Welcome to uploading the podcast, where we take you behind the wheel with the world's best creators, marketers, and professionals who have cracked the code on how to profit through content. You'll learn the ins and outs of content, strategy, creation, production, distribution, growth, platforms, tools, and more. If you haven't already, be sure to join Cas magic, the all in one content workspace for professionals. We'll be sending out tips from our shows in our weekly newsletter, and we've also got a slack community of over a thousand creators, so make sure to drop in and say hello. And now get ready for the show. Welcome to today's episode of uploading. And today we have the pleasure of speaking with Stephanie Arkellian. She is the podcast marketing and audience development specialist for Impact Theory, a podcast hosted by Tom Bilyeu that currently has 4.2 million subscribers on YouTube.

Uh, in today's episode, we're going to be covering a lot, but we're going to dive into how to create a podcast that actually converts your listeners. The most effective ways to promote your show relationships, developing your audience, figuring out who they are and how to grow them, and then also different parts of just working in a really professional content or how to work with production, how to nail campaigns and how to play even a little bit of pr in terms of growing everything together. So, Stephanie, I'll let you kick us off. Why don't you give us a little bit of background about yourself and how you got involved in impact theory to begin with.

Yeah, absolutely. Thank you guys so much for having me. So I've been in podcast marketing for almost six years. Before that, I was running my own social media and digital marketing agency and was introduced to a network called Kurt Co. Media. And they were just starting and had brought me on just for social media and digital marketing work. And I really fell in love with the podcasting industry and as it was growing and developing and every little aspect of it. So I ended up leaving my company, going full time in house for Kurt Co.

As their head of marketing. I was there for four years, and then I've been at impact theory now for a year and a half as their podcast specialist, and it's been great. So I work with Tom show, as you mentioned, and then also Lisa Bilyusho, his wife, women of impact. And we're, you know, developing ways to continue to grow and build and how can we expand this industry? And it's been really interesting experience coming from a startup network like Kurt Co. Where we're building from the ground up and then coming into an established network like Tom and Lisa's and figuring out how can we solve these different problems from different aspects.

So tell us a little bit about maybe for the audience who isn't familiar, tell us a little bit about Tom and Lisa's content. What do they talk about? Who is their audience? And, you know, just tell us about the space that their content is sort of in.

Yeah, so it's really interesting. So Tom and Lisa are co founders of Quest Nutrition, you know, quest bars and protein and all of that. And they sold that off for a billion dollars and turned around and reinvested that money into a media network, which is impact theory. So they've been doing impact theory for seven years, and they each have their own show. Like you said, it's on YouTube and it's on audio on podcasts. And so Tom's podcast was focused on mindset and entrepreneurship and business. And everything that we do here at impact theory leads into how do we help the world develop a growth mindset. So Tom comes at it from a more business aspect, right? A world affairs aspect.

How is what's happening in the economy and finance in the world affecting what you're doing? And how do you not let that stop you? And how do you get out of your own way? And then Lisa's show, women of impact, comes at it from a confidence standpoint. You know, how do you mentally get out of your own way? How do you get those barriers? How do you build yourself up? Whatever that aspect is, whether it's relationships or it's business or it's family or it's whatever you want to do, how do you build that confidence within yourself? So they do play off of each other, but they have completely separate audiences. Tom's audience is a more male skewed audience, Lisa's some more female skewed audience. So we do tailor the content for those audiences. And then what was really interesting when we dove into the podcast side of it is breaking out their YouTube audience versus their audio audience, because they are separate. And that's one of the things that I'm trying to implement into the industry, is to show people, as podcasts are moving into the YouTube space, that you have to treat them separately because your audiences are not going to be the same. YouTube is still the number one most played listening platform for podcasts, but it's a completely separate audience. People who consume podcasts on YouTube are not the same people who are listening to it on Spotify and Apple podcasts and Amazon.

So how do you find your audiences where they are. And it's, there is crossover in the audiences. Obviously, they like the content, it's similar content. But how do you then cater to each audience when they differ? And that is the thing that we work on the most.

