actually rub shoulders and be around people of this kind of caliber really helped my personal and professional development.
• 21:10
  SPEAKER_01: That's really what I did it for.
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_01: It wasn't for the money.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_01: Because I think a lot of times when people take clients, and I know this is about writing and stuff like that, this show.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_01: We take clients and we think that if I just land one big fish client, it's gonna take care of all my marketing problems and it's gonna really cement my stature in the marketplace.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_01: And that's not true because it's not the client's job to promote you after you're done, it's your client's job to just pay you.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_01: And um, that's why I don't have any hard feelings if I work with a client like that and we don't continue our relationship.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_01: I don't have any hard feelings if they don't want me on their podcast or they don't come on my podcast.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_01: All of them have, but we don't do business anymore, and even if opportunities came now, I'm in a different place in my career where I want to.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: Do different things.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_01: So it's I think we we I think freelancers and and contractors and folks in this space tend to feel like, well, if I just can put a a John Maxwell or Donald Miller on my resume, it's gonna be great for business.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_01: And I can honestly say it it didn't make that much of a huge difference.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_01: I was building my brand for years before that.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_01: It it enhanced it, sure.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_01: It's is it bad publicity?
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_01: Of course not.
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_01: But it'll run its course.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's been what four years since I've worked with with Story Brand.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_01: You know, and so I don't, you know, the juice is gone.
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_01: They've moved on to do other things, right?
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_01: If I'm still hanging my hat on that project, something's wrong with me.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, but uh again, it's just body of work.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_01: It's just body of work.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_01: I tell people build a podcast, build your blog, build your email list, um, keep getting out there in front of people.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_01: The only real difference from the people who've made it and the people who haven't is that they've consistent, they've been very consistent and they've consistently grown.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_01: And that's really it.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_00: Now I'd love to drill down a little bit on this concept of building a body of work.
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_00: Specifically, I've noticed that there has been a shift the last uh shift.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_00: I want to make sure I put the F in there just in case anybody's like what is he there's been a real shift in in things the last couple of years in that many of us are are going audio first and then not focusing as much on the blog content.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_00: Would you say is that primarily your impulse these days?
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_00: Is the podcast is your main way of building your content?
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_00: Because I noticed, and because I geek out about this kind of stuff, and apparently I have nothing better to do than analyze these kinds of things.
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_00: But I have noticed that a lot of times when you go to people's websites who who do writing but also podcasting, that under the podcast tab, there obviously will be links to their podcast episodes and all that.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_00: But then when you go to the blog link on their website, those will basically be blog posts that are just a description of the episode.
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_00: Basically, they're show notes.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_00: Would you say that is that your approach these days is that you're mainly focusing on audio and not so much on writing blog posts?
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I would say that the podcast and my email list are the main channels.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, those are my primary marketing channels.
• 24:19
  SPEAKER_01: The way that I look at it is that the only asset I have in this business, the only thing I can actually sell off to somebody is my email list.
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_01: If you really look at what are the sellable assets in an online personal brand business, it's just your email list.
• 24:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I can't I can't sell MikeKim.com to anybody.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_01: I can't sell my Instagram or my Facebook accounts to anybody, right?
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_01: You're not big enough.
• 24:47
  SPEAKER_01: And so when I started my career, I blogged quite often, and the whole goal was to engage my email list and grow my email list.
• 24:58
  SPEAKER_01: The problem is writing takes a long time.
• 25:01
  SPEAKER_01: And when I got into podcasting, I kept blogging, but the podcast is a completely different animal because I I think it was um I I think it was 2014 when I started my podcast.
• 25:16
  SPEAKER_01: And I realized that a blog is like a single, like um from a band, right?
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_01: Like a music single, yeah, a hit single, and the podcast is like the entire album.
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_01: And the most diehard fans will listen to an entire album that a band puts out.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_01: So when I put out this podcast, I had folks who years later would say, I went back to episode one and listened to every single episode.
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_01: I said, Something's wrong with you.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_01: Like I don't I could never listen to myself talk that much.
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_01: Like, that's crazy.
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_01: Like, thank you.
• 25:49
  SPEAKER_01: I'm flattered, but wow.
• 25:50
  SPEAKER_01: And you realize it's a completely different animal.
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_01: Now, because people aren't really blogging now, I've started blogging again.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_01: I just don't do it once a week.
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_01: I can't, I can't produce it at that kind of churn.
• 26:02
  SPEAKER_01: And um, when it comes to content, I tell people like there's really three things that you have to factor into your content marketing strategy.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_01: It's um it's the volume, which is your body of work, how much stuff you know, you know, do you have?
