November 1, 2023 • 43 mins
Ever wondered how artists and musicians transition into the corporate world of sales and marketing? We sat down with Jeff Dolan, CEO of Wavve, who walks us through his unique journey. Our conversation delves into his initial struggles and how he shifted gears from art and music to marketing, eventually leading him to the helm of Wave, a game-changing platform for podcasters and audio creators.
Are you tired of reshooting content? In the age where social media engagement is crucial and personalities are the driving force behind brands, we discuss with Jeff the smart move of re-purposing content and striking the perfect balance between entertaining and informative. Jeff shares his insights on finding your niche audience, building your personal brand, and staying relevant in the rapidly evolving digital marketing landscape.
Join us as we navigate the highs and lows of Jeff's podcasting journey and how he managed to reach over 260,000 downloads. We also explore the genius behind Wavve's revolutionary idea of syncing visuals with audio waveforms to enhance social media marketing for podcasters. Jeff offers invaluable advice on creating a unique listener experience and using visuals effectively to captivate your audience. Tune in for this enlightening discussion with a leading voice in the podcasting industry.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey guys, ryan Amant from Chasing Financial Freedom
podcast.
I hope you guys are having agreat day today.
On the podcast, we have JeffDolan.
Jeff is the CEO of Wave, acloud based platform that helps
podcasters and other audiocreators keep marketing on
social media simple.
He's a podcaster, musician,award winning filmmaker who
(00:20):
loves to encourage creators ofall stripes.
Sir, welcome to the show.
Thanks, ryan, glad to be here.
Thanks for coming on.
I know it was a little bit of await, but we had a nice little
pre-conversation.
I'm looking forward to ourconversation today Me too.
Yeah, it's gonna be fun,awesome.
So, before we get into morewhat you're doing, a little bit
more about your doing with Wave.
(00:40):
What about yourself?
Who are you and what makes Jeff?
Speaker 2 (00:46):
Wow, that's a big question, isn't it?
I live on the coast inWilmington, north Carolina.
I love to surf and have agrowing family and always have
been interested in I don't knowthe word for it is always
changing, but always improvingyourself, self help, hustle
(01:08):
culture.
I don't know what that is.
I think all of this type A'sjust pretty much are like no
matter what situation we'rethrown into, we're just gonna
try to be better, jeff, and onething I really missed in myself,
really on, was that I was acreative person and a creator
and I was always into art andmusic and graphic design and
(01:30):
video, and so I have alwaystried to pursue that in some way
, shape or form.
And then it became prettyapparent at some age where it
was like, all right, you got toactually make money if you want
to live and thrive.
So then I was like, okay, so Ican't just go to a corner and be
creative, I gotta actuallyfigure out how to make money.
(01:51):
And so that's where I got intoa business sales marketing, the
whole business side of it and Inever really lost my love for
the arts and encouraging artistsand I really think they are
leaders.
And so I feel like, if you'regoing to be a creator slash
leader of whatever you're doing,whether you're a solopreneur or
(02:14):
leading a company you have tobring that creativity and know
what you're doing all the time,and especially in this market.
There's so many inputs we weretalking about earlier, so many
different things that arehappening in the world and in
our culture, and online andsocial media and podcasting
Everything's changing.
You have to have that kind oflateral thinking, that kind of
(02:34):
creative mind to compile all ofit and be nimble and move with
the market.
That's always been somethingI've loved and pursued to just
encourage creators, and that'swhy I love doing conversations
like this.
Speaker 1 (02:49):
So how does a CEO of a tech company live on the East
Coast and not actually live inSilicon Valley?
Speaker 2 (02:58):
Yeah, it's a good question.
So I think these days it reallydoesn't matter where you live
unless you're trying to get likefunding.
And with Wave it's privateequity backed and the guys are
all from North Carolina and theylove the calm approach to
(03:18):
growing a company where it's notlike the hyper pressure Like we
invested 100 million, youbetter 10x or you're dead, and
so really good guys over at CalmCapital and they're really
having a different view of howto grow companies and I think
it's catching on a lot of shiftaway from Silicon Valley and
(03:40):
especially with COVID it'sbecome pretty much we can live
anywhere to do whatever we needto online.
And then you have a lot of theVC firms.
For a while there they werejust throwing money at people
before even doing any duediligence.
If you try to compete with that, all the smaller VCs are
(04:01):
private equity.
It's just a numbers game.
A group that I'm with.
They are very good aboutfinding good leaders, putting
them in charge of good companiesand having a long term view.
Speaker 1 (04:14):
So a little bit about Wave.
Did you found Found?
Did you Found it?
And it's 12 in the afternoonhere on the West Coast and it
sounds like I need some morecoffee.
Were you the actual founder ofWave?
Speaker 2 (04:31):
I was not.
No, it was started by threefounders back in 2016.
And they pipped a few times andthen hit on what Wave is today,
right as kind of podcasting.
Bow Wave Crested during COVIDwhen everybody was at home
saying that I could sort ofpodcast while I'm sitting around
(04:54):
at home, and so we really didit from that.
And that's actually when theoriginal founders started
another B2B company, which was,which was hoping with churn, and
so they wanted to switch overto that and they sold Wave to
the private equity calledCapital Guys.
And then they saw what I wasdoing in marketing and said, hey
(05:18):
, can you help us scale Wave andlead Wave?
And so they put me in a coupleyears, almost three years ago
now.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
So the journey that you've been on with Wave, how
would you rate it?
Speaker 2 (05:31):
It's incredible for me.
I'm a first-time CEO.
I came out of corporate Americain medical software sales, so
SaaS sales, but in the medicalfield selling to doctors and
health systems.
That whole field was gettingreal interesting because Epic
and Cerner were starting to takeover, a lot of the smaller
(05:53):
players were getting eaten up, alot of consolidation happening
and a lot of saturation in thatmarket.
As a salesperson I was verymuch getting antsy or angsty
about not doing the marketingbecause in traditional corporate
it's like sales and marketing.
Speaker 1 (06:14):
How to be chatter Exactly.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
We sent you leads.
You didn't close them.
It's your problem.
You sent us horrible leads.
Of course, we didn't close them.
Send us better leads.
What I saw happening was youreally needed to be one person
and really know how you'reprospecting and marketing a lot
of the digital market yourself.
It's interesting as I saw thattrend.
(06:38):
I started a social media agencyon the side.
One of my first clients oractually my first client was
like hey, I really like whatyou're doing for me.
Can you help me more full timeworking to scale the company?
That's when I got out ofcorporate America back in
(07:00):
2018-ish.
It's interesting how theindustry has progressed.
It's really become not justsales and marketing melding into
one person or one entity, butI've seen the rise of the
influencer, where it's like thepersonality is leading a company
(07:22):
.
That's been really interestingto see.
I've actually had to deal withthat.
I've gone through this wholecycle where it's okay, corporate
America, BSE, traditionalmindset.
Then it's actually look at allthese guys building and they're
leading their companies.
They're on social media,they're doing podcasts, they got
(07:43):
a YouTube channel, they're likelevel Z celebrity or whatever
you call it.
It was really interesting tosee that shift happen where, if
you're not out online leadingyour company and then being
visible, nobody really knows whoyou are.
I don't know anything aboutthis company If I can trust them
(08:03):
, especially with AI now on thescene you don't know what is
real.
You're looking at some dudewith 16 abs and you're like I'm
pretty sure that's notanatomically correct.
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (08:21):
That's hard.
You're talking about AI and wecan go down that rabbit hole
shortly, but that's the youreally hit on a nerve that I
know I've struggled with overthe years is if you're not out
in front of everybody socialmedia-wise, how do they know who
you are?
My podcast or my passionprojects?
(08:42):
I'm in the real estate spacemore affordable housing and the
only way I can get eyeballs onwhat we do is by posting three
to five times a day across mysocial channels.
After a period of time I can'tmanage it.
I have two VAs that do that forme.
That's awesome, yeah, butbefore I did that, I was always
(09:06):
wondering why I couldn't getpeople interested, more
interested in what we were doing, because I'm in Arizona.
A lot of our work is in theMidwest, so I'm not near it
being able to effectivelycommunicate and share our story.
Podcasting, video, social media, blogging all those things I
(09:30):
hardly ever did.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
Yeah, it is funny how we think somehow people are
going to find out wheneverybody's in their phone and
we somehow think they'll justsearch us.
I think the new stats are likeall the Z folks are now not even
searching Google anymore,they're searching their socials
Really.
Yeah, they're searching likeTikTok and Instagram search.
Speaker 1 (09:56):
Wait a minute.
They're getting their data andtheir information from TikTok.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
Yeah, isn't that crazy.
The Gen X and older, they'restill going to.
Google to find With the youngergeneration.
They're already on all thesocial video platforms and
they're just searching rightthere.
Speaker 1 (10:12):
They're on YouTube or wherever.
What you're telling me is oneof the largest generation
doesn't even go to Google.
How, if you don't put yourselfout there on these video
platforms, how can you be found?
Correct?
Great, that just blows my mind.
Yeah, not that they just gothere, but is there any more to
(10:35):
that story?