And why? Why are they different? Is it because of discoverability on YouTube versus, you know, Spotify, where you sort of, you know, nobody's going on Spotify to discover something new and isn't suggested new things, you sort of type in, you know, exactly where you're going for. So how are they different? I assume if there's discoverability, it has to be more top of funnel as well.

Mm hmm. Absolutely. And so, yeah, YouTube is a search engine, right. So you go in if something's topical, you know, right away, like what is happening, who's talking about it, what just came out. You can search on a topic and you can binge multiple episodes of people talking about the same topic. But on podcasts, it's a little bit different. The community is different. The way that you engage is different.

So podcast is a very intimate medium, right. It's in your ears. You're normally listening to it when you're doing things that are, you're usually alone for. Right. You're driving, you're cleaning, you're working out. Those are usually solo activities versus YouTube. You know, you can watch on tv, you can share with people, you share clips, they can go viral versus podcast. Clips don't go viral usually, unless there's a video portion of it.

But that intimate aspect of it, you develop a relationship with your host. Right. If you're spending, the average podcast listener consumes five to seven episodes a week. That's a lot of time. So if the average episode's an hour, it's five to seven episodes you're spending with could be one host or multiple hosts, but that could be more time than you spend with your partner when you come home at the end of the day. Right. So you develop these parasocial relationships with the host, and you come back for them. They could have a range of guests or their storytelling ability.

They could be talking about a different, you know, range of topics, but you come back for how they ask the questions, how they interview, how they tell the story, versus on YouTube, you're coming in for the topic.

Usually, yeah, I think, you know, earlier today I was, I was doing work and I was listening to a YouTube video in the background as I was doing some work. And that's not something I do for a podcast because I have this relationship with how I treat podcasts that require, you know, a lot of my attention, almost like audiobooks, where, like, I cannot multitask and listen to an audiobook podcast. I can multitask a little bit more. But YouTube, for some reason, for me, it feels like. Like I can. So I'm curious, Stephanie, how has the space evolved from when you first started out and you started working with impact theory? How has your tasks, responsibilities, and duties changed and evolved since then? Just given that YouTube, like, where was the channel when you joined, for example, and what have you implemented and what has changed?

That is a really good question and a big question. So we really came in. So about a year and a half ago, they brought myself and our ad sales executive, Christina Mills in, and we really created a foundation of the network. Right? Like, Tom and Lisa have been around for so long, since the beginning of podcast, really. So they have this loyal following already. So how do you come into something that has the loyal following and build it right? So first thing is dive into your audience. So what content are they consuming? What do they like the most of? If you have a range of topics. So for Tom's show, you know, it could health, it could be fitness, it could be finance, it could be relationships.

So there's so many aspects in that. So what content's performing well and where is it performing well? What age range is it? You know, if you look at. So if we just do the audio side, right. If you break out Spotify and Apple, what are your demographics there? Spotify leans a little bit younger. It's a little bit more. They're still growing. Versus Apple, podcasts is more established. That's a more a listener who's used to consuming podcasts, right.

It was built in the phone. That's how podcasts exploded. Apple put the podcast app automatically on your iPhone that you couldn't delete it at first. And that's how podcasts grew. So it was the exposure. So they have that audience down path. They know what they're doing. So if that kind of audience is consuming one thing, but then you put it on YouTube and that audience is consuming something different, how do you move forward? So we really did a full audit of the podcast of Tom, had over 1000 episodes on his feed when we first started.

So taking all of that data and really analyzing it, and what can we focus in on what maybe isn't doing well anymore? What do we need to evolve and how do you continue to grow? And the biggest thing I think is that, so in 2019, right before the pandemic, the end of the year, there were about 800,000 podcasts out. Now there's over 5 million. So the pond has gotten so much bigger. Right. It's a very noisy space. It's really how do you stand out when you're not brand new and shiny? Right. You've been around for a while, so do you keep consistent? How do you keep growing? And I think it's something that the industry hasn't experienced yet because it hasn't been around long enough. This industry is still new.

So we're discovering these problems as they come up, right. And we're all trying to figure out what is that next step? How do we take it there when it's never been done before? And that's why I love having these conversations with you guys and what you create, because the more people we have focusing on these issues that are coming up that we've never dealt with, the greater the responses are going to be. If we have more eyes and ears trying to figure it out, we're going to have more creative solutions. So the biggest thing has just been how do you continue to evolve?

