Latest / Glovisor Podcast / Unlock the Power of Podcasting: How Megan Dougherty Transforms Businesses! One Stone Creative (Ep 66)

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Unlock the Power of Podcasting: How Megan Dougherty Transforms Businesses! One Stone Creative (Ep 66) · Glovisor Podcast

0:00
Speaker 1: We're talking about the strategy behind successful business podcasting and
0:03
Speaker 1: how to turn your show into a powerful asset.
0:09
Speaker 2: Welcome to the Glowvisor Podcast, where we explore business growth, communication,
0:13
Speaker 2: and personal development through real conversations with people that make
0:16
Speaker 2: an impact. Our guest is a podcast strategist and the
0:20
Speaker 2: founder of One Stone Creative, where she helps businesses use
0:24
Speaker 2: podcasting strategically, not just to create content, but to generate leads,
0:29
Speaker 2: build authority, strengthen relationships, and support business growth. She's also
0:34
Speaker 2: deeply involved in researching the business podcasting landscape and has
0:38
Speaker 2: spent years studying what successful shows are doing, and perhaps
0:41
Speaker 2: more importantly, what actually makes podcasting valuable to a business.
0:46
Speaker 2: Full Visor welcomes Megan Doherty.
0:49
Speaker 3: Thank you so much. It is so wonderful to be here.
0:52
Speaker 1: Let's begin. Tell us a little bit more about what
0:54
Speaker 1: you do.
0:55
Speaker 3: So, as you mentioned, I'm a founder of One Stone Creative,
0:58
Speaker 3: and we're a podcast production agency. And we work with
1:00
Speaker 3: specifically expert entrepreneurs and smaller business owners to develop shows
1:04
Speaker 3: that do real functional work within their businesses. And so
1:07
Speaker 3: that might mean improving their SEO and discoverability, improving their
1:10
Speaker 3: sales processes in different ways, doing their strategic networking for them.
1:13
Speaker 3: There's a lot of different ways we can make a
1:15
Speaker 3: podcast do really, really useful things. And in addition to that,
1:18
Speaker 3: as you so kindly mentioned, we are really interested in
1:21
Speaker 3: business podcasting in general. What does the industry look like?
1:24
Speaker 3: What changes from year to year? And how can we
1:26
Speaker 3: make sure that as business owners, we're investing our time
1:29
Speaker 3: in podcasting wisely and well? Because as anyone, as you
1:33
Speaker 3: may know, and as anyone, it's really easy to spend
1:35
Speaker 3: a lot of time and money on a podcast without
1:37
Speaker 3: necessarily knowing it's doing any work for your business that
1:40
Speaker 3: you can measure. So that's something that we're consistently trying
1:42
Speaker 3: to solve.
1:43
Speaker 1: Can you share with us a little bit more about
1:45
Speaker 1: when you talk about SEO, what does that mean and
1:48
Speaker 1: how do you infuse that into the podcasting world?
1:52
Speaker 3: Yes, there's a couple of different kinds of SEO or
1:54
Speaker 3: different ways of looking at SEO when it comes to podcasting.
1:56
Speaker 3: So there's the SEO that you might do to get
1:58
Speaker 3: your podcast discovered. And that's going to be how you
2:01
Speaker 3: title your shows and what the description looks like on
2:03
Speaker 3: Apple and Spotify and these different things and the way
2:05
Speaker 3: kind of you're using those systems and those algorithms to
2:07
Speaker 3: be found by people who are looking for podcasts. And
2:10
Speaker 3: then on the other hand, there's using your podcast to
2:12
Speaker 3: generate the content and the ideas that you're going to
2:14
Speaker 3: be using for your more general SEO. And that would
2:16
Speaker 3: mean recording content on topics that you know people are
2:20
Speaker 3: going to be looking for and then optimizing the particularly
2:22
Speaker 3: the written materials that go along with your episodes that
2:24
Speaker 3: you are more easily found by the search engines and
2:26
Speaker 3: now by the AI platforms as well.
2:29
Speaker 1: Now, you've been doing research on different podcasts for many years.
2:34
Speaker 1: What is the one metric that you follow the most?
2:37
Speaker 3: Well, there's a lot of metrics that we follow pretty closely.