• 26:17
  SPEAKER_01: How much are you going to produce?
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_01: It's the velocity, how often are you going to produce it, and it's the value, is it any good?
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_01: There are a lot of people who are turning out content at a great velocity, and it's not valuable.
• 26:31
  SPEAKER_01: It just it's just mediocre content.
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_01: And there are others who, because of that, have built up a volume of content, but they're building on platforms that are very ethereal and temporal, right?
• 26:45
  SPEAKER_01: They're very temporary.
• 26:46
  SPEAKER_01: They're on Twitter and they're they've got 25,000 tweets, but nobody sees them.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_01: And so the reason I love podcasting is because it allows you to do all three of those things.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_01: You have the volume, you have the the regular velocity, and it's not really difficult to have a conversation with somebody and record it like we're doing right now.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and then you can add a lot of value there.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_01: And if you work on making sure the podcast is good, it actually hits all of those three things with relative ease.
• 27:14
  SPEAKER_01: The problem with the blog post is that the velocity can be very, very overwhelming unless you have a team of writers.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_01: So what I've done with the with a blog instead is aim to maybe put a really good post out once every six weeks.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_01: And at the time of us having this conversation, I put one out at the start of the year called Five Predictions for the Personal Brand Marketing Space in 2020.
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yep.
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_00: I love that one.
• 27:39
  SPEAKER_01: It's a timely, yeah, it's a timely one.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_01: I loved it.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks.
• 27:43
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and of course, most people who read it don't know that there was a podcast episode about it two months earlier.
• 27:49
  SPEAKER_00: Well, that's that's where I first heard it.
• 27:51
  unknown: Yeah.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_00: It's on your podcast back in December.
• 27:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 27:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_01: I just repurposed it.
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_01: And a whole new slew of people consume that content because it's in a different medium.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_01: Now, then you could theoretically say, well, why don't you write a blog post for every you know podcast you put out?
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_01: I just can't, I don't have the velocity for it.
• 28:08
  SPEAKER_01: Or I don't want to invest the money in finding a copywriter to do it, because I'd rather use that money to run paid ads.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_01: So now it's like, you know, strategy is the proper allocation of resources, you know, time, money, people, energy, right?
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_01: And so if instead of paying a writer a thousand dollars a month to turn my blog posts, uh turn my podcasts into blog posts, and the writing might not even be that good for that price point.
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_01: You know, that's not a very high, high fee to pay to a cop a good copywriter.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I'd rather take that money and run ads and grow the email list directly, and then when I have time, send out good blog posts and just do little mini stuff through my email list, which is what you were referring to.
• 28:51
  SPEAKER_01: And with email, it's easy because it's shorter, it doesn't have to be as extensive as a blog post.
• 28:56
  SPEAKER_01: I can write an email to my list, be very short, punchy, and pithy, and do that in 30 minutes.
• 29:02
  SPEAKER_01: Whereas writing a blog post, to be honest, will take me a couple hours a week.
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_01: So, you know, there's all that that's involved.
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_01: So um, yeah, it's that's just kind of the modality by which I'm creating content right now.
• 29:15
  SPEAKER_01: But at the end of the day, the only asset that I really have in my business is my email list.
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_01: I Instagram can shut me down, YouTube can shut me down, Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg, like Thanos from The Avengers, can snap his fingers and decide that yeah, I no longer exist.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_01: Um, even the podcasts can shut me down.
• 29:37
  SPEAKER_01: You know, that I mean they're these are on borrowed channels, they're on barrowed feeds and outlets.
• 29:42
  SPEAKER_01: The email list is the only thing that I own.
• 29:46
  SPEAKER_01: And everything I do outside in marketing, social media, uh, blogging, podcasting, launches, webinars, the purpose of those things is to feed the email list.
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_01: Now you don't do it in a spammy way, but you realize, Kent, that at some point you've got to look at your business and say, this business is like a baby, and that baby needs food, and the food are leads.
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_01: And that's an email.
• 30:15
  SPEAKER_01: It is my job to raise this child and feed it.
• 30:19
  SPEAKER_01: And that's the way that I look at my my at my business, and like that means feeding it email addresses.
• 30:25
  SPEAKER_01: And what are similar?
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, what are some of the best ways that you have found to grow an email list?
• 30:30
  SPEAKER_00: I know that that is a topic of lots of different conversations and lots of different potential answers, but in your experience, what are the best strategies that strategies that you have used to do that over the years?