Yeah, I mean, positioning is key for, you know, you mentioned there's so many podcasts out there, and so you need to understand what is the unique value proposition that you're going to have for the audience and people based on your expertise, your storytelling, what your life story is, and what you're truly passionate about. So for anyone who is listening that you know, here's you how you go over data and go through it to extract particular insights. If I am a podcaster or youtuber who's starting out, what are you looking for when you're digging into the data? You know, sure, you can see demographic, et cetera, but what are the questions that you need to be asking yourselves that might uncover insights on where to go or where to double down on?

That's a great question. So the first thing that I did is pull all of our historic data. So let's say I pulled everything since the beginning of time and then in the last year. So then if we look at the last year and then break all of the up, say we had 50 episodes over the year, right? Break it down by category. So this one's health, this one's business. And then how are they performing? What is the average download for these categories? 30 days out, 60 days out. How do they perform? Are they performing well right out the gate? And so we know that there's going to be an initial bump or these slow burns, because if you're looking at YouTube analytics, usually those are slow burns, right. You want to see how they do 30 and 60 days out.

And podcasts can differ. Sometimes they pop right away. In that first week you get all your downloads, and sometimes it's a slow burn because if you have a lot of followers and it's part of their daily routine, you know, sometimes they catch up. So looking at the different categories and say, okay, well, this year, you know, the average downloads on the health episodes were up versus last year. So let's lean into that. Let's try a couple more health themed episodes and see if it continues to perform that way. And maybe the finance ones aren't performing as well as they did six months ago or a year ago. So let's maybe, you know, switch around a couple themes and see if we can just test it out.

And it really is about playing. So you have that historic data and testing things out. One of the things that we say here at impact theory is dent the card, don't break it, right? So, like test things out. It's okay to make mistakes and learn if you are learning from them. So let's keep testing. A b testing. Does this work? Does it not? Testing out titles and headlines, right. That's one of the things that we separate for YouTube and podcasts.

It may be the same content and the same episode, but when it goes out on YouTube, it has a different title that's going to catch the search engine and the algorithm more versus on podcasts, it's a little bit more direct. Right. Because if you're a listener and you follow, you want to know who you're talking to and what you're talking about. So that is one way how we tailor the content.

Yeah. The other. The other thing I was going to say, it's like. And you're also looking for the common threads and who is engaging with the content the most. This reminds me of like finding, it's almost like product market fit within a software company, but here it's like audience market fit, where you're trying to identify that exact person and Persona that is the rabid fan, not just a listener and not somebody that just discovered it. How do you guys think of a fan versus a listener?

Ooh.

Okay, so this is something that I developed last year for us, is our through line. So you have the listener, the fan, and the evangelist. Right? So you have a listener. So someone who comes in, maybe listens once, maybe they've seen it, they've maybe seen Tom and Lisa on social. So that's a general listener. Right. So then we turn them into a fan. So that's getting them to follow.

Right. We now have your, not your algorithm, we have your following. So you want to get more of the content. And then if we can get them to our paid subscription, where we have more episodes and ad free episodes and bonus content, we call that an evangelist, or I do, because then you're paying for the extra content. So how do we get people into that funnel? And once you get them in, if you expose them as a fan, how do you get them into an evangelist? And that's something that we're still, you know, figuring out right now because we do have so much content and we do have such a large audience. It's some, it's, you know, there's, there's good and there's bad because you have so much data to look at. So how do you break it down versus if you had a smaller audience, you'd be a little bit more clear. But getting people into that funnel, what are they interested in? So we do we, when we launched our subscription, so last year, we launched the paid subscription side of the content, which was since Tom had so many episodes on his feed, there's no way you're going to be able to go through 1000 episodes.

And if you're scrolling through on a phone, it's just an endless list. Right. So anything before 2020, we ended up archiving, which was only about 500 episodes. And because we archived that, we turned that into the subscription. Now, instead of just getting, you do get the ad free episodes when you sign up. And this is not just like a promo for a subscription, but it's how I took 600 episodes. And what do you do with that? And we ended up giving you. So if you do get the subscription, it's not just, you know, the ad free, but you get five other playlists.

