Tableside Mashed Potatoes - A Marketing Podcast

Why create a podcast for your business and how to do it. Podception!

January 23, 2020 ZGM Modern Marketing Partners Season 1 Episode 1
Tableside Mashed Potatoes - A Marketing Podcast
Why create a podcast for your business and how to do it. Podception!
Show Notes Transcript

Pilot episode - In marketing, we know that audio and video historically convert well. In ZGM's very first podcast episode, we break the ice and talk about why podcasting might be the right medium for your business and the ways you can use it to diversify the way information is being provided to your audience. It's PodCeption!

Big thank you to Calgary band, Thomas Thomas for lending us "Happy New Year Baby".

Resources:
Who we are
Starting a Podcast checklist
Audacity audio recording/editing software


spk_0:   0:00
That's great, because we're engaging our audience. That just awesome.

spk_1:   0:03
Yeah, Critical factor here is audience. We need one.

spk_2:   0:10
Please Thank everyone. It's the table side of Foch. This'd

spk_1:   0:20
Wow, we should quit right here.

spk_2:   0:21
Do you want his job? I

spk_1:   0:23
heard it pays better at all being at all this shit out. So fine.

spk_0:   0:29
Yeah. Okay, let's start this again. Sorry, guys. No. Everyone, welcome to the table side mashed potatoes. Podcast. A digital marketing podcast hosted by myself. Derek Havinga, Peter Bishop, Scott Heron. And we worked for GM modern marketing partners. And this is our first podcast,

spk_1:   0:48
I think. I think we're saying so to big things happening. One, we only got haircuts for this episode.

spk_0:   0:54
We're not recording this visually at all. So

spk_2:   0:58
it's a confidence thing.

spk_1:   0:59
Yeah, s Oh, that's important. That's gonna come across nicely, guest. Yeah, And two. Derek and I both broke our dry an you ery as of five minutes ago just for this podcast as well.

spk_0:   1:10
We've lasted 22 days, which is pretty good. I haven't really been craving a drink until today, because, uh, I'm not gonna lie. I'm slightly nervous about this being our first podcast. People are gonna listen to it. And I don't want to sound like, uh, like an idiot.

spk_1:   1:27
You still think people are gonna listen to this? Which I think

spk_2:   1:29
that our 20 for the part that I played in twisting you guys arms toe, have a drink with me? My apology. You know, this is

spk_0:   1:37
our first podcast. So I thought maybe we should introduce ourselves. Um, well, my name Derek Havinga content strategise at GM. So I work on a whole bunch of things content, marketing, and even digital project management for a little while. And now I'm focused on strategy generating leads using organic content for our clients for ourselves. Yeah, that's me in a nutshell. How about you, Scott?

spk_2:   2:04
Product design director here. It said him. So, um, which means I oversee our product in U ex team. We make websites, APS and other digital products. That's it.

spk_1:   2:21
How about yourself, Peter? I am one of the partners here, as well as ah, conversion director. I work with Content Team, the Data and Insights Team and the product team. Back in the day, I was illustrator at no notions of ever doing it for a living, but that's where I started and somehow ended up here through a weird, twisting road. You know,

spk_0:   2:44
it's it's kind of interesting, because, uh, we've been trying to start a podcast for a very long time. We pitch it to other businesses as well. A cz ah, form of generating leads for their own Lee generation strategies. Um, so our topic today is Ah. Starting podcast for your business.

spk_1:   3:03
Yeah, I like this. Causes like we are starting our podcast we're talking about starting podcast is very inception.

spk_2:   3:10
Snake eating its tail.

spk_1:   3:11
Yeah, I got so here. I got one question Before we get into these points, like how long and go do we decide we're gonna do this? You guys remember?

spk_2:   3:18
I didn't decide. I think I was sort of volunteer old

spk_0:   3:22
when I started here almost four years ago. And then I met Scott and I sat near him. He talked at length about specific things that you know about in product design or even just things in life in general. And he always had interesting insights on it all. He's blushing. Yeah. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. And I remember we were walking into work, and I was like, Hey, Scott. You should, like, start a podcast or something. You love podcast. You listen toe this podcast and that podcasts. And it only took about three and 1/2 years toe. Finally get him to do it

spk_2:   4:01
on. I've kind of, you know, I'm looking at this like I'm third might hear you guys, you know, let me know. We want to talk about all chime in.

spk_1:   4:09
I thought I was third. My So it took four years. And I think this is something people would like to know. What a How come it took so long and be what tipped it over the edge. How come we're actually doing this now? Was there something that changed?