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I I it's I'm always interested to hear what other people are teaching about how to grow an email list.
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I know that there are some you know different ways to do that.
• 30:54
  SPEAKER_01: I will honestly just say that the only things that have really, really spiked my email list are uh launches, doing launches because that is an event in itself, right?
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_01: Because it garners so much publicity.
• 31:10
  SPEAKER_01: So doing a launch campaign where people are opting in for a webinar or a series of webinars or some pre-launch content, speaking engagements, because I usually give people my slides to my talks, so I'll pick up a couple hundred people if I speak at a conference or whatnot.
• 31:27
  SPEAKER_01: And uh webinars.
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_01: And webinars being smaller than a launch, because when you're promoting a webinar, you have to sign you have to register.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_01: Like, you know, there's there's no way the other way around it.
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_01: Like they have to register, so people expect it.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_01: Now, underneath all that, I I put in a small amount of money daily to run ads to a couple of my lead magnets.
• 31:49
  SPEAKER_01: Uh free that's those are free resources that I give that templates or checklists of some sort.
• 31:55
  SPEAKER_01: But any of the spikes that I've seen in my email list have become have come because of launches, speaking engagements, or webinars, and that's really it.
• 32:04
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I know that there are a lot of other people who will teach.
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_01: You should write a really great blog post and try to get it on a really big site and allow them to share your opt-in and yada yada yada, and that sounds great, but I'm not banking on that.
• 32:25
  SPEAKER_01: Right?
• 32:25
  SPEAKER_01: Because someone else can make that decision for me.
• 32:29
  SPEAKER_01: I'm banking on let me use the brand that I have, the content that I'm creating, um, the audience that I've already already attracted, and serve them and ask them to get word out about what I'm doing.
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_01: So that's that's just kind of in my experience how it's been.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I have to compliment you on your webinars.
• 32:47
  SPEAKER_00: I attended your I well, I don't know if it was your most recent webinar, but it was a recent one from I think December or sometime, I don't remember exactly, but it was the six-figure roadmap webinar and took a bunch of notes and really appreciated it because so many times webinars are just one big long sales pitch, but yours actually have really good content to them.
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_00: And and I always know hey, he's gonna be promoting his thing, which I'm totally cool with because I love your stuff, but I also appreciate it because it was actually just really good content.
• 33:19
  SPEAKER_00: So I could tell that that you really worked hard putting that together as you do all your stuff.
• 33:24
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I can't think of any of your podcasts or anything that I've seen that I have come across where I just thought, oh, that was that wasn't really not very good.
• 33:33
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like I can tell everything is really thoughtful and and there's always something great there, which I always appreciate.
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
• 33:41
  SPEAKER_01: I just try to I just try to share content in a way that I think I would understand.
• 33:45
  SPEAKER_01: You know, simple, you know, just easy to get.
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_01: And and that's just really how I approach it.
• 33:52
  SPEAKER_00: When you're putting together your topics for your podcast, what what in your mind tells you this is a topic I need to cover on my podcast versus uh this is something that might be good, but I'm not going to talk about it.
• 34:04
  SPEAKER_00: Like, is it things that people are asking you about?
• 34:07
  SPEAKER_00: Is it things that you personally want to talk about?
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_00: What's your filter for deciding on those topics?
• 34:13
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 34:13
  SPEAKER_01: So actually, my my podcast is really geared um towards two types of people.
• 34:19
  SPEAKER_01: So the way I look at business, I took this out of Todd Herman's book, um, not his actual book, but he talks about this a lot.
• 34:29
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, he says that there are five stages of business.
• 34:33
  SPEAKER_01: The first stage is the startup phase, and that's when you're trying to validate your product, service, or your offering.
• 34:40
  SPEAKER_01: You're still working on your course, you're still working on your service that you're going to offer to the market, right?
• 34:47
  SPEAKER_01: So that's a total startup phase.
• 34:49
  SPEAKER_01: And in that phase, it's very easy to get overwhelmed by all the things that you have to do.
• 34:54
  SPEAKER_01: You tend to get stuck because you're comparing yourself to everybody else, and you're not really sure what makes you different, right?
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_01: You're not even sure how to make your first dollar.
• 35:05
  SPEAKER_01: And so I gear a lot of my I gear a lot of my early content toward that audience, that startup phase.
• 35:13
  SPEAKER_01: Like as if they're literally still working their job, they don't know where to start, they want to get some education, they want to get some understanding of the lay of the land before they start really doing some stuff to intentionally, you know, build this thing and go full time.
