Thinking of Podcasting? What You MUST Consider First

Hello and welcome to the show. Making today's recording in the living room and the kids at home. So I expect to have some interruptions in the background. Now the goal of the podcast is free business education. So please share, promote and talk about the show so that people living in Nigeria and abroad can benefit from the questions that we tackle. And if you have sales and marketing questions, you can call, you can SMS, or you can WhatsApp on 080 64662140.

The country code is +234. Now, today on the show, we are not going to have a very structured discussion of anything because I had a discussion with a listener of the podcast recently. Let's just call her Spicy to protect her identity. And no, I didn't come up with that name. She came up with the name herself. Spicy is involved in a couple of businesses. Sorry, one moment. Let me go and settle the rascals. OK, Sorry about that.

The munchkins are just running around like, you know, children do. So I think what will happen is maybe when we're moving from this place, hopefully by then and have a bit more money, maybe I can move into one of those six bedroom places and then convert 1 part of the house exclusively to a recording space and then we should stop with all these interruptions. So as I was saying now I had a conversation with Spicy and spicy is involved in a couple of businesses.

There is the skin care and beauty thing that she runs. Then there's the thing that she does with her husband where it's like some local foods and local spices. So you know how those of us in a certain part of the country, you know, Benway State, well, although she's from Niger, but I said Niger, you know, all join like we are together, all of us are together. Although there's some people who would say what's the connection?

I mean, Nigel States and Benway State, what's the connection? Basha by force I've Co opted all of you. We're all brothers. Benway state, Plateau State, Niger, Kaduna, you know, Terabah, NASA, as far as I'm concerned, all of us, we're all brothers and sisters. So you know how in all part of the world now we can have some kind exotic spices and foods and things like that. So that's the second business that they're involved in.

So the family is essentially running two businesses. But then she likes writing, she likes writing fiction, she likes writing a whole bunch of stuff. And of course, as it happens with people who grew up artistic because I was one of those kids growing up in Abuja, you know, military era. So me and my brother, we used to draw comics, what else? You know, some guys around used to be into that whole, you know, music thing.

But, you know, it was a different time. You know, like, nowadays, you know, people think about children's artistic talent, and you want everything to flourish and things like that. But some of us grew up in a different era. So you had some of these talents, and they were not entirely nurtured. And I can't blame our parents anyway because to be honest, if we were serious, would have just continued writing, rapping, singing or doing whatever it is that you wanted to do.

Because that's the only way that people like, am I, you know, could have come out anyway. Am I? Who else before MI junior, I'm pretty before junior, I'm pretty. Who else? And then some of you are going to have to do some research because I'm sure even MI some people listening to this podcast don't know MI Mr. Incredible MI Abaga then junior. I'm pretty I mean, that's that's really old school, old school Nigeria hip hop and it's your assignment for you.

So how did I even get here? So I was just saying that, yeah. So she likes to write fiction. Some of our people's, you know, also write fiction. But after a after a while, you know, people stop. So the reason why she reached out to me is because she wants to know what's up. How can you start a podcast? And particularly she wants to start a podcast that is around sharing her experiences in writing and also sharing about the business aspect of writing because she rightly recognizes that writing a book is one thing, but selling a book is another thing altogether.

Let me repeat for those of you who like to write, writing a book is one thing. Selling a book is another thing altogether. You can be writing, but you if you are not selling, then you are not making any money. So that's what she wants the podcast to be about. Now, the reason why I agreed to have the conversation with her was because I think there are lots of people who want to start podcasts but are starting podcasts prematurely because a podcast requires a lot of investment of time and thought and effort.

I'm not going to mention the money because there are some of us who podcast on the cheap. And I recommend that you can start your podcast cheaply or affordably. Because for me, I have been podcasting over the last five years from every single phone I've used, whether it's a Nokia or whether it's a Xiaomi or whether it's a Samsung or whether it's an Acer or whether it's whatever. I have done everything exclusively through mobile phones and not through any paid service.

So it can be done. But for some reason, some people insist that they must spend money. One particular person in particular, this one breaks my heart because she went to go and buy 3M worth of equipment today. She still hasn't started. The thing makes me sad. But anyway, my wife says it's not my business that I'm only beefing these people like that because I don't have three M to waste on recording equipment anyway, where was I?