spk_0:   4:24
I think for me, what took so long is I was a little bit nervous about being on a podcast. It's weird, too, because I don't really like being in front of the camera. Are being in front of, like, people. I don't really like public speaking that much. And for some reason, the only way I could start a podcast was if I actually just joined it essentially and just forced it upon other people.

spk_2:   4:50
Yeah, I think Yeah. And then, like just picking

spk_1:   4:52
a date, I think was good. He was all something to blow off first and pick another date. But it was

spk_2:   4:58
all this equipment we have to do something that

spk_1:   5:01
that was another driver for me is like you buy stuff is such sunken cost a thing where is like and that gets you doing? It was like gym memberships. A lot of people will. We'll pay money to get to a gym, because in the fact that they're paying makes you do it for it. Well, in theory, right,

spk_2:   5:19
Well, then just look at these things like this. Look way more credible than we have any right to claim, right? Like, you look like radio microphones.

spk_1:   5:28
Yeah. Is the illusion that we're professional? Yeah.

spk_0:   5:31
Yeah, we've got the pop filters. Although my pop filter went limp and it's not working for me now. Way arms that we bought it. We got the mixer. We've got the software on the laptop, and we've got two pretty charming guy.

spk_1:   5:49
Yeah, pretty sure there is talking about me, and

spk_2:   5:52
I'm sure we'll wonder The three of

spk_0:   5:57
us could probably talk about why businesses should start a podcast.

spk_1:   6:02
Yeah, So I think there's a number reason everyone knows now. I'm sure it's pretty obvious video and audio obviously performing really well, especially against, like, text and whatnot. So and what's nice about podcasting is passive audio, so you can listen to it well, doing other things like commuting and whatnot. Video requires a lot of attention, right? Lord audio is something that you can fit into your day a lot easier to seem, especially with our kind of day to day. So it was a great medium to use and something that we've known for ages. We need to get into, and we talk to clients a lot about. It just makes sense that we practice what we preach.

spk_0:   6:38
I think that's true. It kind of gets to the first point that we had about coming up with the podcasts. And it all starts with developing the concept essentially in kind of identifying again. What are your goals for your podcast? What? Why do you want to do it? Do you want to become the thought leaders? And it's such a cliche. Word is they're two words. I guess the thought leaders in our industry and do you want people to know that. Hey, we're the experts, and you should listen to your podcasts and in turn, Hey, if you got any questions, maybe you'll talk to our sales guy and might get some sales out of this.

spk_1:   7:12
Is brand building its lead? Jen, if you know how to convert on leads, which will talk about, I'm sure down the road, Um, but also again, it's just something you kind of you want to try out deuce because it keeps life interesting, right? We do. A lot of the things that we do are the same every day. It's nice to introduce new things to try out, right, like we don't know where this ago we might do 300 episodes or we might do to

spk_0:   7:38
and it's Yeah, it's a It's a great thing for being able to diversify your content offerings to your audience or whatever is never a bad idea. Some of the things that you need to think about when you're coming up with that concept is unity. Evaluate the market so you need to figure out okay, how many people are doing a podcast in the realm that I'm doing a podcast? So we did a trial podcast. We're trying to come up with a name, and one of the names were like, Oh, that's Ah, that's a great name, but there's probably a 1,000,000 podcast called that. And, yes, there were about a 1,000,000 digital marketing podcasts, and they covered pretty much everything that we want to cover. So we had to kind of pivot another marketing keyword.

spk_2:   8:21
Are you stuffing right now? I am stuff.

spk_0:   8:23
Hey, you know what? If we transcribe this podcast, you know what that does If we put that

spk_1:   8:28
on our website essential. You have copy sitting out there P word riches ready to be, like, crawled indefinitely by, you know, Seo on Google crawlers, all that good stuff. So it feels like a good move. Um,

spk_2:   8:42
And then another thing is

spk_0:   8:43
thinking about what your audience wants toe listen to. So you need to look up. Okay? What are some of the questions that they might have and you might find out? Okay, what are people searching for online? I

spk_2:   8:54
don't think you

spk_1:   8:55
can put enough value on that test run. Right, cause that helped. I think in a time it's like a throwaway episode. I would recommend that to anyone like don't go in your first episode thinking you're gonna That's it. You just do a throw away One where ever gets used to the mike. You get used to the banter and you get usedto seeing what the cadences and I thought it was super valuable like I would. Everyone is doing it. I would recommend town book this one. No way. Laugh. So we did one now where we tried to come up with our

spk_0:   9:27
name, which is actually part of the concept ing part of coming up with the podcast is coming up with a name on. We came up with the name tableside mashed potatoes and that name beat out Ah, whole bunch of names that we crowd sourced within the agency. Um, do you want to explain why we're calling it tableside mashed potatoes? Because I still hate the name.

