What Authors Should Know Before Hiring a PR Firm

Written by Assistant on March 7, 2023. Posted in Blog, Marketing, Sales. No Comments on What Authors Should Know Before Hiring a PR Firm

By Jennifer Tucker, Marketing Manager at Smith Publicity

Reporters holding cameras and microphones in every direction

You’ve worked incredibly hard on your book, and you’re finally ready to get it out into the world for others to learn from, appreciate, and enjoy. One of the first decisions you’ll have to make is about how to do that. If you choose to work with a book marketing firm (which, of course, we highly suggest), there are several things you should consider before hiring one.

Book marketing campaigns often move at a fast and furious pace, so preparing your platform, materials, schedule, and expectations prior to kicking off your campaign will ensure that you are ready to hit the ground running from day one. While finding the right team can feel like an overwhelming process, taking the time to do so will set you up for maximum book marketing success. Here are some things to know before hiring your PR firm:

Prep your platform

Before bringing a book marketing agency on board, you’ll want to make sure you have a solid foundation for your author platform. What exactly is an author platform and why is it important? Your author platform consists of the various places you “house” your author information and get yourself out there, and having an active and cohesive platform ultimately helps to build your brand. Now, you can make the most of your time once your campaign begins.

Though your publicist can help guide you on how to grow the various pieces of your author platform as part of your book marketing campaign, having most of the pieces in place in advance will benefit you greatly. You’ll want to be sure you have a professional website with information about your book that includes clear instructions on where and how to purchase, an “about” page for you as the author, a page for media coverage, and a page for contacting you. If you’re working with a publicist, you can put their contact information for the duration of your campaign. Make sure your social media pages are linked, as well.

Speaking of social media pages, they certainly constitute an important part of your author platform. Though it’s not necessary to be active on every social media platform, having at least one or two pages that are updated frequently and consistently adds legitimacy to your brand, facilitates connection with potential readers on a more personal level, and simply helps you get the word out about your book. Having these pages up and running before your book marketing campaign begins will give you an advantage for two major reasons. Once pitching begins, the media may search you to see what kind of online presence you already have established. Also, you will be able to share any media coverage you receive on your social media pages which will amplify the number of eyes on your project.

Communicate your schedule and availability

Clipart-style calendar with clock next to it

Simply put, the most collaborative book marketing campaigns are the most successful. Your PR team knows you have a life outside your book; however, if you’re committing to marketing your book, you will get the best results if you can dedicate proper time to media opportunities as they arise. For instance, you may receive a request to write a guest article, an invitation to appear on a podcast, or be tapped (often last minute, due to the nature of the media) to offer expert commentary. If you’ve anticipated the possibility of these extra projects and made room in your schedule for them, you’ll be able to get the very most out of your campaign.

Before your book publicity campaign begins, make sure you’ve assessed your schedule for the time the campaign will be taking place and have communicated any “black out dates,” or dates you absolutely won’t be available for interviews and/or other opportunities to your publicist. It’s also helpful to communicate openly with your team, family, and friends so they are aware that, during the time of your campaign, your schedule may look different as you are in the midst of a publicity push for your book.

Get clear on your goals

People standing next to life-size cartoon-style trophy, bullseye, and notebook of goals

A good book marketing firm will ask you what your goals for your campaign are before you sign on. This may seem like an obvious question and an even more obvious answer; however, there are many different goals an author can have for their campaign. Whether your goal is to sell books, to grow your brand, to bring in new business, to raise awareness for an important issue or cause, or to become established as an author… it’s important that you and your publicist are on the same page. Your book publicity campaign will be designed to achieve—and build a strong foundation to continue to achieve—the agreed-upon goals of you and your team.

Having a strong sense of what your goals are and why before hiring your PR firm will help you go into your book marketing campaign with a sense of clarity, and will help your PR team design a campaign that is customized to go after the types of opportunities that will ultimately help you achieve your goals.

Keep in mind that the more realistic your goals are, the more likely you are to achieve them. Creating your goals based on what will really move the needle for your particular project, instead of what you think looks or sounds most impressive, can fast-track the success you see. Which brings us to…

Set your expectations

Before hiring your book marketing team, it’s helpful to know that coverage is very rarely guaranteed—especially in the timeframe of your campaign. This doesn’t mean you won’t get any coverage or even see fantastic results during your campaign and afterward, but sometimes authors go into the process expecting to become a New York Times best-seller within weeks of kicking off. The truth is, with nearly 2 million books published globally each year, there’s fierce competition. Though your publicist will work their absolute hardest to make sure you stand apart, setting your expectations from the get-go will ensure that you’re going after the right opportunities.

It's also important to note that before you’re in the thick of your campaign, not all coverage will occur within the timeframe of your book marketing campaign. Your PR team is working to set you up for continued success, meaning you may likely see coverage come through days, weeks, months, and even years after your active campaign has concluded.

Rally your network

Woman staring up at a mountainous pile of papers

Finally, before hiring professionals to get the word out about your book, don’t forget to make announcements to your own personal and professional networks. In moving down the checklist of who to contact once their book is ready to be publicized, many authors forget to add their nearest and dearest to the list when, of course, they are your built-in and biggest fans.

Rallying your team, clients, LinkedIn connections, friends, family, and community in support of your book will give you a head start in terms of building your following.

Each individual who spreads the word to their own network offers endless possibilities for organically growing your readership. After all, the power of word of mouth recommendations and support should never be underestimated.

The time period after finishing your book but before officially launching is a sacred one. How you use this time to prepare you for what’s to come can make all the difference.

What most surprised you, or what do you still want to know? Let us know your thoughts below!

More About Jennifer Tucker

Jennifer Tucker is the Marketing Manager at Smith Publicity, and before that worked as a book publicist at the firm for nearly a decade. While there, she secured top national media placements for her authors including Good Morning America, People Magazine, Nightline, Fox & Friends, Family Circle, NPR, and The Los Angeles Times. For questions about services, please reach out to info@smithpublicity.com.

a woman stands on top of a tall mountain made of technology with clouds in the background.

How Do You Create Quality Content That Stands Out from the Crap?

Written by Assistant on March 1, 2023. Posted in Blog, Leadership, Marketing, Social Media. No Comments on How Do You Create Quality Content That Stands Out from the Crap?

