What Businesses Need to Know About Podcast Storytelling w/Seth Silvers

[00:00:00] J. Rosemarie: My guest today's Seth Silvers CEO and founder of Story on Media. Thanks for coming and talking to me today, [00:00:06] Seth Silvers: sir. I'm really happy to be here. [00:00:09] J. Rosemarie: Yes. Sure. my first question always is, tell me about Seth Silvers [00:00:14] Seth Silvers: yeah, good question. I'm sure you get a lot of different answers. so yeah, my name is Seth. I live in Fort Collins, Colorado, and, um, run a podcasting agency and marketing agency here.[00:00:25] and early, you know, this season of my life, I'm really passionate about helping businesses to understand how they can market more authentically. And I believe that one of the best ways for them to do that is through podcasts. And so for the last couple of years, our team has been focused on helping to launch podcasts and helping to grow podcasts and helping a lot of business owners to understand just the value of building a podcast and how that can work into your marketing for your business and different things like that.[00:00:51] J. Rosemarie: Okay. Thank you. All right. And how can podcasting help businesses? [00:00:57] Seth Silvers: It can help businesses in a lot of ways. I [00:01:00] think one, one really big way can help businesses is it can help by giving them a lot of marketing content. So I think a podcast is a really great source of content where you can use a podcast and you can cover a lot of platforms with, um, with a little bit of time, you can turn a podcast into a relevant asset for, you know, YouTube and Instagram and Tik TOK and all of those platforms, and even transcribe it into a blog, post, and email and all of these different things.[00:01:23] So I think for. for a lot of business owners that they're struggling to create enough content online, but they also want to educate their audience. A podcast is a really good option. And then another way that podcasting can be really good for businesses is because, um, it gives you an opportunity to nurture your audience.[00:01:42] there's every business kind of has like a fringe audience where they haven't necessarily bought from you. They're not one of your customers, but they, they know who you are. or they knew who your customers are. And so podcast isn't meant to just be a sales pitch, but it can be a place where you kind of create a watering hole for your [00:02:00] dream client, for your dream audience.[00:02:01] And so it's a really good place to kind of show and show your community that you want to provide value for them. And a lot of businesses want to educate people. They want to inspire people, but they don't know how to do it. So I think a podcast is a really good way for businesses to be able to really move their kind of fringe audience down that path, to where, when they want value and they want answers to questions.[00:02:25] They're going to, they're going to come to you and your podcasts. Yeah, [00:02:28] J. Rosemarie: that makes sense. I like the analogy of the watering hole. you make absolute sense. [00:02:34] Seth Silvers: Yeah. Yeah. We're all going to watering hole. Like we're all getting our information from someone. Um, we're all going to learn and find answers to our questions.[00:02:42] So it's kinda just the question of where are they going to find it from you or from someone else? [00:02:46] J. Rosemarie: Yeah. Makes sense. Okay. You mentioned authenticity and I'm guessing that's probably a problem with B to C relationships. And so how can a business, [00:03:00] foster, that authenticity with their audience through like, through podcasting, for example?[00:03:06] Seth Silvers: Yeah, I think authencity is interesting because if it kind of exposes us in a sense that, if you're not, if there's not. Authentic. And purpose-driven reasons behind what you're doing. When you try to be authentic with your audience, there's not going to be much substance. And so I think for a lot of businesses that their sole goal is just to make as much money as possible. [00:03:27] And they're not really concerned with the customer. They're not really concerned with serving. Being authentic is going to be really hard. It's going to be hard to find good things to talk about, but for a business that is really driven by value and purpose, and they're wanting to make an impact in the world and they're placing their customers’ needs above their own and all of these different things that are very purpose-driven a podcast can be a great place to share some of those stories and share some of that value and really show that you are authentic in your desire to make an impact and your desire to serve.[00:03:57] So I think a podcast is a great way to [00:04:00] show that authenticity, to kind of get specific with your question. I think some of the ways that you can do that through podcasting is to share some of the stories behind your business. every team member is a story. Every product is a story, every core value.