So I wanted to be sure that look, if you're going to start a podcast, you need to be thinking about a couple of things correctly before you begin because there's no point in not taking stock to see whether this is worth the trouble. And then you now start and then after a while you now fade away because people make noise about there are millions and millions and millions of podcasts, you know, correct. Yes, there are millions of podcasts, but unfortunately I

can't remember if it's 80% or 90% of the podcasts that are out there are dead. So somebody will say that podcasting on Africa is on the rise, hundreds of thousands. But if you go and check it, you will see that is it less than 70% of people even make it to 10 episodes. So the every person will start episode 1, episode 2 by trying to get to episode 10. They will say, oh boy, I beg man, this stress. And then they fade. It's called pod fade.

Don't fade. They won't do anything again. So don't be deceived. The podcasting is on the rise in Africa. This is that that that that I can have a podcast too. This is, I forget it, 90 percent, 80% of those podcasts, a lot of them are dead. Episode 10, they're tired, they collapse and they give way. Now the reason why people collapse and the pod fade and they give way and they say or more off to the next one is because a lot of people are starting podcasts who don't need to even be starting a podcast in the 1st place.

You need to have a compelling reason. So when I'm talking to people about making podcasts, the first thing that I tell you is that look, let's be clear about this thing. You don't want to make some money. You want to make some rally or you're an evangelist. I don't know an evangelist like preaching the gospel. But you know how OK, like clearly I'm OK, yes, I'm part evangelist because I'm giving the good news for free.

Now this is how you can increase your business using some simple sales techniques, some simple conversational techniques is how you increase your business. So yes, I'm being an evangelist, but I also expect to make some money. Some of the conversations that I'm having with you people eventually turn into paid coaching engagements, like the client that I have in Benin currently and the very first person who hit me up on the show who, well, we didn't end up working together because to be honest, I have some ethical concerns because he was in the adult space, if you can put it that way.

He was selling erectile dysfunction. Yeah. Erectile dysfunction medicine. I mean, you've been listening to the podcast for a while. You remember when I was talking about him. So that's a separate. That's a separate issue. But what I'm just trying to say is that for me, it's clear the reason why I'm still podcasting after five years is because this is a lead generation machine. And that's the reason why I also have the radio show and that's the reason why I will get the TV

show. I'm not being a missionary here. I'm trying to make some money. I need to make some cold hard cash so that I can move into a six bedroom place and then convert 1 place into a studio so that I'm not recording my recording. And then, you know, children are just running up and down or my wife is saying get out. I need to use this room. So where was I? Now, before you start the podcast, you also have to be very clear, why am I starting this podcast?

Is there some good news that I'm trying to preach and I don't care about the money, or is it money I'm running after? Maybe there are other reasons, but for now, those are the only two reasons I can think of. So in the beginning, I was trying to figure out very clearly who are you? And that's one of the reasons why I was having this conversation with Margaret. Before we start, who are you? Are you trying to make some money off of this?

Or I just trying to spread some gospel, trying to spread some good news just because of the love of mankind or the love of humankind. And one of the reasons why I told her I don't think you're ready for a podcast yet was because there I couldn't get that clear purpose of what it is that she's trying to do. There are some people who say I'm just doing this out of the goodness of my heart. But then by the time you get to episode 10, after all the work that is involved, you'll be like, hi, this is the second job.

I'm tired. And then you stop because a lot goes into these things. Now, for people like me who are brave enough and there are not too many of us to just whip out the phone, make a recording, don't edit, just upload like that. For people like us, yeah, recording is, is is a lot easier if I talk for 30 minutes and then I take 5 minutes to come up with a podcast and title, 5-10 minutes to come up with a title. And then the Internet is bad and it takes me 15 minutes.

You can see that it takes me maybe worst case scenario, one hour every day to get a podcast episode uploaded. Now for those people who want the video with the proper lighting, with the proper background, the proper everything, with the proper microphones, you now record it. You now watch it back. You now edit it. Remove all the arms and the ARS and the cuffs and the this and edit this and edit that. Now, for people who go through on that stress, you will find that to put one hour's worth of footage on the podcast on YouTube, you'll find that it could take as much as six or seven hours just to get one episode done.