2:40
Speaker 3: So this is you're referring to our annual state of
2:42
Speaker 3: business podcasting report, which we started in 2020. And so
2:46
Speaker 3: this is going to be the seventh year now in
2:47
Speaker 3: 2026 that we release it. And some of the things
2:50
Speaker 3: that we've kind of been looking at the entire time
2:52
Speaker 3: that we've been doing this research are things like how
2:54
Speaker 3: long are episodes? How frequently are they being released? And
2:57
Speaker 3: what does the structure of an episode sound like? You know,
3:00
Speaker 3: just to not to kind of prescribe this is the
3:03
Speaker 3: best type of podcast, but really to look at what
3:05
Speaker 3: are the trends and the benchmarks and best practices in
3:08
Speaker 3: terms of the shows that are being created? So other
3:11
Speaker 3: things that we look at every year are what does
3:13
Speaker 3: the cover art look like? And how is social media
3:15
Speaker 3: being used by these companies that are hosting these podcasts?
3:19
Speaker 3: There's a lot of really rich and interesting information when
3:22
Speaker 3: you take the time to kind of meticulously go through
3:24
Speaker 3: top performing shows.
3:26
Speaker 1: Wow, I would imagine. Now, does every business need to
3:31
Speaker 1: have a podcast?
3:33
Speaker 3: No, I don't think that every business needs to have
3:35
Speaker 3: a podcast necessarily. I think it comes down to... What
3:39
Speaker 3: do you want your business to do or achieve? And
3:42
Speaker 3: can a podcast help you do that more effectively? I mean,
3:45
Speaker 3: there are some people who, they start a podcast and
3:47
Speaker 3: they're like, oh, this is one of the greatest things
3:49
Speaker 3: I've ever done. I'm meeting people, I'm connecting, I'm repurposing
3:52
Speaker 3: this content. It's awesome. Other people start them and they're like, okay,
3:55
Speaker 3: so this is cool. Like I'm enjoying some parts of
3:57
Speaker 3: it and I'm getting some okay results. But like I
4:00
Speaker 3: do better just doing in-person networking when I go to conference. Like,
4:02
Speaker 3: so it really comes down to the business owner and
4:04
Speaker 3: the goals and making sure there's a mesh there. And
4:06
Speaker 3: I think, you know, podcasting isn't, appropriate for everyone in
4:10
Speaker 3: the same way that like email marketing isn't necessarily appropriate
4:12
Speaker 3: for everyone or, you know, trade shows aren't appropriate for everyone.
4:16
Speaker 3: It's a tool that's meant to do specific things. And sometimes,
4:19
Speaker 3: you know, there are other tools that will do something
4:22
Speaker 3: as well or better for a particular business or business owner.
4:25
Speaker 1: Now, I want to go back to the personal side.
4:27
Speaker 1: What inspired you to pursue this path?
4:30
Speaker 3: None of this was my fault. So my background was
4:33
Speaker 3: in online marketing education and digital business development. And I
4:37
Speaker 3: was kind of at not a crossroads, but kind of
4:40
Speaker 3: I was in between big projects in my career. And
4:42
Speaker 3: a colleague from a company I used to work at
4:44
Speaker 3: reached out to me one day out of the blue.
4:46
Speaker 3: And she says, hey, do you want to start a
4:47
Speaker 3: business together? When I said, well, with you, Ms. Audra Cassino,
4:50
Speaker 3: I would absolutely love to. And her background was in
4:52
Speaker 3: broadcast audio. So we just started putting those two kind
4:55
Speaker 3: of skill sets together, the sound engineering and the storytelling
4:59
Speaker 3: elements of her previous career and the digital marketing and
5:02
Speaker 3: business growth elements of mine. And we started producing podcasts
5:04
Speaker 3: for business. And that was back in 2017. So I
5:07
Speaker 3: think we really found a combination of skill sets that
5:09
Speaker 3: worked really beautifully together.
5:10
Speaker 1: Now, you offer many different arrays of services, but what
5:14
Speaker 1: is the major service that you see more customers coming
5:18
Speaker 1: back for you to help them with?
5:19
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, the biggest one, and we have some clients,
5:22
Speaker 3: we have some shows that we've been producing for, you know, six,
5:24
Speaker 3: seven years now at this point, which is wonderfully gratifying.