So we took the 600 episodes, divided them into their themes, so relationships, business motivation, etcetera. And every week, each one of those playlists gets an episode added to it. So you can listen to Tom's entire playlist on finance, an entire playlist on Mindset, entire playlist on health. So if you haven't been listening for seven years, these are all new to you, and this is all back, back catalog content that you can then continue to use for new listeners and see if there's interest there. And so when we were launching that, one of the tools on Spotify that they've recently released is a poll question. And so you can poll your fans. And so we put out what is the most important thing to you that you would pay for in a subscription? Is it ad free episodes? Is it bonus content? Is it access to the archives? What is it? You know, is it ama's? Is it. What is it? And so we ran polls for a couple months to see what our listeners wanted, and they really wanted ad free content.

So, absolutely. That's the first thing out of the gate. You get, you know, ad free content. And now we're giving you five extra playlists of ad free content as well.

Stephanie, on that point, what? Because I know monetizing and ads is something a lot of creators think about, like, how many ads are in Tom's current. Tom and Lisa's, like, current shows. So, like, you know, yeah.

What.

What is the admix look like for what's running now versus, like you said, being able to go ad free and what the incentive is to switch over that way.

So we do. We do have a good amount of ads. Like, I wouldn't say it's an overabundance, but we have the normal, you know, both shows have pre post and two mids, but it's then, you know, how many ads do you put in each mid roll? So we try and balance it by time. So if we have a longer mid roll in the first position, you know, we're not going to stack three or four ads in there, because we want to make sure that it's all about the listener experience. So everything is still focused on that. So it's a balance of, yes, you want to monetize, yes, you want to be a good ad partner, but everything goes back to your listener, and if they're not enjoying it and they're overwhelmed by the ads, then they're not going to listen anyway. So everything back to you. So we test it out.

So sometimes there'll be less ads. Sometimes we test out, like, can we put in, like, a sneak another one in just to see does it work? Does it convert? And that's really what it all is. So, yeah, pre post and two mids.

And how long are these? Like 15 2nd slots? Like 30, 60.

So when I came into impact theory, Tom's YouTube episodes are long. He has these really in depth, intimate conversations, and they go two or 3 hours. And on YouTube, that's great content, right? That's normal. On podcast, it's a little bit long, right? Because if you are driving or working out or whatever it is, that's a long time to commit to. And sometimes you don't have the time to go back for another full hour and a half. So what we did is for our podcast, we split the episode. So on YouTube, you get the full three hour episode. But on podcasts, we split it.

So anything over about an hour and a half, hour 45, we will split into two episodes to make that a better listening experience so that people feel like they're getting a decent amount in that the chung enough information in there, and then when they come back, they get another part of the conversation. And that's good for listener retention, listen rates, ad sales, everything. And so we've seen a huge spike in our downloads because of that. Because if you are playing a three hour episode and your listeners don't have that amount of time, and they're dropping off at an hour and a half, you're losing so much content that you could be taking advantage of. If you are not listening to an hour and a half, that's ads, that's content. The guest. So we looked at that and said, let's split it and test it, and it has been very fruitful for us.

Okay. Wow. 3 hours. So, Blade and I have done 300 of DTC pod at an hour long each. And it's funny that, like, just a little amount that you use in archive was 500, and those are 3 hours long each. So, what does this workflow look like? What is, like, the full. You know, I've. I've watched impact theory.

I think I've consumed over 100 of those episodes over the years. Um, I know Tom's, like, full. Yeah, yeah. I love the stories covered there because it's such a broad range, but, you know, with a specific message to drive across. So it's a full production and 3 hours, you know, that's, like, the only other podcast. It's like Joe Rogan or something that goes for that long. And so takes a lot of prepping attention, focus. What does the entire workflow look like? All the way from preparing for the show all the way to publishing the episode?

Ooh, that's such a good question. I love this. I never get to talk about both sides of it. So it comes down to. So let's start with, like, the guest pitch, right? So our production team is always looking for a new guest that fits into the topic. So, like I said, everything that we do feeds into how to help people develop a growth mindset, right? And so Tom will have these different categories. So, how do we find guests that are topical and current and fit into that and can have a conversation or even a two hour, three hour conversation? Sometimes. You guys have interviewed hundreds of people.

