Monetizing a Podcast (WITHOUT SPONSORS) | Ft. Dan Lok Advice

Now, Travis, when you get into podcasting, because I do see some people, they get into podcasting and they think, Oh, I can, we, we, we, I can make an income very, very quickly to replace my job. What, what was your experience? How long did it take for you to actually generate a little bit enough money to feel like, okay, I've got something here. Yeah. The common misconception is exactly what you just said is like, I'm going to build the show and I'm going to hit launch. I'm going to get my million downloads and I'll just sit on the beach and collect sponsorship, paychecks, you know what I mean? Obviously that's not how it went for me. And that's not how it goes for anybody anymore. And honestly, like back in the day, 2010, 2011, it was literally the wild West back there. So you just got in early enough, you know, when there's only 700 other podcasts and there's 5 million podcast listeners, and that goes up to 25 million podcast listeners. You can ride that, ride that wave, but not anymore. And so that was the problem for me is that no shade at all to the mentors that I had along the way. It was just the fact that the mentors that I was, that I was getting advice from, they had built their shows back in 2012, 2013. So when I started my show in 2017, it was just a different landscape. No, I did all the things that they told me to do, but the numbers didn't follow. What, what, what do you think has changed from your opinion? Oh, it's really the saturation piece that's changed significantly and not even in a bad way, Dan, like a lot of people will use that as an excuse to not start a podcast. It's like, well, it's too saturated. Yeah, sure. But if that's your excuse, then you're never going to do anything. You know what I mean? Like everything's saturated. There's 35 million YouTube channels. There's 500 million blogs, you know, like there's like a half a million books that come out every single year, but you don't see people being like, oh, you know, I'm not going to write a book because there's too many of them, you know, but for some reason people use that as an excuse for not podcasting when there's only 1 million podcasts, so like 1 35th of YouTube channels, 1 500 of blogs, you know what I mean? So you can't use that as an excuse. That is the biggest thing that changed in the industry is just the fact that that's why people like, you know, the Joe Rogans of the world have done so well in the space is like, yes, he's an interesting person. Yes, he's an intriguing character. And yes, he had access to high level guests. He was able to bring on the show, but he started at the right time. You've got to always mix in a little bit of luck and a little bit of timing into the equation. And he hit it right at that point when there just wasn't a lot of other podcasts to choose from at the time. And so when podcast listening became more readily available to people, iPhone and patients devices, you know, people just started looking for those shows that were already in the top charts when there was only, you know, 100,000 listeners or whatever. So those, those shows were able just to continue just to ride that wave up to the top. And now, you know, 100 plus downloads every single month show. So that's how that has to be one of the biggest things that changes. It's, it's saturated. So you have to grow it purposefully. It's not going to happen on accident. You can't just bump up into the top charts or get new and noteworthy and then just have this big, you know, incoming downfall or a deluge of downloads. You know what I mean? Like it was just not going to happen anymore. You have to be intentional and you have to purposeful and you have to treat it like an actual business. Yeah. And wouldn't you say also I think consistency that this is not something that, Oh, I did 10 episodes. It didn't kind of go anywhere. And I'll try my best. No one wants to be on my show. Like, Oh, this is dusty. This doesn't work like that kind of thing. Actually, let me ask a different question. How many shows did you do until you hit that? Maybe the 1 million down or a hundred. Yeah. Listen to Travis. It's not four. It's not 40. It's not 100. It's 400. Yeah. People have a, such a, a low tolerance for the obstacles. It's such a low tolerance for the pain that those obstacles bring, because it feels bad, right? When you're creating this, I've been doing three episodes a week since I started. So when you're creating that much content and you're putting that much effort into something and it's not having any sort of return, it starts to really, really start to just irritate and, and make you feel bad about yourself. Yeah, sure. Yeah. It just, it nurtures those self-doubt that voice inside your head. That's telling you you're not good enough. It's just being like, yeah, you were right. You aren't good enough. You've been doing this for seven months, but then when you really look at it in the grand scheme of things, seven months is not a long time to do anything at all. Like there's no name of field that you can get to the top of in seven months. That's just not, it's, it's a completely unrealistic expectation of, of what's going to come to you, especially if you've never done anything prior to that, that would set you up in a different way to be able to take advantage of that time. You know what I mean? So people just come to the table with completely unrealistic expectations. And when you come up against that first obstacle, it's just like, Oh man, I wasn't expecting this to be difficult. It goes back to the original question. So how long it took you to actually generate some income from the podcast, just to set that expectation for any, any one of my listeners who wanted to follow the podcast? Yeah. So this was one of the things that I think I actually did pretty well was when I realized that the downloads weren't coming because I hit the top charts first week of launch. I did all the things I had an amazing launch, all the things I was supposed to do, but the downloads didn't follow. And so at that point I had a decision basically like either quit or figure out a different way to make this work. And so that's kind of what I teach people. Dan's called credibility first method, instead of worrying about downloads coming in to allow you to go get credible guests, to allow you to go