Here’s some facts that might shock you. 500 million tweets are sent out daily, and the weight of that sheer amount of content can be felt. On top of that, 11% of these tweets come from bots, whose sole purpose is to generate content.

In a world of AI-generated content and increasingly cluttered digital noise, it’s more important than ever to have our authenticity and humanity be heard. But aren’t you as exhausted as I am with the notion that you must be EVERYWHERE in order to stay relevant and ‘top of mind?’

So, we can use technology to help us, right? Our tech tools are wonderful, but they can also go completely off the rails. Here’s a few entertaining but cringe-worthy examples of #MARKETINGFAILS.

KFC had to apologize after sending a promotional message to customers in Germany urging them to commemorate Kristallnacht with cheesy chicken. Kristallnacht was a Nazi-era attack resulting in the death of 90+ Jewish people, marking the beginning of the Holocaust. Yikes. This PR meltdown started because KFC programmed a bot to send automated push notifications based on calendar events, including national observance days.

In another notable campaign, Coca-Cola encouraged people to reply to negative tweets with #MakeItHappy, so a bot could transform the negative words of the tweet into a cute image. As things on the internet so often do, Coke’s innocent attempt at positivity went south as quotes from Hitler’s Mein Kampf were tagged with #MakeItHappy. The bot made positive images, one of them being a cat playing the drums, out of Hitler’s words. When technology tools go unregulated, we see these types of consequences occurring.

And yet, we must ABC! (Always Be Creating…right?)

The Thought Leaders, like you, that we work with every day have brilliant bodies of work through your audiobooks and podcasts that we produce with you.

BUT, what I hear most often from our clients is the experience of ‘content fatigue.’ This is the state of listening to their own message over and over again in their minds, on paper, in their emails, and in their courses and classes. Content fatigue is something that thought leaders battle every day.

Did you know, however, that our audiences don’t get tired of entertaining, interesting content? Particularly when that content is surrounding a focused topic.

I never get bored of the antics of the Pearls Before Swine comics, or of JauncyDev, the content creator who famously creates videos giving human personalities to different dog breeds. Millions of people eagerly await every single derivative that these content creators bring to the table, month on month and year upon year.

@jauncydev
Dog breeds give life advice #dogbreeds #dogs #dogadvice #dogsofttiktok #dogbreedsoftiktok
♬ original sound – Jonny

We, as thought leaders, are no different. When we allow ourselves to go deeper into our content to find derivatives and angles on the topics we’re already in love with, our audiences come along with us.

3 Ways to Get Re-Energized From Your Own Message

The ‘Book Oracle’

Open your book to any page and read a couple of paragraphs out loud while running a voice recording app on your phone in the background. Then stop looking at the book but keep talking, stream of consciousness style, riffing on your own content. Transcribe what you say and see what new nuggets arise.

The ‘Indignant Response’

Set Google Alerts for keywords or topics in your book, and allow yourself to get catalyzed by what pops up. I used this method in the creation of this message- it’s a response to the article on AI generated content issues where I learned about the KFC fail.

The ‘Dear Abby’

Collaborate with a colleague, fan, or team member who is familiar with your work to send you a question each week for you to answer. These questions can be created for each chapter of your book, or episode of your podcast. Freely allow yourself to answer and ask questions as you capture this exchange in a document, in emails, or even in video or audio exchanges.

The last thing any of us need right now as humans, much less as leaders, is more noise. Focusing on content ‘craft’ vs. ‘crap’ is the gift we can give ourselves as a good use of our time, and the gift we can give the people we serve to make their time and attention worthwhile.

Inspired to turn your Voice into influence and become a Thought Leader worth listening to?

Let's Talk

robot hand reaches for podcast microphone on a gray background

Does AI Mean Doom for the Future of Audiobooks and Podcasting?

Written by Assistant on February 8, 2023. Posted in Audiobook Marketing, Blog, Podcasting. No Comments on Does AI Mean Doom for the Future of Audiobooks and Podcasting?

In early January of this year, the tech giant Apple launched a catalog of over 25 audiobooks completely narrated by artificial intelligence. If you’ve written a book or have a podcast, this is some industry shaking news. AI is predicted to play huge roles in audio industries this year, and it shows no signs of slowing down. What does this mean for thought leaders? Is a robot coming to replace you?

Well, no. If anything, this is an opportunity to further use your authentic voice as an essential part of your brand.

First, let’s get one thing straight: the need for a human voice is not going away. AI audio is a great cheap option, but humans crave more depth than what it has to offer. AI cannot accurately add breathing into audio at this time, which is key for how humans listen and interpret the credibility of a narrator, as well as the emotional content. Inflection, modulation, sarcasm, and much more are all beyond the current technology’s capability.

Even more, AI audio runs the risk of dipping into the “uncanny valley,” a psychological phenomenon where people feel uneasy around things that appear similar to, but not quite human.

Our voices are invaluable resources, and the data shows this. Podcasts and audiobooks continue to grow at unprecedented rates. Take a look at the growth:

The podcasts and audiobooks that an ever growing audience are seeking out feature authentic human voices. Our unique speaking styles as thought leaders are something that AI can never replace. In fact, doubling down on our uniqueness by utilizing our voices as an essential part of our brands is a smart growth and marketing strategy that we can explore further in conversation together.

However, this isn’t to say that all AI is bad, or that it has no place in the audio industry. In fact, the judicious use of AI saves us on our precious resources of focus and time. Thought leaders and content creators can use up and coming technology to further their message. Take a look at some software you should keep your eye on this year:

As mentioned above, there’s no stopping artificial intelligence. And while the world is safe from a robot audiobook narrator apocalypse (for now), you can rest easy knowing that your authentic voice is your biggest asset. AI can only help you save time and broaden your reach this year.

Inspired to turn your Voice into influence and become a Thought Leader worth listening to?

Let's Talk

Guest blog feature image, "Kim Eley: Don't Write Your Book Until You Know These 5 Things!"

Don’t Write Your Book Until You Know These Five Things!

Written by Assistant on February 7, 2023. Posted in Blog, Marketing, Publishing, Sales. No Comments on Don’t Write Your Book Until You Know These Five Things!