Sometimes the conversations aren't meant to be that long. So who are the guests that can have that, that can feed in, that can really give insight to our audience? So the production team will create a whole pitch packet for Tom. And you know why we like this guest? What we think is relevant about it, what you could talk to them about. Here's some examples of them talking, and here's why we think it would be good. Tom review. Great. Approve the guests. We get them on.

So we do film in person on set here in our office. We do have our impact theory studios here. Both podcasts are filmed here. And so we'll have the guests on, they'll film. We have the producers on set, you know, listening to the conversation, marking things down, like for spicy clips that we like. Oh, this is gonna be a really great sound bite at this moment in the conversation. Or maybe we can use this for the intro. So the episode gets recorded, production takes it.

They do a first run through because we have a multi cam setup. So they will combine the footage together. We will get the audio draft of that. We start pulling from that audio draft of how to write the intros for Tom to set up the episode. Right. Of, like, here's what they talked about. Here's why it's important. We'll cut out break times.

Like, after the break, we're going to come back and talk about this, this and this, things like that. So we'll start drafting that. Production finishes, the video setup. They do a final cut. We get the final audio. Then it goes to our copywriter to write the show notes for YouTube and then the show notes for podcasts because they are slightly different. And then the sponsor links get added in by our ad sales because some are video ads, some are audio ads. So make sure that's in there.

All the show notes are great. Then we look at the titles. You know, we look at the headline that we're the thumbnail and the headline that we're going to put on for YouTube. Take that and say, okay, that's the topic. That's what's going to get that audience in. So then how do we change that and adapt it to the audio audience? We separate it out. We get it uploaded, and it goes out to the openance.

Awesome. I'm always so curious about how teams do this because this is a process that, and I'm, you know, that probably needs to just get optimized over and over and over. There's so many steps and things that arise every time to add in remove. Like if you find a data insight and you realize that now, actually, we can leverage this for SEO. Where does that go into the workflow? A lot of the times content teams work in silos and don't know. The person that's working on YouTube doesn't know that there's somebody on SEO working on a specific keyword that actually matches content that has already been created and can be leveraged is a perfect plug for cast magic. But I'm curious how you envision the entire repurposing engine. So you guys produce a ton of content.

You mentioned that a lot of insights sit in this content, especially backlog, old catalogs, and even with the new content now, so much of AI allows you to repurpose that content and make so much more out of it. So what does the content repurposing engine look like, and how do you see that?

So there's a lot of arms to it of, you know, how do you repurpose all this content? And I think this is very topical. What's going on in the podcast industry as well. People are talking about moving to YouTube or repurposing the content because we're at this point in the industry where everyone's looking at it now. You know, if you've been in podcasting for a couple of years or so, you have a decent amount of episodes, and how do you make the most of it? How do we work smarter, not harder? Even though I don't like that saying, but essentially that's what it is. So the first thing that we do is replay episodes on the podcast. Right? Apologies. So if they were archived episodes that are no longer on the feed, we theme them out. So a couple times a week, you'll get a replay episode.

One maybe on business, and then one's on relationship, and then the next week is a Tom Ama and then one's on finance, so that we're still keeping the content alive. And because if you haven't been around for seven years listening to Tom, which most of our listeners haven't, it's new to you, right? If you haven't heard it, it's new to you. And a lot of the episodes are still evergreen, so they're still relevant, especially if it's health content or business content. Maybe not spot on relevant, but in general, it's still evolving. Or we have an episode later down the line, a couple years later. If Dom did a business episode in 2017 on AI and then did one in 2020 and then does one now, it's going to evolve. So we can. It's nice to show those changes as well.

