Freelancing business is becoming increasingly competitive.
Standing out from the crowd is key.
It’s no longer enough to simply offer excellent services; you need to cultivate a strong personal brand that resonates with your target clients and collaborators.
While many freelancers focus on social media and traditional marketing, a powerful yet often overlooked tool for building authority, expanding your network, and genuinely connecting with your audience is podcasting.
Far more than just a hobby, hosting your own show offers a unique set of benefits that can transform your freelance business and open doors to opportunities you never imagined.
Key Takeaways:
- Hosting a podcast provides a reason to connect with industry leaders
- Podcasting offers a consistent platform for honing your conversation and listening skills.
- Each episode you produce adds to a growing body of work that showcases your expertise and thought leadership.
- Cultivating an engaged podcast audience creates a powerful community that can support your current and future ventures
- Collaboration allows you to cultivate essential leadership skills, empowering you to manage projects and people more effectively.
- Interviewing guests with larger followings provides a strategic way to expose your show to new audiences and grow your own loyal reader base.
Hosting Your Own Show is a Networking Gold Mine
Think about the difference between these two offers, which you’ll make to the rockstar in your space:
- I’d love to sit down and pick your brain for an hour or so.
- You’re invited to be a guest on my show, which has an audience specifically tailored to your industry.
Which of the two is more likely to receive responses from a really busy person?
Obviously it’s number two.
The networking gold mine of having your own podcast is that you have a reason and a value offering to the person you’re reaching out to. You get the added fortune of speaking with the person and providing the conversation to your audience.
A System for Developing Your Conversation and Listening Skills
“If you want to stand out as a leader, a good place to begin is by listening.” – Richard Branson
As the host of a show, you’ll begin to notice more about how you converse with people.
Your audience will begin to provide you with feedback.
Whether it’s negative or positive, it’s all helpful for understanding how you come across in conversation.
Potential Feedback:
- You talk too much
- You don’t listen to your guests
- You’re hilarious
- You ask great questions
- I’d rather listen to a cow chew grass than this show
All of this is constructive because it provides you with an opportunity to learn more about yourself.
The more conscious you are of your conversation style, the more skilled at conversation you will become.
This pays off everywhere.
Especially if you are looking to become a skilled public speaker and orator, podcasting can be a great way to practice and can even lend legitimacy to your public-speaking credentials.
Building a Body of Work
With each show, you’re building on your body of work.
You’ll be speaking to different experts or refining your own audible pitches.
With each show, you’re polishing and developing your expertise in your chosen field. With each show, the body of work grows and becomes more valuable.
Here are a few things you can do with this amazing body of work you’re growing:
- Turn podcasts into full-blown blog posts, complete with show notes and quotes.
- Bring in sponsors to create revenue from your podcasts.
- Cover live events and conferences in new and interesting ways through your podcast interviews.
Your digital business card is going to be as diverse as powerful as you want. The more content you create using your podcast, the more audience you’ll attract.
Utilization of the Greatest Supply Chain in Human History
You are creating media and serving it globally with a limitless supply. This is a power that has never existed in the history of humankind.
Think of what it would take to create this system 20 years ago (1995.)
You first would need a recording studio, which used to be really expensive. You’d then need the capacity to print CDs at scale.
You’d also need the distribution capacity to deliver the CDs around the world.
What we’re describing here is a multi-million dollar organization which still wouldn’t be as powerful as what we have today.
Today, with a WordPress website and easy-to-use software, you can achieve better results from within your office or even from your bedroom.
Why better?
Because delivery is faster and anyone can receive the files from a Bushman in Africa to a hipster in Portland.
It’s an astonishing opportunity.
Building an Audience Can Support you in Anything you do in the Future
No matter what you get into next, having an audience you can reach out to is powerful.
Podcasting is essentially serving your community.
You’re providing value and building an authentic relationship with people that will last.
Having an audience is a way to lead people to see your dreams manifest into a reality.
In today’s world, they say eyeballs are everything.
The more people you have watching what you do, the more you can create and generate. But I believe ears are everything and then some: through a podcast, you are creating an emotional and often personal connection with guests.
Just think, they are listening to your voice right in their ear, as if a close friend were talking to them in confidence.
This audience will not only follow what you do next, but will probably support what you do next in a very big way.
Your podcast audience is not just any audience, they are probably your most devoted fans.
Working with a Team
From reaching out and booking guests, researching and publishing, a lot goes into podcasting.
The best shows have a team that works together to make the best show possible.
As the host, you’ll be cultivating that leadership skill that empowers you to create bigger and better projects.
Connect The Success of Your Show With Those Who Have Bigger Followings
Everyone starts with a small audience and grows it over time.
Having an interview show in which you invite guests onto your show allows you to connect with and attract the audiences of the higher-profile guests you bring on your show.
With each new guest, your opportunity to grow your true fan base is enhanced.
For freelancers looking to elevate their personal brand, a podcast is more than just a creative outlet; it’s a strategic business asset.
By cultivating a dedicated audience, you’re not just creating content; you’re building a community that will champion your future projects and bring clients.
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