By Kim Eley, CEO/Founder of KWE Publishing

So many writers dream of publishing their books, but if you don’t know where to start, the process of actually publishing a book can seem daunting! The process of publishing a book can seem like it’s shrouded in secrecy.

In particular, writers who have never published a book before often are filled with questions about how to publish, what their publishing options are, when to contact a publisher, what marketing will look like, and much more.

Here’s some good news: even though you might be overwhelmed, you can publish a book—even if you’ve never published anything before! There are so many amazing first-time authors whose stories have changed readers’ lives, and your story deserves to be told, too!

To make the concept of publishing a little more approachable, we’re going to share five things writers who want to publish their first book should know about the world of publishing!

1. There are a variety of ways you can publish your book.

When writers think about publishing their books, they often think about one of two things: working with big-name publishers (also known as traditional publishing) or self-publishing. And while these are both options, there’s a third option as well—working with a hybrid publisher.

Let’s break down the three most common ways books are published:

Traditional publishing: you typically submit your manuscript or pitch your manuscript to a publisher, often through an agent; the publisher in these cases often has more control of your manuscript, the layout of the book, etc., and the royalties you receive can vary from publisher to publisher.
Hybrid publishing: this is sometimes considered an option that’s in between traditional publishing and self-publishing. You still maintain a good amount of control over your book, but you’ll also work with editors and publishers who can do much of the technical work that’s involved in publishing a book (such as ensuring your book makes it to wholesalers, formatting your book, etc.).
Self-publishing: you have ultimate control over your book, and while you have the potential to keep more of the money you make, you also have to pay for editors, illustrators, marketing, etc., directly, and you will need to research the ins and outs of what’s needed to publish your book on particular platforms (obtaining your ISBN, creating and formatting your documents, etc.).

So, what’s the best option for you? It depends on your timeline, budget, patience, and goals. If you want to publish and retain total control over the process, want to keep the bulk of what you make off your book, are okay with doing some research, and you’re willing to independently hire editors and/or illustrators, self-publishing might be a good option. Hybrid publishing is a great option for writers who want to maintain control over their books but need some help with formatting, editing, and other behind-the-scenes things involved in publishing. Traditional publishing can be time-consuming, especially for first-time authors who don’t have an agent, but pitching your manuscript to a traditional publisher can lead to your book being picked up in some cases (though it’s not always guaranteed, of course).

Ultimately, none of these options are “better” or “worse” than the others—it all depends on what you want!

2. You can contact a publisher before your book is complete.

If you want to work with a traditional or hybrid publisher, you don’t have to wait until your book is complete to reach out. In fact, it can be useful to start working with a publisher well before you plan to publish your book!

Though every book will vary (and some publishers will have a preference as to when you submit your manuscript), manuscripts often go through several iterations. After a first draft is written, editors who work with your publisher (if you choose to work with a hybrid publisher or traditional publisher) will review your manuscript to look for any grammatical, technical, or developmental issues that may need to be corrected.

For authors who want to self-publish, it’s often a good idea to contact an editor (or several editors, depending on the length of your manuscript and the genre you’re writing in) soon after you’ve finished your first draft. Being open to revisions and suggestions from experts can help you create a more polished book, which translates to giving readers a better reading experience.

3. You don't worry too much about formatting if you're using a hybrid publisher or a traditional publisher.

Often, people worry about making their manuscript look a particular way before sending it off to a publisher, and while you do want your work to be legible, the format you send your book in is likely not the way your book will ultimately look if you work with a traditional or hybrid publisher!

That doesn't mean you want your formatting to be a total mess, of course—after all, being organized as you write will make the process of publishing less time-consuming!—but you don't necessarily have to spend hours or lots of money on trying to format your book yourself.

open and closed books scattered and stacked haphazardly on a table

Most publishers are familiar with taking manuscripts written in Google Docs or Microsoft Word and formatting them as needed. Formatting is a part of the publishing process that publishers often take care of, so you don't need to buy pricey software that may not be needed on your end, to begin with.

If you're self-publishing, depending on the platform(s) you're using, you still likely won't have to spend too much on formatting; many platforms, such as Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP), offer templates that can be used for formatting.

Of course, if you're self-publishing and are struggling to get your format to look just right, don't hesitate to reach out to an expert who can help! You can find experienced individuals willing to help you format your book on sites like Upwork or Fiverr, for example.

4. It’s never too soon to start marketing.

Regardless of what method you choose to use when publishing your book, it’s never too early to begin your marketing efforts.

When working with a hybrid or traditional publisher, some (if not most, in some cases) of the marketing efforts will be done for you. With a hybrid publisher, you may be offered marketing packages that you can use when marketing your book, or you can choose to go solo if you’re a marketing whiz.

And when you self-publish, you’ll be the one who’s responsible for your marketing; in some cases, you might want to hire a professional, but some authors prefer to do the marketing on their own.

There are several great ways to market yourself and your book well before it’s published, including by creating a mailing list, talking about the publishing and writing processes on a blog or social media platform, creating a website for your book, paying for ads, appearing on podcasts…the list goes on!

By marketing your book before it’s published, you can build up an audience. An audience that knows you (aka a warm market) is generally more likely to purchase something of yours than an audience that doesn’t know you (aka a cold market). Plus, building an audience early ensures you can continue to share about future projects beyond your first book!

Of course, you can also market your book well after it’s been published, too, especially if your book is coming out in new formats, such as an audiobook, after the first printed edition of your book has been published.

5. You define what success looks like when it comes to your book!

People gathered around stacks of books for a signing

Every writer has a different reason for publishing their book. Some writers want to entertain readers, some want to educate and advocate for a particular group of individuals, and others just want to share a story that’s important to them.

If you’re working with a hybrid or traditional publisher, spend some time talking to them about what your expectations are for your book. They can help you figure out what’s realistic and manageable, and what steps you need to take to meet your goals.

And if you choose to go the self-publishing route, it’s still important to clearly define your goals for your book—and do a bit of research to learn the best ways to meet them. You don’t have to wait until you’ve finished your book to start this process!

Just because you’ve never published a book before doesn’t mean the process has to be overly complex or difficult!