You can see why most people now fade after 10 episodes. If this is something you think you're doing out of the goodness of your heart, but then you're investing 6-7 hours getting every single episode out. I mean, how much of your heart do you have to give? Let's just be honest, that 10 episodes, that's really like 7080 episodes maybe. Sorry, I say 80 episodes, 8100 hours of time that's put into that thing. And for most people, they look at it like, man, that's wasted effort.

So at least those of us who want to get money out of it, you know, we're plodding along. We're thinking, we're strategizing and we're trying to see how this thing can yield some cold hard cash at the end of, you know, next year, 2 years, whatever. There's something to keep us going. You need to be clear what are your motives for starting a podcast before you get in? If you do not have a clear motive, if you can't give me a clear motive master to use, do not start the podcast.

There's no point in starting waffling and then giving up. Just be clear what you're trying to achieve. Start and let's get going. So the assignments that I now give her was look, just go and have a hard think. Why do you want to start a podcast? You need a compelling reason. Then if you're going to start a podcast, The good thing is based on what you have said, the the basic outline of the podcast is now clear because she wants to share her experiences with writing because lots of writers have given up.

Then she also wants to share the business aspects of writing. Then some of the people that she admires are writers who have had their works turned into movies. So that was my assignment #1 where I figured out why do you want to do this thing #2 you need to be doing lots of research about the business aspects of writing. Since you are making a podcast where you share your experiences, That is the substance of your podcast.

You now mic up every single week and you're talking about, hello, this is me. I'm a spicy, I'm a writer. I've noticed that there's a problem in Nigeria. Lots of creators are giving up precisely because they do not know the business aspect of XYZ. Come Along with Me, my podcast series where I explore the business aspect of writing so that over time we can build writers in Nigeria who go on and have books published that become movies such as Harry Potter.

Sorry, no Harry Potter. What's her name? JK Rowling, Abby, JK Rowling, Chimamanda Adichie, Tom Clancy, Stephen King, you know, blah, blah, blah. That will be episode 1 bound the intro People listen, they know what you're about. They know you're not pretending to be some big shot author, but they're along with you for the journey. And then Step 2, episode 2 will be this is what I have learned so far in my journey in record and then on and on and on.

So your podcast is going to take one of those sharing experiences, exploring diary formats, you know, sort of similar to what it is that I'm doing. So that's the good news based on the things that we spoke about the kernel, the the fleshing out of our podcast, you know, is becoming clear. And now told her to go and do a bit of research. First of all, she also needs to go and do the research on the authors who publish and whose works have been able to be turned into movies.

Because like she rightly recognized, I also told her that writing the book is the easy part, selling the book is the hard part. There are lots of people who have mad talent, but you will never know because they could not get their thing sold. A very popular example of this is the artist. What's his name? The Impressionist painter. This guy with the ear, what's his name? Now listen, I just skip my mind. This is a French Impressionist painter who got his ear chopped off.

OK, I can't remember his name anyway, but he's a French Impressionist painter now. He's a very popular painter now. His works are selling and reselling for millions and millions of dollars. But while the guy was alive, my guy died, broke, broke herself. It was, I think is it his sister and some executors of his estates that were able to sell his stuff. So he did what he thought was the hard part, which is making the art.

But was not until he died that the executors, his younger sister, Abby's older sister, any whichever of his sisters were not able to do the hard work of selling the thing. Creating your art, I'm not saying is rubbish or creating your art is, yes, it's hard work that goes into it, but is the easy part. The hard part is actually is selling your art. Going into the booth and recording your music is the easy part. Selling your music is the hard part.

Lots of young boys, lots of tea boys running around, you know, trying to be rap artists and things like that. And, you know, my voice is always the same. Like, OK, yeah, maybe you can spit some bars, but OK, yes, you know, you know, I mean, yeah, you can spit some bars, but you need to work on your, you know, work on your flow, work on your delivery, work on your cadence. There's some things you need to work on. But then when you're done,

studio time is the easy bit. Selling the music, distributing the music is the hard bit. But nobody wants to pay attention to that. And so you have people going into the studio and, you know, they think they're going to be the next Kendrick Lamar or something like that. Like, because of how? Because your flows are tight, you need more than tight flows to blow. Selling, marketing, distribution. That's the name of the thing anyway.

