002: How Your Podcast Can Open Doors For You and Your Brand with Brittany Hodak

What if your customers were as obsessed with your brand as Swifties are with Taylor? As it turns out, superfans aren’t just for pop stars! Drawing on nearly 20 years of dedicated study and research, award-winning entrepreneur, author, and keynote speaker Brittany Hodak is a long-standing investigator of the “superfandom” phenomenon. As the co-founder of Bright Ideas Only (formerly known as The Superfan Company), she has orchestrated fan-engagement campaigns for some of the world’s biggest brands and artists, and her podcast, Creating Superfans, offers a crash course in turning customer experience into your superpower.

In today’s episode of Business Beyond the Mic, Brittany gives us a glimpse into her podcasting journey, shares some of the initial obstacles she faced, and explains why it took so long to launch her show in the first place. Tuning in, you’ll find out what it takes to create evergreen content and how Brittany’s Shark Tank appearance continues to influence the success of her podcast today. She also shares her tips for content strategy, finding the right sponsorship match for your podcast, and what it looks like when your message truly resonates with your audience. Whether you’re launching a new podcast or running an established business, this conversation will give you the essential playbook for tapping into the unmatched power of superfandom!

Takeaways From This Episode:

You can leverage the power of customer experience without comparing your brand to the biggest and best in the world (or trying to imitate them). As Brittany says, “You don’t need LeBron James teaching you to play basketball if you’ve never played basketball!” Your brand is your employees. It’s the way you treat your customers and show up in every single interaction. Don’t overlook the little things.

The logistics of putting a podcast together can be overwhelming. While you should have a clear idea of how it fits into your business and how it can help you better serve your audience, don’t overthink it! Brittany avoided launching a podcast for much longer than she should have because she got caught up in the details. Your podcast creates a personable and accessible entry point into your brand, so go ahead and invite people in.

There are a variety of ways to know if your podcast episodes are hitting home with your audience. Downloads are an obvious metric to keep an eye on, but Brittany also highlights the significance of “unsolicited feedback,” particularly social media engagement, when it comes to discerning whether your message truly resonates with your audience.

You can take the chaos out of the podcasting process by sitting down and getting really intentional about your strategy. From coinciding release dates with book launches to finding the right balance between solocasts and guest interviews to releasing episodes in predetermined seasons, there are so many ways to take the stress out of creating, launching, and sustaining a successful show!

Wondering how you can turn your podcast into a recurring income stream? Brittany has some great advice for aligning yourself with the right sponsors, promoting your own products, and monetizing your podcast for the long term. Consider a referral affiliate program, which is a win-win scenario for sponsors and podcasters alike!

A good craftsperson never blames their tools, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t set yourself up for success with the best podcasting tools possible. Brittany recommends investing as much as you can in a good-quality microphone that is purpose-built for podcasting so that your listeners don’t have to struggle and strain to listen to your show.

Quotes:

“We are living in an experience economy: experience is everything and everything is experience.” — @BrittanyHodak [0:03:33]

“I wanted to create [a podcast] that, regardless of when somebody found it, was a really strong point of entry into the experience of me, my brand, and this world of talking about creating superfans.” — @BrittanyHodak [0:11:40]

“Think about who you want to align yourself with [in terms of sponsors]. This is your personal brand, this is your podcast. It is very important that you can stand behind what you’re promoting.” — @BrittanyHodak [0:18:39]

“When we try to attract everyone, we end up engaging no one.” — @BrittanyHodak [0:26:16]

“[Podcasting] has been a really great way for me to open doors that otherwise would have been difficult to open.” — @BrittanyHodak [0:28:24]