← Podcast Editors Mastermind
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- [00:01]
A
Welcome to the Podcast Editors Mastermind Show. I am Steve, back with a wardrobe change. Stewart. And we are going to be talking about what we wish we knew when we first started editing podcasts for other people. I've got a fantastic panel with me here today. Let me first introduce my brother from another mother, Bill Stewart.
- [00:17]
B
Yeah, I thought we weren't going to talk about our sordid history and. Okay, that's right, you've made the first move. We'll go with that.
- [00:23]
A
Bill has been in radio and production since 1989. Podcast production is a side gig for his network job for companies like Intuit, QuickBooks and Total Babble. What is Total Babel?
- [00:34]
B
That is my podcast that I do. It's kind of how I fell into this. And I would just warn people it's a little bit edgy, so I kind of highlight it here and there, depending.
- [00:44]
A
Is that totalbabble.com or.
- [00:46]
B
Yeah, totalbabble.com and wherever you get fine podcasts. And thank you for having me.
- [00:52]
A
All right, and then we have Chris Duckett. Chris is a seven year podcast editor, specializes in video podcasts and has mastered three audiobooks, something I have never ventured into. I think there's too many restrictions, Chris. Video podcasts, you must be busy.
- [01:10]
C
Not as busy as I probably could be, but that actually falls into what we'll probably talk to today because there's probably things I could have set myself up with a better foundation on to build my client base out. But yes, I keep busy. Definitely multiple episodes a week for some podcasts and definitely weekly episodes for the others. And it can be challenging, but other times it can be really smooth sailing. And I try to ride that line between them as easily as I can.
- [01:37]
A
Okay, well, we're foreshadowing. We'll hear more about that when we get into the topic. And then Andrea Klender, who's also back with the wardrobe change, which is weird because this episode's actually coming out before the other one that came on earlier this morning, so that's all confusing. Yeah, yeah. Andrea is the founder of the Creative Impostor Studios, a boutique agency producing award winning media for artists, organizations and creative leaders. Welcome back, Andrea. For the first time.
- [02:04]
C
Thank you.
- [02:04]
D
Welcome back. In the past. For the first time. Time means nothing in podcasting land, right?
- [02:09]
A
Yeah. Well, I can say come, welcome back because you've been on the podcast Mastermind show before. It's just not when it was hosted.
- [02:14]
C
Yes.
- [02:15]
B
Long ago.
- [02:16]
C
Yeah.
- [02:16]
A
Yeah. So you're even more OG than I am. There we go. Well, I appreciate you all being here, we're going to talk about what we wish we did differently when we started editing for money. Now, I started in 2016. Chris, when did you start editing podcasts for other people? And was it video or is it just audio back then?
- [02:32]
C
So it was just audio originally. I'm saying seven plus years because I can't really even keep it straight. But yeah, it's probably 15, 16, very early. Like twit was God for me.
- [02:46]
A
Oh, that was early. Yeah. So why don't you lead us off with one thing that you wish you had known or done differently when you started back then?
- [02:57]
C
I wish I'd known how many hours I was actually going to be putting in on a per episode basis and then how to broach the subject with my clients on billing accurately. But because I would quote, oh, yeah, it's an hour of audio. It'll take me two hours to edit. No big deal. It's gonna be X amount. And of course that X amount was way lower than it is today. But even then it was still very, very low, probably for what it should have been in general. And then I was under billing, so really trying to learn how to manage that. And tied to that was knowing and understanding. Okay, what do you actually want from your finished product? If you don't need me to spend 15 hours, which is an overstatement, hopefully in most cases, but if you don't need me to spend a lot of hours to make this pristine audio for you, then I don't have to make it pristine audio for you. But what do you want from me, and are you willing to pay for it? Because that's the big thing out there that I'm underlying here is that, you know, I would spend hours and hours in RX doing all sorts of different filters and things like that on my slower than heck computer at the time, trying to get the best quality possible. And in the end of the day, I don't think my end clients actually really understood what they were getting from me and how much effort and time I was putting in.
