2492 - What It Takes to Build a Podcast That Grows and Generates Revenue with BackBeat Media's Dave Hamilton

Dave Hamilton, founder and CEO of BackBeat Media, joins Josh Elledge on The Thoughtful Entrepreneur to talk about building a podcast that lasts. BackBeat Media's Dave Hamilton says releasing on a schedule is a podcast's prime directive, and his firm looks for 3,000 to 4,000 downloads per episode. In this episodePlay the fill. Dave's name for owning the moment when imposter syndrome makes you want to hold back. Release consistently. Dave calls it the prime directive, ahead of audio quality and content quality. Be the guest hosts want. Pitch for the host's audience, skip one-word answers and have an arc for each story. Does your audience contact you? That's the question BackBeat Media asks every podcaster before it sells sponsorships for the show. Questions this episode answersWhat does it take to start a podcast today? Dave's answer: first, start recording. Second, don't stop. How do you get booked as a guest on a podcast? Dave says the pitches that work show the guest understands the show and explain why they would be good for the host's audience, not why the audience would be good for them. He can still tell when someone is faking being a fan, even with AI. How do you become a great podcast guest? Never give one-word answers, Dave says, and never answer a yes or no question with only yes or no unless that's clearly what the host wants. Have an arc in mind when you start a story so it lands somewhere. A standout quote“Play the fill. Just own it. You won't regret it. Yes, sometimes you will fall on your face.” Dave Hamilton About Dave HamiltonDave started podcasting in June 2005 with Mac Geek Gab, which he co-hosts and which is now more than 21 years old. He also hosts Gig Gab, a show for musicians, and is part of the podcast Business Brain. LinksBackBeat Media website https://www.backbeatmedia.comDave Hamilton on LinkedIn https://linkedin.com/in/davehamiltonFull article and transcript on podverified.com https://podverified.com/post/2492-building-a-podcast-that-grows-dave-hamilton About The Thoughtful EntrepreneurThe Thoughtful Entrepreneur is a daily podcast where Josh Elledge talks with founders and business leaders about what is working right now. Want to be a guest? Apply at podverified.com/podcast https://podverified.com/podcast. Curious how podcast hosts see you as a guest? Get your free PodVerified Score https://app.podverified.com/start.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Play the fill, just own it. You won't regret it. Yes, sometimes you will fall on your face.

• 0:08Speaker 01

  Welcome to The Thoughtful Entrepreneur, the show where I talk with business owners about what's working for them right now. I'm Josh Yelich. Today, my guest is Dave Hamilton. He runs Backbeat Media, a company that sells sponsorships for podcasts. It's a podcast network. Dave is legendary in the podcasting space, and he's been podcasting himself since 2005. Dave is old school. If you've ever thought about a podcast for your business, or you already have one, this is a good episode for you. Dave explains why showing up every week matters more than perfect sound, what makes a host

• 0:48Speaker 01

  invite a guest back, and a lesson he learned onstage as a drummer that he calls "play the fill." Do you run a business and have a story other owners should learn about? Apply to be a guest here on The Thoughtful Entrepreneur. I'd love to have you at podverified.com. That's podverified.com. Click on Podcast. Now, here's my conversation with Dave.

• 1:19Speaker 01

  With us right now, legendary podcasting pioneer, it's Dave Hamilton. Dave, you are the CEO of Backbeat Media. You have been helping creators and publishers monetize podcasts for 20-plus years. You're the host of Mac Geek Gab, which, Dave, how long have you been podcasting?

• 1:41Speaker 00

  I started podcasting in June of 2005, which makes Mac Geek Gab, and it was Mac Geek Gab was the first show that I did, and we haven't stopped. So that makes that show 21-plus years old. And thanks for having me.

• 1:55Speaker 01

  Yeah. Dave, what, so normally, let me ask you this because it's just tradition before we get into, even though I have so many questions about your podcasting experience. What do you do for fun when you're not at work?

• 2:08Speaker 00

  Um, I mean, I enjoy my work. I know, I know, everybody says that, but I really, I am someone who believes in the concept of lifestyle businesses.