• 35:30
  SPEAKER_01: The second group of people would be in the second stage of business, which is the ramp up phase, and they have clients or they are making some money, but they haven't differentiated themselves in the market enough, and so their conversions aren't very good.
• 35:49
  SPEAKER_01: They're not converting to sales very well, and they don't have a main marketing channel.
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_01: So, in that ramp up phase, what I'm really trying to help them do is differentiate themselves in their marketing, which is why I teach copywriting and uh my program is called Copy Proof to help them market and write in a voice that's uniquely theirs, right?
• 36:11
  SPEAKER_01: You have to be different, you have to be yourself and increase their conversions, which is why I teach direct response copywriting, and help them pick a marketing channel, whether it's a podcast or a blog or Instagram or YouTube, whatever you choose, make sure it's the right channel and stay consistent with it.
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_01: And how do you stay consistent with it?
• 36:31
  SPEAKER_01: You got to create content.
• 36:32
  SPEAKER_01: Well, how do you create good content?
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_01: You have to learn to write.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 36:35
  SPEAKER_01: So everything that I do is for those two groups, the startup and the ramp up.
• 36:41
  SPEAKER_01: Now the third phase is the buildup, which is really where I was for years.
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_01: That um the revenues in the business were great.
• 36:50
  SPEAKER_01: We were we were capping out nearly half a million dollars a year.
• 36:54
  SPEAKER_01: You know, what did I do with that money?
• 36:56
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
• 36:57
  unknown: Right.
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and at the end of the day, though, I'm the main driver of the business.
• 37:02
  SPEAKER_01: If I get hit by a truck, boom, there goes the business.
• 37:06
  SPEAKER_01: If I don't do a webinar, if I don't come up with the ideas, if I don't create the content, if I don't do this, I don't do that, the business does not move forward.
• 37:16
  SPEAKER_01: So even though revenues were great, I was starting to get very tired.
• 37:20
  SPEAKER_01: And that's because I wasn't at stage four, which is to scale up.
• 37:26
  SPEAKER_01: And scale up are the systems that you need to consistently generate leads, to consistently generate the income, to consistently have SOPs, standard operating procedures in place so that you can do something and replicate it over and over again.
• 37:42
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's in the phase that we're in right now.
• 37:45
  SPEAKER_01: We're moving from that build-up to the scale up phase.
• 37:49
  SPEAKER_01: I've got an incredible partner named Chelsea Brinkley who runs basically everything in the business now and is really trying to help me get there.
• 37:56
  SPEAKER_01: We're trying to systemize um, you know, sales, and with them, we're trying to systemize marketing.
• 38:02
  SPEAKER_01: We're trying to systemize customer service, and we're trying to systemize um the finance, right?
• 38:08
  SPEAKER_01: Bookkeeping and accounting.
• 38:10
  SPEAKER_01: And those are really the the four areas in every any business that you have to master in order for the business to be healthy and for the entrepreneur not to want to kill themselves, right?
• 38:19
  SPEAKER_01: Sales, marketing, um, customer service, and and finance, internal stuff, and then you know, hiring people and stuff like that, internal, internal hires.
• 38:29
  SPEAKER_01: And so we're really trying to move things to that place, and uh we're we're seeing some success in some areas, and others are a little bit more slow going, and uh that's why, you know, kind of tying this whole thread together.
• 38:43
  SPEAKER_01: I can't be spending four hours a week writing a blog post.
• 38:47
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it doesn't scale.
• 38:49
  SPEAKER_01: It's not yeah, it's not good for me.
• 38:51
  SPEAKER_01: Like if we had a writer, sure.
• 38:53
  SPEAKER_01: Well, then it begs the question how are we gonna afford a writer?
• 38:56
  SPEAKER_01: Well, let's make sure these other things are in place so that I don't have to, you know, start 18 new coaching groups just to pay a writer.
• 39:04
  SPEAKER_01: You know, right?
• 39:04
  SPEAKER_01: Let's use what we already have and systemize it.
• 39:07
  SPEAKER_01: So that's how you that's how I'm viewing things.
• 39:10
  SPEAKER_01: But back to the original question, how do I create content for the podcast?
• 39:13
  SPEAKER_01: I look at the businesses through through through that lens, and I really gear it towards the people who are in the startup in the ramp of that's great.
• 39:21
  SPEAKER_00: I loved what you talked about in your, I think it was your most recent email just a few days ago, and I saw it on social media too.