Whether you choose to self-publish, work with a hybrid publisher, or work with a traditional publisher, you can create and share your story with the world—it just takes some time, patience, and a willingness to learn and accept some outside help when needed.

What most surprised you, or what do you still want to know? Let us know your thoughts below!

More About Kim Eley

Specializing in personal development books and thoughtful children's books is the mission of Kim Wells Eley’s company, KWE Publishing; the common thread of both is to help people see what's possible and shift to a more enjoyable, fulfilled life. she says. As a writing coach and publishing consultant, Kim gives clients six steps to make their books a reality.

Kim is happily married to her BFF and has been for over 20 years. She’s a speaker; an author; a resident of Prince George, Virginia; a cat lover; a collector of orchids; and she gets all of her news from comedy shows.

3 Ways to Improve DEI Programs with Internal Podcasting

Written by Robin Thompson on July 25, 2022. Posted in Blog, Leadership. No Comments on 3 Ways to Improve DEI Programs with Internal Podcasting

By Tina Dietz, CEO Twin Flames Studios

Twelve years ago, over 80 percent of Americans reported that they held companies highly accountable for promoting diversity, ensuring human rights, and educating employees to take action (ConeInc.com Who’s Responsible?, 2010). More than a decade later, how has that accountability translated? How can we continue to battle unconscious bias in the workplace?

DEI is not a new and trendy idea, nor is it a “nice to have.” A corporate culture that promotes diversity, equity, and inclusion is an expectation-and for good reason. If your company is not diving in and doing the work to cultivate a culture where diversity is welcomed as the norm, you’re missing out. What gets unlocked with diversity is the endless innovation and creativity brought out by your employee’s authentic selves.

The human voice has qualities that transcend demographics. Various vocal features such as the “contagiousness” of laughter, structures and themes in oral storytelling techniques, and the detection of when someone is trustworthy via someone’s voice are hardwired into us as humans. The implementation of internal corporate podcasts allows for the diversity in companies and organizations to flourish, to reinforce and develop company culture and values, and democratize leadership.

But why podcasting? You might be surprised that research shows that audio-only communication can increase team-cohesion and productivity.

With audio-only communication and internal podcasting your organization can:

Develop better listening skills
Cultivate an environment to form deeper connections
Establish a culture of verbal equity
Decrease bias
Increase your team’s overall happiness
Reduce stress levels
Create psychological safety

Many companies are implementing podcasting as part of their DEI programs. Here are three powerful benefits of internal podcasting to promote and develop diversity and inclusion in the workplace with specific examples:

Podcasts give ERGs an opportunity to have a voice

Employee-led resource groups (ERG) promote diversity and inclusion by ensuring everyone gets an opportunity to have a voice.

Some great examples include:

Sodexo Diversity & Inclusion is one of the company’s six strategic imperatives, including their DEI podcast, with 25 percent of the executive bonuses linked to diversity objectives.

The Lehigh University podcast, featured in PodBean. When asked, “Is there a wider value to the podcast?” This was the response:

“The podcast has allowed staff members’ stories to have greater reach than their normal range might offer. For example, one of the staffers is a role model to, and supportive of, the LGBT+ community at Lehigh. Students and faculty members who otherwise may not know, were made aware of this person's commitment to being an important resource. Another episode featured the story of the university’s performing arts center director. This story served both to highlight the diverse careers and paths to them at Lehigh and also to show people beyond the campus the many functions the university serves in the community,” Hillary Kwiatek.

2. Audio-only format decreases bias

Have you ever gathered with your team only to discover there are some who speak to one another more than others? They tend to seemingly speak one-on-one in meetings leaving several other team members out of the conversation. In other words, they dominate the meeting. As humans, we naturally tend to gravitate to those we like the most, whether intentional or unintentional. In-person and zoom meetings leave room for distractions from non-verbal queues to appearance. DEI in the workplace requires a multifaceted approach. Corporate podcasts decrease benevolent and unintended biases, as well as decrease the malevolent or discriminatory biases. Podcasts allow for us to become better listeners and establish a culture of verbal equity. Decreasing bias bolters company culture and creates new relationships.

“We show that when interacting partners have audio cues only, the lack of video does not hinder them from communicating these rules but instead helps them to regulate their conversation more smoothly by engaging in more equal exchange of turns and by establishing improved prosodic synchrony. Previous research has focused largely on synchrony regulated by visual cues, such as studies showing that synchrony in facial expressions improves cohesion in collocated teams” (Physiology & Behavior).

3. Internal podcasting promotes psychological safety

Anxiety, panic attacks, and lack of confidence can hinder our ability to speak when all eyes are on us. Zoom and in-person meetings can produce visual distractions and unconscious bias. In audio-only mediums, like podcasting, employees feel psychologically safe from those hindrances. Research shows that eliminating visual distractions and nonverbal cues can help. When we turn off the camera and rely only on audio cues, the conversation flows and improves cohesion in meetings. The ability to identify others’ emotional states by simply listening is a powerful tool that few of us fully access as leaders. Internal podcasting allows us to create that safe space and prioritization of listening.

The added benefit of internal podcasting in regards to reducing stress levels, is the ability of the listener to move while listening. Movement and exercise is important to manage and reduce stress levels, thus assisting in the prevention of or mitigation of anxiety and depression. Podcasting reduces stress levels, creates psychological safety, and improves your team’s overall happiness.

While podcasting as an audio-only format can remove unconscious bias, it can also highlight diverse voices (as we touched on in points one and two).

When companies weave psychological safety and DEI together, employees feel safe to bring their whole selves to work. Having a diverse workforce improves productivity, innovation, creativity, and saves organizations money (Nathan & Lee, 2015).

According to researchers from the University of Iceland, when supervisors actively listened to their employees, employees reported higher dedication and vigor. This correlated to an increase in reciprocal communication, more psychological safety throughout the organization and improved physical and mental health. Taken further, this indicates that when leaders establish an environment where everyone’s voice is heard and people engage in thoughtful participation, we create a climate where we can maximize strengths, address weaknesses and curb burnout.

Valuing diversity leads to psychological safety within organizations, fostering more positive, open-minded, creative, and better-performing employees.

