Episode 21: So, You Want to do a Podcast?

As discussed in the ⁠Modern Wisdom⁠ podcast, 90% of podcasts don't make it past three episodes, and of them, only 10% only make it to 21. So to celebrate being in the 1% of podcasts, Dave Parry and Richard Buckle reflect on their podcast journey and share some of their top tips for creating a podcast.

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Please note: Whilst all transcripts are double checked for accuracy, they are transcribed via Otter.AI so may contain errors.

David Parry 02:25

Hello, and welcome to this very special edition of The SME Growth Podcast special, because it's our 21st. And we will explain more in a moment. But I'm Dave Parry. And with me Rich, we've now made it through 21. Well we will have half an hour's time. So why is 21, You did explain in the last podcast but for those unfortunate souls that haven't yet caught up with last week's episode. Just tell us again. Why is 21 important?

Richard Buckle 03:08

Well, according to some research, we did something like 90% of podcasts don't make it past three episodes. So if you can get to episode number four, you're in the top 10%. But that 10% only 90% of those get up to sorry, 90% only 10% to those get to 21 podcast. So by getting to your 21st podcast, which we have, we're on the cusp of achieving, you're in the top 1% of all them podcasts

David Parry 03:36

Well, I think more than cusp, we're three minutes in, I think we've done that. If it stops now we've done it just happened to finish with a very short one, 

Richard Buckle 03:45

The people saying please stop now, not those two waffling on again. So we thought okay, that's a momentous occasion. And we should have had a little drink here to celebrate with that. But I've got my cup of tea. So we thought well, let's do something to mark the fact that this is the Milestone One and and pay homage to the fact that we've learned a lot along the way. We've had lots of help people were giving us advice. And we've incorporated that as we changed. But also lots of people who are listening to these saying, gee, you know, we want to do the podcast, that'd be great. How do we do it? So we thought we'd dedicate today to just go through some of our learning points and do it as a bit of a how to. Yeah, if you wanted to do a podcast, It's a great resource for pointing people to or if you are interested in starting a podcast. 

David Parry 04:37

So we're not saying we're the experts. But you know, we're one step ahead of someone who's only done 20 podcasts maybe and certainly several steps ahead from someone still thinking about doing it. And there's a big barrier isn't there to doing getting started? Probably true in life of anything 

Richard Buckle 04:53

I think when I first started out consulting years ago, I remember the first thing I wrote in my day book or whatever it was back In the old days, he ended up booking wrote in, there was a quote from Aristotle that said, what we must learn to do, we must learn by doing. And I think that could you know, that is true podcast, too,

David Parry 05:10

Just do it JFDI 

Richard Buckle 05:12

you are not going to learn how to do it without actually doing it.

David Parry 05:16

Exactly. And you learn all along and we look back, listen back. Now look back now to those early ones. And yeah. 

Richard Buckle 05:27

And to be fair, you know, there's still things that we want to do. We've still got ideas about how to evolve podcasts, move it on. Yep. Get some new hosts.

David Parry 05:37

Well we got a guest lined up next week. And new Team, Team member, say hi to Pete, Pete's joined the team. And Pete comes with a wealth of video experience, videography. So look forward to that changing what you see on the screen may change for those of you watching on on Spotify, or watching the shorts on YouTube or the clips on social media. So that's good. And I think the audio is continuing audio quality is continuing to prove what we say, however, may not be improving quality, but you'll be able to hear our drivel ever more. Without the hisses and crackles and echoes and background stuff. So let's sum let's just join. I thought about a structure for today. Why don't we just go with sort of my WHAT, WHEN who type of list of things and try and use that as a coat hanger for our thoughts. And it's not a bad thing anyway, to start with? Why in lots of stuff. Why are we in business? Why we're here? So why why do you think we started podcasts?

Richard Buckle 06:45

Clearly, it's, I think, one of if not the fastest growing medium of how people consume content. And clearly, we will have our podcasts that we listened to. And you think, well, we've got things that to say or just a way of is we're looking for ways of how can we create more content in a way that's that's reasonably I say, easy, but that there's some kind of format around isn't it some sort of structure around

David Parry 07:12

I think it's, it's scalable. And for the time it takes for us to sit here and talk to each other about in podcast format that would have taken as much time to talk to our in house team of writers and creatives. And so we get two bits of output for the price of one. In fact, you get 200 for the price of one by the time you scale it out. We've talked about content leveraging before, haven't we? So we get lots of video content and shorts and clips and stills and transcripts and all sorts.

Richard Buckle 07:41

So it's a great way of creating content. And I think as well, we just we've always had this idea. I mean years ago, we toyed with how do we do something like a five minute MBA day wasn't it people would always be asking for what's a good resource for just tapping into we don't want to get an ology in it or whatever. But we just want to learn some stuff about business. 

David Parry 07:59

And we've learned a lot along the way. We've been doing this for nearly 20 years now, not podcasts, but advising businesses. And we've seen so many different things go well and go badly and try different things that we wanted to distil that somehow. And like you say, in the past, we thought maybe a coffee break email or something. But actually, this works a lot better. So there's a lot about sharing that knowledge, adding a bit of value to our existing clients. But I think it's probably fair to say as well, we're doing it to try and get the Wellmeadow name out there a bit wider and maybe generate a bit of interest, maybe trigger the old inquiry or lead, you know, but the lead generation from it. I can't say that we're not doing it with that. Without that in mind as well. So yeah, why not?

Richard Buckle 08:41

And it's also it's quite enjoyable. It's quite a,

David Parry 08:44

I think it wasn't, we weren't gonna go to 21. I mean, let's be honest, and we doing and I think if we didn't enjoy it, and hopefully that comes across, it wouldn't be anywhere near as listenable. I think there's a bit of it as well that we talked about it for long enough. There was a bit of that, you know, get off the fence you're gonna do or not. But to prove that we could I mean, how difficult can it be you're just sitting having a chat with a microphone somewhere nearby, then then you let all the Tech Wizards out there to turn it into something polished. So yeah, we wanted to prove that we could do it and achieve all these other things. 

Richard Buckle 09:18

Yeah, I think it's, it is it's great that people can I think the beauty of a podcast is that people can listen to it at their own convenience isn't isn't. And that's whatever you're doing, you know, driving in the car, going for run, sitting around home doing some work, just you know, that kind of thing. It's it's not unique in that way. But I think people think the popularity of podcast is rising because you can have that 

David Parry 09:42

when it stops you walking along the street scrolling on your phone and bumping into a lamppost. 