• 39:28
  SPEAKER_00: You were talking about this um well, in your predictions, you for 2020 you talked about micro content, and I think this was an example of this, and correct me if I'm wrong, but it was this hilarious post about you're on the beach, and you know, is this an ad for like a middle-aged men's product?
• 39:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I just loved that because it was really, really funny and a little self-deprecating.
• 39:49
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm a middle-aged man, so of course I relate to that.
• 39:52
  SPEAKER_00: But would you say that was an example of micro content?
• 39:56
  SPEAKER_00: It's just something very small, a few sentences, a funny picture.
• 39:59
  SPEAKER_00: Is that a good example of what you're talking about with the micro content?
• 40:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, because you know, with with the content out these days, like the whole the whole purpose of the content is really just to build relationships.
• 40:11
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 40:12
  SPEAKER_01: I always say that marketing isn't about closing a sale, it's about opening a relationship.
• 40:16
  SPEAKER_01: And when we think about the content that we're creating, there are really three reasons that people tune into the content that you create, or any content in general.
• 40:26
  SPEAKER_01: Like there's there's only really three reasons why anyone pays attention to anything online.
• 40:31
  SPEAKER_01: It's because they want to be, and these don't go in any particular order, but they either want to be educated, they want to be inspired, or they want to be entertained.
• 40:40
  SPEAKER_01: And that's really the only three reasons that people tune into any kind of content.
• 40:43
  SPEAKER_01: If you really think about it, we watch sports because we want to be entertained.
• 40:47
  SPEAKER_01: We watch YouTube tutorials because we want to be educated.
• 40:50
  SPEAKER_01: We watch Tony Robbins because we want to be inspired, right?
• 40:54
  SPEAKER_01: We read books because we want to be educated, inspired, and entertained, right?
• 40:58
  SPEAKER_01: Like all those things.
• 41:00
  SPEAKER_01: And when you create this content, and whether it's long form content, whether it's a podcast, whether it's microcontent, chances are that all of you are tuning in, you're you're building it, your business or the business that you're trying to build is going to fall under one of those three categories, mainly.
• 41:17
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm mainly an educational brand.
• 41:19
  SPEAKER_01: I teach people marketing, right?
• 41:22
  SPEAKER_01: But if I forsake entertainment and inspiration, I'm going to sound like a dry, boring teacher.
• 41:28
  SPEAKER_01: Correct.
• 41:29
  SPEAKER_01: And nobody wants that, right?
• 41:31
  SPEAKER_01: Nobody wants that.
• 41:32
  SPEAKER_01: So 80% of what I do, by and large, is going to be educational.
• 41:37
  SPEAKER_01: On my podcast, it's 80% educational, probably more so, 90%.
• 41:42
  SPEAKER_01: But within those episodes, I try to be, you know, I try to use my humor.
• 41:47
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes it's, you know, dry.
• 41:50
  SPEAKER_01: Sometimes it's like that's why I love it though.
• 41:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I recorded an episode with a friend while we're drinking scotch.
• 41:55
  SPEAKER_01: You know, like I remember that.
• 41:57
  SPEAKER_01: Let's have some fun with this.
• 41:58
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 41:58
  SPEAKER_01: Let's have some fun with this.
• 42:00
  SPEAKER_01: Or there are other episodes that will be inspirational.
• 42:03
  SPEAKER_01: So if I look through my Instagram feed or my Facebook feed, you know, the way that I use those channels is very different because of the way the channel is is set up.
• 42:12
  SPEAKER_01: So on Facebook, on my personal Facebook feed, it's probably 50 to 60 percent, even more so, like inspirational and um entertainment.
• 42:27
  SPEAKER_01: I don't do a lot of education on Facebook because that's not why people really use Facebook.
• 42:32
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 42:33
  SPEAKER_01: No one wakes up in the morning and says, I'll go to Facebook to learn stuff.
• 42:37
  SPEAKER_01: They don't do that.
• 42:38
  SPEAKER_01: They say I go to Facebook to stalk my friends, see what people are up to, waste time and and you know, get entertained.
• 42:44
  SPEAKER_00: That's so true.
• 42:45
  SPEAKER_01: Instagram has changed over the last couple of years because of the way influencers and marketers are using it, and is becoming more of an educational platform, even though in the past it was more inspirational and there's a lot of entertainment on it.
• 42:59
  SPEAKER_01: I use it for all three of those things.
• 43:02
  SPEAKER_01: But then, you know, in my podcast, I'm heavily educational.
• 43:07
  SPEAKER_01: On my in my email list, I'm heavily educational.