- [04:27]
A
All right, raise hands if you can relate to Chris's number one point there. All right, let the record show we're all raising our hands. Yeah, I think I was working for less than minimum wage on my first client as well.
- [04:38]
C
Yep.
- [04:39]
A
Let's go to Bill. Bill Stewart.
- [04:41]
B
Yes.
- [04:41]
A
What is on your list? What is something you wish you'd done differently when you started?
- [04:46]
B
Because I haven't done this as long as many of you. I have just started doing it for Money. The last three or four years. I've been editing since 2012, my own show and that really primitively getting more and more consistent and getting technology that's become so much better. But I would start marketing myself sooner and work on that much sooner because the big gigs that I've had have been specifically because it was word of mouth from another friend and it all worked out and it said with a larger company. And while that's great and I have their website to show for it, but I don't have a portfolio as you would talk about to say, hey, look at this in a really nice website. I can point you to SoundCloud, I can say here's links to other things. But even today marketing myself more and better is something that I need to work on when I'm not doing a job and a half and doing a full time job too. So that's kind of weighing my time I guess is what it is.
- [05:49]
A
Okay, raise of hands. Anybody's experienced that.
- [05:53]
B
I especially enjoyed Andrea nodding as I was talking. Thank you very much for that.
- [05:57]
D
I'm like, I heard pricing first from Chris and then I heard marketing from Bill and I'm like, I don't need to say anything.
- [06:07]
C
The marketing side has definitely been a challenge for me because I've been fortunate enough that every one of my clients has been a referral from a friend or from a past client, which is great. It's led to a very tight, very small studio in comparison to some editors portfolios. But at the same time I've come into them with some type of knowledge of that they know of me or they know someone who trusts me. And so I have a lot of buy in from the beginning. I don't have to build that up or try to win that.
- [06:37]
B
Do you ever get stuff just cold from whatever source you're putting out there, somebody that just wants to hire you? Because I feel like I'm looking at the kids on Fiverr who are willing to do it for 10 bucks an hour and how do I compete with that? And. And I don't want to compete with that for that amount of money.
- [06:53]
C
I don't is a short answer on that. I think I've stopped trying to do the schedulosity thing on my website because it just was like it was an expense that I wasn't really getting anything out of. I've never had anybody actually use that to try to reach out to me and say, hey, I'd like to know more.
- [07:10]
B
That's been a big challenge for me. That's Why I ask that? Yeah.
- [07:13]
A
Andrea, let's go to your list, your top 10 list. I bet you've got a whole bunch of.
- [07:19]
D
I have categories.
- [07:21]
B
So.
- [07:22]
D
Because I started my podcast without knowing that I was going to be an editor for other people in 2015, and I think my first client came along in 2016. The technology was very different back then, and I'm, you know, thinking of how I was using, like, a router and Skype and like, all. I can't even remember what. The whole setup was, something that Pat Flynn posted on his website ages ago. And the landscape was different. You know, Spotify didn't have podcasts. YouTube didn't have podcasts. It just was a very different time. And so there are things that I would go back to the beginning of my business in 2016 and do in that world, and then there are things that I would do differently if I was starting today, and then there are things that I would do differently. The third category is I would have liked to have done differently, but I'm not sure I would have been able to. So what category do we want? Things I would have done differently in 2016. Today, that last one, that last one. What I would have liked to have done, but not sure I would have been able to. So this goes back to the marketing question, which is having an actual niche, because in the beginning, I was editing for whoever wanted to pay me to do it. And I'm not saying that that was bad, but I am saying that the more I have leaned into certain categories of shows, certain types of podcasters. So for me, that's a lot of arts and culture and history and mental health and education. Those seem to be like my strongest categories. The more I've really defined myself there and leaned into that, the marketing becomes a little bit easier to. Because I can more clearly say who I work with and how I help them. The other thing along with that is understanding strategy and being able to include strategic consultation with my production and editing services. Because in the beginning, like I said, that time, 2016, you could kind of rely a little bit on the power of Apple podcasts, which didn't exist. It was actually itunes at that time. There was a little bit of, if you create it, they will come. Because, again, things were different. There wasn't as much competition for media, and there weren't as many platforms out there. And that's not the case anymore. And so in the beginning, I was just helping people to sound better, helping them to launch their show by just telling them the step by steps of how to do it. But we weren't having conversations about, well, what is it that your podcast is designed to do? Who is your listener? What do you want your listener to do as as a result? And video wasn't even. I mean, it was a thing, it existed, but it wasn't like nobody was asking me to edit their video podcast. I think having those strategic conversations and then knowing who I best serve and how I specifically serve people in that niche, I would have liked to have been more intentional about that at the beginning, but I don't know if I could have been. Like, I feel like I sort of needed to discover that in a way through trial and error.