do these other things and then get more downloads for me. It was like, okay, if I'm going to make my content good, I'm going to start at the very beginning, going for the best guests that I could possibly get a hold of. And so what I ended up doing is I ended up monetizing my show when I had less than 200 downloads an episode. Oh, wow. And, uh, but it was just through listening to my audience and creating something that I knew would be valuable for the audience that I had created. So I am a back cause of the ask method. It's basically just like you build an audience around a certain topic in which, and then you build a community within that audience and you get to know that audience's needs and desires. And at the time I had zero on my business experience at all. I was just a door to door sales guy that was trying to get into this world. So I was just creating content and it was called building networks. So I talked about networking relationships and I was just like, I want to help people understand the importance of having good people in your life because I think it's a super valuable skill set to have. And then I listened to that audience and had literally, and I did one-on-one phone calls, three one-on-one phone calls for anybody in my audience that knew it. And I got to know my audience in a very intimate level, ask them questions like, Hey, what's an obstacle when it comes to networking? What's an obstacle they're coming up against that I can create more content around and now keep note those things. And then I released my first ever quote unquote mastermind, um, six months into my show. So to answer your question about six months into my show that, that I monetized for the first time. But when I say I monetized, I mean, I, it was like a three month thing that I charged, like, I don't know, 600 bucks or something like that. It was a watch. It was a total watch. I did not make any money on it at all. It was just like the first offer. Yeah. And the first time I remember this guy, uh, the first dollar I ever made in my life, online business, I'll never forget it because it was probably the most important dollar, right? It was basically a guy who had been a fan of the show and I was on a phone call with them and I told him that I was thinking about releasing a course on networking. It was going to be 300 bucks. And by the time we hung up the phone, I looked, I got a notification. I pulled it up and he had PayPal'd me the 300 bucks and said, let me know when it comes out. And that was the first dollar I ever made. I was like, wow, this guy believes that much in what I do and trusts me that much to deliver on a piece of course material that hasn't even begun to exist. I literally just told you an idea and you paid me for that. And that by itself is like, wow, this is, there's something to this. You know what I mean? And it ended up being the mastermind. He joined the mastermind. I remember calling him up and saying, Hey, sorry, I mislead you. I'll give you your money back. I'm not doing the course. I mean he sent me the difference between the 300 and whatever that price was. But yeah, that was, that was the first, the first dollar I've made on my mind was the power of podcasting to me is the ability, the intimacy that you have with your audience and the ability to create trust on a faster basis than any sort of other kind. I think for anyone that's listening, you don't need to think about, I'm not a podcaster. That's not what I do. I don't have radio experience. I don't know anybody that I can interview or whatever mental hurdles that you might have right now. Challenges is simply not true because I believe anyone needs some kind of platform. Now you could be a podcast, it could be a YouTube channel, it could be Instagram, whatever it might be. We need some kind of platform, right? And podcast, in my opinion, is one of the easiest things to start because video takes more skill. It takes more setup. It takes everything, maybe more of everything. Editing and podcasts. You can get a recorder, you can get a mic, you can get it from Amazon, a little Yeti mic, a little headset, three bucks. Yeah, exactly. You're good to go. It doesn't cost a lot of money. I'll share a quick story with you. This is before podcast. My very first, when I was a copywriter, I'm talking about when I was 20 some years and I had the idea I wanted to get more clients, copywriting clients. I was a young guy, 20 some years old, you know, with an accent, you know, it's tough to get clients, right? So I came up with the idea, this is like way before, what if I interview some of the great copywriters in the world? Okay. And we're talking about like Travis. At the time I was using a like a mini cassette tape recorder. That's how early this was. Okay. And, and I would contact these copywriters. Now I'm talking about back in the days, big names, big names, Joe Vitale, Michael Masterson. What's amazing is I'm this young guy in my one bedroom apartment emailing them, Hey, would you like to be in my product? Right. I had contact, I think 20 some more people, almost all of them said yes, exactly. Wow. Okay. And then I have to know, let's like that. Yeah. Like I just ask, that was it. I had no credibility. I had no audience. I just asked, sure. What I did is I had the phone on my telephone with my landline. I have my tape recorder. I recorded interview like this holding it up to the phone and I want to make sure it's closer to them, not me. Cause it's too loud. Like there's no volume controlled in this disc. Right. I had to help leveling those sound because the mini cassette tape only has so long pause. I need to switch the other side and do it. Right. And I ended up putting together this product. That's why I hear people say, Oh, I don't know anybody. You don't need to know anybody. Yeah. I didn't know anybody. I was just like, you know, like an entrepreneur, young kid, but I asked him and they said yes. And what I did is I, then I pay a friend of mine to interview me. Yeah. And put yourself in the same. Exactly. That's exactly how I did the marketing. Right. I was, I was, I was 20, I mean something like that. And then when I sit down with a client, I would say, Hey, look at this copywriting. All these are great masters. Oh, but they charge, you know, $15,000, $20,000 to write copy. Mine is like 3k, 5k. Oh, okay. That's how I was getting clients.