• 43:10
  SPEAKER_01: I always want there to be a clear takeaway, right, from it.
• 43:13
  SPEAKER_01: And so, you know, a takeaway from that email that you mentioned was hey, I just wrote this funny caption, and maybe we should just have some fun in the kind of content we create.
• 43:22
  SPEAKER_01: That's your takeaway, right?
• 43:24
  SPEAKER_01: So if you think about all the content you're creating, it breaks down to those three things.
• 43:29
  SPEAKER_01: Which one are you going to major on?
• 43:32
  SPEAKER_01: And then you can build backwards from there.
• 43:35
  SPEAKER_00: Man, that this is great.
• 43:36
  SPEAKER_00: We could do a whole podcast on all of these topics.
• 43:39
  SPEAKER_00: It's just it's so so much stuff that is really, really helpful.
• 43:43
  SPEAKER_00: Now, maybe you don't want me asking about this on a public podcast, and I can edit this out if you want to, but are you still planning on or are you still working on a book?
• 43:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 43:52
  SPEAKER_00: I remember you talking about that a while back, and I'm I was like, oh man, I gotta ask him about that because I've been so anxious to read.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_00: To read that when it comes out.
• 44:03
  SPEAKER_01: I'm working on it still.
• 44:05
  SPEAKER_01: I am writing it.
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_01: I've actually made progress, which is good.
• 44:09
  SPEAKER_01: And on one hand, I'm like, this is not as hard as I thought it would be.
• 44:13
  SPEAKER_01: Because I just thought it would be like I'd have to write like 900 pages.
• 44:17
  SPEAKER_01: And then on the other hand, it's been very difficult to find time or make time to do it because I'm just in a season of so much travel.
• 44:27
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm also in a season of doing a lot of scale up.
• 44:31
  SPEAKER_01: So back to what I was saying, like it it takes a lot of time to put these systems in place.
• 44:36
  SPEAKER_01: You know, if if I'm talking with my team and they're like, hey, we want to run these funnels or we want to have these ads, you've got to you've got to build all this stuff.
• 44:45
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, I don't really want to do it because there's not an immediate payoff.
• 44:49
  SPEAKER_01: And that's the same thing with a book.
• 44:50
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you post something on social media and you get the payoff right away.
• 44:55
  SPEAKER_01: And we become accustomed to that, you know, hit of what whatever, right?
• 45:00
  SPEAKER_01: Um, whatever positive brain chemicals hit us, right?
• 45:04
  SPEAKER_01: Um when we when we get that affirmation, and we've by and large, all of us have to some degree lost the ability to focus on one thing that's not gonna have a payoff right away.
• 45:16
  SPEAKER_01: And that's what both the systems that I have to build and this book you know fall under.
• 45:23
  SPEAKER_01: And I just have to power through it, I just have to make it work.
• 45:26
  SPEAKER_01: So yeah, there's that.
• 45:27
  SPEAKER_01: I'll be doing a lot of writing on planes and in hotel rooms for the next uh season or so.
• 45:32
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I know that's that is a long and um sometimes a very drawn out and emotionally draining process.
• 45:39
  SPEAKER_00: So whenever that comes out at some point, I will happily uh read that and promote it and dive into it.
• 45:44
  SPEAKER_00: So thank you.
• 45:45
  SPEAKER_01: Well, Mike, this has been we're shooting for the end of the year.
• 45:48
  SPEAKER_01: So we'll awesome.
• 45:49
  SPEAKER_00: Mike, this has been a blast.
• 45:50
  SPEAKER_00: I'm so grateful that you were able to take some time to chat with me.
• 45:54
  SPEAKER_00: I know you're again, you're traveling, you're so busy, you're working with the team, and got so many different things happening.
• 45:59
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm just grateful for the value that you're putting out into the world through your humor and your content and your podcast, and man, just so many good things.
• 46:08
  SPEAKER_00: I'm just really grateful for everything that you're doing to help people.
• 46:11
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, it's my pleasure.
• 46:12
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, we just all do our part, right?
• 46:15
  SPEAKER_01: And for for those of you who are listening, um do the work, build the body of work.
• 46:21
  SPEAKER_01: You you never know who you're gonna impact, right?
• 46:23
  SPEAKER_01: And it's not wrong to want to impact people, and um, it's not wrong to share your stuff and share what you learned.
• 46:30
  SPEAKER_01: And uh, if I can be of help in any way, just reach out and um yeah, so let's all we're all in this together, to be honest.
• 46:38
  SPEAKER_01: Some of us is good as all of us.