So my assignment is spicy was this. Let's look at Nigeria now, who are the artists that have written stuff that have later on turned into movies? So I called Smart Money Woman because that book has been turned into a movie and it has been turned into a series that are on Netflix. So you can watch it Smart Money Woman. And I think the lady's name is Arisha Ogu or something like that. So forgive me if I'm pronouncing her name wrong.

I mean, it's obvious now that I don't know too many tribes in Nigeria. So there are lots of names that are mispronounced. So Arisha Ugu, I think Smart Money Woman want to check out the stuff. So I said, look, we need to research Smart Money Woman. Now, I suspect that the reason why Smart Money Woman was able to be turned into a movie was because Irisha Ugu already had the platform before she wrote this thing. Now Popsy, if I remember correctly, I think is involved in capital markets.

She already was writing on money matters and already had like a podcast. So I know podcast a what do you call this thing before podcast blog, A blog on, you know, female empowerment and finance and those sorts of things. So and I think some mailing list. So she had a platform first so that when the book came along there was an Ave. through which to sell the books. She really had a relationship with people on her blog and people on her mailing list and everything so that when she wrote the book she could now say community.

My fellow sisters on the path of female empowerment, I have written the book. If you want to support your sister, come and buy one copy. You can buy it here. You can buy it here. It cost 7 K per copy. So Irisha, I suspect I haven't spoken with her and I haven't done this as a study, but you know how you'd be seeing some moves that some people are making And you know, I've been seeing I've been seeing the moves. I suspect it was through her platform that she was able to sell the book.

Now there's some people that I meet who beef her and that one is normal. Some people say I was there, that the book is not everyone is not everyone meeting like no substance, no whatever. And you can continue to beef. But most important thing is she wrote the book. She sold the book. Not only did she sell the book thing is now on Netflix. Not only did they do the film from film, they now did series on top. So beef all you want you know,

but she did it and please by the way, this whole beefing thing doesn't help was one thing I didn't like when I was a wedding photographer. Too much beef you say I don't even see was there. So the guy can't even take good picture. That is just packaging A packaging they use. He's just deceiving brides. That was the unnecessary before. OK, yes, you're a better photographer from than him, but he's the one that knows how to connect with Bryce and he's making all the money.

What are you beefing for? Is the is the beef helping you? You Then you're beefing. The guy is out there killing it is making money. So this beefing thing doesn't help. So instead of saying Irisha, she can't write, is light, no fluff, no real finance there. She's never a finance expert. Just look at her or if you have access to her, go and hang out with her and try and figure out what she's doing as making her ministry moving.

Then you too take that knowledge and move your ministry forward. This beef, Oh yeah, it's not helping anybody. So I told her one research Irisha. Google. If I'm pronouncing the name wrong, please. Yeah, correct me later. Send me a message, let me know. Yes, so research smart money woman. I also told her to research the Harry Potter woman. I think that's one that is JK Rowling, Abby. Oh, I'm not calling the name of the former president of Ghana because Ghana had one Rowling as a president.

So JK Rowling as Harry Potter. They also told to go and research to my mother Adichie, because Shimamanda's Adice's books, I think one has been connected, has been converted to a film. I think 1. I haven't watched it. Then also talk about Tom Clancy. Tom Clancy? That's old, you know, seventies, 80s, yeah, seventies, 80s, but lots of spy stuff that have been converted into movies. I think Tom Cruise. I think Tom Cruise has acted in one of those Tom Clancy movies.

Then Stephen King with the horror thing. So I told her, go do some research, look at all these people and start trying to see what are the common threads, How were they able to write these books? How were they able to sell these books? And then how were they able to get these things converted into movies? So I suspect that you will find the importance of a platform in some of them. But either way, there's some lots of important lessons to learn here.

So my message to her was this is all the homework we have to do. Why do you want to start the podcast? Learn from all these other people, see, kind of discover the frameworks that you need to hit. But bottom line is all this hard work of the research and the thinking, this is the important stuff that you have to do before you start the podcast. Because as hard as recording the podcast is, actually it is the conceptualization, the thinking,

the strategy behind the podcast that is the real hard stuff. If your motives are wrong and if your thesis is wrong, your podcast will fail, either because you're tired or because people don't want to hear what it is that you have to say. I just finished having a conversation with what's his name now, Jeffrey. Jeffrey. I've forgotten the surname. I'm real sorry, should I have written it down? Jeffrey any Jeffrey's in Abuja and he's a web app developer, UX

developer, UX and UI developer. We just had a conversation about a few things. So shout out to Jeffrey for listening to the podcast and for other people who are in his situation. You know, you're an UI, you're an UX and you listen to the show. So shout out to you guys even though I abuse you people from, you know, from time to time. Thanks for still listening to the podcast and not fading away. So OK, I'm lost. Where did I, how did Jeffrey enter into this matter now?

