Podcast Growth Checklist

Creator Marking Platforms

99+ Awards Worthy of Winning

Creator Hub

First 5:

1. Subscribe/Follow

2. Download

3. Listen

4. Rate/Review

5. Keep Coming Back

The 3:

1. Facebook

2. LinkedIn

3. Meetup.com

Last 5:

1. Personal

2. No Links (unless given permission)

3. Slow Play

4. Short and Sweet

5. Ask Questions

Learn More about Adam Adams here: https://growyourshow.com/

Follow the Frugalpreneur:

https://www.frugal.show/

http://thesarahstjohn.com/podcast

Get 1-on-1 Help With Your Podcast:

https://www.podseam.com/

Join the Free Community:

https://www.thepodsquad.pro/

Get Your Freebies:

https://www.podseam.com/freebies

In this episode, you will learn the following:

1. Joe Casabona's background in web development and how he got into podcasting

2. The process of securing sponsorships for a new podcast

3. The various ways that a podcast can be monetized

Resources:

https://casabona.org/

https://podcastliftoff.com/freebie/sarah/

https://www.podseam.com/freebies

Chapter Summaries:

[00:00:00] - Joe Casabona started his career over 20 years ago as a freelance web developer before realizing his true passion. The podcast has made over $250,000

[00:00:46] - In high school and grammar school. He did drama club and he loved presenting. He has a master's degree in software engineering and he's been working remotely since 2013. He started podcasting because he wanted to talk to people about how they were building things. It's a way for him to be the extrovert while still working from home.

[00:02:47] - Joe started a podcast in 2016. The name came from a domain he bought while he and his wife were on their honeymoon in Italy. Chris Coyer, a big name in the web development space, was his 6th guest and it started getting a lot of downloads from there. He had 50,000 downloads in nine months. He got it sponsored before he even started.

[00:07:58] - There are five ways to make money podcasting. The first one is sponsorship. The second one is membership. The third one is affiliate links. The fourth and gift is products and services.

[00:18:02] - It's important to choose the right sponsors for your podcast. Manscaped approached him earlier this year about sponsoring his podcast. He didn't think their products were in alignment with his audience. Some brands wanted exclusivity for an extended amount of time, or they wanted him to guarantee downloads upfront.

[00:19:33] - Baked in ads give the most value to podcasters. CPM is probably not going to work for most podcasters who aren't in the top 2%.

[00:28:30] - How I Built Bits is going to be a five or ten-minute episode with a short read at the beginning. People can sponsor the episode for $99 until the end. It's a way to increase the number of sponsors in an episode and make money.

[00:30:53] - Make Money Podcasting is a 20-minute-long mini podcast. It's geared towards creators and small business owners.

[00:34:20] - Joe makes about $30,000 to $50,000 per year on podcast sponsorship alone. He has locked in about $6,000 worth of sponsorships this week. He's considering scaling back the number of sponsors to two in 2023.

[00:37:26] - Workflow: Airtable, Calendly, Zapier

"If you want to bootstrap a business, you better like learning and you better like making mistakes."

"The difference between a successful frugal premier and an unsuccessful one is the successful ones just kept going while the unsuccessful ones quit."

Ray Blakney is the founder and CEO of Podcast Hawk, a platform that helps you get booked as a podcast guest on autopilot. He is also the founder of Live Lingua, a successful online language school.

This is Ray Blakney's story...

Ray Blakney is a software engineer who quit his high paying job to start multiple businesses. He is the founder and CEO of Podcast Hawk, which helps you get booked as a podcast guest on autopilot. He has also bootstrapped multiple seven figure companies..

In this episode, you will learn the following:

1. How Ray Blakney bootstrapped multiple seven-figure businesses without any money

2. How Ray Blakney's first business became profitable almost immediately

3. How Ray Blakney's second business was born out of necessity during a global pandemic

Chapter Summaries:

[00:00:00] - Sarah St. John is the host of the Frugalpreneur Podcast. Ray Blakeney is the founder and CEO of Podcast Hawk, a platform that helps you get booked as a podcast guest on autopilot. Ray quit his job as a software engineer and has bootstrapped multiple seven figure companies.

[00:00:23] - After studying computer engineering in Silicon Valley and working in Fortune 500 companies, he quit his job and moved to Mexico to start a business. He sold his house, car, condo and all his possessions and started a chocolate factory in Southeast Asia. Now he's writing a book about his life.

[00:03:45] - In 2008, he launched a Spanish school in Queretaro, Mexico, for $2000. And it was profitable from day one. He didn't know how to build a website and he didn't do the front end very well. He was a computer programmer. He is currently doing a course called Podcast Pro. Before he wrote his first business, he had launched two successful businesses. He owned a chocolate factory in Southeast Asia and a language school in Tulum, Mexico. He read two business books a week. He's been trying different business models since 2008. He doesn't want to do it again. There was a pandemic in Mexico and the borders were closed for 30 days. This affected the business of a language immersion school. The school had to cancel all the bookings and refund all the money. It took them seven years to get to seven figures. Most people will never have a seven figure business if they stick to it for seven years. If you're 25 and listening to this, at 32, you have a 7 figure business. Even if you're 40 or 50 listening to it, you can still have a business.