• 46:40
  SPEAKER_00: So what's the best what's the best way for people to get in touch with you?
• 46:44
  SPEAKER_01: Um I would honestly say, since you're listening, all listening to a podcast, just listen to my podcast.
• 46:49
  SPEAKER_01: It's called the Brand You Podcast.
• 46:51
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, a great episode to start with would be uh the one on uh the seven steps to building a profitable personal brand.
• 46:59
  SPEAKER_01: Um I'll send I'll send you that direct link, Kent, if you'd like.
• 47:03
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, yes.
• 47:04
  SPEAKER_01: Uh we can put it in the show notes.
• 47:05
  SPEAKER_01: That's really kind of foundational to the stuff that I teach.
• 47:08
  SPEAKER_01: And um, that would be a great place to start because it just kind of lays out like the different steps, and it it is exactly what I run uh people through when I'm coaching them or in a court uh in a course or anything like that.
• 47:20
  SPEAKER_01: It's just getting those things set up so that you can actually uh build a strong foundation for all the content creation you're gonna do.
• 47:27
  SPEAKER_00: Cool.
• 47:28
  SPEAKER_00: Well, Mike, thanks again so much, and I will link to all this great stuff in the show notes.
• 47:32
  SPEAKER_00: And once again, really appreciate you and taking the time to do this.
• 47:35
  SPEAKER_01: It was a pleasure to be with you and pleasure to be with all of you guys tuning in.
• 47:40
  SPEAKER_00: Well, I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Mike.
• 47:43
  SPEAKER_00: Before we leave this episode today, I want to share my three biggest takeaways from our conversation.
• 47:49
  SPEAKER_00: Here we go.
• 47:51
  SPEAKER_00: Takeaway number one is create a body of work.
• 47:55
  SPEAKER_00: This is a key concept because we live in a really impatient time.
• 48:01
  SPEAKER_00: We all want quick results from our work.
• 48:03
  SPEAKER_00: Mike is doing amazing things these days, but remember that he's been doing this for a while now.
• 48:09
  SPEAKER_00: Mike's been at this for a number of years.
• 48:11
  SPEAKER_00: So it's easy to look at all the things he's created and think, wow, he just got so lucky.
• 48:15
  SPEAKER_00: But the truth is that Mike has been really hard at work for for a number of years, and he's been doing this for a while.
• 48:21
  SPEAKER_00: It's really easy to put pressure on every little thing that we create.
• 48:25
  SPEAKER_00: But remember that those things add up over time.
• 48:29
  SPEAKER_00: It's not just about creating one thing, it's about creating a total body of work that consists of things that you create over a long period of time, not just one thing here and there.
• 48:40
  SPEAKER_00: And that's exactly why being consistent in your creative work and in your writing and in building your business, that's why those things are so important.
• 48:48
  SPEAKER_00: So create a body of work.
• 48:51
  SPEAKER_00: Takeaway number two, take on clients for your personal and professional development, not because you think they will help you get more business.
• 49:01
  SPEAKER_00: Now, this was an insight I had actually never heard anywhere.
• 49:04
  SPEAKER_00: I thought this was really fascinating.
• 49:06
  SPEAKER_00: Mike has worked with some giant names in the personal development industry, including John Maxwell and many others.
• 49:14
  SPEAKER_00: But I thought it was interesting that those experiences did not necessarily lead to other huge things.
• 49:20
  SPEAKER_00: So when we're considering which clients to work with, we should think about how these people will help us grow and develop.
• 49:27
  SPEAKER_00: It's not the client's job to promote us and make sure we get the next gig.
• 49:32
  SPEAKER_00: They're, you know, their concern is they're hiring us for something.
• 49:35
  SPEAKER_00: So make sure that we take on clients who are going to help us in our personal and professional development.
• 49:42
  SPEAKER_00: In other words, we're looking for challenges.
• 49:44
  SPEAKER_00: We're not looking for them to just promote us.
• 49:46
  SPEAKER_00: We're looking for opportunities that help us to grow on a personal and professional level, not just an easy win that's going to get us to the next thing.
• 49:54
  SPEAKER_00: Then finally, takeaway number three: Mike's podcast and email list are his main marketing channels.
• 50:01
  SPEAKER_00: This was a fantastic insight, and it's exactly the reason why I have moved more and more toward podcasting.
• 50:08
  SPEAKER_00: You can develop a really intimate and personal connection with a listener that you cannot get through a book or through a blog or through other types of things.
• 50:16
  SPEAKER_00: And I and trust me, I love books.