• 2:17Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 2:18Speaker 00

  That be, and I know in the entrepreneurship community, there can go both ways. There's people that love them, people that hate them. Love that. But I really do enjoy my work. I work to live, but, but I know that I'm going to work a lot. And so I enjoy not every aspect of my work, mind you, Josh, but you know, a lot of it. And I, I work on things that I enjoy so that even the unenjoyable aspects have something to them. But I am also a-

• 2:46Speaker 01

  But a hobby, is what I'm looking for.

• 2:48Speaker 00

  Yeah, I'm a drummer too. Although I'm not sure my wife would agree that that's a hobby. It's another job, but, but that is something other than work that I do. And I absolutely enjoy that as well. So.

• 3:01Speaker 01

  Do you perform onstage?

• 3:03Speaker 00

  All the time.

• 3:04Speaker 01

  Really?

• 3:05Speaker 00

  Oh, yeah. Yeah.

• 3:06Speaker 01

  What do you, what are you drumming in front of people?

• 3:09Speaker 00

  So just, we're Saturday night, and I don't know when this will come out, but you know, the days before we recorded this, I just played a Led Zeppelin and Heart tribute in front of about 600 people in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. And I am not one to usually boast, so this is a little atypical, but we crushed it. It went really, really well. And the audience loved it. We loved it. It was great. Yeah.

• 3:34Speaker 01

  Jeez, to do John Bonham, my friend, that's-

• 3:38Speaker 00

  You know, I learned a business lesson on that stage, because as we were walking out, I, you know, like literally two minutes before we took the stage, I was, you know, my bandmates and I were talking, and it's like, you know, some of them were like, wow, you know, there's a lot of people there, and like, we're pretty exposed up there. I'm like, we're super exposed, I said. And then there's me sitting on top of a drum riser, about to go play John Bonham drum parts. And here's the thing, I know that there is someone currently sitting in the audience, like over there, that knows these parts better than me. And so, but the difference between me and them, and this is what I have to put into my head, this isn't egotistical, it's just how I need to frame it. The difference between me and them is that for tonight, they are sitting

• 4:20Speaker 00

  there, and I'm sitting onstage. I've earned it. I've deserved it. It's all fine. Like, and I hope they enjoy it. If they choose not to, because they think they're better than me, they might be better than me. But if that negatively impacts their enjoyment, that's on them. And I hope everybody else there enjoys this, and we got to go out and crush it and own it. And we will. And we did. And, and there was, there was a moment, it's happened several times, but there was a moment early on that really is the business lesson that I, that I will share here. I started feeling timid about a fill. Now, if you know anything about Led Zeppelin and John Bonham, timid is not a word you would use to describe him, nor that band.

• 5:02Speaker 00

  And I realized, I'm like, wait a minute, I can't be timid on this stage at all. Like, I am, I am selling myself short, and I am not delivering what the audience came to see. So anytime I was feeling timid, I would just play some huge bombastic drum fill. And, and there's a business lesson, there's a life lesson for this, but a business lesson too. And, and it's one that I've compartmentalized for myself as "play the fill, Dave." But it's, you know, it's when you are feeling timid, it's probably some version of imposter syndrome, or whatever, like, you know, but that's your thing. But whatever scenario you're in, you deserve to be there. You've created the opportunity that got you there. Doesn't mean you're the only

• 5:46Speaker 00

  person that could be in that scenario. It doesn't mean you're necessarily the best person. You are the person at that moment. Play the fill. Just own it. You won't regret it. Yes, sometimes you will fall on your face. That's fine. You'll learn. We call mistakes tuition in my world. And we call that, actually, we have a podcast called Business Brain. That's, that's young. It's only 12 years old. And so, but that, but one of our mantras there is that our mistakes are our tuition. And one mistake you can make over and over again is not doing the thing. So do the thing. Play the fill.

• 6:18Speaker 01

  You know, that is, that is quite aspirational for a would-be podcaster. Would you mind just talking about, what does it take, do you think, for someone to podcast today?

• 6:34Speaker 00

  First, start recording. Second, don't stop. It's very easy to, in the early days, I don't know if we use the term "pod fading" anymore, but in the early days, we talked about people that started and stopped because they found it wasn't their thing. And, and we called those the "pod faders," right? And it wasn't, there was no shame in this. It was just, you know, you realize, like, this is a lot of work. And the most important thing for any podcast, and I will call this the "prime directive," is that you must release consistently. That's the most important thing. And it's the only important thing. You'll notice I didn't talk about audio quality. That's super important. That's, that's the number two thing. You'll

• 7:19Speaker 00

  notice that thus far, I haven't talked about content quality. That's important. That's the number three thing. But neither of those second or third things are important if you're not releasing consistently, because you won't retain an audience, no matter how good your audio or your content is. If you're not releasing consistently, the world runs on a schedule. If Timmy listens to your show at noon on Tuesdays, well, if you haven't released a show, Timmy's going to listen to somebody else at noon on Tuesday.