Richard Buckle 09:45

You can consumption on your terms isn't really

David Parry 09:48

A time that suits you. You can break up and break up halfway through because the phone rings while you get to where you're going to

Richard Buckle 09:53

speed it up the whole time. Have you listened to us on double time?

David Parry 09:57

Tried that, not quite like chipmunks. But But no, but so I suppose any other organisation thinking of doing a podcast may well have any of those reasons for doing it and maybe more besides. And when I thought of just as How would other maybe larger organisations benefit from this, there is an element of internal communication, you get two subject matter experts of any business to talk to one another, or three or four of you, or, or however you do it, then there's bound to be people in that organisation that didn't know you knew that. Or maybe they knew that you knew it, but they didn't know it. So you're starting to spread that knowledge internally. So you've got another audience there

Richard Buckle 09:57

If you can catch that, I mean, the number of conversations we have with people where they start to talk about their business, I remember in a meeting the other day, someone was here, and they probably gave 5/10 minute, kind of an overview of their of their business and how it works and things. And you think actually, that's, it's great to hear that. But it's not been captured anywhere. It's not being kind of really in depth sort of information about particular industry or whatever. And that'd be actually really good to capture that on a podcast.

David Parry 10:37

Yeah, it's not a shame. You had that conversation. You think I wish that was recorded

Richard Buckle 10:49

Start thinking everything should be a podcast? So but it's it is good to know the number of conversations that happen in business, between people who've got immense amounts of knowledge in their head and just almost vanish into the ether. Once they're done such as, bounces off the walls, it's kind of just capturing that and just saying, right, let's, let's just get this down, whilst we've got these people. 

David Parry 11:26

So come up with your own reasons for why and I think it's important that you're quite firm about those, because if you're going to go through this exercise, it's going to take longer to start with, once you get up to speed on it, you're not quite sure whether it's what you're enjoying doing, whether you, you're talking to an audience out there listening or not. So be clear why, especially if you've got to persuade other people in your organisation, to either let you do it, or to buy some equipment or whatever, you know, you need to have a compelling reason. Okay, so that's why, I guess the next thing on my why, what, how and who would have a thing is what we're going to talk about. You can't just sit down and talk about the weather or beer as we do all the time, you know, there are there other things that may be more relevant. So I suppose you'd start with something that you know about. And it struck me that if you have to research, what you're going to talk about in the podcast, you've probably already lost the point, its supposed to be talking about stuff you know about.

Richard Buckle 12:22

Nobody wants to listen to a script today. It's reading off things. I mean, the old facts or figure here and there or reference, fair enough, bring it to life, but you kind of got to be able to talk about subjects. I mean, you gotta Yeah. And I think as well, probably a lot of business owners maybe put themselves down in that regard. The has more, you've got more to say than you. You know, I mean, crikey, we've done 21 episodes.

David Parry 12:49

yeah, and there's plenty more in the pipe. But you're right, I meet so many people who don't give themselves credit for their expertise. They presume it's common in their space. And well, everybody knows that. Well, maybe their competitors do, but their customers won't know that their staff maybe. So yeah, something that you can confidently talk about and come up with some interesting bits, pepper it with stuff, you've looked up for sure to give it context and check your facts.

Richard Buckle 12:49

And I think if you can kind of maybe be a little bit nonlinear with it, because you've almost got to try and come up with things that you've got your core expertise that you're going to talk about, but then you can spin that off. So if you were, you know, an engineering firm or something, you could talk about whatever type of engineering you're doing, but maybe there's elements of, you know, how do we recruit for engineers? Or how do we, you know, it doesn't have to be about technical subject, for example, there's all this kind of, what's it like to manage an engineering company? What's it like to run a business on your own? Or was it you know, all these kinds of things are actually kind of interesting topics that people are interested in?

David Parry 13:52

Well, it goes back to our episode on buyer personas and understanding where do your buyer personas live? What media do they consume? What are they interested in, you don't just have to produce content, that's about what your company does. You're trying to add value to your audience, whatever that may be. So it could be you know, one of our buyer persona types mentions the fact that quite a lot of our clients are into fitness. So we could talk about that for either physical health or mental health. I think mental health as well, that may be a subject in the future. Topics like impostor syndrome and, and burnout and you know, being lonely at the top, you know, that people don't talk about them enough in business. And yet that's not what we do. We don't provide advice on it, but let's surface it exactly. And have a chat. So so that's the sort of things you might want to talk about. Be careful though, because this is your brand you're creating the podcast could almost be one of the most powerful pieces of your brand more so than now you probably as business owners love your logo and the way your website's done and you know how you are you express yourself in your other marketing materials. But, but when you speak, that that really is the person It's not something that someone's written on their behalf is it? 

Richard Buckle 15:03

Must it's got to be authentic though as well, isn't it? So, we normally these episodes are about three hours long, and then we have to edit them down. But you do have to you do have to think about what what is your tone? And what is your.

David Parry 15:20

Yeah, and if you've got a personality, the business has got a personality as being a bit jokey and then have adverts or, or website plays a little bit on the funny side of life, then you can afford to be a bit like a podcast. But if you're really deadly serious, you know, high end law firm or something, you probably don't want to be cracking jokes every five seconds. It's not what your audiences are expecting. So you got to get that right.

Richard Buckle 15:42

So you're gonna get that right. I suppose style as well, we've kind of had a little bit of a play with different styles. Maybe we started off doing some case study stuff, first couple of podcasts,

David Parry 15:54

If people have listened back a lot more people in the run you threes and fours I think was those. And it wasn't none of them have been scripted. But there wasn't even really a bullet point list of things to talk about, you know, at least I opened this one we say let's do that. Why? Why are we went up to things before. It was very freeform. I think you ended up doing a lot more of the, almost questioning the group on that one as well. You probably had a bit more of a thought in your head about the types of things you wanted to cover. And the other participants were waiting to see which way it would go. So there's certainly something to be said there for preparation get everybody on the same page. Yeah, where might this discussion go? So that was that type. Clearly lots of the ones we've done since our this style conversation conversation, two blokes in a pub, you know, just having a bit of a chat, the interview style, I think they're probably a lot more podcast of interview style now there than this style. And I could see why. Because you don't have to come up with the content. Yeah, you got to be good.