Why do they go there beforethey go to Google Is it a trust
thing.
They're already there.
Speaker 2 (10:41):
Think about the psychology.
I've explained this before.
I'll try to make it moreconcise.
Our generation, the oldergeneration we're into long form
content as the first step.
Yes, we're going to create thepodcast, the long YouTube video.
We're going to write the book,we're going to have the
documentary.
We're going to go all outbecause we're deep thinkers of
(11:02):
experience and we know what'sgoing on.
The younger generation bumpthat.
Just give me the 30 secondtrailer so I can see if I even
want to spend more time on it.
This is the generationbasically watching Netflix on.5
X speed what I can't evenimagine that.
Speaker 1 (11:20):
Wait back up, you serious, they watch it one and a
half times Speed.
Speaker 2 (11:24):
Go to Netflix.
I could not believe when I sawthis.
Go to Netflix or who?
Click on the settings andyou'll see the ability to speed
it up now, just like YouTube.
It's insane.
Who is watching anything onthat speed?
Speaker 1 (11:40):
What you're telling me is their attention span is
shorter than anything we know.
Speaker 2 (11:45):
Yes, what's interesting is they will create
that form first, which is smart.
They'll test out the short formtrailer first.
If that hits, they'll spendmore time on it and make longer
form.
They don't even waste time ifit doesn't go viral or it
doesn't get likes or changes,whereas our generation we're not
(12:07):
sure.
We just Google it and then wechop it up and put it on socials
.
They're going to be honest, evenas far as I've talked to some
folks doing socials wherethey're like if something popped
off, they say you should goback and read it and make a new
title and the first few secondsdifferent and repost it.
(12:28):
They're like no, that's toomuch work, I'm just going to
reshoot it.
They literally won't even gothrough the work of repurposing
stuff.
Just reshoot it, read, make itfresh.
It's that iteration.
They're already creators on theplatform, live streamers on the
platform, gamers on theplatforms.
(12:49):
That's where they live, that'swhere they search.
They're not used to saying, oh,let me go to this other webpage
and search and then get a bunchof text and then find it and
then click and then get anotherbunch of text and then read
through this long blog to try toget what I need.
They're just like.
(13:09):
I need somebody to explain itto me in 30 seconds or less.
Just explain it to me Then, ifI'm interested, you have a link
where I can go.
Why do you think YouTube justcame out with this new where you
watch a YouTube short and, ifyou like it, you click to watch
the whole long YouTube videoright from the short?
Speaker 1 (13:27):
I saw that on my podcast channel.
Because we do shorts on thatand I see that now I think
TikTok started that.
Because I've been doing that onTikTok for several months now,
I'll put out a short like fromour podcast.
I'll get a 30 second short andthen I can link it to the longer
version.
Right, yeah, that's huge.
Speaker 2 (13:48):
Yeah, it's really huge.
Yeah, it's interesting too,even with folks that are going
live.
Now I got caught the other dayon TikTok where I couldn't even
go live because I didn't have athousand followers.
But you can't even go live yeton TikTok.
You can't go live on someoneelse's channel.
(14:08):
So if they're live and they gotmillions of followers or
whatever and they want to callyou up, they'll be live on it
with them.
You can't even go live unlessyou have over a thousand.
Speaker 1 (14:18):
But can you go live on your own channel without a
thousand followers?
No, Wow.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
So I got to bolt my game up on TikTok basically.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
Then let's share, because I'm in the same boat,
because I just recently put Iput together a TikTok page just
for the podcast.
I got 150 followers, whatever.
But you know what You're in thespace and maybe we talk about
it is the consistency and beingpersistent with putting video
(14:48):
out.
But sometimes even with that itdoesn't help with algorithms
and I'm not trying to win thealgorithm, I'm just trying to
figure out what sticks andsometimes some of the stuff we
talk about on my podcast withguests doesn't stick at all,
doesn't resonate, because it'sthings that people don't want to
listen to, as in change, it's afour letter word for people.
Speaker 2 (15:10):
Yeah, People, some people are looking.
It's entertaining.
Some people are looking as newsright, they just give me
headlines, give me the quicktakes on what your opinions are.
They're looking at trustedpeople Very few people.
If you look at kind of thestats how they break down, very
few people are looking as like aimprovement platform, Like let
(15:33):
me go find the gurus that aregoing to teach me how to do
something, In other words,learning that's why I struggle.
Yeah, that is a portion of it,but a lot of us that are on
creating content, we are sharingour knowledge, our experience,
we're teaching and you have tomake it fun and entertaining to
(15:54):
make it palatable for some ofthe younger audience, right,
because they're just tuned itout.
I just want to be entertained,right, so you got to make it
more entertaining.
The shock value, right, thesurprise factor, there's all
these different things that youcan do.
But then, as a creator, youhave to step back and say why am
I doing this?
Because, literally, I'm nottrying to dance, I'm not trying
(16:16):
to like have a talent showsituation.
So you have to be okay with thelevel of engagement that you get
on whatever you're trying toput out, because you're just
trying to find your audience andyour customers.
Right, because I think theother thing is there are YouTube
channels that make so muchmoney and they don't have many
(16:36):
followers.
Right, they might have 300followers and they $300.
Those 300 people are reallyimportant for what they're
trying to do.
Yeah, if you get 300 VCs on aYouTube channel for very
specific content and they havedollars at their disposal and
they invest in your company,that's all you need.
You don't need millions offollowers.
(16:57):
And so you got to look at likewho is your audience, who are
your customers and what do youreally want to put out?
Because the other concept thatI struggle with is, once you
start doing something and startgetting known for something,
you're almost painting yourselfinto a corner right, because now
you have an audience that'slike leaning in.
I want to hear from you aboutthis.
(17:19):
And then maybe your lifechanges and you're like I don't
do that anymore.
Or I was on a diet and now I'min shape, and now I don't care
about talking about foods, I'mgoing to move over here or
whatever.
And then I was like oh man, yougot to start over again.
And I was at a conference wherethey asked this of YouTube
(17:40):
executives and they were reallyfans of it.
If it's around one topic,around one audience, put it all
on one channel shorts, longs,whatever.
But if you pivot majorly, justcreate a channel.
And I thought that was reallyinteresting.
Because the other way that Iwas thinking about it is if
you're a personality, you'retaking your audience on a
(18:02):
journey and if you'reentertaining enough, if you're
an actual personality, then yourpersonality should outshine
whatever you're talking about towhere they're like I trust Ryan
, right, I trust him.
I want to hear from him aboutreal estate.
I want to hear about him, hearfrom him real estate in Arizona,
in the Midwest.
(18:23):
I want to hear about affordablehomes.
And then all those keywords arelike this is what I trust Ryan
to talk about.
And then, all of a sudden,you're like, hey, I'm in a
commercial real estate or I'mflits or whatever right Now.
It's okay, you're taking themon a journey, and they're like I
love Ryan so much, I'm justgoing to keep listening because
he's going to make it fun and Ilike the way he teaches, I like
(18:44):
the way he puts out content,right, and so that's ideally.
You want to get to that kind ofnext level where you're not
just one of the people teaching,you're like a person that
people trust.
And then they're like okay,cool, I'm going to tune in.
And then, when new platformscome out, they're like I'll, let
me find Ryan on there, makesure I add him real estate,
because that's what I'm doingand I think that's the hardest
(19:07):
challenge.
It's the hardest challenge tobreak out as an actual
personality and let yourpersonality shine on socials.
That's the hardest pivot tomake.
Speaker 1 (19:19):
I would say that's a struggle that I've been through
many times and I'll tell you forvery specific YouTube, in the
sense of Ryan Demant as a realestate guy podcaster and I
didn't mention before we justrecently got a nonprofit
approved that is going to helppeople with financial coaching
(19:40):
and so forth to becomehomeowners Congrats, thank you.
But that didn't do well with mypodcast.
About three weeks ago, fourweeks ago, I broke off and
created just a channel onYouTube that's just Ryan Demant
and it's just me talkingPersonal brand.
Personal brand it's mixed rightnow because I'm still.
(20:04):
I still have real estate, Istill talk about lending.
And then true talk is really myhashtag TRUTalk and just
talking real to people.
Some people tune it in, somepeople tune it out.
There's some haters out therethat are like why are you
talking about this?
People don't I talk aboutadversity.
We all go through adversity andwe have problems and I'll share
(20:26):
some stories and people arelike why do you talk about this?
It's boring.
Yeah, I get it.
I'm not that entertainingpersonality, I'm just being real
with you guys.
But what I wanted to get backto is if you can't truly be
yourself and be real in yourmarketing, so forth.
You're going to stuck spacewhere you're not going to get
anything.
You just got to put out whatmakes you happy and, like you
(20:48):
said, find that niche market orthose clients that fit you and
market to them.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
Yeah yeah, it's a mix of different types of content
too.
You can get stuck with theformat and how you do things,
your workflow, where you justput the same exact every time.
That's a hard thing to breaktoo.
You have to be sensitive towhat the trends are, what's
cheap, what the styles are.