• 7:48Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 7:48Speaker 00

  That's just how it is.

• 7:50Speaker 01

  You know, in some ways too, your earlier advice of "just play the fill" is applicable here as well, because podcasters who do the thing and are consistent at it, generally don't have too big of a problem of getting back up on the bike and doing it as long as too long a time doesn't go by. But it's like this with anything that we have to do in business. We feel insecure. You know, there's a degree of vulnerability, like you getting out onstage, you getting behind a microphone. I remember, Dave, you know, I had, before I started podcasting, like officially podcasting, I was taking my radio segments and, you know, converting them

• 8:28Speaker 01

  into a podcast back in 2008, magically found my way onto Apple iTunes at the time. But I remember when I started my first episode of The Savings Angel Show, and I want to say, maybe this is around 2014 or thereabouts, I was so afraid. I don't, you know, I was afraid of being judged. You know, I was putting it out there. You know, and people were just going to think I was some dummy, or fake, or whatever, right? You know, just from doing that. And then I heard Pat Flynn, another OG in the podcast space, I listened to one of his first five episodes, just for kicks. Like, okay, let me see what he was like when he started. And I

• 9:10Speaker 01

  recommend anyone, like, if you want to do YouTube stuff, go look at your favorite YouTubers, go look at their early stuff, and it's going to make you feel so good. So when I was listening to one of Pat's early episodes, I literally heard him talking, and then he goes-

• 9:29Speaker 01

  And then he restarts it and he didn't edit it out.

• 9:32Speaker 00

  Oh, I love that.

• 9:33Speaker 01

  And that was the moment I said, listen, you know, we're all the same there. Uh, you know, nobody was born good at this. You do the thing, Arthur's open hour, you do the thing. You have the power.

• 9:47Speaker 00

  You, yes, and you just gotta keep doing it and you, you strive for perfection, at least I do. I, but I know that the beauty of it is that perfection is unattainable. You might have different, your definition of perfection might change, right? You know, you, you might attain, like you might get somewhere, but you're never gonna get it's, they can't all be perfect. You will have segments that you think, ah, it couldn't have gone any better. Love that. That's great. You will have episodes where you feel that couldn't have gone any better. And that's great, but the next episode's not gonna be as good as that one. It's just how it works and, and this is true of any kind of performance.

• 10:28Speaker 00

  You know, you walk on stage, be it literally a stage or your podcasting stage. It's a performance no matter what, and you get to find out in the first few moments, which version of me is showing up. I just, I do a show for musicians too called Gig Gab. And I was interviewing a friend of mine who I've played music with here in New Hampshire, and he has gone on to be one of the principals in The Outsiders on Broadway. So performing at a very high level. And yeah, which is fricking amazing. Like I, I love it for him. He works extremely hard. It's no surprise. He has made it to Broadway. He's super talented.

• 11:09Speaker 00

  And then also he is a student of his craft, but he knows that you've gotta be, you know, they're doing eight shows a week on Broadway. You are never going to expect to be a hundred percent of you eight times in a week, let alone a thousand times over the two years that he's been doing the show. And so you need to know, you need to know that, okay, some days it's gonna be 60% me. And how do I navigate through a show when I realize in my head that I am onstage in front of 1,100 people on Broadway who love this musical and came to see it?

• 11:49Speaker 00

  How do I get out of my head by accepting I know who 60% me is? And I know how to navigate this show with the tools that 60% me brings with him. And that's, that's only something you can learn by experience. And, and so you have to do it and fail and learn and all of those wonderful things.

• 12:11Speaker 01

  And there certainly is a little bit of spotlight effect in there. For example, you playing drums probably know every little like, ah, it's a little late coming into that. Honestly, 99% of the crowd doesn't know and probably close to a hundred percent don't care.

• 12:29Speaker 00

  That's it. Even the 1% that know, they also appreciate many, most of them. There's that one guy, screw that guy, but the rest of them.