Corporate internal podcasts can increase team-cohesion, creativity, and productivity by championing diversity, equity, and inclusion. The audio-only format of podcasts removes distractions and bias, creates a stress-reduced space for everyone, and provides an efficient method to highlight diverse voices to your entire organization. Click here to learn more about how to use podcasting to promote DEI in your workplace.

6 Reasons to Use Podcasts as Part of Your Learning Management System

Written by Robin Thompson on July 8, 2022. Posted in Blog, Leadership, Podcasting.

By Tina Dietz, CEO Twin Flames Studios

No one wants to work for an organization that doesn’t invest in their employees. We’re seeing proof of this with “The Great Resignation” that’s been happening throughout the US. According to Gartner, a Global corporate research company, lack of career development is a leading cause of employee attrition, with 40 percent of workers stating it as a key factor in their decision to leave.

Richard Branson said, “Train people well enough so that they can leave, treat them well enough so they don’t want to.” Training like this is challenging when your staff is handling multiple priorities and craving innovative, tech-savvy options. However, it’s worth it because organizations that offer better training solutions see improvement in employee innovation, productivity, and retention.

So, if companies know they’ll get better results, why do so many organizations struggle with having quality training programs? The truth is that it can be difficult to convey the wealth of knowledge your senior leadership has obtained over their years of experience. Another harsh reality companies face is how to access the information their employees consume when they’re sent to workshops and seminars. Having an efficient way to disseminate the information they learned may be hard to deliver all at once. And, what about the times employees don’t seem to retain the information or a way to easily reference back to it?

You’re in good company if you can relate to these issues. Training programs can be costly and time-consuming to deliver company-wide, but they don’t have to be. The fastest-growing segment in Human Resource spending is employee learning systems and the adoption of new tools and technology. Businesses across the globe are learning new ways to improve their employee’s continuous learning, including the use of internal podcasting for onboarding and training.

Why Internal Podcasting?

Benefits to using internal podcasts to improve your learning management system (LMS) include:

Podcasting democratizes mentorship.
- Senior leadership can bring their experience and wisdom to the entire organization or individual departments (customized topics) so their time and energy are maximized while reducing the perception of favoritism.
- According to a CNBC study, workers at practically every level are significantly less likely to quit if they have a mentor, and 90 percent of employees reported being happy in their job when they are being mentored.
- Studies also show that when a company uses a mentorship program, they experience a 50 percent higher retention rate and 93 percent of employees believe their mentoring relationship was helpful.
- 68 percent of millennials who stay at their organization for 5 or more years have a mentor, compared to just 32 percent of those without a mentor.
- Using podcasts for senior leaders to mentor “one to many” will eliminate most of the typical challenges mentor programs entail, including any perceptions of favoritism, coordinating and managing the process, identifying and developing qualified mentors, matching mentor to mentee, time constraints, and high costs.
Podcasting repurposes long workshops into bite-sized evergreen content.

- Training programs that your company has invested in, such as workshops, can be turned into podcast episodes. This repurposes content into evergreen learning that is bite-sized and highly accessible via their LMS and/or secure podcasting apps.
- Hiring trainers and consultants is an investment that can be fleeting. There is a lost opportunity to make the most of training that you’ve invested in by having these recorded and then transformed into accessible modules and podcast episodes to help with implementation and understanding of the material.
- Finding extra time for employees to complete training can be challenging. Listeners stay engaged with short yet entertaining podcasts anywhere, anytime. Bite-sized information is more likely to be retained, so what better way for your employees to learn and develop than through podcasts.
- Employees can go back and listen to podcasts as many times as they need for the information to sink in. Repetition is key to memorizing or understanding information and modifying or changing behavior.

3. Highly accessible

- Internal podcasts are easy to consume and as accessible as music. Audio is available when team members can’t watch or read content, allowing learning to happen anywhere.
- 87% of people who listen to podcasts enjoy them because they can listen while doing other things. The top activities for listeners are exercising, driving/commuting, and doing housework.

4. Accommodates kinesthetic learning and reduces screen fatigue.

- The average adult spends 11 hours per day of screen time, whether that is a computer, phone, tablet, TV, or other electronic device. “While this problem is more pervasive in office-based jobs, it does involve those who don’t work on computers as well, since many go home and spend hours on their phones and TVs after work,” says Vivian Tran, MD, internal medicine physician at Scripps Clinic Mission Valley. Excessive screen time causes a variety of negative health impacts, while podcasting gives your eyes a break.
- Not only employees with an auditory learning style benefit from podcasts. Kinesthetic and visual-kinesthetic learners benefit as well. These types of learners tend to be less accommodated in many companies, given the sedentary nature of office environments and the long-held belief that most people are visual learners. However, more recent studies find that multimodal learning is more common in today’s workforce. Employees can listen on a lunch break workout, walking to another wing of the building, during their commute, or better yet while performing the task they’re listening about so they can learn while doing.

5. Provides a more personal approach than eLearning courses.

- When employees are given the opportunity to learn more about their leadership team, more relatability and respect can be fostered. These connections help companies retain their employees, making your investment in them so much more rewarding.
- Internal podcasts provide a more personal approach and increase retention of training materials when delivered with a storytelling style. The content can provide relatable stories, interactions, personal advice, and Q&As to enhance training.

6. Podcasts are perfect for employee onboarding.

- Podcasts for onboarding introduce new employees to the mission, vision, values, and goals of the company. They also help communicate culture and DEI, get to know who’s who on a more personal level, and create a sense of belonging. “Organizations with a strong onboarding process improve new hire retention by 82% and productivity by over 70%” (The True Cost of a Bad Hire, Glassdoor).
- Podcasts give new employees information that will help them be successful, including what is expected of them in their particular role. New employees and employees switching roles will feel more confident about their performance. It will also be easier for those transferring departments to develop new skills, learn new strategies or understand new SOPs.

- For example, VMware, a virtualization company, implemented an innovative approach to overcome the challenges of training busy people. They implemented single sign on (SSO) and assigned training credits for each employee as they listened to each training podcast.

The quality of your employee training and ongoing learning opportunities are crucial to the lifeblood of your business in today’s competitive talent market. Your company can utilize internal podcasting to create training and development solutions that will solve its training and development woes and improve employee engagement. To learn more and book a time to explore how internal podcasting can foster more productivity, loyalty, and innovation on your teams, please Contact Us today.