Anyway, I can't remember how Jeffrey entered into the matter. So shout out to Jeffrey. But anyway, I'm just saying that yes, so Jeffrey, so how Jeffrey entered this matter is this Jeffrey said that my podcast is one of the real estate podcasts in Nigeria. He said one of the few real, that he's saying things that make sense. Some other people have told me that, you know, mine is practical and that's the reason why they listen to my own podcast over other sales podcasts or other business podcasts out there.

So you can see that because I did my, I had my conceptualization right, my core thesis was right, that when it comes to business content, we have very little that is written for, I say written that is being created for a Nigerian audience, taking global best practices, whether in sales and marketing or whatever, and distilling it to a Nigerian audience. So we have Nigerian people making podcasts, but because they want to make things that are, you know, professional or world class, they're making it as if you are talking to people in North America.

And unfortunately, you know, we're not there yet. We're not there yet that we have such a cosmopolitan audience that that's the kind of thing that they listen to. So we need to be making lots of these things, you know, for the Nigerian market, speaking in Nigerian voice, you know, very conscious of the fact that we are talking to our own people. So that was my thesis when I started the podcast. The thing is, I could have been wrong.

And if I was wrong, then the podcast would have never taken off. But apparently, yeah, I was right. And so people have keyed in. So this is some of the hard work that goes on before you start the podcast. What are your motives? Why are you getting in? What is the main reason? What is going to sustain you? You lock no one down. And the next thing is, what's the important thing itself? What is it that I'm going to say? Do people even want to hear the thing that we're going to say?

Who are we going to be talking to? That's the hard thing. So that was my assignment to her. Figure out your motives. Do all these research. The research is going to give you greater insight into what it is you're going to say, who you're going to talk to. And while you're doing this, you might be able to figure out, you have to figure out all these things, you know, is there a market? Do people even want to hear what I have to say?

So I'm going to do the homework. And I'm glad that she's doing the homework and I'm glad that she was able to allow me to shoot straight. And so if I'm having a conversation with you, just like Jeffrey who called up later on, I'm going to shoot straight Novak's. It's just that I have limited time apart from making the podcast and my personal issues, I'm trying to build a business here. So I have paid client work to attend to.

So if we're talking, I'm just budgeting like 15, maybe 30 minutes Max, so I have to get quickly straight to the point. So I might not spend too much time massaging your ego. So just know that when I shoot straight to the point, I'm not trying to shoot you down. I'm not trying to say what you're doing is rubbish. I just want to deliver the most value I can in the small amount of time that we have so I can get onto my paid client work and get onto my other responsibilities.

But summary, for those of you like Spicy who are thinking of starting a podcast, they actually are some of you who should not be starting a podcast. You're better off putting your time and your energy into other things that will move your business forward. But if you decide that you're going to have a podcast, we need to be able to figure out why are you starting this thing? If you're missionary and you're doing it out of the goodness of your heart, then expect the goodness of your hearts to carry you for a very, very, very long time because it takes a while for a podcast to gain traction and to gain an audience.

If you're doing this thing because you want to make money, oh, very good, welcome aboard. The goal of making money will sustain you for a long time. And the goal of optimizing the podcast and producing the podcast and all of that will be to see how we can get this thing to be a money making machine as quickly as possible. So we need to be clear on the motive. After working on the motive, we need to be sure that we have something that is worth saying and that there are people in the market who are willing, ready and open to hearing what it is that you have to say.

So those are the big things that we have to finish up or rather decide. So this is 30 minutes. Let me just wrap it up. So that's all for today folks. If you have got any sales or marketing questions, then call me SMS me on WhatsApp me on 08064662140. The country code is +234. Thank you very much for your time and attention. I'll catch you guys at the next episode.