spk_1:   9:50
You know, what I like about it is rate in the name is a marketing idea.

spk_0:   9:54
So the name came from me one time at lunch thinking about business ideas to supplement my income. And I thought, Hey, you know how some restaurants have tableside guacamole? Well, why don't they have ah tableside mashed potatoes. You

spk_1:   10:09
know, I think there's many reasons, but let's keep going.

spk_0:   10:11
Yeah. So you ordered tableside mashed potatoes. The waiter comes with, like, a bucket of potatoes

spk_1:   10:19
or any country already cooked to this

spk_0:   10:20
point. You already cooked. They have the masher. They've got the milk. Or if you're vegan, they've got the goat milk. And then they just started mashing the potatoes tableside. You know, you've got chives, you've got bacon bits you've got.

spk_1:   10:36
It would be like like tubby die would have unusual things that you wouldn't typically put on mashed potatoes like Lucky charms, baby carrots. Or like shrimps

spk_2:   10:45
actually care. I grew

spk_0:   10:46
up eating baby carrots with my mashed potatoes. Yeah, was weird. My dad loved that. Yeah. Pistachio shells. Yeah. Who

spk_2:   10:53
here? Here's Here's my my only thing with this. You just got one thing. It doesn't make any sense. It's like

spk_1:   11:03
I like your separate company in the restaurant employees you to come in and mash the potatoes tableside.

spk_0:   11:08
Essentially, it's a potato pop up. So yeah, I go to these companies and say, Hey, I've got this great idea. You

spk_2:   11:16
have an idea. I think

spk_1:   11:19
this is like a prototype

spk_0:   11:20
and I'd say, um I don't know. For every order of these mashed potatoes, maybe I'll collect, like, 0.5%.

spk_2:   11:28
Is there something about this experience that you get outside of just having it brought immediately to your table? Warm And it like it's not even a, you know. Ah. Ah, luxury item. You've taken a subsistence crop.

spk_0:   11:42
It's the story. It's in Ireland. But they had, like, the famine Potato fan? Yeah, where they're starving. And then potatoes essentially save the population.

spk_2:   11:54
Yeah, sure. So if this was 1940 and you were like, Hey, people can eat more than potatoes. Now. I got to get rid of these thousands of potato. They have a brilliant idea.

spk_1:   12:03
Every potato has a story. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Part of the experiences you're telling the story of each potato that went into there. Tableside mash.

spk_2:   12:11
You opt out of this service, you know me. I'm a I'm a yes and guy, but I just can't get there and I'm trying to do and I'm trying to be, you know, as, uh, Kevin O'Leary is I can, in the scenario here to just, you know, yeah, I give you some perspective.

spk_1:   12:27
You probably need to experience it like there's no way you can just say, All right, this isn't for you until you've actually tried it. It's like Cirque du

spk_0:   12:33
Soleil. Yeah, let's see if it's not for you, it's not for you. Well, let's really do

spk_2:   12:37
this. Then. Every time we have a guest on the podcast, you're serving up mashed potatoes, making it right in front of them.

spk_0:   12:45
That's a lot of work. Like I got a bunch of buttons to push here on the computer. And, yeah, I might have to scale up in my staff from one toe two way. Be that some other things to think about when you're thinking about a name is you know you want to use keywords in a name, so it's searchable. Stuff it with some sort of keywords. So tableside mashed potatoes, the digital marketing podcast,

spk_2:   13:11
such a non sequitur you kind of

spk_1:   13:13
have to otherwise like, we're gonna end up on cooking channels. Yeah, yeah, well, and I I think everything's going towards natural language. So it's one of those things were like, yeah, putting your key words, but also don't do it to the point where you sound like a robot and you're just like it's obvious. Like Google, especially with their laser algorithms. They're just pointing more and more towards. Hey, just speak like a human. Get your point across. If you're in the industry, you're naturally going to use industry terms, so just try and do that as much as you can. I'm sure Apple and every other search engines following suit, so yeah, yeah. Um, so format. How do you decide on a format?