Richard Buckle 16:51

If you're getting guests on as well, isn't it then then it's sort of you want to hear what they're saying, then you've asked the point of having them on the show. So it's

David Parry 17:00

And we're going to be doing a few more of those. But we're not an interview podcast, we're here to share our expertise peppered with people who pop in from time to time to share their expertise. And of course, there's a benefit of that if you're thinking of doing a podcast in that you start to address their audience as well as yours, because they're likely to share that podcast, at least with people and

Richard Buckle 17:20

That's the goal isn't it, one of the goals

David Parry 17:24

I think that's why some people do it almost exclusively as an interview format, because they're trying to tap into other people's audiences all the time. I think we've got quite a strong view that part of a very strong part of the value for us is that we give giving something to our clients to our existing. Yeah, we're not always just trying to hunt down other people. We're not sponsored. You know, we don't have adverts and all that, because well, we kind of sponsoring ourselves. We're doing it for ourselves.

Richard Buckle 17:48

Yeah, sponsored by Wellmeadow.

David Parry 17:50

Sponsored by us. I think you've got to workout as well, you're gonna call it you know, it's got to meet with what you're going to talk about when your brand and is it an interview thing is a conversation. So coming up with something that makes sense that fits with the rest of what your marketing is all about? So we're called the SME growth podcast. And if you Google that we come number one. Yeah. So that's quite handy. You know, if you're trying to share it with people, rather than saying, you have to go to Spotify and look at Wellmeadow and blah, blah, blah, just google and

Richard Buckle 18:21

You may not want it. I'm trying to think why we decided not to call it the Wellmeadow podcast, I think it's 

David Parry 18:27

Yeah, I think we're trying to do what it says on the tin. You know, we're not telling you about Wellmeadow, we're telling you how to grow your SME? So that's why that's what it is. So, so that's, that's what we're going to talk about, we're going to call it all that type of thing. Who, so who are going to be the speakers? You know, Who's In Who's behind the microphone? And then who's behind the control desk? And there's lots of people involved in this job the same people every week? Do you have interviewees? So we've gone for the style, it's settled down to the two of us and I think that's working well, because you settled into a way of working together. You don't have to, you could have different people every week doing it.

Richard Buckle 19:04

Yeah i'd say it's become quite familiar and natural to do it, isn't it? Like if you just said, six months ago, we're gonna do podcasts just sit and talk for half an hour it'd be a bit like oh, what what we're gonna do and how the cameras and lights or what's gonna happen you know, not quite that But whereas now it's like okay, we're doing a podcast today just yeah, get on and do it and we know it's become second, of second nature which would I think it's an encouragement for people to say that if the first couple are going to be a bit bumpy Right, yeah, you know the first okay, but doesn't matter because no one probably can listen to them. Right?

David Parry 19:43

Imagine if you find a podcast now and it's on episode near blardy blar you You don't think I found that one that now I'm gonna go back to number one or listen to them all the way through from the beginning it's not like watching a series on the telly as it were, you need the plot,

Richard Buckle 19:54

but I reckon if you go to any podcast that's that's reasonable in number of episodes size and you go back to their first couple of podcasts, the vast majority of them bit scratch and different, scratchy. You know, it does take a while to find your feet.

David Parry 20:08

Good tip for people thinking of doing this, go and find someone established, go and listen to episode one and take some confidence from the fact that they've come a long way since they haven't. So will you? Yeah. So I think it works well. It's good. I think choosing the people, you got to get that balance between the people in your organisation that know enough to talk about. But also you don't mind listening to. Now I think we probably all know people that are very expert on stuff, but they drone a bit or perhaps, you know, go off in tangents in ways that are less interesting. And you got other people who are absolutely brilliant on microphone. Yeah, you know, and they've really comedic and great fun to just be with anyway. But they're maybe not your subject matter experts. Yeah. So maybe get them together

Richard Buckle 20:51

Find a balance

David Parry 20:52

Get the balance. Yeah. And accept that not everybody wants to do this. But there is a little bit where if you're maybe pushed a little bit to give it a go, you find you don't mind it, after all, a bit. Like we talked in a previous one about public speaking. Everybody says that I can't do public speaking or I'm frightened of public speaking. Just give it a go and you find that you can get good at it

Richard Buckle 21:13

exactly. You're not gonna learn if you don't do it.

David Parry 21:17

and then how many people this is working well with two, I think it's easier to bounce the conversation backwards and forwards between two people. If you have a guest, maybe it's two plus two guests, you could do one interviewer and a guest, you could do that. The four way conversations I think were harder to manage, you probably need a lot more practice there to bounce conversations four ways. Make sure everyone gets a turn

Richard Buckle 21:38

I think maybe as well, just how long your podcast is going to be. So if you're going for half an hour, four people is quite Yeah, it's probably a it's a bit of a stretch to get everyone to have a fair hearing, someone said something. Whereas maybe if you a longer form, you can have people in but then you get into the kind of, Okay, what does the room now that like, you know, it gets harder to place cameras as well. And so you don't see the camera in the shot camera in the shot. And then if you've got four people and you want a close up shot, and everybody but for cameras, so there's there's all these sorts of things that you don't really think about at the start until you start doing it. And then you realise Oh, actually, we probably do need to, you know, think about this a little bit, 

David Parry 22:18

we have to start watching telly a bit, then I think how do they do panel discussions, they're not all around a table, or you'd see the cameras behind me to see you have to be in a bit of a row, which is actually quite unnatural to talk to people who are sat alongside you. Yeah, you normally talk across. So you've got to think about all that type of thing. So that's getting captured, recording the podcast itself. But then afterwards, there's amount of time that's needed to edit it. We talked about processing the audio, yeah, if you're doing video as well, you got to edit that into the shorts, and then cascade it across all the various platforms to make sure that someone actually finds it. So who do you have to do that? Well, I think that may be one of the major barriers as to why companies haven't done it yet. Because even if you could find maybe you got a really bubbly MD or, or marketing personnel, salesperson, or, or whomever, and they are prepared to sit behind maybe even an iPhone just to chat about the subject for half an hour. The thought of what happens next puts people off.

Richard Buckle 23:16

Yes, there is a reasonable amount of work that goes into processing all of this footage. And yeah I think you're gonna do well. And if you're going to do it, yeah. And then that's back again to your brand, isn't it? What do you want this to come across? So you know, you could do this with an iPhone and chuck the whole thing, I could put it

David Parry 23:23

raw, no processing at all, that would take you half an hour. But to do it, I think the way we do, it probably takes a day and a half, two days or so of somebody's time to it. And that's including everything that's editing shorts, the clips to go on LinkedIn are different. And even though you can use software to cascade it across all the podcast platforms, that won't include Instagram, LinkedIn, YouTube, you'll do those manually your own website.