(21:16):
Youtube, tiktok all theseplatforms change all the time,
so you got to constantly be likehey, now they have this new
feature and that lets us do thiswith the music, or this with
the clips, or this with therinse.
You swipe up and you swipe thisway.
Now we swipe this way, right,all the different things that
are changing.
You have to read the market andyour audience and keep it as
(21:39):
entertaining as you can.
I think the other thing is, ifyou're teaching something right,
like you're teaching realestate, there's a local aspect
to it as well, of course, and soyou could also tap into the
regionality of what you're doing.
So if you are in a certain area, then the people local will
(21:59):
start tuning in.
That's really powerful.
If you want to bridge it overto like real life, right, like
in the real world, I've seeneven the podcasters where
they're like hey, I'm going ontour, which is crazy to me Going
on tours of podcasters andyou're literally just with a
microphone and interview justlives.
But you can do it if you'reregional, right, you're like,
(22:24):
hey, meet me at my next house.
We're gonna have 30 to 50people show up because we're all
tuned in and I'm gonnainterview you for my podcast.
That would be a really excitingpodcast to watch, right, you're
interviewing somebody whileyou're walking through one of
your properties and explainingstuff and teaching stuff.
That's much more dynamic.
(22:45):
And so, being creative like thatand thinking what are different
ways that I can do it, I thinkit's really funny how, once guys
really achieve what they wantto achieve in real estate or
investing in your business,they're always like, okay, now I
don't have any meeting in mylife, I'm bored, I'm rich, I'm
just gonna be a podcaster.
And so they buy the big studioand have the interviews with all
(23:11):
these guests on.
They really could go up andthey do really well, a lot of
them.
And so I think the rest of us,they're setting a bar.
They're setting a bar for theentertainment, the quality of
guests, the quality of the show.
That's a lot of the folks.
If you're teaching a certaintopic, you have to look to.
Just okay, anybody who'ssearching in my space is gonna
(23:34):
find these people.
Why am I standing out?
Am I just trying to copy themand just be another version of
them, or am I bringing somethingdifferent, to give them a
reason to say hey, I want tofollow Ryan as well, because I'm
on the blank?
Speaker 1 (23:51):
Yeah, and that's back to finding your voice and
working on that.
I call it the shtick, becauseyou really need to be yourself.
It took, it's still taking mesome time, but it's also when
you're in front of the camera,knowing how to speak and being
able to effectively communicateyour message in a short period
of time.
I struggled with shorts for thelongest time and I'm like you
(24:13):
know what Until I can manage itproperly, I'll shoot us old
people, we'll shoot a longerversion and I'll use a tool like
Opus to cut it down and findthose shorts that work.
Have I gotten better withshorts?
Yes, but I still think Istruggle with it and I'll
continue to do it.
I'm not gonna give up on it.
(24:34):
It's just a lot easier for meto sit down and shoot five
minutes, or stand up and shootfive minutes on the other side
of my room here and let Opus dothe rest of the work For me.
Speaker 2 (24:45):
That's time well spent, one of the things that I
realized was a shock to me wasif you shoot some long form
content, you can't clip it Likeit's unclipable.
So if you do, like listicletype blogs or like these are the
top 10, whatever, If you justclip that, you have no context
(25:06):
of what you're talking about.
It's just unclipable content.
So there's certain contentwhere or you're telling a long
story, it has different partsand it just has no context when
you clip it.
And what some influencers arenoticing is working is they're
really focusing on giving ashort pitch their longer form
(25:28):
content.
So instead of clipping it,they're just shooting.
They're having a guy summarizeit right, or they're taking a
summary, or they're taking themost attractive part and they're
saying hey guys, I'm going tobe talking about this awesome
thing.
Click the link to tune in.
Can we to see you there?
We're going to be live chattingwhen we're doing this.
See you there.
And it's just that short, butit's not even about the content.
(25:50):
It's just a trickler to getsomebody that's swiping to stop
for two seconds and be like oh,there's something happening that
I want to check out.
Speaker 1 (26:00):
That's what I typically do for these.
I'll shoot a short that justtalks about.
I give them a I call it an eyepopping opening of some sort
that catches their eye and say,hey, wednesday at 5am Eastern
new episode drops blah.
And just give them a little bitof information and then see
what happens.
Those do quite well.
Those reels and shorts do verywell for me where people are
(26:22):
engaged in and they're there.
But again, until you startdoing it and physically putting
yourself out there to moveforward with it, you don't know.
Speaker 2 (26:32):
So yeah and it's, yeah, it's hard to commit to
that kind of stuff.
Speaker 1 (26:34):
It's just, yeah, that's, that's.
The other thing is the timecommitment to all this Yep, and
then you show up and I've donethings.
Speaker 2 (26:41):
This is everyone.
You start off no followers.
You're just like hey show upand then one person's all right,
and that's.
Speaker 1 (26:51):
It has to start somewhere, because I know that
feeling all too well.
When I started this podcast Iwas getting three, four
downloads and I know itdownloads as a vanity number,
but when you're first startingit's man.
Will somebody listen to mypodcast?
Speaker 2 (27:06):
And that's why Mr Beast is so funny.
I saw a cloak from thesebasically.
I basically tell you how to doeverything.
Hey, yeah, he's make a hundredepisodes of whatever you're
doing.
Don't even look at yourfollower accounts and take 100
and just fix one thing each time.
So each time you do it just fixone thing and all of it is just
(27:29):
right, like you're not even inthe I mean to you past a hundred
.
Oh, what are you doing?
So I'm like wow.
And so I think a lot of it toois just like along.
Do you have the endurance totake the distance to even get
the data to see what's workingor not working?
Speaker 1 (27:44):
Yeah, and that is that's in this space called pod
fade.
I know that because when Istarted, this December will be
five years of this podcast.
In five years, yeah, everyWednesday an episode, never
missed.
Speaker 2 (27:58):
Good job.
Speaker 1 (27:58):
Yeah, and I took a picture when I started and 25,
26 podcasts were there at thattime.
Only four right now are active.
When I say active, at leastputting one episode out a month
or some type of rhythm ofepisode.
Of those there could have beenmore.
(28:20):
I just snapshotted those andjust and I watched those and
it's crazy how quickly peoplejust drop off for the longest
time.
Two, three, four, fivedownloads is what I was getting.
Yeah, they only list listenedfor three minutes four minutes.
Yeah, it was pretty depressing.
And then I found pod match Alexand his team over there.
Man have been huge.
(28:40):
Yeah, it's changed mypodcasting world and now it's I
have to decide how I can take itto another level, because I
think I'm stuck here with mydownloads and I'm stuck here
with listens.
Now it's like how do I bettermy game, bring better quality,
help with listenership, andthere's a bunch of stuff to do.
And I haven't even scratchedthe topic of monetization yet.
(29:03):
I don't even think I'm there.
I think I'm passing 260 or270,000 downloads, something
like that.
Speaker 2 (29:10):
That's amazing.
And is that mostly real estateoaks or no, it's, it's.
Speaker 1 (29:17):
I get the audience is all across the United States.
When I first started I wasreally localized to the United
States and some how I got intothe Soviet Union, I got into
South America, japan, thePhilippines.
I get I've got two VAs therethat have been working for me
from almost the beginning ofthis.
So I'm guessing they're sharingsome of that.
So I'm guessing that's how Igot there Nice, and then Canada,
(29:41):
and it's just, it's spreadacross the you know the globe.
But Podcasting is just weird.
You have to find that space andstick with it.
We're coming to the end of theyear and I'm like man, can I
preload a bunch of episodes andjust get them over with and give
myself some downtime, becauseit's a lot of work.
Speaker 2 (30:03):
It is.
Speaker 1 (30:03):
It's a lot of time and effort that goes into this
and as my plate continues to getfuller on my other businesses,
I'm like I don't want to stoppodcasting, because I enjoy
talking to guests like yourself,about everything, and I learn
something new all the time.
I just have to figure out howto make this work again, because
it's getting to the point wheremy plate is full.
Speaker 2 (30:25):
Yeah, one of the things that I recommend to folks
is the season.
So, just like TV shows haveseasons, that's the best way to
do podcasts, because you do havethat built-in break where you
can say, hey, this is the lastseason of this season, we'll see
you back in January, we'redoing this and this and the year
(30:49):
, and then you reset theexpectation and you can be
thematic so you can say we'retrying something different this
season.
This season we're going to bedoing XYZ, and so it helps you a
little more on your episodesand gives you a break point to
replan and come back, and a lotof times it doesn't hurt your
(31:10):
numbers.
It's interesting, like I'veseen Patrick, like David do,
I've seen a lot of folks do itCasey, neistat, where they take
a break and people are sad butthey come back stronger and
people are like, oh yeah, thisis, I can't wait.
It's like they're lookingforward to you coming back and
as long as you tell them you areand set that expectation,
(31:32):
that's a way of giving yourselfa built-in break, because
there's no rules to this, asmuch as everyone says.
Consistency, yes, that's true ifyou want to consistently grow,
but it's your life.
It's like you're a person.
You have to run your businessand take care of your stuff.
So, yeah, I think I'm a fan ofthe season.
(31:54):
I'm also a fan of.