spk_2:   13:53
I guess so. This is interesting

spk_0:   13:55
because there's pros and cons, all different types of formats. So you know the interview format. If it's just one person and a guest, you might have to plan your podcast way, way ahead of time in advance. Um, or maybe it's just one person talking on the mike, which is, you know, a lot of talking and might be very difficult for the host unless it's completely scripted, which might come out a little dry or something like us, where it's just, you know, it's unscripted conversation. We've got our points you want to hit. We're gonna banter a little bit because three of us are friends, and that's what we do have to be

spk_1:   14:29
fun. I believe that. It's just like, if you are, if you just doing it because you feel you have to, then it's just never gonna be sustainable. So

spk_2:   14:37
I think they're so so many good. Well, good asterisk industry podcasts that have great content, but it is really dry there. There. It's like they're reading a sheet. That's what I think we're hoping to avoid in a formulaic sort of way. Like with this podcast. As I put my sheet a little, you can have the liner notes. Fact

spk_0:   15:00
Eric so dry It's hard producing a show, man. I gotta keep all the

spk_2:   15:04
notes can. Yeah, well, someone has to,

spk_1:   15:06
like, do the work, right? Like Scott and I are literally riding the coattails.

spk_2:   15:11
You're working the board.

spk_0:   15:13
I'm play by play. You guys our color commentator? Yeah,

spk_1:   15:15
we're both third Mike,

spk_2:   15:17
So I think I don't know where the the percentage splits, but I think you need a certain amount of, you know, good content that's gonna be that's gonna resonate with your audience. But you need some level of, you know, affability and chemistry. Organic flow of conversation. Maybe it's funny. In our case, it probably isn't but you need something that is going to keep it going beyond just delivering fax.

spk_0:   15:43
Yeah, I agree. You think aboutthe length length is important? The podcast platform can be listened to you. Maybe as you're driving to work or walking to work or walking your dog at the gym. It's just something in the background that you're listening to and you're going to get some good insight from. It s So we've discussed that. Are length is gonna be around the 20 minute mark.

spk_2:   16:04
So out of two and 1/2 hours of conversation, we're gonna try to come up with 20 minutes Valuable audio content. Yeah, and then deciding on Okay,

spk_0:   16:14
Whose case? Somebody needs to be in charge of the actual agenda of the podcast. You know how how the podcast is going to flow. So the intro is it gonna be 15 seconds long? Is there gonna be some banter? Is there gonna be some sponsors that we have to hit? Uh, which is

spk_1:   16:31
way Don't have that problem, you know? Not yet. Anyway. They

spk_0:   16:34
are our clients. Somewhat sponsor it. No, I don't think so. No. Okay. Oh, this is unfit. Um, somebody needs to like actually lead the conversation. So if we're starting today, go away off the handle here will need to steer the car back here like we've kind of identified that. Let's say I'm the I'm the person that sets everything up, and then you guys provide all the good insight.

spk_2:   17:02
Color commentary. Yeah, it's

spk_1:   17:04
good point, but you do need structure, no matter how easy it is to check. Because when we go out is easy enough to to go three stuff. But, like with no structure man, we go off on tangents forever. Like as you probably already experienced. We

spk_0:   17:18
literally talked about the business of tableside mashed potatoes for 10 minutes, and you've probably only heard 40 seconds of it. Lucky you

spk_2:   17:27
tell us about the podcast gear. What do you need? It's funny

spk_0:   17:30
with our podcast. The podcast year was kind of like the catalyst to say, OK, now it's time to start this because we've spend money on, you know, the mixer, the microphone, the microphone stand, which is like an arm that we've attached to our desks. Or, in Scott's case, he's attached it to the coffee table and what we call the lounge

spk_1:   17:52
critical equipment. Yeah, but without the arm, you're literally crow ched over your microphone

spk_0:   17:58
on then, of course, the software. So you're gonna need a little bit of knowledge in terms of the software, but they're like What I use is Adobe Audition, which is free with the adobe creative cloud. But there's other software out there that you can get for free. Or you can spend money on it on others, pieces of software. So if you have a Mac, you can just use garage Band, which is totally fine.

spk_2:   18:21
I mean, really, if you if you were just like you know, somebody who's young starting out, we just get a little mite that plugs right into your phone and do it right? Totally. You don't need to, like, spend thousands of dollars right up front to know whether this is where you're

spk_1:   18:34
gonna enjoy doing in this gear like that. We got didn't cost much like you're talking about. A couple 100 bucks is not thousands, right? Like no, the mikes for next to nothing now, right? So it used to be back in the day, would be like $200 Mike's. But nothing, nothing like that.