5:27
Speaker 3: And I think the people who come back to podcasting
5:29
Speaker 3: again and again are the ones who are really able
5:30
Speaker 3: to get multiple kinds of use out of their show.
5:33
Speaker 3: So the type of podcast we see coming back the most,
5:37
Speaker 3: sometimes it's solo podcasters. You know, every week they've got
5:40
Speaker 3: kind of their monologue, their thoughts, their take on what's
5:43
Speaker 3: happening in the industry this week. That tends to be
5:45
Speaker 3: a very long running type of show. And then people
5:47
Speaker 3: who are really getting a lot of value out of
5:48
Speaker 3: the networking of podcasting, where they're using it as a
5:50
Speaker 3: tool to build the relationships that are going to be
5:52
Speaker 3: useful in other kinds of business. So we find these
5:54
Speaker 3: are the types of shows that go on for the longest,
5:57
Speaker 3: or if they're done in seasons, they kind of come
5:58
Speaker 3: back to do season after season after season.
6:01
Speaker 1: Now, is there a sweet spot in the number of
6:03
Speaker 1: episodes that should be released on a weekly basis? And
6:05
Speaker 1: then how long should those episodes be?
6:08
Speaker 3: So I've actually got wonderful hard data on this for you.
6:12
Speaker 3: So the vast majority of the most successful podcasts release
6:16
Speaker 3: weekly or more. And that or more has been increasing
6:19
Speaker 3: over the last few years. We're seeing more and more
6:21
Speaker 3: episodes being released weekly. their length is slightly like often
6:25
Speaker 3: it's not always you know full 40 minute episodes that
6:28
Speaker 3: are being released multiple times a week sometimes it's a
6:30
Speaker 3: longer one and a shorter one or multiple shorter ones
6:32
Speaker 3: but weekly is pretty much kind of the if you're
6:34
Speaker 3: looking to build traction quickly that's the number you should
6:37
Speaker 3: if at all possible be aiming for that said For
6:41
Speaker 3: most businesses, any podcast is better than no podcast. And
6:44
Speaker 3: if your workflow or if your bandwidth or your resources
6:46
Speaker 3: mean that you can do this twice a month or
6:48
Speaker 3: even once a month, often that's going to be better
6:49
Speaker 3: than nothing. You just have to moderate your expectations in
6:51
Speaker 3: terms of how fast you're going to grow or how
6:53
Speaker 3: fast you're going to see the results. And in terms
6:56
Speaker 3: of length, that's a really interesting one because In the
6:59
Speaker 3: many years we've been doing our research into the business
7:02
Speaker 3: podcast now, it's been one of the most robust and
7:05
Speaker 3: consistent results over time. And it's between 44 and 46
7:07
Speaker 3: minutes per episode. And I found that really fascinating. It's
7:12
Speaker 3: interesting because it's an average of the shows that we
7:14
Speaker 3: look at. And a lot of the top business podcasts,
7:16
Speaker 3: they're those kind of marathon, three-hour, four dudes sitting around
7:19
Speaker 3: a conference table type of shows, right? So they are
7:21
Speaker 3: probably skewing the average a little bit longer. We find
7:24
Speaker 3: in terms of production, that 30 to 45 minute, though,
7:27
Speaker 3: is really a sweet spot in terms of being able
7:29
Speaker 3: to get into some really rich subject matter, but not
7:31
Speaker 3: letting things drag on too long.
7:33
Speaker 1: You mentioned that you do a lot of show production,
7:37
Speaker 1: but what does production entail?
7:39
Speaker 3: Yeah, so it... I mean, you can get so many
7:43
Speaker 3: different kinds of help for your podcast. And when we
7:45
Speaker 3: talk about production, first it starts with kind of designing
7:49
Speaker 3: the show. What should this look like? And what are
7:51
Speaker 3: the bones of an episode that's going to make it
7:52
Speaker 3: sound like a podcast and be consistent week to week?