Artists are not robots, and ifwe're creating stuff, it's okay
and we want to connect withpeople and grow our businesses
and things like that.
Yeah, all of us have to do whatmakes the most sense for us,
and if it becomes just a drudge,just like a heavy weight, then
(32:19):
you're not going to show up,you're not going to bring your
energy, you're not going toenjoy it.
People sense that and thenthey're going to tune out and
that's not what you want.
Speaker 1 (32:27):
Not at all, and I'm going to switch topics here.
We haven't spoken about it andI think it needs to be brought
out.
Is Wave?
I was an early adopter.
I know I used it and it was agreat platform.
Can you talk a little bit aboutWave and what land this episode
and close it out?
But I'd love to be able to hearwhat's going on with Wave.
Speaker 2 (32:45):
Yeah, so we're a small company.
We help podcasters, audiobookauthors take their audio and
turn it into video for socialmedia influence.
It's for people that don't wantto be on camera, like we are.
They don't want to edit video,they don't want to mess with, do
anything around hiring peopleto do video, but they want to
(33:07):
create video right, becausethat's what social media is
about.
And really, when you're talkingabout the content you're
producing, especially podcasts,it's longer form and there's no
visual to it.
It's just you're listening,you're working out, you're
running, you're doing errands,you're doing chores, you're not
actively looking at a screen.
So really what Wave is doing ishey, put some visuals to your
(33:32):
audio, clip it out and just makesomething that's moving on the
screen to capture the attentionso they read what the topic is
and then listen to it and thenget them hooked.
And if you can do it fastenough, easy enough, often
enough, they will become fans ofyour podcast.
And so you're trying to getsomebody that doesn't know
anything about your podcast to alistener, a regular listener,
(33:55):
and if you have the righttargeting, the right content,
you're attract somebody.
So if I'm like hey, I'm anArizona real estate investor and
I need to know more about themarket and I see that it says
Arizona real estate, affordablehousing guru, and then I'm going
to click on that and I'lllisten to it and in the scroll,
(34:18):
when I'm scrolling, wave hasgiven you that we could probably
say it's AI driven, but it'sbasically we're matching the
audio waveform to your voice.
So it's custom.
Every video is custom, everyclip is custom.
We make every frame of thatwaveform match your audio and
that movement is just enough tostop the scroll, for them to say
(34:39):
what is that?
Oh, interesting, and then havethem read and listen to it.
You can put captions on atprogress bars.
It's just enough to where youcan rapidly get it out, very
cost effectively, very easily,and find your audience.
And so that's what we've beenworking on.
Like we talked about prior tothe show.
A lot of the podcasters aremoving to full on video, right,
(35:02):
they're recording on Zoom,they're recording on Riverside,
we're on Reast, all theseplatforms that are creating the
video easily, and then that'swhat they're starting with.
Now some people don't liketheir visual, right?
They haven't dialed in thelighting, the background, the
right.
So they're just like I recordedon Zoom so I can see the
interview and have an interview,but I'm not using this visual,
(35:24):
and so they have their niceprofessional photo, they create
the way video and they put thatup on social.
I've also heard interesting onewhere the podcasters are
recording on Zoom or similarplatform.
They're putting out their audioonly podcast, but their clips
are of the visual of the video,so they're only clipping out the
(35:48):
talking heads, but when you goto the podcast it's just audio.
So that's an interesting thingtoo, and all of these things are
different levels of creatorsophistication and so we're ways
.
Really, coming at this point iswhat's the easiest on-range
that we can give you to onsocials as a podcaster, right?
So we're really catering to theperson that just there's small
(36:11):
shop.
They don't want to mess aroundwith the video, they want to get
rapidly, they want to get asmany platforms as they can.
They already have the logos,they already have the nice
headshots.
They already have maybe it's acorporate.
We have a lot of corporatefolks.
We have audiobook authors wherethe investment in book cover is
way more interesting thananything they could have on
(36:33):
video.
They have some artists that hassome amazing cool side-by
looking art on there and that'sthe cover and that's going to
stop the scroller.
And they invested a lot in thatbook cover and they want to
market that book cover and sothey just put that on there with
some audio under it and that'sall they're trying to do.
Same with music artists.
Music artists use a lot becausethey want to make their album
(36:54):
cover famous.
Right, they got a really coolphoto that they spell out of
time and trying to figure outthe right curated album cover.
That's what's on their audiogram, right?
They just put that cover onthere with the music going.
That's all they need becausethey want people to imprint that
as the new thing that's comingout.
(37:15):
And so a lot of times you canuse your thumbnail as the entire
video.
That's what Wave helps you do.
Instead of, the thumbnail goaway immediately when you start
playing.
You don't actually get to seethe thumbnail.
A lot of times, the thumbnailis the thing that makes you go
listen to it in the first place.
If you're ever scrolling onYouTube or any of these
(37:36):
platforms where you're lookingat thumbnails, or even podcasts
players, where you're scrollingthrough all the covers, the
cover is the thing that you say,oh, what is this?
Yeah, I like that.
That looks like something Iwant to do.
If you click on that and it'sjust video, then that thumbnail
goes away and now you're waitingfor talking to do something, or
(37:59):
you're not sure what that isgoing to be and what Wave is
doing is.
We're just saying just keepthat thumbnail going and just
have some movement and somecaptions on it, because nine
times that is ten.
Thank you.
If it's learning, they're goingto just tune out of the visual.
Anyway.
If I already know that we arejust talking, that's what all
I'm going to say.
For an hour I'm moving on, I'mnot going to be watching the
(38:20):
screen and I've only heard.
Despite.
I've been like serving people.
I think it's 10% right now isthe current stat on how many
people, when they watch, whenthey're learning, they're like
watching the people the entiretime, right, like they're like
looking at the screen and likelooking at it in the entire
Almost.
Everyone else is just I got it,but they're following it
(38:42):
somewhere doing something else.
Speaker 1 (38:45):
Depending on the platform, because each of my
podcasts are hosted in twodifferent places.
Like Anchor wants you to putvideo up.
Speaker 2 (38:54):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (38:56):
So it pushes.
Since I've started doing videoon Anchor, it has pushed me out
to more people, or at least anopportunity to more people,
through Spotify, since Spotifyowns Anchor.
Now Buzzsprout, where thispodcast is hosted, doesn't offer
video, it only offers audio.
(39:16):
But now they're saying they'regoing to come out with video, so
I have no problem doing thevideo piece I've just found off
of Anchor I'm getting bettertraction with video.
I don't know stat wise, ithasn't changed.
Listen time it's steady, butI'm getting additional eyeballs
or exposure because they havesome type and you probably know
(39:37):
more than I do.
But there's something with theSpotify and Anchor algorithms
together.
For some reason in the searchfeature I'm getting, since I've
gone, video.
I think I've gone from maybe athousand or 1500 searches to
where I'm over up to 7,000searches.
Yeah, they're pushing it too.
Speaker 2 (39:58):
They're pushing it.
So if you are doing videoyou're getting priority and so
they're proactively promotingyou.
So that's really good.
And you hear any sort ofplatform where they're trying a
new feature.
If you jump on that featurethey push that more and so
you'll get an outsized return onthat when you jump on stuff
early.
So I definitely encourage, ifyou are on a platform, to try
(40:21):
out the new things, like ofcourse, I did try out this one I
think they just closed.
I can remember the name of it.
It was like create your ownradio show and they had this
huge promotion on it and it waslike old school radio where you
could have the songs that youlike and you're the host and
you're running your radiostation and you're DJing or what
, and I just saw the other daythat they shut it on.
Speaker 1 (40:45):
Wow, the other, and we'll wrap it up.
But this is one of the last andwe'll wrap this up.
But internet radio, no,anything about it.
I've been approached severaltimes saying, hey, you should
have an internet channel.
And I'm thinking 24 hours a day, seven days a week, I don't
have enough episodes, what's?
Speaker 2 (41:03):
interesting is the radio trust for radio has been
struggling for a long time andour realizing podcasting is a
really good source of talk radioand so there's a lot of new
movement lately.
There's some headlines wherethe radio stations are saying
(41:27):
hey, we can put programming frompodcasts on air.
So if you're a podcaster andyou have episodes or you're
willing to start putting liveshows on and you can really
easily move over and become aradio personality and just a
podcaster, and I think we'regoing to start seeing that as a
(41:47):
trend in the market.
We're going to start seeingpodcasters crossover to radio
for sure.
Speaker 1 (41:54):
Interesting.
That's pretty cool.
So, before we wrap this up,best place people can reach out
and then I'm sure peoplelistening are going to want to
test out wave and I don't knowwhat you guys are offering.
If you offer anything whatever,where would one go to try out
wave?
Speaker 2 (42:10):
Yeah, you can go to wavveco waveco and sign up for
the newsletter to put out two asa week on all the latest trends
and articles and headlines inthe podcasting audio space and
social media space.
So that's a really goodnewsletter.
It's called the Wave AudioInsider, the Wave Audio Insider,
and then I write personally onYouTube on my own personal brand
(42:34):
, jeffdolyncom.