5 Ways to Solve Interdepartmental Communication Woes with Internal Podcasting

Written by Robin Thompson on June 24, 2022. Posted in Blog, Leadership, Podcasting.

By Tina Dietz, CEO Twin Flames Studios

Employee engagement can feel like a never-ending uphill battle. Companies never accomplish great things if their talent just shows up to collect a paycheck, but how do you ensure your employees feel connected to your organization, stay long term, and encourage others to do the same?

Internal podcasting is a powerful tool to cultivate a culture of employee engagement. Internal podcasts are usually produced with the help of a production company to privately reach their internal audience of employees and stakeholders.

It's no secret why using internal podcasting to improve employee engagement is catching on. Compared to other forms of media, podcasts are easy and inexpensive to produce — and their popularity speaks for itself. A whopping one-third of Americans listen to podcasts regularly, according to Buzzsprout.

Podcast listeners crave new and edifying content to listen to. In fact, the second most popular podcast topic is news according to Edison research. Why shouldn’t it be content that serves your company’s mission and builds your company’s culture? Your employees are used to listening to their favorite news and educational podcasts, so they will trust your corporate podcast as a relevant source of information for training and development. Internal podcasting reaches employees in ways that traditional meetings and corporate culture training cannot.

Done correctly, podcasts are a powerful tool to motivate and develop employees, ultimately leading to better team cohesion and talent retention.

So, how do you do it right? Here are five ways to use internal podcasting to engage, develop, and retain employees …

1. Highlight Top Performers and Rising Leaders

We’ve all heard that one of the best ways to improve moral and employee engagement is to recognize achievement. However, the big question is “How?”. You can only have so many pizza parties, and the “Employee of the Month” plaque is getting a little tired.

A better solution — feature a top performer or rising leader on the company’s internal podcast. This is a chance to shower good work with positive attention in a very public way. The podcast producer could:

Share a big win and highlight the team members responsible.

Feature promotions and rising leaders within the organization.

Recognize outstanding performers by name and describe their success.

Highlight top performers and leaders as subject matter experts where they can share a story or host a Q & A as part of a training exercise.

Employee recognition encourages excellence and creates a sense of shared purpose. It also improves engagement. Employees love to listen along and celebrate the success of their teammates and aspire to be featured on the company podcast as a reward for their contributions as well.

Business and tech consulting company Slalom puts this practice into practice with a segment of their Slalom On Air podcast called “Wins to Know,” highlighting big wins within the organization to its audience of over 8,000 employees.

2. Reinforce What’s Working in the Company

One of the advantages of podcasting is the opportunity to communicate a message to many people at a time. What better venue than a podcast to disseminate best practices, and training, so everyone in the organization can reinforce what’s already working and keep everyone on the same page?

74% of podcast listeners tune in to learn new things, and 82.4% of podcast fans listen to 7 or more hours of podcasts each week, so you also don’t have to twist yourself into knots distilling a complicated best practice into a 2 minute sound bite — you can use stories and examples to explain and still have confidence that the audience will actually listen.

Employee engagement, development, and retention starts with proper onboarding and training. Many savvy organizations are turning to internal podcasts for training, development, and onboarding procedures. For example:

Virtualization leaders VM Ware includes podcasts as mandatory training for new onboards, even using their back-end monitoring tools to verify completion of the training requirement.

3. Highlight Positive Culture Developments

Highlighting positive developments within the company doesn’t have to be limited to individual performance or business practices. The company podcast can also highlight examples of great company culture – teams or groups that took initiative to solve a problem or improve morale.

For many companies, an internal podcast became a cornerstone of company culture during the COVID-19 pandemic, when unplanned remote work led to the risk of a breakdown in company culture. As work from home and hybrid jobs remain popular, podcasts are an important tool to reach both on-site and remote employees.

Reinforcing corporate culture encourages other employees to do the same. They might not have even realized what goes into a healthy company culture or how they can actively contribute. Demonstrating it to them through the podcast is an efficient way to raise the bar for the entire organization.. Here are a few things to keep in mind when using podcasts to reinforce company culture:

Highlight your organization’s values and be sure your script aligns with your corporate culture
Invite employees to company events
Weave in personal stories, hobbies, or humor to improve engagement and inspire deeper connections among employees
Provide updates on company goals and vision

4. Unify the Team Behind a Story or Mission

One of the best ways to get an employee to regard a job as more than just a paycheck is to cast their role as service to a broader mission. Employees who buy into the mission don’t just have a job — they have a purpose. A team united around a mission is unstoppable.

How do you make a mission resonate? By telling a story. Storytelling is the oldest tool in human history for captivating an audience and uniting them around a theme. Use part or all of your podcast to tell the company’s story.

You may have heard of the importance of storytelling in business to grab your customers’ attention. Storytelling is also an excellent way to create connections between leaders and employees. Rather than only being told information, workers feel empathy and connection to their supervisors. Crank up the drama and don’t be afraid to make it personal. Employees respect their bosses more when they are vulnerable, have flaws and a compelling story that shares their leadership journey.

When healthcare administration company Signature Performance brought on two new C-level executives, the company used its internal podcast to introduce the new leaders, let them tell their story in their own words, and articulate their vision for their role and contribution within the organization. It was an opportunity to use the power of hearing someone’s voice to build connection and trust.

An internal podcast is easy to start, cost effective to produce, and simple to distribute. Best of all, it’s one of the best ways you can effectively reach and communicate with your company’s most important asset — its talent. Don’t waste the opportunity. Use your internal podcast to build team cohesion, foster positive company culture, and decrease turnover expenses by earning your employees’ commitment and loyalty for the long haul.

Do you have further questions about how internal podcasting can help improve your employee engagement? Contact us today.

4 Ways to Use Internal Podcasting to Engage, Develop, and Retain Employees

Written by Robin Thompson on June 21, 2022. Posted in Blog, Leadership, Podcasting.

By Tina Dietz, CEO Twin Flames Studios

Done correctly, podcasts are a powerful tool to motivate and develop employees, ultimately leading to better team cohesion and talent retention.

So, how do you do it right? Here are five ways to use internal podcasting to engage, develop, and retain employees …

1. Highlight Top Performers and Rising Leaders

Share a big win and highlight the team members responsible.

