Talk About The 3 Pillars Of Small Business Success

I'm Ryan Murray, an entrepreneur, business consultant, and creator of multiple small business training programs. Along with my co-host, Ryan Owens, we have had the privilege of working with hundreds of different small businesses ranging from startups to multi-million dollar companies.

Over the years of helping small businesses we started taking note of the different successes and failures we saw in the businesses we helped. It was amazing that even though every business was different, the challenges and solutions in each business were remarkably similar.

Based on these similarities we started developing what we consider to be our recipe for success. You see, I can tell you to go figure out how to bake cookies and you might get it right but likely you'll get it wrong several times before getting it right. Likewise, you can launch or run a business and figure things out on your own, making many mistakes along the way or you can follow a recipe for success and get it right the first time. We believe that recipe centers on 3 main ingredients: Marketing, Management, and Money. So we created a podcast focusing on those 3 pillars of success.

We launched our first introductory episode in Sept of 2019. Our initial goal was to start creating online content because so much of our training programs were only done in live, face to face settings. Whereas, I will always prefer the energy of a live audience, it's limiting on how many people you can reach. We started our podcast as a way to reach a broader audience and potentially help more small businesses succeed in business.

I remember trying to launch the podcast. We started by making a list of topics. I had decided that if we couldn't create a list of topics for a years worth of podcasting we didn't have enough content for a show. After quickly and easily creating a years with of potential topics and saw that this would work.

It took a while to start working well as co-hosts. We did several practice sessions and worked on refining the process. It was hard getting criticism from our test sessions we sent out, but I'm glad we did that because our show is better for it. We're always improving, but there were several mistakes we fixed before ever launching our first episode. The process took about 3 months for us.

One of the most important lessons we learned was how to quickly and consistently produce an episode. At first we were about a 4:1 ratio (it took about an hour to produce 15 mins of content). Most of the time was spent editing. We continually find ways to improve that process and are now slightly under a 3:1 ratio. This is important in finding the time to be consistent with our show.

We knew upfront it would be a commitment to produce regular content so we focused on creating templates, schedules, processes, and anything else that would facilitate production. We started with a long-term perspective. We want a show that will last for years not months.

We spent about $2,000 getting a "studio" set up. I converted a spare room in my house. We also pay $50-$100 a month for hosting, artwork, etc. The real expense is in promotion. You can spend a lot in either time or money or both. With ours being a small business podcast, we've made money with our show indirectly. It has helped us get clients and promote our training programs.

We have made money from our podcast, but not in the same way most podcasts do. Our podcast is complimentary to our other training programs so we use it as a "soft sell" for our paid content. Through our podcast we have been able to sell license agreements, be part of the curriculum for a university entrepreneurship course, and get paid to create content for other organizations connecting to a similar market.

Some of the tools we use are Blubrry for hosting, we started with Garage Band for recording and editing but have updated to Audacity, and we use Rode mics and mixer. Our setup is pretty straightforward. We don't have a lot of equipment and try to keep it simple.

Originally we weren't doing guests. We have since expanded our format to include guest interviews that we do via phone because they come from all over. Because we've been in the industry for well over a decade it seems pretty easy to pull from our existing network for now. However, we do plan to expand outside of our network and have already started reaching out to others.

When we first started preparing for recording shows we would do extensive notes and cue cards, but that made the show feel too rigid and not as enjoyable to listen to. By the time we recorded our first show, we moved to more of a conversational format. It helps that we both have extensive experience so there is a lot to draw from. We like the more casual approach.

We started marketing our show by reaching out to our existing network. Having worked with a lot of entrepreneurs was very beneficial to get us started. We've done a little bit with social media, mainly Twitter and LinkedIn, but neither platform has done much for us. We've seen good organic growth from iTunes and were surprised at the size of our international audience. When we first started it was about 10%, now international is 30% to 40% of our audience. Listennotes.com has also helped by directing people to our website and increasing our traffic.

I used to do a blog several years ago. I didn't enjoy it very much so it felt like a homework assignment every time a needed to create content. As such, I didn't create great content and it wasn't frequent enough. On the contrary I love podcasting. It's just fun for me. As a result our content is better and more frequently produced, which means we are growing. My advice is do what you love. Not everybody enjoys podcasting. Some people prefer social media or blogging. It's work to create content, so you better enjoy doing the work.

I thing I wish I had known sooner (or done sooner) was connecting with other podcasters. There are tons of resources to connect with others. Reach out and be willing to help them along the way too.

You can listen to our show Marketing, Management, & Money on all the major podcasting platforms.

Our website is MarketingManagementMoney.com

Our online trainings are found on TabletWise.com
tabletwise.com/users/profile/4912161115602944

Or reach out directly at Ryan@MarketingManagementMoney.com