So those are the two places youcan find me.
Speaker 1 (42:38):
Awesome.
I will put a link to each ofthose in the show notes.
Sir, thank you very much forcoming on.
Great conversation, love whatyou're doing.
But also you shared a ton oftidbits and gold nuggets on this
episode, so thank you very much.
Cool Thanks, ryan.
It was fun.
And then after a while I justthought of just some pretty cool
things to have in Israel as thead for waves choosing a boat to
sail home.
I love you.
Cheap conversation, good-bye,bye.
Hey guys, ryan Amant from Chasing Financial Freedom
podcast.
I hope you guys are having agreat day today.
On the podcast, we have JeffDolan.
Jeff is the CEO of Wave, acloud based platform that helps
podcasters and other audiocreators keep marketing on
social media simple.
He's a podcaster, musician,award winning filmmaker who
(00:20):
loves to encourage creators ofall stripes.
Sir, welcome to the show.
Thanks, ryan, glad to be here.
Thanks for coming on.
I know it was a little bit of await, but we had a nice little
pre-conversation.
I'm looking forward to ourconversation today Me too.
Yeah, it's gonna be fun,awesome.
So, before we get into morewhat you're doing, a little bit
more about your doing with Wave.
(00:40):
What about yourself?
Who are you and what makes Jeff?
Speaker 2 (00:46):
Wow, that's a big question, isn't it?
I live on the coast inWilmington, north Carolina.
I love to surf and have agrowing family and always have
been interested in I don't knowthe word for it is always
changing, but always improvingyourself, self help, hustle
(01:08):
culture.
I don't know what that is.
I think all of this type A'sjust pretty much are like no
matter what situation we'rethrown into, we're just gonna
try to be better, jeff, and onething I really missed in myself,
really on, was that I was acreative person and a creator
and I was always into art andmusic and graphic design and
(01:30):
video, and so I have alwaystried to pursue that in some way
, shape or form.
And then it became prettyapparent at some age where it
was like, all right, you got toactually make money if you want
to live and thrive.
So then I was like, okay, so Ican't just go to a corner and be
creative, I gotta actuallyfigure out how to make money.
(01:51):
And so that's where I got intoa business sales marketing, the
whole business side of it and Inever really lost my love for
the arts and encouraging artistsand I really think they are
leaders.
And so I feel like, if you'regoing to be a creator slash
leader of whatever you're doing,whether you're a solopreneur or
(02:14):
leading a company you have tobring that creativity and know
what you're doing all the time,and especially in this market.
There's so many inputs we weretalking about earlier, so many
different things that arehappening in the world and in
our culture, and online andsocial media and podcasting
Everything's changing.
You have to have that kind oflateral thinking, that kind of
(02:34):
creative mind to compile all ofit and be nimble and move with
the market.
That's always been somethingI've loved and pursued to just
encourage creators, and that'swhy I love doing conversations
like this.
Speaker 1 (02:49):
So how does a CEO of a tech company live on the East
Coast and not actually live inSilicon Valley?
Speaker 2 (02:58):
Yeah, it's a good question.
So I think these days it reallydoesn't matter where you live
unless you're trying to get likefunding.
And with Wave it's privateequity backed and the guys are
all from North Carolina and theylove the calm approach to
(03:18):
growing a company where it's notlike the hyper pressure Like we
invested 100 million, youbetter 10x or you're dead, and
so really good guys over at CalmCapital and they're really
having a different view of howto grow companies and I think
it's catching on a lot of shiftaway from Silicon Valley and
(03:40):
especially with COVID it'sbecome pretty much we can live
anywhere to do whatever we needto online.
And then you have a lot of theVC firms.
For a while there they werejust throwing money at people
before even doing any duediligence.
If you try to compete with that, all the smaller VCs are
(04:01):
private equity.
It's just a numbers game.
A group that I'm with.
They are very good aboutfinding good leaders, putting
them in charge of good companiesand having a long term view.
Speaker 1 (04:14):
So a little bit about Wave.
Did you found Found?
Did you Found it?
And it's 12 in the afternoonhere on the West Coast and it
sounds like I need some morecoffee.
Were you the actual founder ofWave?
Speaker 2 (04:31):
I was not.
No, it was started by threefounders back in 2016.
And they pipped a few times andthen hit on what Wave is today,
right as kind of podcasting.
Bow Wave Crested during COVIDwhen everybody was at home
saying that I could sort ofpodcast while I'm sitting around
(04:54):
at home, and so we really didit from that.
And that's actually when theoriginal founders started
another B2B company, which was,which was hoping with churn, and
so they wanted to switch overto that and they sold Wave to
the private equity calledCapital Guys.
And then they saw what I wasdoing in marketing and said, hey
(05:18):
, can you help us scale Wave andlead Wave?
And so they put me in a coupleyears, almost three years ago
now.
Speaker 1 (05:25):
So the journey that you've been on with Wave, how
would you rate it?
Speaker 2 (05:31):
It's incredible for me.
I'm a first-time CEO.
I came out of corporate Americain medical software sales, so
SaaS sales, but in the medicalfield selling to doctors and
health systems.
That whole field was gettingreal interesting because Epic
and Cerner were starting to takeover, a lot of the smaller
(05:53):
players were getting eaten up, alot of consolidation happening
and a lot of saturation in thatmarket.
As a salesperson I was verymuch getting antsy or angsty
about not doing the marketingbecause in traditional corporate
it's like sales and marketing.
Speaker 1 (06:14):
How to be chatter Exactly.
Speaker 2 (06:17):
We sent you leads.
You didn't close them.
It's your problem.
You sent us horrible leads.
Of course, we didn't close them.
Send us better leads.
What I saw happening was youreally needed to be one person
and really know how you'reprospecting and marketing a lot
of the digital market yourself.
It's interesting as I saw thattrend.
(06:38):
I started a social media agencyon the side.
One of my first clients oractually my first client was
like hey, I really like whatyou're doing for me.
Can you help me more full timeworking to scale the company?
That's when I got out ofcorporate America back in
(07:00):
2018-ish.
It's interesting how theindustry has progressed.
It's really become not justsales and marketing melding into
one person or one entity, butI've seen the rise of the
influencer, where it's like thepersonality is leading a company
(07:22):
.
That's been really interestingto see.
I've actually had to deal withthat.
I've gone through this wholecycle where it's okay, corporate
America, BSE, traditionalmindset.
Then it's actually look at allthese guys building and they're
leading their companies.
They're on social media,they're doing podcasts, they got
(07:43):
a YouTube channel, they're likelevel Z celebrity or whatever
you call it.
It was really interesting tosee that shift happen where, if
you're not out online leadingyour company and then being
visible, nobody really knows whoyou are.
I don't know anything aboutthis company If I can trust them
(08:03):
, especially with AI now on thescene you don't know what is
real.
You're looking at some dudewith 16 abs and you're like I'm
pretty sure that's notanatomically correct.
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (08:21):
That's hard.
You're talking about AI and wecan go down that rabbit hole
shortly, but that's the youreally hit on a nerve that I
know I've struggled with overthe years is if you're not out
in front of everybody socialmedia-wise, how do they know who
you are?
My podcast or my passionprojects?
(08:42):
I'm in the real estate spacemore affordable housing and the
only way I can get eyeballs onwhat we do is by posting three
to five times a day across mysocial channels.
After a period of time I can'tmanage it.
I have two VAs that do that forme.
That's awesome, yeah, butbefore I did that, I was always
(09:06):
wondering why I couldn't getpeople interested, more
interested in what we were doing, because I'm in Arizona.
A lot of our work is in theMidwest, so I'm not near it
being able to effectivelycommunicate and share our story.
Podcasting, video, social media, blogging all those things I
(09:30):
hardly ever did.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
Yeah, it is funny how we think somehow people are
going to find out wheneverybody's in their phone and
we somehow think they'll justsearch us.
I think the new stats are likeall the Z folks are now not even
searching Google anymore,they're searching their socials
Really.
Yeah, they're searching likeTikTok and Instagram search.
Speaker 1 (09:56):
Wait a minute.
They're getting their data andtheir information from TikTok.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
Yeah, isn't that crazy.
The Gen X and older, they'restill going to.
Google to find With the youngergeneration.
They're already on all thesocial video platforms and
they're just searching rightthere.
Speaker 1 (10:12):
They're on YouTube or wherever.
What you're telling me is oneof the largest generation
doesn't even go to Google.
How, if you don't put yourselfout there on these video
platforms, how can you be found?
Correct?
Great, that just blows my mind.
Yeah, not that they just gothere, but is there any more to
(10:35):
that story?
Why do they go there beforethey go to Google Is it a trust
thing.
They're already there.
Speaker 2 (10:41):
Think about the psychology.
I've explained this before.
I'll try to make it moreconcise.
Our generation, the oldergeneration we're into long form
content as the first step.
Yes, we're going to create thepodcast, the long YouTube video.
We're going to write the book,we're going to have the
documentary.
We're going to go all outbecause we're deep thinkers of
(11:02):
experience and we know what'sgoing on.
The younger generation bumpthat.