• 12:38Speaker 01

  Get out of here, buddy. You got a bad attitude.

• 12:41Speaker 00

  Exactly. That's on you.

• 12:42Speaker 01

  We're here to get the lead out.

• 12:43Speaker 00

  Yes, exactly. Led Zeppelin wasn't perfect live. Very few performers can, can say that they were ever, or that they were always perfect live. And there's beauty in that, in the rough edges. I've got a friend of mine that I play with sometimes and he's like, hey, you just, you don't wanna polish it too much. You wanna leave a little bit of hair on it. Like it's, it's gotta be, there's beauty in those imperfections. And, and it makes it human too. That's live art. When it's not the same every, exactly the same every time, you know, there's, there's a minimum bar you wanna hit depending on what you're doing. And that's fine and, and good, but no, it's never gonna be perfect. You can, I, I, I beat myself up for the things that I didn't get perfectly.

• 13:29Speaker 00

  Boy, howdy, do I. And already like I came off stage glowing after the Zeppelin thing. And now a few days later, I'm like, I guess it's time to watch the video. I know I screwed this one thing up. How bad was it? You know, this, that and the other thing. But that's fine. Like I'm, I'm going to use it to improve, not to beat myself up, even though I'm definitely beating myself up.

• 13:47Speaker 01

  Uh, Dave, I do a lot of work, um, at Pod Verified and, and I work as a fractional chief communications officer, where I am really working with people that have, they have messages that they want to bring to the world. Um, they're hoping to do so collaborating with content creators, including podcasters. Um, and so I'm, you know, I always try to, you know, make sure that they're able to perform, uh, so that they can get the results that they're after. And I'm hoping maybe you could share a few bits of wisdom that you would offer to folks that want to guest on podcasts, how to be a great guest and just how to be successful at it. Uh, I'm sure you're like me, have done a gazillion interviews and so you've seen the good, bad and ugly. Um, trust me when I say it's, it's not a high bar in my opinion.

• 14:32Speaker 01

  I had to, to, to be very competent to get at that 60% level. Um, but would you mind maybe filling in some of those tips that you'd recommend?

• 14:41Speaker 00

  Well, I mean, the first thing is getting yourself booked on the show. Initially, my, the ones that work for me are the emails that make it clear that they understand the show. Now with AI, people can, can fake that slightly better now, but not, it, I, I can still tell immediately whether someone is actually a fan of the show or if they're like, the most recent thing you talked about, and here's this, and it's like, yeah, okay. Uh, but then also sharing why they would be good for my audience, not why my audience would be good for them.

• 15:20Speaker 01

  Right.

• 15:21Speaker 00

  Right? And, and, and, and it's like you said, this is not a high bar. Once you get on the show, be comfortable, fake it until you make it. Uh, never answer one word answers. Do what I'm doing here. Make Josh stop you from talking. Uh, like these are important things. Well, you are there to help the host. Sometimes you're gonna be there to fill space for the host. That, that's part of the gig, right? The other part is to be interesting and, and share anecdotes. And so try and have a, you know, an arc in your head when you, when you start to share something so that it lands somewhere. You won't always, I'm not exactly sure where this one's gonna land.

• 16:01Speaker 00

  But you know, like be conversational, listen, but also be ready to speak. And even if they ask you a yes or no question, never answer yes or no unless you're certain that's all they want from you because it might be some kind of lightning round thing.

• 16:17Speaker 01

  Those clips, by the way, of interviews that go badly where the guest is like, yes. Oh, oh, okay. I mean, now it's also incumbent on us to not ask the yes no questions, which is a trap, which is a trap I've gotten myself into. It's like, oh, well, I stepped in that one, didn't I?

• 16:34Speaker 00

  We all do it. Yeah, we all do it because we're, the goal, when I have a guest on my show, I tell them that they are the guest co-host for that episode. I encourage them to ask me questions. I wanna put us on as equal footing as I can so that they understand that this is a conversation. And that's what I have found is most valuable for my listeners. It's also what I've engineered and of course with podcasting, you know, people that don't like your show don't listen anymore. So it's a self fulfilling prophecy to find what you want and go. So, yeah.