[00:04:16] There's a story behind that. There are so many stories within a business that a business could share. Other than just kind of your origin story of here's when we started. And here's what we're doing now, and also your customers. I think your customers, have a story of why they're engaged with you. So that's one way you can really get your authenticity, show your show, your authentic heart to your audience is by getting some of those stories out in the world.[00:04:38] And again, podcasts is one of many, but I think it's a really great way to do that. [00:04:43] J. Rosemarie: Yeah, I see. It's a great way in that it could, almost be a two-way conversation. [00:04:49] Seth Silvers: All right. Yeah, absolutely. And there are some ways that that's happening now. you know, for the last year or so, we've been working with, the team at a Fireside Chat, which is one of mark Cuban's companies.[00:04:59] and we've been [00:05:00] experimenting with more live podcasts a lot. And so some of the podcasts that we've been doing. It is a live show every single week. And it's a place where the audience can interact and the audience can bring their questions in the audience can give their 2 cents. And so, yeah, it very much does become a two way conversation.[00:05:15] And I think that's only going to become more and more powerful. [00:05:18] J. Rosemarie: Right. Yeah. Sounds good. Yeah. And why should businesses tell more stories? I mean, our customers know who we are hopefully, and, they know what we do. So why is storytelling important? [00:05:32] Seth Silvers: Well, probably because most people don't know I would push back and say, I, I bet you, most people don't know what you do.[00:05:38] And I bet you that there's people that even are in your close circle. that they probably think they know what you do. But if you think, if you ask people around you like, Hey, what do I do for a living? It would be interesting what answers you get. And so I think as business owners, we make this assumption that everybody knows what we do, and I don't think that's always true.[00:05:58] And so podcasts is, you know, [00:06:00] it's a good way for people to be able to understand your story and really have some clarity around what you do. There are a lot of businesses that don't want to tell stories. and that's fine, you don't have to, but I think that you know, the people that we work with the best are ones that they're wanting to make an impact.[00:06:16] They're wanting to grow their business and they're wanting to do it in a pretty authentic way. And you know, culturally right now, I think people are realizing we have access to so many good stories. And so, people want to know your story. There's plenty of data out there that says that your customers want to know your story.[00:06:32] And if it comes down to them picking a brand that they don't know the story of and a brand that they do know, the story of people will actually pay more and they'll switch brands, to accompany that they know a story that they know the story and they can trust them. Um, even if people have been using you for years, if somebody else comes along and they're more connected to their story, then people are going to be okay with switching.[00:06:53] J. Rosemarie: Yes. Yeah. I guess it's that emotional connection that you build with our brand? [00:06:59] Seth Silvers: [00:07:00] Yeah. Yeah, it is. I mean, it is the emotional connection. You know, we look in our own life and we realize a lot of times the people that we are closest with are the people that we've spent the most time with. and so, you know, to some extent, time equals relationship and time equal trust.[00:07:15] And in general, we buy from brands that we trust. And so, uh, podcasts, you know, if, if you have regular listeners. They might be giving you 30 minutes of their time every single week. So that might be somebody that, you know, now you're in their ears and in their head for 30 minutes a week. Building that trust and that relationship with you.[00:07:35] And that can go a long, long way. [00:07:37] J. Rosemarie: Yes. True. I agree because you know, it's a mom and usually the shopper, I usually go with a business, I'm, emotionally connected to like trader Joe's or whole, you know, whole foods because there's something there for me that resonates with me. So yeah, I. Yeah. All right.[00:07:59] Thank [00:08:00] you. So we've established that it's good to have a podcast as a business, and it's good to connect with your audience through storytelling and being authentic. how can a business market itself, online, I mean, we're talking online, so how can businesses do that? [00:08:19] Seth Silvers: Yeah. And are you saying kind of like through podcasting or just morning?[00:08:23] J. Rosemarie: Through podcasting, but also, because now they have an asset, right. That they, this new to them, most likely. How can they market themselves, through that podcast?