Just give me the 30 secondtrailer so I can see if I even
want to spend more time on it.
This is the generationbasically watching Netflix on.5
X speed what I can't evenimagine that.
Speaker 1 (11:20):
Wait back up, you serious, they watch it one and a
half times Speed.
Speaker 2 (11:24):
Go to Netflix.
I could not believe when I sawthis.
Go to Netflix or who?
Click on the settings andyou'll see the ability to speed
it up now, just like YouTube.
It's insane.
Who is watching anything onthat speed?
Speaker 1 (11:40):
What you're telling me is their attention span is
shorter than anything we know.
Speaker 2 (11:45):
Yes, what's interesting is they will create
that form first, which is smart.
They'll test out the short formtrailer first.
If that hits, they'll spendmore time on it and make longer
form.
They don't even waste time ifit doesn't go viral or it
doesn't get likes or changes,whereas our generation we're not
(12:07):
sure.
We just Google it and then wechop it up and put it on socials
.
They're going to be honest, evenas far as I've talked to some
folks doing socials wherethey're like if something popped
off, they say you should goback and read it and make a new
title and the first few secondsdifferent and repost it.
(12:28):
They're like no, that's toomuch work, I'm just going to
reshoot it.
They literally won't even gothrough the work of repurposing
stuff.
Just reshoot it, read, make itfresh.
It's that iteration.
They're already creators on theplatform, live streamers on the
platform, gamers on theplatforms.
(12:49):
That's where they live, that'swhere they search.
They're not used to saying, oh,let me go to this other webpage
and search and then get a bunchof text and then find it and
then click and then get anotherbunch of text and then read
through this long blog to try toget what I need.
They're just like.
(13:09):
I need somebody to explain itto me in 30 seconds or less.
Just explain it to me Then, ifI'm interested, you have a link
where I can go.
Why do you think YouTube justcame out with this new where you
watch a YouTube short and, ifyou like it, you click to watch
the whole long YouTube videoright from the short?
Speaker 1 (13:27):
I saw that on my podcast channel.
Because we do shorts on thatand I see that now I think
TikTok started that.
Because I've been doing that onTikTok for several months now,
I'll put out a short like fromour podcast.
I'll get a 30 second short andthen I can link it to the longer
version.
Right, yeah, that's huge.
Speaker 2 (13:48):
Yeah, it's really huge.
Yeah, it's interesting too,even with folks that are going
live.
Now I got caught the other dayon TikTok where I couldn't even
go live because I didn't have athousand followers.
But you can't even go live yeton TikTok.
You can't go live on someoneelse's channel.
(14:08):
So if they're live and they gotmillions of followers or
whatever and they want to callyou up, they'll be live on it
with them.
You can't even go live unlessyou have over a thousand.
Speaker 1 (14:18):
But can you go live on your own channel without a
thousand followers?
No, Wow.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
So I got to bolt my game up on TikTok basically.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
Then let's share, because I'm in the same boat,
because I just recently put Iput together a TikTok page just
for the podcast.
I got 150 followers, whatever.
But you know what You're in thespace and maybe we talk about
it is the consistency and beingpersistent with putting video
(14:48):
out.
But sometimes even with that itdoesn't help with algorithms
and I'm not trying to win thealgorithm, I'm just trying to
figure out what sticks andsometimes some of the stuff we
talk about on my podcast withguests doesn't stick at all,
doesn't resonate, because it'sthings that people don't want to
listen to, as in change, it's afour letter word for people.
Speaker 2 (15:10):
Yeah, People, some people are looking.
It's entertaining.
Some people are looking as newsright, they just give me
headlines, give me the quicktakes on what your opinions are.
They're looking at trustedpeople Very few people.
If you look at kind of thestats how they break down, very
few people are looking as like aimprovement platform, Like let
(15:33):
me go find the gurus that aregoing to teach me how to do
something, In other words,learning that's why I struggle.
Yeah, that is a portion of it,but a lot of us that are on
creating content, we are sharingour knowledge, our experience,
we're teaching and you have tomake it fun and entertaining to
(15:54):
make it palatable for some ofthe younger audience, right,
because they're just tuned itout.
I just want to be entertained,right, so you got to make it
more entertaining.
The shock value, right, thesurprise factor, there's all
these different things that youcan do.
But then, as a creator, youhave to step back and say why am
I doing this?
Because, literally, I'm nottrying to dance, I'm not trying
(16:16):
to like have a talent showsituation.
So you have to be okay with thelevel of engagement that you get
on whatever you're trying toput out, because you're just
trying to find your audience andyour customers.
Right, because I think theother thing is there are YouTube
channels that make so muchmoney and they don't have many
(16:36):
followers.
Right, they might have 300followers and they $300.
Those 300 people are reallyimportant for what they're
trying to do.
Yeah, if you get 300 VCs on aYouTube channel for very
specific content and they havedollars at their disposal and
they invest in your company,that's all you need.
You don't need millions offollowers.
(16:57):
And so you got to look at likewho is your audience, who are
your customers and what do youreally want to put out?
Because the other concept thatI struggle with is, once you
start doing something and startgetting known for something,
you're almost painting yourselfinto a corner right, because now
you have an audience that'slike leaning in.
I want to hear from you aboutthis.
(17:19):
And then maybe your lifechanges and you're like I don't
do that anymore.
Or I was on a diet and now I'min shape, and now I don't care
about talking about foods, I'mgoing to move over here or
whatever.
And then I was like oh man, yougot to start over again.
And I was at a conference wherethey asked this of YouTube
(17:40):
executives and they were reallyfans of it.
If it's around one topic,around one audience, put it all
on one channel shorts, longs,whatever.
But if you pivot majorly, justcreate a channel.
And I thought that was reallyinteresting.
Because the other way that Iwas thinking about it is if
you're a personality, you'retaking your audience on a
(18:02):
journey and if you'reentertaining enough, if you're
an actual personality, then yourpersonality should outshine
whatever you're talking about towhere they're like I trust Ryan
, right, I trust him.
I want to hear from him aboutreal estate.
I want to hear about him, hearfrom him real estate in Arizona,
in the Midwest.
(18:23):
I want to hear about affordablehomes.
And then all those keywords arelike this is what I trust Ryan
to talk about.
And then, all of a sudden,you're like, hey, I'm in a
commercial real estate or I'mflits or whatever right Now.
It's okay, you're taking themon a journey, and they're like I
love Ryan so much, I'm justgoing to keep listening because
he's going to make it fun and Ilike the way he teaches, I like
(18:44):
the way he puts out content,right, and so that's ideally.
You want to get to that kind ofnext level where you're not
just one of the people teaching,you're like a person that
people trust.
And then they're like okay,cool, I'm going to tune in.
And then, when new platformscome out, they're like I'll, let
me find Ryan on there, makesure I add him real estate,
because that's what I'm doingand I think that's the hardest
(19:07):
challenge.
It's the hardest challenge tobreak out as an actual
personality and let yourpersonality shine on socials.
That's the hardest pivot tomake.
Speaker 1 (19:19):
I would say that's a struggle that I've been through
many times and I'll tell you forvery specific YouTube, in the
sense of Ryan Demant as a realestate guy podcaster and I
didn't mention before we justrecently got a nonprofit
approved that is going to helppeople with financial coaching
(19:40):
and so forth to becomehomeowners Congrats, thank you.
But that didn't do well with mypodcast.
About three weeks ago, fourweeks ago, I broke off and
created just a channel onYouTube that's just Ryan Demant
and it's just me talkingPersonal brand.
Personal brand it's mixed rightnow because I'm still.
(20:04):
I still have real estate, Istill talk about lending.
And then true talk is really myhashtag TRUTalk and just
talking real to people.
Some people tune it in, somepeople tune it out.
There's some haters out therethat are like why are you
talking about this?
People don't I talk aboutadversity.
We all go through adversity andwe have problems and I'll share
(20:26):
some stories and people arelike why do you talk about this?
It's boring.
Yeah, I get it.
I'm not that entertainingpersonality, I'm just being real
with you guys.
But what I wanted to get backto is if you can't truly be
yourself and be real in yourmarketing, so forth.
You're going to stuck spacewhere you're not going to get
anything.
You just got to put out whatmakes you happy and, like you
(20:48):
said, find that niche market orthose clients that fit you and
market to them.
Speaker 2 (20:55):
Yeah yeah, it's a mix of different types of content
too.
You can get stuck with theformat and how you do things,
your workflow, where you justput the same exact every time.
That's a hard thing to breaktoo.
You have to be sensitive towhat the trends are, what's
cheap, what the styles are.
(21:16):
Youtube, tiktok all theseplatforms change all the time,
so you got to constantly be likehey, now they have this new
feature and that lets us do thiswith the music, or this with
the clips, or this with therinse.
You swipe up and you swipe thisway.
Now we swipe this way, right,all the different things that
are changing.
You have to read the market andyour audience and keep it as
(21:39):
entertaining as you can.
I think the other thing is, ifyou're teaching something right,
like you're teaching realestate, there's a local aspect
to it as well, of course, and soyou could also tap into the
regionality of what you're doing.
