1. Partnerships

Hello, all. This is my first one of these and I've just got a bit of an idea that's kind of floating around my head and I haven't really done anything about it yet because I want to I don't know what I want to do, whether I want to refine it or just get out there and do it or figure out what it is that I actually mean first. because me, the way I like to do things or the way my brain likes to do things is, right, here's an idea. Let's make a spreadsheet, you know? You can probably hear a piano in the background. Sorry about that. So we are currently doing our sales, as we always do, we have a sales, you know, an outbound sales type of thing that's going on. But outside of that, let's think of it as like, so outside of that, we've got like whale hunting, which is trying to get some big names and stuff like that. But then outside of that still, we've got like partnerships, right? And so the value of partnerships is, is evident. It's like, you form the one partnership, you can make it mutually beneficial and it can, it can feed you for years, you know. And so I have one, two, three, four, five, five-ishh. five to six, kind of avenues for potential partnerships. Initial avenues. There may be more, you see. But what I want to do is I'm going to. I'm going to tell you what these things are. And see, I haven't given them all a lot of thought yet. They're still in the in the larval phase. And so and so, yeah, tell me what you think. Tell me if I'm missing something, if I'm forgetting neglecting to think about something or just tell me your general thoughts, but here's my thoughts. So influencer agencies, right? So there are agencies that have, well, influences, right? And they go, yeah, we'll get you a deal with whoever and do this and you need to do this many things or whatever. And so what the influencer agencies want is obviously to get to be more valuable for their influences, you know? And what the influences want, say influences more, what the influences want is is are, what the influences want is is kind of exposure, I don't know, is a terrible word, kind of authority, I suppose, but just kind of getting out there and like building a platform. They want more platforms to be on, you know? And frankly, there may be a level of ego involved there as well. You know, why do you think a lot of CEOs do their own podcasts for their company? And so there may be a level of ego there as well. And podcasts are, I mean, look at how many influences have podcasts. As soon as they come off, you know, I'm in the jungle or whatever. That's not what it's called. It's, you know, the good ones. They get podcasts and then they build their own, like next career step from from what is their time in the limelight, you know, drawing to a close. And so it's prolonging their, their kind of their their relevance, I suppose. And so, yeah, influencer agencies, like a partnership with those, I don't know, I don't know what these partnership could look like. I mean, maybe it's, maybe it's. It could be on the one hand, it could be like a white labelled, um, don't like that term. White labelled production where it's like, okay, we influencer Agency X, we can provide you with, you know, podcast and stuff like that. And it's included in your fee or whatever, something like that. And then it's just weird behind the scenes or it could be a kind of more of a referral thing, you know? which would be interesting too. So there's things like that, you know, ways that we could do that. Or it could be as, yeah, that referral could be as simple as refer us to your to your hosts and stuff like that. And your hosts, your influences, and then they get a kickback. It could be as easy as a kickback, you know, or it could be we get to go into these influencer agencies and give them a, because I suppose influencer agencies are also there to to teach, to guide as well. So like, if I had an influencer agency, I would have people coming in and this is a guy who's all about marketing and stuff. This is a guy all about fashion, what you need to do, you know? And so like, not a seminar, but you know what I mean? Maybe we could come in and go, look, this is why, look at this this influencer, X, who just came off, you know, I've taken all my clothes off because I've got a six back.com. and, and then they prolonged their career, not only prolonged their career using a podcast, but look how big their podcast is now. And like as a career path type of, you know, that type of thing, maybe we could come in and give a a talk, you know? I don't know. These are just ideas. But I kind of, yeah, anything that involves a partnership that's really beneficial to the agency is what we're looking for here. Right. And then the next is marketing agencies, which is very similar. but like with marketing agencies, they're all content. They're all about content, obviously, and obviously we're short form content being being a key thing nowadays with marketing agencies and stuff like that. And so the white label production Work better there because the marketing agencies, they go, all right, this is this, is this, we've done all your short form for you. We've done that for you. Podcasting is a bit more of a skilled thing. And so, and so. White label and could work there or it could be, you know, that referral thing again, because podcasts are very much within marketing. You know, it's that whole type of thing of, instead of just creating short form content, why not create the long form and then mine the short form from it? You know what I mean? And so I marketing agencies, that's an interesting one as well. The third is PR agencies, which is very similar to when influen agencies, but in a different people, I suppose. And so there's like, you know, leadership angle and stuff like that. It's less, you know, people that's just come on, come off. You know, I've had sex with three people on a beach. Um, you know, and then a done a trial and got voted off. It's less people that have been on that, and it's more people, it's more like CEOs and stuff, you know, for well, it's more than that. PR agencies cover a whole load of things. I mean, PR is literally get on out there and get your message out there a lot of the time. And so same thing, same thing, how we interact with them, I'm still a bit hazy on, but we've got the white label, we've got the referral, we've got that type of stuff. Anyway, branding agencies. And so once a business builds a brand, they need content, you know. And so it could be a natural step from that. That one's a little little less good. And then so business coaches and consultants, right? So business coaches themselves are obviously prime podcasters, right? Again, ego. It comes back to ego a hell of a lot of the time, right? However, these business coaches and consultants and stuff like that, they are giving advice to businesses and entrepreneurs and things like that on what to do. You know, sometimes they have a team of our team, a gauntlet. No, a thing of 20 people, like a group coaching, that's what it's called. So