Richard Buckle 23:59

Yeah. And you can then you've got different formats for those different platforms. So

David Parry 24:02

different shaped images,

Richard Buckle 24:04

all that. So it's, it's, yeah, you need a bit of a need a bit of an engine behind it. Really, yeah, to make it to make it really go

David Parry 24:13

So especially if you're doing it relatively regularly, and we'll come on to that in a moment, you've got to therefore think, what's this going to cost? Either internally, or if we were to pay someone like Wellmeadow to do that bit for us? What was that gonna cost? You know, was the trade off? Is it worth it? You got that going back to the why, you know, are you sufficiently driven that you want to do this? Or are you only really bothered if it's effectively free?

Richard Buckle 24:32

I think as well there is there's an elements of where the more professional the output you want the more technical it gets as well, isn't it so we're, you know, we're gonna be talking about equipment in a bit but it's reasonably high end kit it's even to that especially software to the into technical things like what's the frame rate you want me the other day at some ridiculous frame rates? Where we were absolutely crisp, 

David Parry 25:01

We could have slowed that down to tenth speed slow motion and still had it smooth. 

Richard Buckle 25:07

yeah, there's all those sorts of technical things that you've almost got to have a handle 

David Parry 25:13

Okay, so that's the who you need internal the talent as you might call them need though, at the postproduction people, the techies and all the wizards out there. Okay, so we've done why, what, who, when? And when we could talk about frequency, how often should we do them? Maybe more time a day you do them, but what our frequency? Would we do them weekly 

Richard Buckle 25:36

I mean, obviously, some people do a daily podcast. But I think if you're at that, if you're at that end of the spectrum is probably a job. 

David Parry 25:41

Yeah, would have would have to be and have quite a team. 

Richard Buckle 25:47

I think fortnightly maybe at a push. I think about that. I think that's too much of a gap Yeah, and a monthly is definitely too much. 

David Parry 25:58

You've forgotten it, what did they say last time? They can't remember, I've forgotten the name of that podcast. 

Richard Buckle 26:02

I think I think with a podcast, I think what we find is that you've got to, you've got to get the traction going on it. Yeah, at the start, you're gonna have nobody listening to you. Yeah. And you've got to be able to build enough of a momentum. Maybe there's

David Parry 26:13

Maybe there's nobody listening to this now 

Richard Buckle 26:15

Just talking into the void. So you've got to get that traction and momentum going. And I think as much in terms of what people want to hear in terms of you know, this is a weekly podcast or whatever, just the discipline of our own diaries, having carving out the space to say, No, we've got to get a podcast out this week,

David Parry 26:35

To the point we've come in a slot and evenings to do them. Last week. We're at 730 In the morning, 

Richard Buckle 26:43

Because you, I think, is the discipline, you've got to have the discipline to get them out. Because otherwise, you miss a week, you missed two weeks, all of a sudden, the momentum is gone.

David Parry 26:54

It's a bit like the diet will start tomorrow, you've got to absolutely be committed to do so I think weekly post effect, if you say we can, we're going to do a monthly one, then go back to the why, you know, if you only got 12 things a year, you want to talk about? Is that all that is that the sum total of your expertise, you want to share it it looks a bit lame, doesn't it? Really?

Richard Buckle 27:12

I mean, really, I think as well. I mean, one of the reasons for like one, maybe not a reason, but one of the offshoots of podcasts, you see a lot of times there's a community, isn't it? So it's, so I'm not saying that we've got a SME growth podcast community, but who knows what might happen? Do some webinars, do some events or something? Bit of merch. I have a live version every year or whatever. But it is about, you know, sort of like, back the buyer personas, certain types of people listen certain types of podcasts, because they're interested in things. So. So you are you've got that community there? Well, in any community, if you were only turning up once a month, or 10 times a year or something, it's not really community, But whereas I think a weekly thing gives you enough

David Parry 27:59

I agree. And in terms of it's sort of not quite when but the time element. How long do you think a podcast should be? Ours are about half an hour. For those listening, and we're just coming up to the half hour mark, please be aware we are doing a slightly longer version today, because we've got a lot we want to share with you. But normally they're about half an hour, could do a 15 minute sort of bite sized version. Can you if if your audience were particularly busy, and maybe they all wanted to just listen to what you were saying. Yeah. Sounds a bit short, though. That, doesn't it? Sure. 

Richard Buckle 28:32

I mean, I don't know. I think it depends on most of the podcasts I listen to tend to be an hour and a half long or something like

David Parry 28:38

But that's really podcast listening, isn't it? It's like watching a film type length. If you've got to understand I suppose, where your people are going to be listening, if they have lots of them are driving to work or on the train with headphones on. You've got that amount of time. If their dog walking, you got that amount of time. I was talking to Alan outside this morning, he's a big podcast listener and he would rather sit and listening to podcasts rather than watch the telly. So we'll just sit and headphones on and listen to an hour and a half 

Richard Buckle 29:05

I do that. shut my eyes think I'll listen to this podcast with my eyes closed.

David Parry 29:09

How Long does it take before you fall asleep.

Richard Buckle 29:11

About Five minutes. Yeah. So going in, though, isn't it? Subliminal

David Parry 29:17

but bear in mind, people are going to be listening in the car on the dog walk so they're not always going to have access to a screen so they won't necessarily watching the video. The video is there to promote it maybe in that case, rather than so don't show things or talk about things that you need to see for them to makes sense 

Richard Buckle 29:32

. Yeah, that was one of the early podcasts. Were doing case studies and throwing things up on the screen and look at this. Look at this. And it actually made the editing a lot more complicated to be honest. Yeah, because you've got screens in screens and all sorts going on

David Parry 29:44

Okay, so that's when sometimes stuff where I thought about where do you physically record it? And then where do you push it out? Where's the channels that it goes out and physically recording it? You need a room that's suitable for the job and yeah, and we've turned our metre same room into a dual purpose room that because I have meetings in but we've put some acoustic panelling on the wall, and we've got lighting, and we've got the camera set up. So it's pretty good space. Not everybody will have that if you're going to set up a room every time you need to do a podcast, that's going to give you a little bit more of a barrier to not do it this week, because the rooms busy for something else. Yeah.

Richard Buckle 30:22

So I think as well, again, the room like what what? What do you want to say with the rooms at the moment? I mean, I suppose we're on that journey of turning it more into a podcast room rather than a meeting room.

David Parry 30:33

You did promise me a neon sign the wall behind you saying the SME growth podcast?

