Great talks with interesting people

My podcast “Talks With Liem Le” (TwLL) is typically about the guest, their career/hobby, and their journey. The podcast is available in video and audio formats.

I’m a software engineer and have been doing that for nearly two decades. Typically I have a co host, Emmett Morgan, who is a Las Vegas real estate agent, but he brings his wide knowledge to help enhance the podcast. The podcast is a long format conversation of 3 hours. I love this format because it gets us to really understand the guest very well.
 

The podcast idea came to me after listening to Joe Rogan, Lex Fridman, Sam Harris, Neil Degrasse Tyson, countless other podcasts and documentaries. Despite the growing number of podcasts, I still felt the podcast ecosystem can actually support the massive number of new podcasts.I do regret not starting sooner but I’m glad I finally jumped into it.
 

Everything is coming out of my pocket. It's something I enjoy, I make time for it. I enjoy it, but I also hope it can eventually make me money some day.

I don't know if I have an overly complicated setup, but this video podcasting sure takes up a LOT of time! A LOT OF TIME!
 

My goal is to find a happy medium where my audience gets a podcast that they really enjoy and I can balance that with my enjoyment of conversations with guests. I absolutely love talking to people about their jobs and having the guest educate me about their profession. So I guess I just hope I find a big enough audience that likes what my podcast is doing. If things work out, I will get to enjoy talking to people about their careers and journeys while sharing the best of their stories for everyone to hear.
 

There’s so much to do!!!

1. Finding new guests through Listen Notes Classified Ads, Reddit podcast groups, friends, friends of friends, coworkers, friends of guests, etc.
2. Profiling guests to see if they would be a good match for a 3 hour conversation on my podcast
3. Having them fill out a pre-podcast questionnaire, having them view existing TwLL conversations, having them read a guidelines document
4. Schedule them on the calendar and coordinate with co host too
5. I’ll spend about 10-45 minutes to research the guest or their area of expertise
6. Brainstorm with co host if necessary
7. Day of the podcast setup studio if necessary (surprising takes up more time and you would think)
8. Prep the guest with additional guidelines
9. Cameras and mics are LIVE!
10. Once the recording is done get the memory cards to a computer
11. Copy video and audio files
12. Make a backup copy of the files on a separate archive disk
13. Import files into Davinci Resolve
14. Make overall changes first
14.a. Audio levels
14.b. Video color grading
15. Cut and chop camera angles or fix audio as necessary
16. Output first draft for guest to preview
17. Fix any mistakes
18. Prepare short clips for YouTube Shorts, TikTok, and Instagram
19. Plan a schedule to roll everything out
20. Inform guest
21. If necessary send the guest an instruction document for them to prepare to share on their social media
22. Final video draft output
23. Upload to YouTube, Listen Notes, Anchor.fm, etc.
24. Archive any files you can, and free up some disk space on your working storage drive. 4K videos take up a lot of space!
25. Back to step 1 for the next guest!
26. Make time to improve your process! Do NOT overbook yourself. Leave time for mistakes, time to explore new avenues to enhance your podcast and time to market, share on social media or just time to unwind a bit.
 

My podcast is on most social media and audio podcast platforms. I don’t know how to market.... Yet. I am learning!
 

For less of a headache I would suggest already being in one of these categories: 1.) working in I.T. 2.) working in the photography/audio industry 3.) be an ultra smart talkative charismatic individual 4.) be made of money and/or 5.) Persistence! This is NOT necessary! I’ve worked as a programmer for nearly 20 years and it was daunting learning all the things about filming and audio recording! I don’t consider myself an ultra smart talkative charismatic individual, so finding interesting guests is something required for my podcast. If you don’t work in I.T. then you’ll have to learn things like Listen Notes (even though they make it pretty darn easy) but you’ll have to know how to get around with social media, how to link everything, how to video edit in something like Adobe Premiere or Davinci Resolve. If you’re doing audio only, maybe you’ll still want to learn about audio mastering, or what microphones make a podcast sound good.

If you don’t have experience with photography/audio like I did then you’ll have to learn about audio equipment and audio editing software (such as Audacity, or Adobe Audition). Being made of money fixes a lot of problems... that’s not something I had the luxury of. I worked hard for my money and I’m trying my best to be smart with it. Let’s hope starting this podcast isn’t a black hole of costs hahah
 

TwLL is available for video and audio on YouTube. While audio only podcasts are available on Listen Notes, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, Pandora, iHeartRadio, CastBox.fm, Anchor.fm and more. TwLL is also on instagram, facebook, twitter too. Just google “Talks With Liem Le” and you’ll easily find my podcast.