[00:08:35] Seth Silvers: Yeah. Yeah. That's a great question. And you know, I'm biased. I think everybody's biased. I don't know if unbiased truly exists.[00:08:42] So, um, you know, I'm, I'm answering that question from the perspective of what I've seen, what I've seen work. What I've seen is that for business, you know, if you're a huge company, if you're like a fortune 500 company, there are just different rules. so I think we'll talk to them, the other few million businesses other than the [00:09:00] fortune 500.[00:09:00] but I think for the average small business when it comes to online, there's gotta be some level of consistent content. And so then I think that from that place, we encourage anybody we talk with, you know, pick a platform that, you know, you could show up consistently on, and really focus on, how can you give value to your audience?[00:09:18] And so first, you know, the, the first thing with that question, how do you mark it on. One, you have to know your audience because if you don't know who your audience is, you don't know where they are. Um, but I think ideally, you know who your audience is, you know, where they are and where they're consuming content.[00:09:34] And then you figure out a way what's a way to every week or a couple, you know, a couple of weeks out of the month that we could be providing value. And, you know, when you're thinking of providing value, then you start thinking about, okay, what questions is my audience asking? You know, put yourself in your audience's mind.[00:09:49] What if they go to Google or they go to YouTube? What questions are they typing into the search engine? and again, they're going to find the answers to those questions somewhere. It's are they finding it from you? And so from an online marketing [00:10:00] standpoint, then it goes to, this position of pick your platform.[00:10:03] Hopefully it's a platform where your audiences and just start creating content that becomes that watering hole. the good thing is it's, it's never been easier to create content. That doesn't mean it's easy, but there are more tools and resources to help people to create content and faster ways and more quality ways than ever before.[00:10:21] And that's really the approach that I always take. you know, you got to know your audience and try to figure out what questions they're asking and hopefully, your content is answering those questions for them. [00:10:31] J. Rosemarie: Okay. Thank you very much. I think I got that too from Gary V. He says answer questions. If you want to know your audience and so their questions.[00:10:42] Yeah. Thank you. That's great. so what is Seth grateful for today? [00:10:48] Seth Silvers: I love that question. Uh, this week I'm grateful for, I'm grateful for our home. We just moved into a new home in Colorado. and that's been wonderful. it'd been something we've run for a little while, so I'm grateful to have our own [00:11:00] home.[00:11:00] Um, I'm also really grateful to, uh, the last couple of weeks I got to, you know, I was with a bunch of podcasters at a podcasting conference in LA. and then with one of my clients. So those, those were really, that was a really great time and I'm grateful for that, but I'm also grateful to be home. I'm grateful that I'm not going anywhere this week, that I can have some time to download some of what I've been learning and, just some time to kind of recalibrate.[00:11:23] So those are some things I'm grateful for, uh, off the top of my head. I have the opportunity to be close to family and so, get to see family every week. And that's something I find myself very grateful for as well. Cause I know not everybody has that opportunity. [00:11:36] J. Rosemarie: all right. Thank you very much for sharing and I, it must be beautiful out in Colorado right now, or [00:11:44] Seth Silvers: it's incredibly windy today and I hate the wind Yeah, I'm not grateful for the wind in the next few days are just supposed to be absurdly windy. So I'm not looking forward to that, but I can, I'll just, I can look out my windows and see the mountains from [00:12:00] there. So [00:12:01] J. Rosemarie: yeah, I've passed through there and Amtrak. So I know. All right. should every business be creating content online?[00:12:09] Like, you know, mom and pop store in the corner, or, you know, should everyone be doing it? [00:12:15] Seth Silvers: Yeah, that is such a good question. I think that comes down to what you want as a business. you know, I don't, I don't want to sit here and say, every business should do it, or every business should do something because everybody's business journey is so individual.[00:12:29] And so, you know, If you're coming to me today and you're saying, Hey, I want to grow my business by, you know, multiple times in the next couple of years. And we want to really build this business. Then again, from my perspective, I'm going to look and say, okay, I think content is a really good way to do that.[00:12:46] I think content should be a part of your plan. So I think for businesses that are really wanting to continue to grow, yes. there are some businesses that, uh, they. They already have their systems in place. You know, they're getting some, they're kind of more old [00:13:00] school businesses and maybe they don't need it.[00:13:02] But again, I think at the end of the day, it comes down to what do you, as a business owner want? And that's, I actually just got off a call with a client and we were talking about this, you know, there's all these ideas floating around. and I kind of said like, you need to know what you want and then we just need to work backwards.[00:13:16] If you don't want, you know, to build up your coaching business, then maybe you don't need to keep doing your podcast. But if you're wanting to keep building up your coaching business and keep building up an online audience, then, you know, a podcast should probably be a part of that solution. So I think at the end of the day, I really figured it really comes down to what the business owner wants.[00:13:36] But if you're wanting to grow your business and you're wanting, you know, wanting to do that in the modern age, then I think that. content will help you much more than it will hurt you. [00:13:46] J. Rosemarie: Okay. All right. Thank you. That sounds useful. and a good place to start right?. All right. So being that, the show targets podcasters. as it relates to content, having a content [00:14:00] strategy and marketing your business or your, your, your endeavor, whatever it is, you're doing give one piece of advice to a podcast or, um, think of the new podcaster or all the fledgling podcaster.