• 50:18
  SPEAKER_00: I really, really love books.
• 50:19
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, for Pete's sake, I'm a ghostwriter, so naturally I love books and I believe in the power of books.
• 50:25
  SPEAKER_00: But there is still something special about a podcast because you can develop an intimate connection with someone through them listening to you, through hearing the inflections and the emotion in your voice that you cannot get from other types of communication.
• 50:38
  SPEAKER_00: Now, that being said, though, the podcast is only one piece of the whole puzzle.
• 50:42
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, as Mike explained it, his podcast helps drive people to his email list, which is the main place that he sells from.
• 50:50
  SPEAKER_00: I also enjoyed Mike's insight about the difference between a blog and a podcast.
• 50:54
  SPEAKER_00: Your blog is like a is like hitting a single, you know, if we're talking baseball terms, but the podcast is like an album.
• 51:01
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, I'm sorry, we're not talking baseball terms.
• 51:03
  SPEAKER_00: Sorry, I got my analogies mixed up.
• 51:05
  SPEAKER_00: Your blog is like a musical single, like an artist will release a single, but the podcast is like an album where people can see all the episodes in one shot.
• 51:15
  SPEAKER_00: In other words, it's like the difference between I'm dating myself here, but uh when I was a kid, my my mom had this whole box of 45 records.
• 51:24
  SPEAKER_00: You know, and maybe some of you remember cassette singles, but those 45 records would have one song on each side.
• 51:31
  SPEAKER_00: So it's like the difference between having something where you're only seeing one song and there's no context for it, versus seeing like scrolling through Spotify and you're seeing the whole album and you're seeing someone's body of work all collected in one place.
• 51:45
  SPEAKER_00: And that's what a podcast is like.
• 51:47
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that's really, really cool.
• 51:48
  SPEAKER_00: And it's one of the reasons why I love podcasting, is because you can see all the stuff that somebody has created on their podcast right there.
• 51:56
  SPEAKER_00: And at this point, I've been doing this a while, and so this is episode 154.
• 52:01
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's a lot of episodes, and I've got to tell you, I've spent a lot of time writing content for my podcast, doing interviews, doing editing, show notes, the whole shebang.
• 52:12
  SPEAKER_00: It's honestly it can be really time consuming, but I love it because I believe in the power of podcasting, and it's exactly for that reason why so many other people love podcasting as well.
• 52:24
  SPEAKER_00: Now, one other thing that Micah mentioned before I start to wrap this up, he mentioned that in content marketing, the components are value, velocity, and volume.
• 52:34
  SPEAKER_00: So value is is it any good?
• 52:36
  SPEAKER_00: Velocity is how often, and volume is is how big it is.
• 52:43
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that's very interesting.
• 52:45
  SPEAKER_00: So value, velocity, and volume.
• 52:47
  SPEAKER_00: And he does podcasting because podcasting meets all those criteria.
• 52:52
  SPEAKER_00: In podcasting, you can deliver value, you can deliver velocity, which is doing it often, and you can do it in volume, which means you can reach a whole bunch of people with the podcast.
• 53:02
  SPEAKER_00: So anyway, enough about podcasting.
• 53:05
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, as you can tell, I love books and I love podcasts and I love Star Wars.
• 53:09
  SPEAKER_00: If you take nothing else away from uh the Smart Business Writing podcast, you will know that I love those three things for sure.
• 53:15
  SPEAKER_00: All right, uh, I want to give a huge thank you to my friend Mike Kim, and I want to encourage you to check out his podcast and his blog, which you can find at MikeKim.com.
• 53:26
  SPEAKER_00: There's tons of great stuff there.
• 53:28
  SPEAKER_00: Also, make sure and follow him on social media.
• 53:30
  SPEAKER_00: He's a hoot, he adds tons of value, and it's really, really good stuff.
• 53:34
  SPEAKER_00: Also, thank you for listening.
• 53:36
  SPEAKER_00: I I say this all the time, I realize that, you know, I'm getting in in my old age, I'm repeating myself, but I'm gonna continue to repeat this.
• 53:43
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for listening.
• 53:45
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks for taking the time out of your schedule to listen to the show.
• 53:48
  SPEAKER_00: I never ever take that for granted.
• 53:50
  SPEAKER_00: Well, my friends, as always, remember that you can find lots more resources for writers and creatives at KentSanders.net.
• 53:58
  SPEAKER_00: And until next time, remember that your writing has the power to change people's lives.
• 54:03
  SPEAKER_00: I'll see you in the next episode.