Feature promotions and rising leaders within the organization.

Recognize outstanding performers by name and describe their success.

Highlight top performers and leaders as subject matter experts where they can share a story or host a Q & A as part of a training exercise.

2. Reinforce What’s Working in the Company

Virtualization leaders VM Ware includes podcasts as mandatory training for new onboards, even using their back-end monitoring tools to verify completion of the training requirement.

3. Highlight Positive Culture Developments

Highlight your organization’s values and be sure your script aligns with your corporate culture
Invite employees to company events
Weave in personal stories, hobbies, or humor to improve engagement and inspire deeper connections among employees
Provide updates on company goals and vision

4. Unify the Team Behind a Story or Mission

Do you have further questions about how internal podcasting can help improve your employee engagement? Contact us today.

Are Podcasts Part of Your Marketing Plan?

Written by Robin Thompson on June 10, 2022. Posted in Blog, Marketing, Podcasting.

Learn four ways podcasts can help solve common pain points of content creation and expand your reach.

By Tina Dietz, CEO Twin Flames Studios

When you’re trying to grow your business, you’ve got a huge amount of information you’d like to share with your audience. But taking everything you and your company are passionate about and distilling it into digestible content often feels like trying to capture a genie in a bottle. Despite your best efforts and highest motivation, it’s all too easy to wind up with content that’s inconsistent, doesn’t connect with your audience, or burns out your marketing team.

Not to mention that in the growing media landscape, it’s harder than ever to capture an audience’s attention. Their eyeballs are constantly pulled between social media, streaming services, hundreds of cable television channels, and millions of websites. But what if instead of eyeballs, you focused on ears?

According to Edison Research’s Infinite Dial 2021 Report released in March, about 80 million Americans (28% of the U.S. 12+ population) listen to podcasts weekly. 116 million people listen to podcasts monthly, a growth of 61.5% since 2018.

As a podcast producer and vocal leadership expert, I’ve seen firsthand how sharp companies increasingly turn to podcasts to solve their content conundrums. Let me take you through some of the most common pain points of content creation, and how you too can use podcasting to overcome them.

Single-use content

Tell me if any of these scenarios sound familiar:

You write a blog post that gets a lot of traction, but a week later no one remembers it
Your team designs a graphic for your website, but only uses it there
You create a social media post that works perfectly on one platform, but falls flat on three others

This is probably the biggest problem content creators and marketing teams run into. No matter how good these pieces of content are, they’re only ever going to be useful once—you can’t just repost them on a different platform. This leads to a never-ending cycle of constantly having to create immense amounts of new content, either for up-to-date engagement, multiple different platforms, or both.

Luckily, podcasts don’t have this limitation. You can take the content from a podcast and reuse it on a number of different platforms, simply by changing its form to adapt to different mediums. And each time you record a new podcast, all those platforms get up-to-date content.

The following six examples are ways you can repurpose podcasts:

Website embeds
- Easily embed podcasts into your website so that the latest episode is always available to play with just a click on the front page. Visitors can listen while they navigate through your site or even continue as they switch to another tab.
Quote cards
- Take the most memorable insights from your podcast hosts or guests and post them on social media as a one-look visual that your audience can quickly absorb while they scroll through their feed.
Video clips
- Many podcast recording methods include video, so you can easily get another secondary piece of content from your podcast. Upload a full, optimized video to your YouTube channel or short, impactful clips to Facebook, Twitter, and TikTok.
Audiograms
- An audiogram is a short media clip that layers an audio soundtrack over a background image and texts or subtitles, sometimes with other effects showing up as well. Think of it like a cross between a PowerPoint slide and an Instagram reel or YouTube short.
- You can easily grab audio clips from your podcast and layer them over branded images and transcribed texts to create multiple audiograms from the same podcast. Then post them to social media, link to them in your email marketing campaigns, or feature them on your website to attract new listeners.
Transcripts
- Some people still prefer the written word. Publishing transcripts of your podcast allows audience members to quickly scan for key phrases and ideas and jump to the point in the conversation that most interests them.
- Google scans your webpages for keywords, and it’s easy for the algorithms to recognize them from a transcript. This helps your website’s search-engine optimization (SEO), leading to higher search rankings on Google.
Articles
- Repurposing podcast content into blogs or articles are another way to create timely and thought-provoking content for the community or profession you serve. This could be on your own website as blogs or case studies as well as used for contributing blogs or trade publications.

The Paychex Business Series, a thought leadership-branded podcast from the global HR and payroll services business Paychex, is a great example of this multi-platform approach.

On the podcast’s main webpage, you’ll see weekly episodes with links to video of each episode on YouTube and audio on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and iHeartRadio. The Paychex Business Series page also includes a few sentences summarizing each conversation, the timestamps of the topics covered, and a link to a PDF of the transcript for easy downloading and forwarding.

The podcast is promoted on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter. One recent tweet from Paychex includes a link to the latest podcast, a short description of its focus on workplace mental health, and a 19-second video with stills of the podcast guest and one of her most impactful quotes from the conversation. The variety of content creates awareness of their message and promotes the podcast to multiple social media audiences.

Another example is Randy Crabtree, the host of The Unique CPA and his team at Tri-Merit Tax Solutions. They are now in their 3rd season of podcasting and went from building an audience from scratch to being in the top 5% of all podcasts, according to podcast data aggregator.

But, the real magic was how the podcast helped Randy Crabtree, the host, reach his goals. As a partner in the company, Randy is excellent in creating relationships and helping companies, but he didn’t consider himself a thought leader or influencer. Hosting the podcast allowed Randy to use his strengths as a relationship builder and generate content that he and his team were then able to turn into articles. They have become regular contributors to industry publications like Accounting Today due to their podcasting content, as they regularly turn their transcripts into thought provoking and timely articles for the accounting profession.

Because of his podcast, Randy also received a coveted mention in the Top 100 in public accounting because of his “excellent podcast.”

As you can see, each podcast can be turned into many pieces of content. Multi-channel marketing is an important process to maintain brand consistency and company growth.