• 17:08Speaker 01

  What does Backbeat Media do? Your website is backbeatmedia.com. Uh, to those who have not been, uh, listening to podcasts for, for decades like I have, you, you may not know the name, but if, if you have, may I was listening to, I say Mac OS Ken when Ken started, oh, I don't know how long ago he started his show, but that, he was one of the first podcasts that I, I listened to every episode for a while.

• 17:35Speaker 00

  Yeah. So Backbeat Media, we, the, the, the running joke, and it's true, is that here at Backbeat Media, we represent the sponsorships of a group of fiercely independent podcasters of which I am one. Uh, and, and like I said, all of that is true. We, podcasters that don't wanna have to deal with booking and scheduling and managing and selling their own sponsorships, work with a company like ours to do that part for them while leaving them completely free to manage and run their show the way they wanna run their show. And we, we've really found our niche with the fiercely independent podcasters. It makes things interesting. It makes this, it creates headaches

• 18:20Speaker 00

  because everybody wants to do something a little bit differently, but that's where the value is. And though generally those fiercely independent podcasters have very loyal audiences. And that's a good thing for sponsors when the fit is right. And we work really hard closely with our shows as well as with our sponsors to make sure that we're putting the right sponsors on the right shows and actually getting the fit right. Cause that's where everybody wins, including the audience.

• 18:44Speaker 01

  Yeah. Uh, Dave, uh, so for our friends that are listening, so first off, like who, who would, should, can, I mean, obviously you have a bunch of shows. Uh, so you can go to backbeatmedia.com just to see all the shows that are already part of your network. And of course, including yours, uh, but, um, like who should be reaching out to, to potentially engage with you?

• 19:07Speaker 00

  If you've got a show, generally speaking, we take shows that are doing, it, it works best when you have an audience already. We certainly work with some podcasters that are developing an audience. Uh, that is not the norm. The norm is somebody with an audience. And you know, we find that three to 4,000 downloads per episode is kind of that, that bar where what we bring to the table is something that's gonna be valuable for you. And, and so that's, that's kind of where that is. But if you think you're the right show for us and you have less than that, reach out. Uh, we, you know, we're, I'm always happy to have a conversation. We all are here.

• 19:49Speaker 00

  Uh, we're a relatively small team, but, uh, but you know, we, we, we love to help podcasters. We can all learn from each other. It's great. So, uh, but it's, if you've got a show uh, that has a loyal audience, then we might be the right place for you. And, and I'll share something I probably shouldn't share, but I will. We ask a question of every podcaster that knocks on our door or every podcaster whose door we knock on. The question is, how does your audience contact you? I am going to give you a secret. We drop, in terms of what we are actually looking to ask, we drop the first word. Uh, for those conversations, we care.

• 20:30Speaker 00

  Does your audience contact you? Because if your audience doesn't find a way to contact you, they are not the loyal audience that we are going to be able to help you monetize.

• 20:40Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 20:41Speaker 00

  Doesn't mean you don't have an audience. It just means, yeah.

• 20:45Speaker 01

  Yeah. Dave, uh, podcasting pioneer, Dave Hamilton, I think that's your official title. CEO of Backbeat Media, uh, host of Mac Geek Gab, uh, which again in our, in your podcast app, to our friend listening to us right now, go search that up. Just go see how many episodes Dave has done over the years. Remarkable. Dave, you're a legend. Thank you so much for sharing your time with us and sharing your insights.

• 21:14Speaker 00

  Josh, thanks for inviting me and thanks for letting me, uh, letting me do this. I really appreciate coming on your show.

• 21:23Speaker 01

  Thanks for listening to The Thoughtful Entrepreneur. If you're new here, welcome. Every episode I talk with business owners or leaders about what's working for them right now. You'll find the full article and transcript and lots of other resources for this episode at podverified.com. There's a ton of free stuff for you there. Now, if you run a business and you have a story other owners should learn from, I'd love for you to apply to be a guest on The Thoughtful Entrepreneur at podverified.com. And if you go on podcasts to grow your business, I'd love for you to get your free Pod Verified score.

• 22:05Speaker 01

  It's like credit karma for podcast casting so you can know exactly the caliber of shows you should be aiming for so you can get your message out to the masses. You can grow your business. You can make the impact you deserve. All of that is free at podverified.com. It shows you how podcast hosts see you and I would love to support you. Now I'm Josh Elledge. Thanks for spending time with us.