[00:15:01] - In his opinion, starting an online business is easier than running a brick and mortar business. For example, for $100 you can have a professional looking business up online in a month. Brick and mortar businesses are usually run by older people who want to retire and are sold for a profit. Idea is to buy an existing business and turn it into a profitable one. He would like to buy a dry cleaner, a locksmith, plumbers or a storage unit business. He doesn't want to buy the brick and mortar business yet, as he wants to be location independent. You can buy a business with other people's money. The business pays off itself in the next two or three years and you just ride it for the rest of your life. If you want to scale it up, you hire someone to scout out all the businesses and you show up once every three months to sign the check. He wants to write a book about the process.

[00:24:37] - Ray is a software engineer and a serial entrepreneur. His main business is Live Lingua, which is the online language. He wants to get on more podcasts. He spent a weekend...]]>Ray Blakney of Podcast Hawk talks to us about his experience bootstrapping multiple software and brick and mortar businesses.

"If you want to bootstrap a business, you better like learning and you better like making mistakes."

"The difference between a successful frugal premier and an unsuccessful one is the successful ones just kept going while the unsuccessful ones quit."

Ray Blakney is the founder and CEO of Podcast Hawk, a platform that helps you get booked as a podcast guest on autopilot. He is also the founder of Live Lingua, a successful online language school.

This is Ray Blakney's story...

Ray Blakney is a software engineer who quit his high paying job to start multiple businesses. He is the founder and CEO of Podcast Hawk, which helps you get booked as a podcast guest on autopilot. He has also bootstrapped multiple seven figure companies..

In this episode, you will learn the following:

1. How Ray Blakney bootstrapped multiple seven-figure businesses without any money

2. How Ray Blakney's first business became profitable almost immediately

3. How Ray Blakney's second business was born out of necessity during a global pandemic

Chapter Summaries:

[00:00:00] - Sarah St. John is the host of the Frugalpreneur Podcast. Ray Blakeney is the founder and CEO of Podcast Hawk, a platform that helps you get booked as a podcast guest on autopilot. Ray quit his job as a software engineer and has bootstrapped multiple seven figure companies.

[00:00:23] - After studying computer engineering in Silicon Valley and working in Fortune 500 companies, he quit his job and moved to Mexico to start a business. He sold his house, car, condo and all his possessions and started a chocolate factory in Southeast Asia. Now he's writing a book about his life.

[00:03:45] - In 2008, he launched a Spanish school in Queretaro, Mexico, for $2000. And it was profitable from day one. He didn't know how to build a website and he didn't do the front end very well. He was a computer programmer. He is currently doing a course called Podcast Pro. Before he wrote his first business, he had launched two successful businesses. He owned a chocolate factory in Southeast Asia and a language school in Tulum, Mexico. He read two business books a week. He's been trying different business models since 2008. He doesn't want to do it again. There was a pandemic in Mexico and the borders were closed for 30 days. This affected the business of a language immersion school. The school had to cancel all the bookings and refund all the money. It took them seven years to get to seven figures. Most people will never have a seven figure business if they stick to it for seven years. If you're 25 and listening to this, at 32, you have a 7 figure business. Even if you're 40 or 50 listening to it, you can still have a business.

[00:15:01] - In his opinion, starting an online business is easier than running a brick and mortar business. For example, for $100 you can have a professional looking business up online in a month. Brick and mortar businesses are usually run by older people who want to retire and are sold for a profit. Idea is to buy an existing business and turn it into a profitable one. He would like to buy a dry cleaner, a locksmith, plumbers or a storage unit business. He doesn't want to buy the brick and mortar business yet, as he wants to be location independent. You can buy a business with other people's money. The business pays off itself in the next two or three years and you just ride it for the rest of your life. If you want to scale it up, you hire someone to scout out all the businesses and you show up once every three months to sign the check. He wants to write a book about the process.

[00:24:37] - Ray is a software engineer and a serial entrepreneur. His main business is Live Lingua, which is the online language. He wants to get on more podcasts. He spent a weekend building a database of all the podcasts in the world. He booked four shows a month for $4000. Pat Flynn and Jordan Harbinger are both advisors and investors in Podcast Hawk Podcast Hawk has a database of every single podcast out there. It updates every 24 hours. They stay in your account, and when you have a new one, you kind of move it. It's not tied to John Smith. When John Smith leaves, you just deactivate that, and then Jane Smith comes in and you retake that seat. It just can make it easier for you to manage.

[00:39:50] -Talked about the lazy man survival mindset. According to him, lazy people are efficient people who don't want to do any more work. He likes the Peretta principle of 80% of the work. In the first 20%, 20% of work will produce 80%.

[00:41:50] - Ray Blakney is an entrepreneur who believes in frugal business strategy. He doesn't want to spend a lot of money on perfecting his product. He travels a lot and he likes the freedom he has. He drives a Mazda and doesn't care about fancy cars.

Connect with Ray:

RayBlakney.com

PodcastHawk.com

Connect with Sarah:

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thesarahstjohn/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thesarahstjohn

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCFWxBqAsNhV4K8iR3UQ2_IA

Twitter: https://twitter.com/thesarahstjohn

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sarah-stjohn

Website: https://www.thesarahstjohn.com/

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