Working Class to World Class
The do’s, the don’ts, and the wish I hadn’ts
Who said running a podcast was easy? No-one ever.
After months of hard but rewarding graft, I closed off Season 1 of Working Class to World Class, featuring 20 inspiring episodes with some of the biggest names across different industries.
Knowledge is power, and I thought that as I get closer to launching Season 2, in the true spirit of Working Class To World Class, I would help others and share my learnings so far.
The killer idea
The podcast market is exploding, with more people than ever craving good content. However, unless your idea resonates with your target audience, it’ll be tough to get engagement.
Here’s my tips:
- Be true to yourself and come up with an idea that you are passionate about. A relatable theme that is compelling and connects with people on an rational and emotional level.
- Give Ikigai a go to understand what your why and purpose is (worth doing anyway for your own personal development).
- Make sure you can articulate your podcast into words – write it down.
- Consider your audience and if the content makes sense – are there angles to make the content unique?
- Think about why people would want to listen – why should they care?
- Trademark the name if you think the idea is that good.
Creating a podcast identity
The identity of your podcast is just as important as your podcast theme and title. Ask any brand designer and they will tell you that good design will:
- Determine how people perceive your brand.
- Build trust and reputation.
- Give you authority in the market.
- Illustrate what your podcast is about.
- Allow you to become instantly recognisable.
First thing - check out other podcasts.
I loved Steven Bartlett’s look on the Diary of a CEO podcast, but I didn’t want to have my face plastered all over it. It works for Steven but for me, just starting out on this journey, felt a step too far. Part of it was also my insecurity of what ‘people might think’, so I went for the side profile.
Black and white epitomise classiness to me (plus they are my safe colours), and the use of the spotlight vibe felt like it set the tempo just right as well as conveying that this podcast series is really about getting to know people by putting them in the spotlight.
Audio identity
The brand identity didn’t stop with the visual. I wanted an intro sting to bring the concept to life.
The intro audio ‘Breaking through the barriers of adversity’ was an important line because it epitomised everything this podcast was about, and echoed my own story as much it did my guests’. The backdrop music added the energy and style I was looking for.
Key learnings:
- Think about your podcast as a brand.
- Make sure you are personally comfortable with how it looks and feels – take time to decide.
- Ask other people for their thoughts – ask them to be brutally honest with you.
- Keep the intro look and feel of each episode consistent.
- Check out other podcasts for inspiring ideas.
- Think about other brand components like, your values, the tone, the style
Lining up podcast guests
This is what I get asked about most, ‘how did you get those amazing guests?’
You need to write a pitch plan - What is the podcast about? Why is it important? Who is it for? Why would anyone care about it? How are you going to distribute it? Who will be on your guest hit list and what criteria makes them eligible? What’s in it for your guests? Who is the target audience?
To secure the best people, you need to treat it like new business:
- Once you’ve identified prospective guests, you need to work out how to get in contact – for reaching bigger names, a couple of ‘OK’ platforms include The Handbook and IMDB. You can sign up for free for a short time but be careful as it’s easy to forget and be stung with a cost. Linkedin is also handy.
- Check out social media channels like TikTok and Instagram, which can provide inspiration and access to possible guests (I never managed to engage guests via these channels).
- Keep refining your pitch.
- Get calling and emailing and put in the time (we forget how powerful the telephone is).
The computer says ‘no’
You need to accept that if you are going for biggish names, you will be hit with more knockbacks than yeses. Luckily, I have developed very broad shoulders (result of being in sales and coming from Clydebank). Just think, every no gets you one step closer to a yes!
Diversity is important to give a balanced view of the world. At one point I had loads of guys lined up but had to hold my nerve knowing that women would come onboard when they realised it wasn’t quite as scary as they thought it would be.
Learnings:
- Be patient. It takes time.
- Sometimes you’ll stuff up a pitch.
- So, what if someone is rude to you? That is life, get over it.
- Be aspirational with who you ask – there is always a chance they may say yes.
- Ask your podcast guests and friends for other ideas of guests.
- Be respectful of peoples’ decision to say no. It might be a no for now but maybe not forever.
Recording your podcasts
At first, I assumed to make a credible podcast, the production had to be as good as TV quality. That is simply not true. People want to hear things that are real, come from the heart, and that aren’t too polished.