spk_2:   18:48
It looks way more impressive than the actual dollar value hunting suggests. Yeah,

spk_0:   18:54
some people will spend $300 on a microphone because of the quality. But I don't know if, like the regular person listening to the podcast will notice

spk_1:   19:04
is like, especially where talk, Who cares? Like you just need something that's not got a ton of noise in it and picks up relatively good sound, right?

spk_0:   19:11
It's kind of like pizza. Even bad pizza is still good. Yeah, so as long as it's audible or consumable, let's

spk_2:   19:19
let's let's let's put this out

spk_1:   19:20
there. And let me tell you, you guys agree, but, like just anything's gonna be better than trying to use your laptop mic right off the bone to that right? Because it's just, I just think is just gonna instantly put you down in quality, which is always, you know, your production value goes down and then therefore you sound like you're coming out of someone's basement.

spk_2:   19:39
Valuable, you have to say, will be degraded

spk_1:   19:41
right in the minds of the

spk_0:   19:43
listening. The only thing I would recommend is making sure that you find a good room's. There's not a lot of noise bleed as they say,

spk_2:   19:52
smaller rooms like soft furniture will absorb like echoes. And so you want a big, loud river. Be type room with just hard

spk_0:   20:01
service is everywhere. Carpeted floors and low ceilings will. Definitely

spk_1:   20:06
you're not using garage band that you're using the adobe suite, right? Yeah. Okay, How is that?

spk_0:   20:12
I think it's It's great. It's perfect. But GarageBand or there's a free PC program called Audacity from up with Lincoln, uh, in the Apple description for our listeners out there if they're interested in starting a podcast is completely free. So there's a lot of ah software you can get for free

spk_2:   20:31
editing. Why is that so hard? So, yeah, because we make it that way. It's not that

spk_0:   20:40
hard, Um, but you do have to have a little bit of editing knowledge, and you can learn it easily through YouTube videos or whatever might not want to add it, like the arms and Oz and all that stuff. But editing some mistakes you may have made in podcast long pauses. Or maybe, you know, the banter has just gone too far, and now we're tryingto bring us back into the topic at hand. Here.

spk_1:   21:04
I don't know what you're talking about. The You know, what I do find is that audio is a lot more forgiving them video editing because, you know, with video, you're gonna notice this obvious break in the visuals. But with audio, you have no idea. Really. So as long as there's a pause, you can edit between those things,

spk_2:   21:22
right? You see what I did? You know what? We're gonna shorten that by a microsecond. No one will ever know. Yeah, that'd be like, Why is he laughing? And then,

spk_0:   21:33
uh, the deployment of your podcasts or publishing your podcast? You need to find a pretty good host. So he is Buzz Sprout, which is awesome because they have an R s s feed built right into it. And then you can publish it directly to apple podcast stitcher Spotify

spk_1:   21:52
bus. Brody also has transcribing, does it not

spk_0:   21:55
totally. Yeah. It's like, what, $12 a

spk_2:   21:58
month? You know what I like about that is trying to find words that can sound like other words. If you see them really quickly and then tryingto look for all those words in the transcript. I was just doing a user test and they were doing the same thing, and it transcribes the like voice,

spk_1:   22:16
you know?

spk_2:   22:16
And there's just the weirdest, like word that they could have assumed that that wascause all Aye, aye. Driven. Right. So it's like an aye aye going through me like, Oh, this is what I think they said. And it's like the most obscure word ever. But what the user actually said was, like, three words that when they said it quickly sort of sounded like this thing. I don't have an example. I can't think of a

spk_1:   22:41
stupid, stupid machine.

spk_2:   22:43
Dumb robot. Actually, that's a great

spk_0:   22:46
Segway, because our next episode is going to be on usability. It is. I'm just revealing that right now. So it's all up to you, Scott. Holy websites. Yeah.

spk_1:   22:56
Yeah, no pressure. But you gotta knock out of the park because we bailed on this one.

spk_2:   23:00
Now, this is gay. I learned a lot of a podcast. Yeah, it's just good. You know, what is? I

spk_1:   23:05
like living it. So we've gone through the whole process to get two Episode one, which is literally taken what a year or more. Um, so it's nice to share, like the process what

spk_0:   23:17
it took to get here. And now we're one of those agencies is launched a podcast. Yeah, well, thanks a lot for listening, and we'll talk to you soon.

spk_2:   23:28
All right. Peace. Thanks.