7:54
Speaker 3: So it's figuring that out. And then most of our
7:57
Speaker 3: clients record independently on their schedule with the guests that
8:00
Speaker 3: they have, although sometimes we do have a producer who
8:02
Speaker 3: will join them in their virtual room. They then send
8:04
Speaker 3: us the raw audio and video and or video. And
8:07
Speaker 3: production means kind of cleaning it up, tidying it, getting
8:10
Speaker 3: rid of any mistakes, adding intro and outro elements that
8:12
Speaker 3: make it sound like a podcast, and sometimes more detailed
8:15
Speaker 3: content edits like moving bits around so that things flow really,
8:18
Speaker 3: really nicely. There's lots of different kinds of editing you
8:21
Speaker 3: can do. Then producing it in the format that it's
8:24
Speaker 3: going to be distributed in, whether that's audio or video
8:26
Speaker 3: or both. And we also write the show notes and
8:28
Speaker 3: create sharing materials and guest communication materials for our clients
8:31
Speaker 3: as well. Because we're, again, usually working with smaller business
8:35
Speaker 3: owners who don't necessarily have a whole bunch of extra
8:37
Speaker 3: time or a lot of available team members to kind
8:39
Speaker 3: of do all of these other subsidiary tasks that really
8:41
Speaker 3: make a podcast valuable. So we try to keep all
8:43
Speaker 3: of those on our desk. So production kind of means
8:46
Speaker 3: the whole from I've just talked to someone. It was
8:50
Speaker 3: a great conversation to amazing. It's on Spotify and also
8:53
Speaker 3: has been sent out to our email list.
8:55
Speaker 1: If one of our listeners wanted to work with you,
8:57
Speaker 1: what would be the journey if they've never recorded anything before? ever,
9:02
Speaker 1: and now they want to work with you, how soon
9:05
Speaker 1: can they start their podcast episodes?
9:07
Speaker 3: It can be pretty quick. So we find most launches
9:09
Speaker 3: take about four to six weeks. And that kind of
9:11
Speaker 3: goes from figuring out the basic idea, what it's going
9:13
Speaker 3: to look like, what it's going to do, most importantly,
9:15
Speaker 3: what's this podcast going to do? And then doing all
9:18
Speaker 3: of the branding, learning how to record, doing some trial episodes,
9:22
Speaker 3: getting a trailer out there. It can go a little
9:24
Speaker 3: faster or take a little longer, depending on how many
9:26
Speaker 3: times we review the cover art and make revisions, that
9:29
Speaker 3: kind of thing. But it can be quite speedy. I
9:31
Speaker 3: often recommend for brand new podcasters, though, if they've never
9:34
Speaker 3: done any recording, they should be a guest on a
9:36
Speaker 3: couple of shows before they commit to doing their own
9:38
Speaker 3: just to make sure they can like stand the sound
9:40
Speaker 3: of their own voice and they like the medium. And
9:42
Speaker 3: I often recommend starting with a season rather than committing
9:46
Speaker 3: to producing every Tuesday for the rest of time. You know,
9:50
Speaker 3: it's a very different type of energy to be like, no,
9:52
Speaker 3: I'm going to do 12 episodes on this topic and
9:54
Speaker 3: it's going to be a complete body of work in
9:55
Speaker 3: and of itself. If you discover that, it's not a
9:59
Speaker 3: fit or it doesn't have the outcome you want or
10:00
Speaker 3: you didn't like the process, it's not quitting if you
10:03
Speaker 3: finished a season and moved on. But if you do
10:06
Speaker 3: kind of communicate that you're going to be doing this
10:08
Speaker 3: for the rest of time and give up after seven episodes,
10:10
Speaker 3: it's not the best look and it doesn't feel very good.
10:12
Speaker 3: So I think new podcasters can really benefit from committing
10:14
Speaker 3: to a short form podcast at first. You can always
10:17
Speaker 3: keep going at the end if you really like it.
10:19
Speaker 1: Will you be able to share with us a client
10:22
Speaker 1: success story?
10:23
Speaker 3: Oh, we've got lots of really interesting ins, but one
10:25
Speaker 3: of my favorites, and this is, I think it's a
10:28
Speaker 3: really wonderful and really illustrative story about the power of podcasting.