Richard Buckle 30:38

Yeah, there's plans underway to you know, stay tuned to see

David Parry 30:42

what we do and see what we do with it. More plants, maybe plants or crickets in the background? Yeah. So that's where you record a record. Acoustically right? And video, right? And you got to be comfortable and practical

Richard Buckle 30:57

And then where do you where do you host it,

David Parry 30:59

So the big secret is that there is a piece of software, it's actually owned by Spotify. And it used to be called anchor.fm. And I think they just rebranded it, because it's Spotify's own thing. And then I call it Spotify for podcasters, or something like that. But if you search for anchor FM, that's what it always was. And that's what people will know it as. So because it's owned by Spotify, it pushes it to that, including the video. And I think I'm right in saying that's the only platform that has video natively in it amongst the podcast platforms. Am I right? 

Richard Buckle 31:29

Could well be. Apple doesn't. 

David Parry 31:32

I've never seen a video on this. And I'm not really plugged into some of the other platforms. But if you do do ank anchor.fm That goes to Spotify, Apple, Amazon, Google podcast, cast box, Pocket Casts and Stitcher as well as an RSS feed. So in one hit, you get all of that lot. As I say, I think the only one of those that has video is the Spotify one. But there if people want it now, then where else should you put it out? Well, YouTube works for us 

Richard Buckle 32:01

put shorts out on YouTube and the full length episode. 

David Parry 32:04

Yeah, we're getting close to 1000 views of the shorts, some of the shorts. So it's good as similarly with LinkedIn. People will say they've seen your video when what they mean is they've been scrolling up that LinkedIn feed. And there's the 60 second stitch together. soundbites highlights reel. And that's you know, it's good enough to get the gist. Yeah. And to know that you're doing it. Yep. So that's good.

Richard Buckle 32:27

Instagram, Facebook reels we should look at as well. But that's another big thing taken off. So. And we host them all on my website as well.

David Parry 32:37

So we do Yeah, I like to some people do the .tv. domain extension two, most of you know, company name.tv. We've just got another blog, two blogs on our website, one for our real blog and one for the podcasts. And then you can host a video on there yourself, which is good in some ways, because you've captured people into your ecosystem. And if you can then tempt them off to go and maybe look at some of the material you have been talking about, you might then get somebody to fill a form in and have an interaction with them. You know who they are. The great thing from the listeners point of view about podcasts is you don't have to reveal who you are to the podcast people. Obviously your platform will know who you are. But in case you were ever wondering, we can't tell.

Richard Buckle 33:16

So you can't tell.

David Parry 33:18

Which is which is okay, that's fine. If people are interested in contacting us they will 

Richard Buckle 33:22

That's why I think back to the point is make it about community, isn't it? A lot of podcasts will either have a really cool it like Patreon or something like that. Yeah, support the podcast. But that way you get to, you know, members, perks and all that type of stuff should

David Parry 33:35

We should set up a Discord server on how many of our listeners find their way to that. Probably not the right demographic. But anyway, yes, they are on their website. So that's you need to pump it up. There's got to be out there somewhere, isn't it? The other thing that I found quite useful is on our email footer, we put a little banner ad to point people to it make it easy to provide some links there.

Richard Buckle 33:56

We need to change the image on that though.

David Parry 33:58

My image is dreadful.

Richard Buckle 33:59

I look like a Carebear.

David Parry 34:01

Has anybody told you you that you look like a Carebear? Just two cuddly guys.

Richard Buckle 34:07

It's very cuddly. festively plump.

David Parry 34:09

It was digitally enhanced. We asked asked an AI to say turn this picture of Richard into a Carebear. So that's that's where? So that what remains of this podcast, which could be the next half an hour if we're not careful is how do you do it? Then? What were our learning points? So I just thought we got to talk about the content first, I think because before you've even bothered about recording, there is there are a few tips and tricks that we've learned to help us come up with some content. Yeah. So I think that you're quite good at coming up with subject ideas. So I think you need someone in the organisation to be that what about one on this one or that one on that? And I would say the instinct should always be yes. Now let's do it rather than no, that will be difficult because yeah, you know, because if you want to try shoot every idea, then you will. Whereas if you want to say, well, there's a grain of something in there, we could definitely make a podcast out of Now let's find it. And then you suddenly you've got a podcast. And even the ones we've not been quite so sure about have all been interesting,

Richard Buckle 35:14

I think once Yeah, like you say, you start with that idea, and almost like a mind map really come up. What would you say about that? And then that triggers another thought and triggers another thought. And before you know it, you've got half an hour or something that you can talk about. And, yeah, that's the podcast. So.

David Parry 35:26

So that's the idea. And then in terms of how you prepare those participating, you could go to a script. And I think we've never done that. And I can't imagine how long it would take to write one. How many words are there in half an hour's with a chat, you know, a lot. And you can't really write the way you speak? Can you? 

Richard Buckle 35:46

And also I think as well, the whole thing would have to be scripted, then and you'd end up with something like a play

David Parry 35:52

You'd have to rehearse it and stuff? So anyway, don't script it? It will take too long to do it. And it probably would come across as wooden. Yeah. Anyway. So it's not scripting, but also the other end of the spectrum, just turn up and have a chat. Bit like early ones? Very, very hard to do. I think. Maybe not. If you're on your own

Richard Buckle 36:11

I think you could do it. But there's a danger, then that goes off topic or just runs into the sand a little bit. The problem is, once you are filming, there is that thing, but once you're in front of a camera, which I suppose is another thing to think about, you get used to being in front of the camera

David Parry 36:32

Ignore the camera

Richard Buckle 36:36

But there is that all of a sudden, what am I going to say next? That you wouldn't have if the cameras weren't there? So

David Parry 36:42

So I think we need something in between, especially if you're trying to manage the balance of conversation. You don't want someone dominating the microphone. Like I keeps throwing over to you and you throw it back again. So the secret, I think I'll put it up For those of you who are watching on Spotify, we have a bit of paper with nothing more than some bullet points on it, really. And you can tell when the other person is either expanding on the bullet point you're already on all they're moving on to the next bullet point thing. 

Richard Buckle 37:09

Yeah, I think it's very helpful to have because yeah, like you say, you know, when the other person is assuming, there's two people doing it, that you know what they're talking about, you can see what's coming next. And I suppose what you don't see if you're what they're in, you won't see it, obviously, if you're listening. But if you are watching on the video on video, because of the way it's edited, that would be focusing on the person who's doing the speaking, you never see as not speaking,

David Parry 37:37

You never use both at the same time, We might be the same person. 

Richard Buckle 37:44

So yeah, so that's 

David Parry 37:46

so I know that you're now going to talk about how you bring in a guest to the conversation. If you're doing a podcast with a guest

Richard Buckle 37:52

So we we try and prep them a little bit, a lot of people don't want to come on a podcast, just as a kind of, yeah, I'll turn up and have a go there 

David Parry 38:02

We tried that. People run a mile.