So sometimes we'll have Tom record an intro for those older episodes and be like, this is from 2017. And it's really interesting to hear what I thought about this back then, because if you listen to current episodes, it's changed. But I would love for you to dive in to see what my basis of my thinking is. So that's one way that we do it. And then one of the things that we're working on right now is also mashup episodes. Right? So if we do have 500 episodes of back catalog and using AI to help us with this and help us write, put it all together, if we upload five different episodes to cast magic on the same topic, how can we then create one episode? So if we have five guests, we're talking about finance right now. Can we combine them into one episode, cut different clips, and have all of these experts talk about it? We already have the original episodes, but how do you have different perspectives and put that together into one? So that's one of the ways we're also repurposing the content, you know, and then running it through and finding the special clips that are relevant today. Did we say something two years ago that maybe is popping up today or is coming true today or coming to fruition, but there's just so many ways to repurpose it.

So that's just the tip of the iceberg.

Yeah. No, the reason I ask it is because so much of content repurposing at the end of the day can be done for business growth, and not only for more eyeballs in traffic, but also to streamline a process that requires less and less overhead while getting more accomplished. And also, I just love how you guys repurpose the content as well and create new revenue streams and channels from it, such as the impact theory university. All of these are themes that you mentioned, which is, like, listener, fan, and evangelist. You sort of tie, like, line the. I'm sorry. You sort of, like, sorry, totally lost it.

No, you, like. You tie everything. You tie everything together, right? From going from your top of funnel content all the way to your university. And maybe, Ramon, maybe that's, like, a great transitioning point I'd love to talk about specifically ITU, right? Like, what is it? How does that function? How does that work alongside all of the content as part of, like, this whole media entity?

Yeah. And that's a really great question, because ITU is such an important part of what we do. So for anyone who's not, you know, familiar with ITU, that is our impact. Their university, and it is an online school, for lack of a better word, that is led mostly by Tom. But Alisa has classes on there as well. So it is a company wide initiative, but it's for those who really want to dig in and take that next step to get out of their own way to build something, whatever it is. So it's. Tom teaches courses on those original topics.

Right. So, on mindset and entrepreneurship and business. And what is that thinking? So it could be episodes that are, as, you know, abstract is just thinking about your focus, your target audience. What do you want to do? Getting concrete about your goals and how do you pare that down? How do you get all the noise out of your head and focus on, this is the goal? And here's what I'm going to implement it. Because sometimes you just need someone to tell you, get out of your own way. And here's how you do it, because we hear that all the time, right? Like, oh, you're just in your own way. You just need to get out of your own way. What does that mean?

And the accountability piece is huge.

Exactly. So there's hundreds of courses that you can dive into that. Tom teaches that Lisa teaches on relationships and confidence and anything that you need. And then there's live talks with Tom. There's one on ones. There's a whole community that they get together and have live discussions and feedback. And we have community managers here who interact with the students every day, try to offer them all of the tools that we learn from running impact theory and offer it to them to help them continue to grow in whatever aspect that is. So it's really this hub of growth mindset, right.

Whatever you are looking for, even if you're not sure, it's great to just dip your toes and see, like, what is there, what is being offered. Maybe it'll seep in, maybe it works, maybe it doesn't. But we want to at least be that place that you can come to where it's available for you.

And then on the operation side for ITU, like, what. What's the overlap with the whole content strategy and, like, what's separate? So, like, yeah, how do you guys operate this entire university? I guess within your media, we could.

Do a whole episode just on ITu itself. And I will say that I'm not the most expert in ITU, but there is overlap with content. You know, we have hundreds and hundreds of hours of ItU content that Tom has created. And so while we don't use those as episodes, we keep it very separate. Because the audience is different, even if Tom's doing solo episodes, but they are similar. It's the same topics that Tom talks about on the podcast. Right. He's not doing anything different on the podcast.

And the questions that he's trying to answer himself than what he presents to his students, and he doesn't ask anything different than them, than he asks of all of us who work here, asks of himself and asks of Lisa. We are all asked the same thing of how do you continue to better yourself? And by asking those questions, narrow it down.

Why?

Why?

Why? It's just that the university is more focused. It is more one on one. It is more specialized to each individual path and journey versus the podcast is a little bit wider. So if you needed to have Tom do us, you know, a specialty class on a specific aspect of business, of, you know, okay, we have this product, and how do you take this specific product to market? Right. What would you do that's going to be a little bit different than what he talks about on the show?