10:31
Speaker 3: So we work with a lot of lawyers. We didn't
10:33
Speaker 3: kind of set out to be like, we're going to
10:34
Speaker 3: be the production company for lawyers, but you know, you
10:36
Speaker 3: meet some lawyers to start producing for them, you meet more,
10:38
Speaker 3: and that's how it goes. And you are probably familiar,
10:42
Speaker 3: and everyone listening is probably familiar, lawyers don't have the
10:44
Speaker 3: most sterling reputation in the industry. Not everyone's really happy
10:47
Speaker 3: when they have to call their lawyer. That's not usually
10:48
Speaker 3: a great part of someone's day. But we found one
10:51
Speaker 3: show that we started producing. This was a compliance lawyer.
10:54
Speaker 3: And as he's talking about the work that he does
10:57
Speaker 3: and his team does and his colleagues do in businesses,
11:00
Speaker 3: and he's so positive and optimistic about the help that
11:02
Speaker 3: he's trying to give and the positive benefits he's having
11:05
Speaker 3: on the companies that he works for, he noticed that
11:07
Speaker 3: after doing this for a little while, people who were
11:10
Speaker 3: calling him were excited. They weren't upset. They weren't mad.
11:14
Speaker 3: They had to be calling the compliance guy. They're like, hey,
11:16
Speaker 3: I heard about how you did this cool thing for
11:17
Speaker 3: this company and saved them a bunch of like legal hassle.
11:19
Speaker 3: Can you do that for us? And it really changed
11:22
Speaker 3: the tone of how he was talking to people and
11:24
Speaker 3: how he was being perceived by the people he was
11:26
Speaker 3: communicating with. And that it's hard to put a number,
11:29
Speaker 3: you know, exactly like what's the like financial outcome of that.
11:32
Speaker 3: But the way that the day becomes better when people
11:36
Speaker 3: are happy to talk to you because they've got that knowing,
11:37
Speaker 3: liking and trusting that they otherwise wouldn't have had. I
11:40
Speaker 3: think that's a hard to measure, but I think very
11:42
Speaker 3: profound difference that a podcast can make for someone. And
11:45
Speaker 3: just when I heard this story, I felt, boy, we're
11:48
Speaker 3: really doing something that matters here, aren't we? We're really
11:51
Speaker 3: helping people connect with their audiences in a way that
11:53
Speaker 3: they haven't before.
11:54
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think your energy carries over into these episodes.
11:58
Speaker 1: That's what I'm thinking.
11:59
Speaker 3: Thank you.
12:02
Speaker 1: Now, what happens once these episodes have been fully produced
12:06
Speaker 1: and they go back onto their socials, how do they
12:11
Speaker 1: move it or move it forward? Is there another level
12:14
Speaker 1: to your business where you can help them market it?
12:17
Speaker 3: Yes. And I think that's really important. So the type
12:19
Speaker 3: of shows that we produce, they're not usually aimed or
12:22
Speaker 3: designed to become top 100 podcasts. They're not aiming to
12:25
Speaker 3: become super famous podcasters. These are people who have businesses.
12:28
Speaker 3: They've got law firms and they've got accounting practices and
12:30
Speaker 3: they're coaches and they've got a consultancy. What really, really matters,
12:34
Speaker 3: the podcast only matters in the context of improving those businesses. Uh,
12:38
Speaker 3: so once we produce episodes and we get them out there, yes,
12:41
Speaker 3: we want them to be good and valuable for the
12:42
Speaker 3: listening public. That's very important, but it's even more important
12:45
Speaker 3: is how business owners are able to use those specific
12:47
Speaker 3: episodes within other areas of their business. So sometimes we'll
12:51
Speaker 3: produce episodes that make really great case studies that can
12:53
Speaker 3: be used in a sales process. So for example, let's say, um,
12:56
Speaker 3: a new, uh, a potential lead came to my website
12:59
Speaker 3: and they wanted to book a call with me. It's okay. Great.
13:01
Speaker 3: They sign up to book a discovery call before that call.
13:04
Speaker 3: Maybe I'm going to take a look at what industry
13:05
Speaker 3: they're in and send them a couple of episodes where
13:07
Speaker 3: people in similar industries that I've talked to and had
13:10
Speaker 3: on my show. Well, they're going to get to hear
13:12
Speaker 3: my voice. They're going to get to hear the way
13:13
Speaker 3: I talk, get a sense of how I do business
13:14
Speaker 3: and what I believe. And that means that when we
13:16
Speaker 3: do get on the call, they already feel like they
13:19
Speaker 3: know me a little bit. And they're going to be
13:20
Speaker 3: much more warmer and receptive because they've already had a
13:22
Speaker 3: chance to be like, oh, okay, I do dig this.