Richard Buckle 38:06

And that's fair enough. Because I probably wouldn't want to either, you want to know what people are going to say you want to have a rough idea of what you're going to be expected to talk about. So we know, we would normally just prepare one of these bullet points lists and say, right, this is the type of thing we want to talk about, and just bring you into the conversation on it.

David Parry 38:22

But we're both used to reading it while talking, knowing that the camera will be on the other person. So you don't keep getting this, you know, looking at this thing. The guests don't do that. They're focusing so much on being part of the conversation and being living in the moment that they don't want that distraction, I think you get used to it, 

Richard Buckle 38:39

you get used to it. And so I think then that's your job as the host, then to try and steer you, it's easier for you to then steer them, just let them flow with what they wanted. That's why they're there, right is talking about their expertise. And your job is to then try and steer the conversation, according to the outline that you've got.

David Parry 38:56

So that's the sort of body of the talking stuff. But there's an intro and an outro. And every podcast had what do you do at the beginning? What do you do at the end? And we did have a few discussions about that. We did try to script those in the early days. But that was kind of a waste of time. You just took them all naturally. But I think you've still got to have a view about what type of things do you want to include? 

Richard Buckle 39:16

Yeah, so I think the intro bit, I mean, the approach we've gone for is obviously we're talking about particular subject in the main body of the podcast. But that can be very subject focused, obviously, you know, we try and bring a little bit of personality through that but I think the the intro bit is more about Well, let's try and bring a little bit more personality into the podcast. Let's try and just, you know, rather than jump straight in just people who are listening that might not know us can get to know us a little bit, hear about some of the other stuff that we've been up to maybe even get some ideas out of it. You know, we're talking about mid journey earlier. If you've not heard of that, go and have a go. You can have 25 images for free. So they those sorts of things just 

David Parry 39:56

A little bit off topic, and maybe current affairs Just and then the outro I think the big question there is, are you trying to make this salesy? Are you going to promote whatever your business does or what it is? Or get people to go places? Or are you just saying thanks for listening? Please share it a bit. Are you going to point people to bits of content on your website and be sort of overt about that? Which may be helpful? If you've said stuff that does relate to it? Or is it come across as a bit forced, you know, oh, please come on. Look at our website. Well, why I've just listened to and listened to that's me. Thanks very much. Yeah.

Richard Buckle 40:29

Well, particularly as well, again, because you're not, you're probably not watching it online, or in front of a laptop you in the car or something, you can't go to the website

David Parry 40:43

I think the same problem if you ask people as we do, please share this podcast. There's no harm in asking people, but they're probably not in a place at a time where that's very convenient for them to do, necessarily. So maybe they'll just do it naturally. Anyway, if they hear a good podcast, they'll tell their friends. If they weren't, then I'm going to just you asking them to do it probably isn't

Richard Buckle 41:02

Interesting to think about it. How many podcasts Have you shared to someone? Just stuff you listen to? 

David Parry 41:07

Yeah, well, only a few. 

Richard Buckle 41:09

And there's only one or two that I can think of the 1000s of podcasts that I probably listened to. I might tell someone to listen to a go listen to that. 

David Parry 41:16

Yeah. And they let me do that, you know, and I've certainly picked up some good podcast tips from others. But there's so many out there. It's a bit like when you recommend someone a good book, you almost feel guilty. So that's another on the list of books, I haven't read, you know, a bit like podcasts I haven't listened to. But a good ones are worth sharing. But I think they'll probably get shared anyway, I'll still probably carry on asking people to share podcast at the end, but they're either going to probably quite frankly. Okay, so that's all the what to say stuff. Let's talk a bit about in terms of our how some of the equipment decisions that you make, I think the biggest one is do you do video. Because you've got to do audio, right? You might call that a blog or a podcast without the audio. So you got to do the audio. The only question is, do you do the video as well? And we've said earlier, it's only really Spotify or YouTube or your own website where people can actually watch you doing it. So is it worth it? I think so for the promotion. 

Richard Buckle 42:15

Yeah, that's Yeah, I think otherwise, it's very hard to get it get the message out. I think it's, it's a great way of being able to leverage content. We talked about that other version, another episode of the podcast, but you're having the conversation anyway. So if you can get the cameras in there, why not capturing?

David Parry 42:31

So let's talk about equipment. Now assume that some people will want to do audio only because it's cheaper and easier. Let's talk about audio first. So the kit we've got, we've got these microphones. These are podcaster microphones from Rode got Rode branding all over them. There's some booms to hold them off the desk, so you don't pick up any drumming fingers or that type of thing. You can get c c stands as well, or you can get desk mounted ones. And then over there, just out of shot, if you're watching on thing is a mixing desk. Now it's called a Rode Podcaster Pro, it's about 500 quid, and it's got four channels on it, plus a load of pre canned sounds and all sorts of processing to get the audio quality right? So if you're talking about a bit of a setup here, you've got your 500 pounds for your mixing desk. These microphones are 100 pounds each the booms are actually more expensive, about 125 each, and we've got four of these. So if you just went for two microphones, two booms, and the mixing desk, you're talking about 1000 pounds ish. Yeah, maybe 1500. If you go for another two and some different ways of hanging the microphones. But so if you're a business talking about doing something for marketing, that I think is quite cheap. You can get yourself up and running with an audio only podcast pretty quickly. For the sake of 1000 1500 pounds. Yeah. But if you really buy into the video bit we've just talked about then you're going up quite a step more. 

Richard Buckle 43:57

So I mean, you have to you can how long is a piece of string when you come to what you actually want to film with? You could do it with an iPhone, but it's gonna look pretty urm 

David Parry 44:10

It's interesting. I was asking Pete video guy this and I was doing some research on YouTube about it. I wanted to see a side by side yeah. So we don't use iPhones, we use a brand of cinematic camera called Blackmagic, which in those circles is very well known. It's probably one of the top end brands for that type of thing. So it's called a Blackmagic Pocket Cinema 4k cameras. In fact, for those of you watching, I'm just going to show Rich now in context because you get to see behind the scenes that we turn the camera. And you can see there's there's a camera lighting and this is our studio setup. Probably won't have been able to hear much of that as I moved away from the microphone, but I just showed a little bit of, of the setup in the room. So we've got those cameras now there Quite expensive cameras, about 1000 pounds each for the body plus a bit for the lens plus the lenses, four or 500 pounds for lens or more for zoom lenses. Yeah, and 

Richard Buckle 45:10

Then by the time you've attached all the other stuff on it, tripod and cages to hang stuff off and all the other bits, you've probably two grand, maybe maybe a little bit more per camera 

David Parry 45:22

So if you're gonna have two people in the podcast, you're going to need two. And you might want three or four if you've got more people or you want a room shot where everybody's in it. So you're talking probably more like, five 6000 pounds when audio plus cameras. Yeah, if you want to go down that route. Yep. And then you might want basic things like tripods to put the cameras on lighting that sort of thing. So, you know, if you had a budget for 10,000, that would cover it, but you don't need to spend all of that. 