So if you are in a certain area, then the people local will
(21:59):
start tuning in.
That's really powerful.
If you want to bridge it overto like real life, right, like
in the real world, I've seeneven the podcasters where
they're like hey, I'm going ontour, which is crazy to me Going
on tours of podcasters andyou're literally just with a
microphone and interview justlives.
But you can do it if you'reregional, right, you're like,
(22:24):
hey, meet me at my next house.
We're gonna have 30 to 50people show up because we're all
tuned in and I'm gonnainterview you for my podcast.
That would be a really excitingpodcast to watch, right, you're
interviewing somebody whileyou're walking through one of
your properties and explainingstuff and teaching stuff.
That's much more dynamic.
(22:45):
And so, being creative like thatand thinking what are different
ways that I can do it, I thinkit's really funny how, once guys
really achieve what they wantto achieve in real estate or
investing in your business,they're always like, okay, now I
don't have any meeting in mylife, I'm bored, I'm rich, I'm
just gonna be a podcaster.
And so they buy the big studioand have the interviews with all
(23:11):
these guests on.
They really could go up andthey do really well, a lot of
them.
And so I think the rest of us,they're setting a bar.
They're setting a bar for theentertainment, the quality of
guests, the quality of the show.
That's a lot of the folks.
If you're teaching a certaintopic, you have to look to.
Just okay, anybody who'ssearching in my space is gonna
(23:34):
find these people.
Why am I standing out?
Am I just trying to copy themand just be another version of
them, or am I bringing somethingdifferent, to give them a
reason to say hey, I want tofollow Ryan as well, because I'm
on the blank?
Speaker 1 (23:51):
Yeah, and that's back to finding your voice and
working on that.
I call it the shtick, becauseyou really need to be yourself.
It took, it's still taking mesome time, but it's also when
you're in front of the camera,knowing how to speak and being
able to effectively communicateyour message in a short period
of time.
I struggled with shorts for thelongest time and I'm like you
(24:13):
know what Until I can manage itproperly, I'll shoot us old
people, we'll shoot a longerversion and I'll use a tool like
Opus to cut it down and findthose shorts that work.
Have I gotten better withshorts?
Yes, but I still think Istruggle with it and I'll
continue to do it.
I'm not gonna give up on it.
(24:34):
It's just a lot easier for meto sit down and shoot five
minutes, or stand up and shootfive minutes on the other side
of my room here and let Opus dothe rest of the work For me.
Speaker 2 (24:45):
That's time well spent, one of the things that I
realized was a shock to me wasif you shoot some long form
content, you can't clip it Likeit's unclipable.
So if you do, like listicletype blogs or like these are the
top 10, whatever, If you justclip that, you have no context
(25:06):
of what you're talking about.
It's just unclipable content.
So there's certain contentwhere or you're telling a long
story, it has different partsand it just has no context when
you clip it.
And what some influencers arenoticing is working is they're
really focusing on giving ashort pitch their longer form
(25:28):
content.
So instead of clipping it,they're just shooting.
They're having a guy summarizeit right, or they're taking a
summary, or they're taking themost attractive part and they're
saying hey guys, I'm going tobe talking about this awesome
thing.
Click the link to tune in.
Can we to see you there?
We're going to be live chattingwhen we're doing this.
See you there.
And it's just that short, butit's not even about the content.
(25:50):
It's just a trickler to getsomebody that's swiping to stop
for two seconds and be like oh,there's something happening that
I want to check out.
Speaker 1 (26:00):
That's what I typically do for these.
I'll shoot a short that justtalks about.
I give them a I call it an eyepopping opening of some sort
that catches their eye and say,hey, wednesday at 5am Eastern
new episode drops blah.
And just give them a little bitof information and then see
what happens.
Those do quite well.
Those reels and shorts do verywell for me where people are
(26:22):
engaged in and they're there.
But again, until you startdoing it and physically putting
yourself out there to moveforward with it, you don't know.
Speaker 2 (26:32):
So yeah and it's, yeah, it's hard to commit to
that kind of stuff.
Speaker 1 (26:34):
It's just, yeah, that's, that's.
The other thing is the timecommitment to all this Yep, and
then you show up and I've donethings.
Speaker 2 (26:41):
This is everyone.
You start off no followers.
You're just like hey show upand then one person's all right,
and that's.
Speaker 1 (26:51):
It has to start somewhere, because I know that
feeling all too well.
When I started this podcast Iwas getting three, four
downloads and I know itdownloads as a vanity number,
but when you're first startingit's man.
Will somebody listen to mypodcast?
Speaker 2 (27:06):
And that's why Mr Beast is so funny.
I saw a cloak from thesebasically.
I basically tell you how to doeverything.
Hey, yeah, he's make a hundredepisodes of whatever you're
doing.
Don't even look at yourfollower accounts and take 100
and just fix one thing each time.
So each time you do it just fixone thing and all of it is just
(27:29):
right, like you're not even inthe I mean to you past a hundred
.
Oh, what are you doing?
So I'm like wow.
And so I think a lot of it toois just like along.
Do you have the endurance totake the distance to even get
the data to see what's workingor not working?
Speaker 1 (27:44):
Yeah, and that is that's in this space called pod
fade.
I know that because when Istarted, this December will be
five years of this podcast.
In five years, yeah, everyWednesday an episode, never
missed.
Speaker 2 (27:58):
Good job.
Speaker 1 (27:58):
Yeah, and I took a picture when I started and 25,
26 podcasts were there at thattime.
Only four right now are active.
When I say active, at leastputting one episode out a month
or some type of rhythm ofepisode.
Of those there could have beenmore.
(28:20):
I just snapshotted those andjust and I watched those and
it's crazy how quickly peoplejust drop off for the longest
time.
Two, three, four, fivedownloads is what I was getting.
Yeah, they only list listenedfor three minutes four minutes.
Yeah, it was pretty depressing.
And then I found pod match Alexand his team over there.
Man have been huge.
(28:40):
Yeah, it's changed mypodcasting world and now it's I
have to decide how I can take itto another level, because I
think I'm stuck here with mydownloads and I'm stuck here
with listens.
Now it's like how do I bettermy game, bring better quality,
help with listenership, andthere's a bunch of stuff to do.
And I haven't even scratchedthe topic of monetization yet.
(29:03):
I don't even think I'm there.
I think I'm passing 260 or270,000 downloads, something
like that.
Speaker 2 (29:10):
That's amazing.
And is that mostly real estateoaks or no, it's, it's.
Speaker 1 (29:17):
I get the audience is all across the United States.
When I first started I wasreally localized to the United
States and some how I got intothe Soviet Union, I got into
South America, japan, thePhilippines.
I get I've got two VAs therethat have been working for me
from almost the beginning ofthis.
So I'm guessing they're sharingsome of that.
So I'm guessing that's how Igot there Nice, and then Canada,
(29:41):
and it's just, it's spreadacross the you know the globe.
But Podcasting is just weird.
You have to find that space andstick with it.
We're coming to the end of theyear and I'm like man, can I
preload a bunch of episodes andjust get them over with and give
myself some downtime, becauseit's a lot of work.
Speaker 2 (30:03):
It is.
Speaker 1 (30:03):
It's a lot of time and effort that goes into this
and as my plate continues to getfuller on my other businesses,
I'm like I don't want to stoppodcasting, because I enjoy
talking to guests like yourself,about everything, and I learn
something new all the time.
I just have to figure out howto make this work again, because
it's getting to the point wheremy plate is full.
Speaker 2 (30:25):
Yeah, one of the things that I recommend to folks
is the season.
So, just like TV shows haveseasons, that's the best way to
do podcasts, because you do havethat built-in break where you
can say, hey, this is the lastseason of this season, we'll see
you back in January, we'redoing this and this and the year
(30:49):
, and then you reset theexpectation and you can be
thematic so you can say we'retrying something different this
season.
This season we're going to bedoing XYZ, and so it helps you a
little more on your episodesand gives you a break point to
replan and come back, and a lotof times it doesn't hurt your
(31:10):
numbers.
It's interesting, like I'veseen Patrick, like David do,
I've seen a lot of folks do itCasey, neistat, where they take
a break and people are sad butthey come back stronger and
people are like, oh yeah, thisis, I can't wait.
It's like they're lookingforward to you coming back and
as long as you tell them you areand set that expectation,
(31:32):
that's a way of giving yourselfa built-in break, because
there's no rules to this, asmuch as everyone says.
Consistency, yes, that's true ifyou want to consistently grow,
but it's your life.
It's like you're a person.
You have to run your businessand take care of your stuff.
So, yeah, I think I'm a fan ofthe season.
(31:54):
I'm also a fan of.
Artists are not robots, and ifwe're creating stuff, it's okay
and we want to connect withpeople and grow our businesses
and things like that.
Yeah, all of us have to do whatmakes the most sense for us,
and if it becomes just a drudge,just like a heavy weight, then
(32:19):
you're not going to show up,you're not going to bring your
energy, you're not going toenjoy it.
People sense that and thenthey're going to tune out and
that's not what you want.
Speaker 1 (32:27):
Not at all, and I'm going to switch topics here.