Three other pain points of content creation podcasts can overcome are:

Inconsistent content

Let’s face it: it’s difficult to keep most marketing content consistent across platforms. In written blog posts, you have to follow grammar and style rules and keep the tone the same across multiple writers. Visual media must also remain consistent with brand color schemes and formatting. It’s easy to miss small (or even not-so-small) inconsistencies, especially when producing large amounts of content over time.

Podcasting solves this problem by holding all the consistency in its conversational format. As long as the length and topic(s) of your podcast stay the same theme, everything else can be flexible. The host and guests have room for a free-flowing conversation, without having to worry about going through a ton of edits or making everything look and sound perfect. Audiences already expect that every conversation is going to be a little different, so there’s no requirement to formalize a podcast besides a consistent introduction. After that, the space is all yours to share organic-sounding content that resonates with your listeners.

Trouble connecting with audience

We often struggle with the fact that the more overt our content is as an advertisement, the less likely potential customers are to want to come back to it. Gene Marks, host of the Paychex Business Series, is the first to admit that “nobody wants to have commercials or products jammed down their throats.”

Podcasting allows you to place your brand in the context of topics your audience already cares about. Tomorrow Comes Today, the branded podcast of UK wealth management giant St. James’s Place, features conversations with economists, journalists, and more on everything from success psychology to the role of investors in combating climate change. Content strategist Lauren Smith told podcasting company Podbean that the podcast has solidified St. James’s Place as a thought leader in the wealth management space.

Podcasts are edifying and enjoyable for both content creators and listeners. That’s the reason 80% of podcast listeners stick around for all or most of an episode. Podcasts offer a peek into a real conversation with real people, and provide real solutions to your content difficulties. You, too, can connect with potential customers more organically through podcasting.

Content producer burnout

If you or your company’s content producers report feeling burnt out today, they’re not alone. A recent study by content agency Vibely found that 90% feel the same way. Too many content producers are asked to spend too much time on mediums that don’t maximize engagement.

Mark Bussel, National Director of Learning and Development for the memorabilia ring company Jostens, used to spend much of his time creating an all-for-one newsletter. He recently turned to podcasts and told Podbean he was shocked at how easy they were to create and publish.

“We’ll take maybe 15 minutes to create an episode by putting a bumper on the front and back and adding a little bit of music,” Bussel said. “I am by no means a technical expert, but I’ve learned in a really short period that we can make it look pretty doggone good.”

As you can see, the magic of podcasts is that they are enjoyable for both marketers and target audiences alike.

For more information about how podcasts can work for your business, click here.

The New Expert Platform: Using Podcast Interviews For Thought Leadership Marketing

Written by Robin Thompson on June 10, 2022. Posted in Blog. No Comments on The New Expert Platform: Using Podcast Interviews For Thought Leadership Marketing

Podcasting is one of the fastest and easiest ways to establish authority – Let me show you how you can leverage it for thought leadership marketing.

It’s no longer only insider knowledge — podcasting is one of the fastest and easiest ways to establish authority. Whether you’re just starting to build a business or you and your company have long-established credentials, this online audio platform can catapult your influence beyond the capabilities of many other expert-building marketing platforms. Since there are now 65 million people in the U.S. listening to podcasts every month, thought leaders have an exciting opportunity before them to engage new audiences and build their brand.

Getting featured on TV or publishing a book still serve as gold standards for having achieved expert status, but podcasting has made it possible for even budding business owners to share their knowledge and expertise with a wide audience.

The advantage of this modern platform is that it’s open publicity — meaning the host has the freedom to generate the message and control the content. Podcasting also requires fewer resources and is more accessible because audio is available to consumers when text and video are not. The convenience of listening to downloadable audio files on smartphones or tablets has allowed for a new wave of attentive, on-the-go listeners.

The opportunity to reach your target market by using your personal voice offers an additional layer of communication to convey your company values and brand authenticity. Doing so deepens trust and develops loyalty. By using a conversational format, leaders have the freedom to articulate what makes their business unique, without using typical marketing jargon.

As you may have gathered, podcasting isn’t just for entrepreneurs. Bigger brands, industry leaders and corporations often miss a big opportunity by not taking advantage of this trend.

Below, we’ll focus on leaders who are looking to establish themselves as experts and develop their spheres of influence.

How Can You Get Started With Podcasting?

You don’t need to be a host yourself. One of the best ways to introduce yourself to a new market is as a guest. Hosts are hungry for content. They are searching for people like you to feature on their podcasts to keep their shows fresh and to provide value to their audience. Libsyn, one of the largest commercial podcast hosting companies, reports an increase from 16,000 hosted shows in 2013 to 22,000 shows in 2014 to 28,000 shows in 2015. These numbers are expected to continue to increase as more people become exposed to the platform.

The key is to connect with the hosts of shows most appropriate for your subject niche, and to do so in a way that’s personal — your chance of getting a response lowers dramatically if you have an assistant send an email.

Podcast hosts want a good fit on their show; if they decide to have you on as a guest, they will take the time to give you ideas on how you can most effectively reach their audience. One way to find podcasts that are looking for guests is to do a keyword search in iTunes or Google for shows with topics that appeal to your ideal clients or target market. iTunes is to podcasts as what Amazon is to books; it is the premier platform for broadcasting your audio message to an eager audience.

You don’t have to start with cold leads, however. The easiest opportunities for guest spots may exist under your nose, via your colleagues. Ask people you know who have been podcast guests to introduce you to the hosts of those shows. Referrals can go a long way in establishing credibility and building relationships.

If you have the resources, you can also use a booking service to acquire guest spots; there are several excellent companies that can take care of placing you on the perfect shows.

How To Leverage Podcast Interviews

Once you’ve secured a podcast spot, there are an extraordinary number of ways you can use, and re-use, this valuable material. You can now post audio clips on your website or blog; include audio clips in your media kit or feature them on your company profile page or LinkedIn page. You can share the audio across social media, or use the transcribed content for new articles or blog posts. A wealth of marketing assets is available at your fingertips when you have podcast content.

As thought leaders, experts and business owners, we’re always looking for ways to increase our exposure and to grow our communities of loyal followers. Podcasts are free to access, there are so many shows to choose from, and it takes virtually no technical know-how to get started as a guest. These characteristics make being featured on podcast interviews one of the best “New Expert Platforms” available today.