Richard Buckle 45:52

Yeah. So it's, yeah, I think then you're into as well, like, everything. We spent money on this room to make it acoustically? 

David Parry 46:01

Yes, we have acoustic wall behind Richard over there, we've got tiles on the ceiling that you can't see, which are made of foam to absorb the echoes and so on. So yeah, so So yeah, there is an investment, it's probably about 10,000 pounds wouldsafely cover it for the kit for the assuming again, video. Yeah. Let's just talk about the iPhone bit though, because people will be tempted to go that route. And there's nothing wrong with that. iPhones have got very good cameras on these days, bare in mind they cost 1100 pounds each as all the latest iPhone, that you may already have one. But they're not free. It's just, you may already have them. 

Richard Buckle 46:35

I think in a business context as well, you probably don't want to be just using people's personal iPhones or you probably want some dedicated kit as well don't you to? And that's what we don't want is a phone call in the middle of filming.

David Parry 46:50

Stop the podcast! Someone's ringing to sell me some electricity supply or whatever they're looking for. 

Richard Buckle 46:56

And I think as well, it does make it feel a bit more. I know a bit more intentional, if you've got proper kit, and it feels like a podcast. And I think this is something we've we've seen it over, you know, the last 15 or so years, or 10 years or so with the iPhone coming out. Changing the way that design looks and changing the way that we're all like, you know, if you read the old books like lean startup, and you look at an MVP, we know what what could you do when you could you know, five, five cents a click on Google, who's getting that nowadays, ropey website that you could throw out, you just can't do that anymore? Because people have been conditioned expects a high quality content, regardless of what stage you are in your business lifecycle. Yeah. So there is an element of saying, well, actually, by investing in the kit, it shows intent

David Parry 47:45

and if you have a guest to come in, and you've got an iPhone on a dodgy tripod, you know, that's perhaps not quite got the same, you're not going to get the same amount out of them in the same as Exactly, yeah. And I think don't ignore the fact that the tech is there for a reason. It's not just because it looks better. The technical difference really between the iPhone and a proper camera like these is probably twofold. One is you've got almost complete control over these cameras. Not only can you change the frame rate, shutter angle, as they call it, video, shutter speed, if you like the ISO settings, the white balance and all that, but it puts out a file which is in its raw form, which you can then do anything with. Yeah, so you've got complete control of what the final image looks like. And it's very high quality. So you can zoom in and crop videos of stuff. iPhone does all sorts of clever stuff. But with the software and you've got less control over you can't do so much. But the other main thing with iPhone versus these cameras is what they call the dynamic range. So the difference between the black and the white. So if you take, there's a great if you go on YouTube, and just just look for a side by side comparison of the iPhone SE 14, and one of these Blackmagic Pocket cameras, they've got the same tripod look at exactly the same scene and he plays it with a Swiper across, you can see what looks like and the depth of the blacks and the brightness of the whites on the proper Blackmagic camera is phenomenal. When you suddenly compare, if you look at an iPhone footage on its own, you don't notice what you're missing. But then when you compare it to a proper photography, video and image is quite different. So like you say, it's probably more about what you feel like doing it than then you'll notice the video difference, but it'll definitely be there. You get more control. 

Richard Buckle 49:20

Yeah, I mean software. There's all I mean, there's all sorts of other hardware you can buy. Right? You know, we've done some not live stream podcast, but we've done live stream events where we've, you know, there's more kit that you can buy to live stream, 

David Parry 49:35

video mixing desks, we've got one of those 

Richard Buckle 49:38

editing software and all that and then 

David Parry 49:41

I don't forget as well for the cameras, you're going to need a very high speed SD card to capture all you can't just rely on your normal digital camera card and

Richard Buckle 49:50

you need also probably something like a Mac studio to actually process it

David Parry 49:54

on the computer to process it. Sure if you try and do this on a laptop. I mean, how much have we spent when you add it up? We've got a few Mac studios out there. Now there are a few 1000 pounds each, you need the processing power. Yeah. Because these large file sizes will grind them to a hault

Richard Buckle 50:09

This is not like you know, an mp4 file from your iPhone. This is serious amount of data. 

David Parry 50:14

Yeah. Is it a couple of terabytes or something coming out of this podcast? I mean, there's gonna be a lot. Yeah, yeah. So that you got to handle a couple of terabytes of the data. That's, that's some mean. Mean stuff. And as I say, even getting onto the SD card, you've got to have something like 512 a second, that can handle that bit rate thing to go on there. So yeah, not not to be sniffed at but still your 10 grand, maybe we'll just get you that studio. If you're only going for two microphone. Two camera setup. 

Richard Buckle 50:41

Yeah. And once you've got it, you've got to use it.

David Parry 50:44

Now, the software is not necessarily you don't necessarily have to spend a lot of software with these cameras, you get software included into that the DaVinci Resolve software comes with black Magic, you can use Adobe Premiere Pro. So that's part of the Cloud Suite that we've got 75 pounds a month. And that does some of the audio stuff as well, because you probably want either Audition, which is the Adobe version of the auditing of the editing software. Or you could do that on the free DaVinci Resolve one 

Richard Buckle 51:16

Adobes got the free AI tool at the moment as well

David Parry 51:19

Yeah, that's the one that's we're using today

Richard Buckle 51:21

To sound more beautiful,

David Parry 51:23

Or very Barry White. And then in terms of equipment, but under the how is also the people? Yeah, how do they do it? And we're not going to try and dress this up or saying you've got to be degree qualified or have had an apprenticeship at the BBC to better do it. Yeah, these bits of software are designed for normal humans to use them. But don't think it's just out the box. Its not easy, it takes some practice. Yeah. Which is why your first few might be a bit scratchy. Yeah. But then another put you off. So if you've got people internally that want to learn that and get better at it, then they will they'll improve. Yeah, clearly, you know, beholding for us to say that's what we do as well. So even when our clients may do podcasts, they can still record it themselves. Send us the files, and then we can do all the clever bits afterwards Do the processing do that. Make it look good. So that's a bit of the how.