You know, that that makes a bunch of sense. And, Stephanie, as we kind of wrap up here, I did have one last question that I think is really important. So you've had the ability to kind of be in the driver's seat of seeing, you know, one of the top, you know, YouTube podcast media sort of arms grow. And I'd be curious if you have any feedback or, like, recommendations for someone who's, you know, who hasn't, isn't quite at the level of Tom and Lisa in their content, but is like, emerging as a content creator is really growing, is starting to grow their audience. Like, what are your kind of biggest takeaways and learnings that you would apply as an emerging creator to, you know, grow your entire business?

It's. I will preface this, but, you know, it is a hard time out there right now. We just, there's 5 million podcasts out there. But what I tell creators, and I will, you know, meet with creators if you have a podcast or a content creator and want some advice on your show. I freelance, but if you reach out to me, I will take a 30 minutes meeting, we'll do a full audit of your show, and I'll give you some action items to leave with if you tell me, you know, what your goals are, because I want to help the industry grow. So what I tend to tell people is really focus in on your why, as long as everything that you're doing feeds into your why. Why are you doing this podcast? Is it to make money and monetize is it to build a community? Is it to build a funnel into your other business? And be realistic about that, because if your goal is to build a funnel into like your real estate business, you're going to have different goals for your podcast. Then we have an impact theory, right? Because it may not be that you just need to monetize and grow it and get more listeners.

You want that loyal group of listeners who are going to sign up for your newsletter, who are going to pay for your real estate course or whatever it is. So focusing on that goal, because then you're not going to be on the same plane as other podcasters who are looking to become, you know, the, the voice of whatever their specialty is, or just to grow and be the biggest podcast and make the most money out of it. And that's not a bad thing either. Maybe you want it to be a full side hustle. Maybe you just want it to, you know, a little extra spending money. Maybe you want it to be your full time job. There's so many definitions of success. So getting really clear on what your definition of success is and focusing in on that, and I would say do not get distracted by all of the other places you can put it.

I think that confusing content creators right now, if you are not already familiar with YouTube, and this is an unpopular opinion, I say that new creators should not try and push their podcast on YouTube unless you have no expectations for it, because it's a whole other ballgame, right? The barrier to entry in podcasting is so low, and that's what's so great about it. Anyone can make a podcast, you can record it on your phone, you can put it out there, you can find your community, right? YouTube is a little bit harder. If you're just going to put the audio up there with like an audiogram or some transcript, that's great. But if you are going out there against the Tom Bilious, the Joe Rogans, the people who have a full production setup, you're going to have a very different experience. So I don't think it's worth splitting your time right now as a content creator to learn a whole new skill set of video editing and then matching the sound with that and color crushing and all of that. And the back end of YouTube is a whole other beast until you're ready to invest that time in it. I think focus on your podcast, build your community and it will transfer over. Then you can grow into YouTube.

But I think focus on what your definition of success is and grow that it's like a social account, right? You can't try and grow on all of them at the same time. You start on one, like, let's grow on Twitter first, or x, you know, and build a community there, because it's a different type of content than on Instagram. That's just different type of content. And on TikTok, and those audiences react to the content differently. So focus on one and build it perfect.

And, yeah, because if you go against the same content that Tom or Joe Rogan might have, they are capturing the entire market. And so there's not going to be a differentiator in your audience. They are. It's. There's too much overlap in whatever your audience is for selling ads based and then what they have. So, Stephanie, I really want to thank you for doing this with us and opening up the hood under everything impact theory. And this was a really fun convo for anyone who wants to either get in touch with you or just keep in touch with anything. Impact theory or.

Stephanie, where can they follow you or impact theory and learn more so you.

Can reach out to me. My email is Stephanie. Stephanie. Mpacttheory.com. my Instagram is Steph. S t e p h. Arakelian. A r a k e l I a n a very long name, full name.

And follow impact theory. Follow Tom and Lisa. They're on every platform. But, yeah, if anyone's listening and has any questions or needs any advice, like, this industry is only gonna grow. And that just. That's just podcasting, but that's just content creation, right? We're at this precipice if we help each other. So I am always here to help bounce ideas off of, if I can, you know, with bandwidth permitting. But, yeah, please reach out.

This was a wonderful opportunity. Thank you guys so much for having me.

Thank you, Stephanie.