again, with the coming in and doing a session type of thing, that's cool. But then if it was more like, if they had high ticket coaching or something like that, maybe, because it's high ticket, maybe it's included in their high ticket. Do you know what I mean? Maybe they could do a super high ticket one where it's like, okay, coach your business and stuff like that, but we'll also do a podcast. I don't know. I don't know. Something like that. They're the five. The sixth one isn't really a. It isn't a partnership one, but it was something that an idea that I had along the way. But I don't think it's. I don't think you guys are going to be very interested, but it might spark some interesting thoughts. And so I've just moved back to Shrewsbury in Shropshire, which is lovely. And one thing I thought was the council, I'll tell you why I thought of this. I got my council tax bill through. $314 quid a month. Right? You Americans, you don't know about this. Have we only got one American now? Nope. Two. I'm not going to tell you which one of you I forgot about.. So, um... 314 quid a month. for council tax. Anyway, point being, that the council has like an unlimited supply of money. It seems, you know what I mean? And I also saw that they're building a new whatever, you know, and that's all council money. And the council money is just seemingly endless. And so there's that. And then also there's a, this is another partnership, I was thinking of, but there's a podcast studio that's just, and like a business where you can have meetings, you know, big board meetings. There's one of those places that's just popped up in the middle of town, right, right opposite the square, right? And I know for someone from whereverville, the States, that might seem just normal. Yeah, of course, there's three podcast studios on my street. You know what I mean? But here, I think you'd probably have to drive about an hour to go to the. You'd probably have to go to Birmingham to go to the nearest one. This is a very, very small town. I mean, there are many things that aren't here. A podcast recording studio is the last on the list. And so a bit of a not so much big deal, but weird deal. Anyway, that's opened up like three weeks ago, right? Council 11 unlimited money. There's a podcast studio right there that looks amazing that they can just buck and d, yada, yada. So I'm going to talk to the council, even either the town council or the county council, you know? Because, I mean, the capital of the county. and see if they want to do something, you know, that could be the Shrewsbury Council podcast, where it's like, because I don't know. There are always wanting, they have, I know that they have a budget for like, you know, community development and community communication and stuff like that. It's always send us your thoughts and it's always, all that type of stuff, you know what I mean? And so, so I'm going to do that. I'm going to try and get in a room with some, some, the powerful people of Shrewsbury, which is hilarious. It's like a like a thousand year old town. And the powerful people from Shrewsbury used to be, you know, earls and shit. Now it's just a bloke in a suit that lives in a three-bed semi. But yeah, so I'm going to going to get that done. But yes, partnerships. That's my. Those are my rough thoughts on partnerships. I bet there's way more. I bet there's way more. And something else that I was thinking as well was we used to go to podcast movement and the other podcast events, conferences. But I don't think that's necessarily wise for the business growth angle. It's good for, like, getting in the know of the new shit and becoming better at what we do. Big fan of that. But, you know, for getting clients and stuff like that, which is what a lot of people use it for. I think we'd be best off going to like a marketing conference. You know what I mean? And that way everyone you talk to isn't, yeah, I've got a podcast or, yeah, I produce podcasts or whatever. They're people that are like, yeah, this is my brand da da. Oh, do you have a podcast? No, no, we don't. We've been thinking about doing that. Well, do you know what I mean? I also been thinking about talking at one. Because no matter how much I refuse to admit it, when I'm not just rambling into a mic with the first thing that comes to my head, I'm pretty decent at chatting and talking, especially on I've been on stage a million times, so I should probably. get on there. But again, effort and cost to outcome, you know, like, I don't know. I don't know. You know, if I do a thing in a marketing conference of like here's when my podcasts are amazing, how many people are actually going to talk to me. Whereas if I go to a marketing conference and then walk around for the entire time talking to everyone I see, it's more gorilla, but I think it might actually work better, you. So, yeah, partnerships, besides this, we've got our sales going on at this time, which is, I mean, that's where that's where a lot of these clients that we have come from, you know. And so there's that. Um, And then outside of that, I'm also working on, I think I might have shown you a little bit, but I'm working on a way to automate all of the reports, either quarterly or monthly, probably quarterly, to be fair. And like have that automated into a lovely, amazing thing. Monthly might be good, actually. But yeah.. Because like talking to Brie from the station, touch points, Yeah, touch points and that type of stuff., you know, helpful. And we want to be the best quality product as possible because there's no reason doing all these sales if we just, if there's a hole in our bucket, you know? And so what I'd also invite from this is ways that we can increase customer experience, you know, like at a minimum, we want to be cranking out amazing quality product, but then we want to raise that customer experience because like, for example, you know, people that I've spoken to a bunch of times on a personal level, they won't leave now. Do you know what I mean? Because that's customer experience in it. And I can do that, but there's only so far that can take us, you know? And I do do that. But again, it's like with Sandya, as some of you may not know, but I think the only reason she's still with us, because she's had quite a time. is because of, you know, we have that that more informal kind of that that connection and that rapport there already, you know, which I think has helped us thus far. I don't think it'll help us forever, but I think it's helped us thus far. But I think it's very easy, especially in production, especially with the type of brains that some of us may have for us to go, right, this is this is the job we'll do the job. Here's the output. Thank you very much. But we need to be thinking more customer experience. And of course, I want to hire someone for this in the future. But for now, any things that we can think of would be great. Right. I'm going to leave it here for now. Thank you very much for listening. I don't have a sign off yet. That's my sign off