Richard Buckle 52:15

Could I just add a little tip as well. The little clap that we do at the start? Oh, yes, that's part of every podcast we do that will clap, which you'll probably never hear

David Parry 52:25

It's all edited out. But we have to say 123 and clap and clap at the same time as each other. Because I'm asked to synchronise the audio and the video, which I suppose we could get clapperboard.

Richard Buckle 52:38

I'm going to mix all the claps together one day in big edit, but now it's just those little tips like that, isn't it that makes it you don't want your audio off sync with your video, because becomes a little bit looks a bit silly or just a bit hard to watch.

David Parry 52:53

Okay, so there's probably some more tips in there as well. After we've done our hundredth, we'll come back and do a few more tips. What about main learning points, then what do you think though? Having done what we've done, how would you help somebody else accelerate the learning journey? The learning curve?

Richard Buckle 53:08

We've talked about the kit. So you're gonna have to make a choice by investing in the kit?

David Parry 53:15

Choose the right stuff from the beginning. That's just a bold decision.

Richard Buckle 53:19

At the end in mind. You know, I think if you thought that you weren't going to do more than, you know, 20/40/50 podcasts? Why you doing it anyway? 

David Parry 53:28

you know what, as well, I think if you spent 10 grand on it, you're going to be more motivated to keep them going. Do you want either your own conscience or your boss breathing down your neck to say, why did we spend 10,000 and you've done three podcasts like that 90% of people that do other bits we've learned as well, as well, in here, remember to turn the air conditioning off. That's got a annoying high frequency noise which you can filter out. But it's a lot easier if it's not there to start with,the lighting then we've got LED lights in here. And I don't know if everybody realises it, but LED lights flicker very fast. That's how they work. And if you and the cameras can pick that up. Yeah. And if the frame rate of the camera isn't different to the flicker rate of the LED lights, yeah, then you get this really horrible effects.

Richard Buckle 54:15

You've got equipment you need to get right, you've got the setting that you need to get right as well, isn't it in terms of both the technical aspects of acoustics? But also what's your look and feel?

David Parry 54:27

yeah, people maybe didn't realise these plants that we have behind us are actually real plants. They're not plastic plants. But that means that they come in here for the occasion, they wouldn't live in here and there's no light. So they go out and live by the window. But we bring them in to dress the room as they say yeah,

Richard Buckle 54:42

and that we're going to do some work on that. I think in the not too distant future. Just now that we're a bit more established. It's and again, it's one of those things you don't have to necessarily have it all done on day one. You know, I think there is something to be said for watching the podcast evolve and Yeah,

David Parry 54:58

well, even our camera position Since we've changed with, they used to be the end of the table, and you could see the door in the background, and we thought would change that round. 

Richard Buckle 55:05

So it's, and you may not, you know, not many people are probably going to have a perfect podcast space. This room, if you start with a blank sheet of paper, you would not use this room as podcast room. Because we've got doors, we've got glass window, we've got plastered across the walls, all this type of thing. But you just got to make do with what you've got. And there are things you can do to adapt it.

David Parry 55:27

And I think the other learning point as well is the shorts have really lifted our game and being able to promote the podcast with these small sound bites. But you've got to remember when you're talking then that someone's got to try and cut out small chunks of what you've just said to be able to put into those. So it's helpful not to talk over each other too much. And maybe to have the odd pause between things.

Richard Buckle 55:50

Yeah, that is, I mean, that's probably something now it's coming a lot more natural, isn't it that when the other person's mean, I was terrible. I used to always get told off when we were doing interviews, or podcasts for doing like active listening. Can you stop doing that just be quiet. Other thing as well, that we really do need to get and you'll see this if you're watching: the swivel chair?

David Parry 56:14

No, I was just about to say swivel chairs.

Richard Buckle 56:17

You know, we're constantly being told off by Verity for moving around. Yeah, and you know, be nice, maybe like a time lapse, and you probably just see us like,

David Parry 56:25

well, if you think about the distance from your mouth to the microphone is really critical. And the levels going up and down all over the place as you're swinging around. And I'm realising I made a big mistake early going over there to that camera, I moved a metre away from the microphone, it'll just be dead air

Richard Buckle 56:42

you live and learn, don't you. We're still learning,

David Parry 56:45

So think about 10,000 pounds worth we'll do it to set it up properly, allow yourself a couple of hours to do each podcast all in a couple of man hours, perhaps if you've got two people involved, and you got to do a bit of bullet point writing, come up with the idea maybe organising guests and so on takes a bit longer. And then post anything from I don't know if you could do it in half a day, probably a day, minimum couple of days, probably by the time we've properly edited it all down and put it out. And I think it probably takes us the top end of that range, even though we're quite into the habit of it. Yeah. But don't let any of that put you off this podcast was designed to encourage people to do it. Right. Yep. Okay, well, 

Richard Buckle 57:26

If it's easy, then worth doing. Maybe not all the time. But well, but it's Yeah, I think it's worth it, I think but you've got to be in it for the long haul. Yeah. So I think if you're thinking, well, we'll just we'll just give it a go, then, you know, there are ways of doing that there are people that hire out podcast studios and go and give it a go. If that if you think well actually, we want to get 100 episodes out of this. Well, 10 grands worth of kit is 100 quid an episode. You know what you get from that? And it's one of those things that is it a slow burner? It does. But it does build and it does grow over time. And 

David Parry 57:59

so 21 was our first milestone from number one. We said we've got to get to 21. What's the next milestone? 

Richard Buckle 58:07

Maybe 50. 

David Parry 58:09

Yeah, sounds about right. Okay, let's have another reflective one at 50. A half a century. Cant wait. Well, that's seven months. So yeah. So if you listen to no others come back in October. Let's see if we made it to 50. Good. Is that it? Have we covered all the key points? 

Richard Buckle 58:31

think so. Just give it a go. Okay, well,

David Parry 58:35

I hope that has inspired someone to give it a go. We've had a number of people asking us. We How do you do it? Any Tips? Yeah, they were they were our tips. Top Tips. Yeah. So thanks a lot for listening. That's The SME Growth Podcast for our 21st episode, our Milestone One, we're now in the top 1% We can definitely say we've we've say we've done 21 

Richard Buckle 58:57

I am in the 1% 

David Parry 58:58

Top 1% of podcasts worldwide. So thanks for that. And as I said in the talk earlier on, please do share it. If you think that's been useful, however, you might do that. We're looking forward to next week where we're going to do a bit of a best of the first 20 trying to pick up the highlights of all the various different subjects that we've talked about. And then we're coming up to our Shakespeare themed one in a couple of weeks time and maybe a guest as well coming in the next couple of weeks. So in the meantime, good luck with the business