The first recording I did was with Jim Kerr of Simple Minds. Within 10-12 minutes of asking, his PR team came back and said yes but we had to record within days as he was going on a world tour. It was beyond exciting but terrifying.
Jim was so into the theme of the interview that he even nipped out of rehearsal days before his world tour. He had his phone portrait style and couldn't work out how to turn it landscape!
Here’s some of the basics that I applied:
- Made the decision to record in my house to keep it 100% real.
- Ensured there was no major surrounding noise.
- Set up on a table with a ring light behind the computer.
- Plugged in a microphone as my laptop was too weak to pick up the audio.
- A few episodes in, realised it was safer to plug into the main internet hub in the house.
- Learned that I should use a proper camera (didn’t for this interview).
- Jim joined the call with his phone in portrait style. He tried to swivel it around to landscape but that didn’t work. Lucky for me, my friend helped to make it look good for the final version.
Preparation
I prepared hard for this interview because, it was Jim Kerr!! But after chatting with a few guests, I became more relaxed and comfortable in my own skin, which led me to ditching the notes and questions, and instead talking from the heart.
The reason for the lack of prep isn’t laziness, it makes me work harder. I intently listen to the conversations in the moment, and I am fully present with my guests. I can be myself if I’m not stressing about shoe-horning questions in.
Fails
There have been many times I let myself down:
- One occasion I tried a different interview style, and it didn’t work. It was the Wayne Hemingway interview too! He is AMAZING but my personality didn’t shine through like the rest of the series. Still kicking myself.
- Due to circumstance, I recorded without a microphone in the Whitney Tingle episode – this is the most basic thing you need to do, and I didn’t do it. Whitney sounded brilliant whereas I was afraid to come off mute!
- Sometimes when I set up in my home, the lighting looks great but as the interview goes on, the brightness in my room changes. It’s so weird and still trying to crack it.
Length of each episode
I try to keep each episode between 40 mins to 1 hour (give or take). However, there is no clear-cut science. I’ve seen longer form content doing well and vice versa. Content is content, and if it’s engaging, people will watch and listen to it.
Sign-off
As this is a personal project, I do not give my guests any sign off rights. I try to publish each episode as straight runs but occasionally need to edit if the blunders are too obvious.
If you are going to use images/footage of famous people, you need to get official sign off from their management. If you don’t, you will regret it later if you’re asked to change things once it’s published.
Distributing podcasts
This was the most confusing part for me – where do you host a podcast?
Platforms I use:
- Podbean hosts my main workingclasstoworldclass.com site. This is where I give more context around who I am, what the podcast is about and the reason for starting it up. The platform is OK but not brilliant.
- I linked my email to the podbean site – lynn@workingclasstoworldclass.com (email was set up separately alongside the website URL).
- Podbean can upload episodes straight to YouTube, Last FM, Apple and Spotify.
- Podbean can only upload audio files or video files separately to Spotify. I really wanted to give the viewer choice of audio or video without having to navigate two different files. Instead, I use Anchor to feed into Spotify directly.
- You can upload to YouTube directly (advantage is YT accept and host larger video file sizes, so you have much greater quality).
- On all platforms you can order how you want people to view your content
Frequency
Make sure if you say you’re a weekly podcast, you stick to being weekly (or fortnightly or monthly).
Whilst I released an episode each week (allowed for a short break during Christmas), I wasn’t as consistent about the specific day it ran, which I will look to change for Season Two.
Ask people to subscribe/follow your podcast!
I missed a trick here for the first few episodes, however now for every interview, I ask people to subscribe/follow.
Don’t be shy about doing this, as you literally need to ask people.
Stats and engagement
Working Class to World Class can be found across a range of platforms – here are a few things to be mindful of:
- Whilst YouTube shows your stats publicly, for me many more people engage on Apple/Spotify.
- It’s worth tracking weekly/fortnightly performance across platforms to see progress.
- Encourage guests to promote their involvement. The moment they do, the number of viewers shoot up!
- At the beginning of my journey, I managed to secure national and local coverage – this really helped instantly raise the profile.
Enjoy it!
Podcasting takes a lot of work but if you’re into the subject matter, it’s time well spent. Enjoy!