[00:14:18] Seth Silvers: Yeah, that's a great question. And I've been thinking about this a lot, because we're kind of always analyzing this with clients, but then also, you know, we were just together with about 1500 podcasters in LA and you know, everybody wants to know how do you, how do you grow your show? Um, how do you get more listens and how do you, you know, monetize and make money in different things?[00:14:37] I think my answer two years ago, or three years ago would have been different than it is today. Um, I think a couple of years back. There is less competition and you having a show, meant, you simply having a show meant a lot more than it does today. I think what we're running into now is that, having a consistent show is no longer enough.[00:14:56] you can't just have a show and expect your show to be very [00:15:00] successful. we've seen that there's kind of three, they asked for one bit of advice, but this kind of, this is our kind of like our framework that we're walking through with our clients is any podcast needs to have three elements in these sound simple, but most podcasts don't have all three of these.[00:15:15] And so the first one is consistency. I think every podcast obviously needs to be consistent. You need to continue showing up. The second one is there's gotta be some kind of offer and again, I'm probably speaking more to podcasters that are wanting to, they have business goals on the back end of their podcast, or they're wanting to make more of a professional podcast or a career podcast.[00:15:34] hobbyists podcasts are amazing, but this might not apply to them because they might not care if they make money from it. But I think you have to have a consistent show. You have to have some kind of an offer that takes your listeners from podcasts to offline, to where you can communicate with them off of the podcast.[00:15:51] And then the third piece is you have to get your show in front of new people. And that's one thing like every month that might look like being on other podcasts, something like this that might look [00:16:00] like speaking at events, it might look like online advertising. It might look like you messaging people every day and asking them to listen to your show.[00:16:06] But those three elements are really what we're building our strategies around right now is yes, consistency, but consistency is no longer enough. We need to have a really good offer. That provides real value to your audience and that takes them off the show. And then you need to, um, you need to be figuring out what are some ways that you can get your show so that in front of new eyeballs, so every month, at least some new eyeballs are seeing your show every month.[00:16:32] And so that's, that's kind of the advice that I would, I would leave with the listeners is really to focus on that. [00:16:38] J. Rosemarie: Yeah. Thank you very much. Thank you. And how can we get in touch with you? [00:16:43] Seth Silvers: Yeah, absolutely. So the best place to find me in the work that we're doing is just www.successwithstories.com. That's our website.[00:16:51] Again, that's www.successwithstories.com. there you can get in touch with our team. am, pretty much on any social platform just @sethsilvers. [00:17:00] Uh, first and last name. I should, shouldn't have to try too hard to find me on those platforms. Um, and then you can also go and check out our podcast, which is called the Small Business Storytellers.[00:17:10] That's where we're really featuring different stories of businesses, small businesses around the country that you've probably never heard of. Um, and really showing that the passion and the drive behind some of the small businesses, that are working really hard and doing really great things, honestly all around the world.[00:17:27] We have international guests as well. So you can find the small business storytellers on any podcasting. [00:17:32] J. Rosemarie: Okay. All right. I'm going to put those links in the show notes. I like to listen to that podcast as well. Yeah, sure. Thank you. Thank you very much. Seth Silvers for coming and speaking to us today. anything else?[00:17:45] Seth Silvers: No, just thank you. Thank you for the opportunity to be here. And, um, yeah, look forward to talking with some of your listeners, but also, uh, you know, like appreciate what you're doing with this show. And thank you so much for the invitation. [00:17:56] J. Rosemarie: Sure. Thank you for coming.