We haven't spoken about it andI think it needs to be brought
out.
Is Wave?
I was an early adopter.
I know I used it and it was agreat platform.
Can you talk a little bit aboutWave and what land this episode
and close it out?
But I'd love to be able to hearwhat's going on with Wave.
Speaker 2 (32:45):
Yeah, so we're a small company.
We help podcasters, audiobookauthors take their audio and
turn it into video for socialmedia influence.
It's for people that don't wantto be on camera, like we are.
They don't want to edit video,they don't want to mess with, do
anything around hiring peopleto do video, but they want to
(33:07):
create video right, becausethat's what social media is
about.
And really, when you're talkingabout the content you're
producing, especially podcasts,it's longer form and there's no
visual to it.
It's just you're listening,you're working out, you're
running, you're doing errands,you're doing chores, you're not
actively looking at a screen.
So really what Wave is doing ishey, put some visuals to your
(33:32):
audio, clip it out and just makesomething that's moving on the
screen to capture the attentionso they read what the topic is
and then listen to it and thenget them hooked.
And if you can do it fastenough, easy enough, often
enough, they will become fans ofyour podcast.
And so you're trying to getsomebody that doesn't know
anything about your podcast to alistener, a regular listener,
(33:55):
and if you have the righttargeting, the right content,
you're attract somebody.
So if I'm like hey, I'm anArizona real estate investor and
I need to know more about themarket and I see that it says
Arizona real estate, affordablehousing guru, and then I'm going
to click on that and I'lllisten to it and in the scroll,
(34:18):
when I'm scrolling, wave hasgiven you that we could probably
say it's AI driven, but it'sbasically we're matching the
audio waveform to your voice.
So it's custom.
Every video is custom, everyclip is custom.
We make every frame of thatwaveform match your audio and
that movement is just enough tostop the scroll, for them to say
(34:39):
what is that?
Oh, interesting, and then havethem read and listen to it.
You can put captions on atprogress bars.
It's just enough to where youcan rapidly get it out, very
cost effectively, very easily,and find your audience.
And so that's what we've beenworking on.
Like we talked about prior tothe show.
A lot of the podcasters aremoving to full on video, right,
(35:02):
they're recording on Zoom,they're recording on Riverside,
we're on Reast, all theseplatforms that are creating the
video easily, and then that'swhat they're starting with.
Now some people don't liketheir visual, right?
They haven't dialed in thelighting, the background, the
right.
So they're just like I recordedon Zoom so I can see the
interview and have an interview,but I'm not using this visual,
(35:24):
and so they have their niceprofessional photo, they create
the way video and they put thatup on social.
I've also heard interesting onewhere the podcasters are
recording on Zoom or similarplatform.
They're putting out their audioonly podcast, but their clips
are of the visual of the video,so they're only clipping out the
(35:48):
talking heads, but when you goto the podcast it's just audio.
So that's an interesting thingtoo, and all of these things are
different levels of creatorsophistication and so we're ways
.
Really, coming at this point iswhat's the easiest on-range
that we can give you to onsocials as a podcaster, right?
So we're really catering to theperson that just there's small
(36:11):
shop.
They don't want to mess aroundwith the video, they want to get
rapidly, they want to get asmany platforms as they can.
They already have the logos,they already have the nice
headshots.
They already have maybe it's acorporate.
We have a lot of corporatefolks.
We have audiobook authors wherethe investment in book cover is
way more interesting thananything they could have on
(36:33):
video.
They have some artists that hassome amazing cool side-by
looking art on there and that'sthe cover and that's going to
stop the scroller.
And they invested a lot in thatbook cover and they want to
market that book cover and sothey just put that on there with
some audio under it and that'sall they're trying to do.
Same with music artists.
Music artists use a lot becausethey want to make their album
(36:54):
cover famous.
Right, they got a really coolphoto that they spell out of
time and trying to figure outthe right curated album cover.
That's what's on their audiogram, right?
They just put that cover onthere with the music going.
That's all they need becausethey want people to imprint that
as the new thing that's comingout.
(37:15):
And so a lot of times you canuse your thumbnail as the entire
video.
That's what Wave helps you do.
Instead of, the thumbnail goaway immediately when you start
playing.
You don't actually get to seethe thumbnail.
A lot of times, the thumbnailis the thing that makes you go
listen to it in the first place.
If you're ever scrolling onYouTube or any of these
(37:36):
platforms where you're lookingat thumbnails, or even podcasts
players, where you're scrollingthrough all the covers, the
cover is the thing that you say,oh, what is this?
Yeah, I like that.
That looks like something Iwant to do.
If you click on that and it'sjust video, then that thumbnail
goes away and now you're waitingfor talking to do something, or
(37:59):
you're not sure what that isgoing to be and what Wave is
doing is.
We're just saying just keepthat thumbnail going and just
have some movement and somecaptions on it, because nine
times that is ten.
Thank you.
If it's learning, they're goingto just tune out of the visual.
Anyway.
If I already know that we arejust talking, that's what all
I'm going to say.
For an hour I'm moving on, I'mnot going to be watching the
(38:20):
screen and I've only heard.
Despite.
I've been like serving people.
I think it's 10% right now isthe current stat on how many
people, when they watch, whenthey're learning, they're like
watching the people the entiretime, right, like they're like
looking at the screen and likelooking at it in the entire
Almost.
Everyone else is just I got it,but they're following it
(38:42):
somewhere doing something else.
Speaker 1 (38:45):
Depending on the platform, because each of my
podcasts are hosted in twodifferent places.
Like Anchor wants you to putvideo up.
Speaker 2 (38:54):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (38:56):
So it pushes.
Since I've started doing videoon Anchor, it has pushed me out
to more people, or at least anopportunity to more people,
through Spotify, since Spotifyowns Anchor.
Now Buzzsprout, where thispodcast is hosted, doesn't offer
video, it only offers audio.
(39:16):
But now they're saying they'regoing to come out with video, so
I have no problem doing thevideo piece I've just found off
of Anchor I'm getting bettertraction with video.
I don't know stat wise, ithasn't changed.
Listen time it's steady, butI'm getting additional eyeballs
or exposure because they havesome type and you probably know
(39:37):
more than I do.
But there's something with theSpotify and Anchor algorithms
together.
For some reason in the searchfeature I'm getting, since I've
gone, video.
I think I've gone from maybe athousand or 1500 searches to
where I'm over up to 7,000searches.
Yeah, they're pushing it too.
Speaker 2 (39:58):
They're pushing it.
So if you are doing videoyou're getting priority and so
they're proactively promotingyou.
So that's really good.
And you hear any sort ofplatform where they're trying a
new feature.
If you jump on that featurethey push that more and so
you'll get an outsized return onthat when you jump on stuff
early.
So I definitely encourage, ifyou are on a platform, to try
(40:21):
out the new things, like ofcourse, I did try out this one I
think they just closed.
I can remember the name of it.
It was like create your ownradio show and they had this
huge promotion on it and it waslike old school radio where you
could have the songs that youlike and you're the host and
you're running your radiostation and you're DJing or what
, and I just saw the other daythat they shut it on.
Speaker 1 (40:45):
Wow, the other, and we'll wrap it up.
But this is one of the last andwe'll wrap this up.
But internet radio, no,anything about it.
I've been approached severaltimes saying, hey, you should
have an internet channel.
And I'm thinking 24 hours a day, seven days a week, I don't
have enough episodes, what's?
Speaker 2 (41:03):
interesting is the radio trust for radio has been
struggling for a long time andour realizing podcasting is a
really good source of talk radioand so there's a lot of new
movement lately.
There's some headlines wherethe radio stations are saying
(41:27):
hey, we can put programming frompodcasts on air.
So if you're a podcaster andyou have episodes or you're
willing to start putting liveshows on and you can really
easily move over and become aradio personality and just a
podcaster, and I think we'regoing to start seeing that as a
(41:47):
trend in the market.
We're going to start seeingpodcasters crossover to radio
for sure.
Speaker 1 (41:54):
Interesting.
That's pretty cool.
So, before we wrap this up,best place people can reach out
and then I'm sure peoplelistening are going to want to
test out wave and I don't knowwhat you guys are offering.
If you offer anything whatever,where would one go to try out
wave?
Speaker 2 (42:10):
Yeah, you can go to wavveco waveco and sign up for
the newsletter to put out two asa week on all the latest trends
and articles and headlines inthe podcasting audio space and
social media space.
So that's a really goodnewsletter.
It's called the Wave AudioInsider, the Wave Audio Insider,
and then I write personally onYouTube on my own personal brand
(42:34):
, jeffdolyncom.
So those are the two places youcan find me.
Speaker 1 (42:38):
Awesome.
I will put a link to each ofthose in the show notes.
Sir, thank you very much forcoming on.
Great conversation, love whatyou're doing.
But also you shared a ton oftidbits and gold nuggets on this
episode, so thank you very much.
Cool Thanks, ryan.
It was fun.
And then after a while I justthought of just some pretty cool
things to have in Israel as thead for waves choosing a boat to
sail home.
I love you.
Cheap conversation, good-bye,bye.
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