13:24
Speaker 3: Or on the other hand, actually, this is not for me.
13:26
Speaker 3: I'm just going to cancel and save everybody's time. So
13:28
Speaker 3: that's kind of one example of how a podcast episode
13:31
Speaker 3: can be kind of surgically deployed. within different areas of
13:34
Speaker 3: the business. And you can do that all over the place.
13:37
Speaker 3: That's on the kind of the sales enablement end, we'd
13:39
Speaker 3: call it. And you can also, I find, you know,
13:43
Speaker 3: podcasts can be very ephemeral. You know, it goes into
13:45
Speaker 3: your Spotify feed, your Apple podcast playlist, it's there for
13:47
Speaker 3: a minute and then it's gone because it's replaced by
13:49
Speaker 3: something else really quickly. But if you invest a little
13:51
Speaker 3: extra time and energy in getting really well optimized show notes,
13:54
Speaker 3: and you know, you actually do the interlinking on your
13:57
Speaker 3: website and make it a real part of the web
13:59
Speaker 3: of content that you're creating, that can have really long-term
14:02
Speaker 3: effects on how visible you are to search engines and
14:06
Speaker 3: to people looking for information and even the LLMs that
14:09
Speaker 3: are now guiding people to different sources. So the short
14:15
Speaker 3: version of all of that is, yes, there's lots of
14:17
Speaker 3: ways to make these really, really valuable, but they all
14:19
Speaker 3: take some diligent, ongoing work on a consistent basis. It's
14:23
Speaker 3: not a set it and forget it type of thing. Absolutely.
14:26
Speaker 1: Because everything's ever-changing. Exactly. And someone has to... keep up
14:31
Speaker 1: with all of this and sometimes having someone inside in
14:34
Speaker 1: your own office to sit there and figure this out,
14:37
Speaker 1: it's just not as effective as it is to probably
14:39
Speaker 1: work with a professional. This is all they do. Now, Megan,
14:43
Speaker 1: if listeners remember only one thing from today's conversation, what
14:46
Speaker 1: do you hope that message is?
14:49
Speaker 3: I hope that it's, you remember that a podcast is
14:51
Speaker 3: not really a podcast for a business owner. A podcast
14:54
Speaker 3: is a tool that you can design to do specific
14:57
Speaker 3: things within your own business. And it doesn't have to
14:59
Speaker 3: follow any particular rules and it doesn't have to look
15:01
Speaker 3: any particular way. You're the boss of it and you
15:03
Speaker 3: can make it do what you want. So I think
15:05
Speaker 3: I'd like everyone to leave with the freedom to be like,
15:07
Speaker 3: I would like a podcast that does this, even though
15:09
Speaker 3: it's not what all the other podcasts sound like, because
15:11
Speaker 3: that's valuable to me and to my business and go
15:13
Speaker 3: ahead and do it with full permission.
15:16
Speaker 1: Good advice. Where can our audience connect with you and
15:18
Speaker 1: learn more about your work and continue this conversation?
15:21
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think the best place to kind of get
15:23
Speaker 3: all of our information and all of our resources is
15:24
Speaker 3: at OneStoneCreative.net. That's O-N-E Stone Creative dot net. There you'll
15:29
Speaker 3: find you'll find my podcast. You'll find information about our
15:31
Speaker 3: services and links to book a call with me if
15:33
Speaker 3: you'd like to chat directly and to LinkedIn, where is
15:36
Speaker 3: that is the only social media platform I currently use.
15:38
Speaker 3: So if you want to hang out, let's do it there.
15:39
Speaker 1: Megan, thank you so much for joining us. We really
15:42
Speaker 1: appreciate your time and the value you've shared.
15:45
Speaker 3: Oh, it's been a pleasure. Thank you so much for
15:46
Speaker 3: having me.
15:47
Speaker 1: You're welcome. Thanks, everyone, for listening. Did this episode inspire you?
15:51
Speaker 1: Make sure you share it with someone who needs it.
15:53
Speaker 1: And don't forget to follow the Globalizer podcast for more
15:55
Speaker 1: conversations that make an impact. Till the next time.