- [10:39]
B
Have you ever had a strategic conversation with somebody and you know in your heart that they're going a bad direction and felt the need to tell them that or advise them on that? Because I recently did and I'm. That came to mind as you were talking about that.
- [10:53]
D
Yes.
- [10:54]
B
Okay.
- [10:54]
D
And there are people who I know are going in that direction that I would like to have a strategic conversation with, but they haven't asked me for my opinion.
- [11:00]
B
Right. That's kind of the way I feel
- [11:02]
D
a little weird reaching out, be like, hey, heads up, up.
- [11:06]
C
I've flat out told my clients because I've become friends and consultant to them, not just their editor. If you're struggling, I can cut out any amount of airtime. Don't hum and ha. Don't take your time. Formulate your thought, then reply. If you have a client that, or if you have a guest that's doing the same thing, they're just blathering on and you know it's not going to sound very good. Go ahead and feel free to stop them for a moment. Hey, my editor is really good. If you need a minute, just take a minute. We'll cut out anything that we need to. And that type of thing gave them the reassurance and. And now even with my client that does a solo, I don't even really have to listen all the way through. I just watch for those gaps or those times whenever he said, you know, tells me in advance, hey, I had to reset at this point, that type of thing and be able just to make sure that sounds good, make sure it looks good and put it out there. But that ties into your first thing about the niche. My niche is natural flowing conversation that isn't hyper edited. I love listening to True Crime or that style of podcasting because it's very informative, very intriguing, it builds on itself and it's all very well Researched and all of that type of stuff. Same thing with radio style drama where it's been built up and put together. I don't have anywhere close to the time or patience though to edit that type of content. I'm just not going to do it.
- [12:37]
B
Do you feel like you're ever competing with somebody that does lots of jump cuts and the 18 year old kids that have 20 million followers? Do you ever feel that?
- [12:48]
C
Not with the podcast that I'm working on in this case, just because that's not the thing. But the other part of the niche that I found was not just the style but also the topics. I did some podcasts that were about legal stuff. I tried my hand at financial and I found that I just drug my feet approaching those podcast edits because every single time I did I was just dreading listening to the conversation because I wasn't interested in it. But the podcasts that I have found that I'm very interested in are personal development, our human optimization, health, wellness, specifically, with a tilt towards men's health or wellness. Just because that's a personal interest of my own. Knowing what I like to listen to and what I like to edit has helped me go to a prospective client conversation and whenever they explain what they want to do in their conversation, I'm going, we can give this a go, but I might be finding you somebody else because it's going to be a better fit.
- [13:49]
B
That's great that you can be in that place. That's great.
- [13:52]
D
And I think it also makes you a better editor and helps with that competition thing. Right. So I have a quick anecdote which is that we had one client that I had been working with for multiple years. They're in the mental health therapeutic space. It's an interview style show. It's not like, you know, some of the shows that I work on are more narrative where we're pulling from, you know, 100 hours of tape to create a four episode series or something like that, and scripting and recording voiceover and adding sound effects and adding like, I love that kind of stuff. When there's a budget to actually take the time that is required to do that, that's it's like I will post it notes spread all over my wall and be like moving things around. I love that this is just a straight up interview show, episodic. However, their brand, they have some specific points of view in the industry that they disagree with and they have a specific, you know, messaging infrastructure and a specific brand that they want to make sure that they're staying true to. And so I know what the flags are for them because I've been working with them for a long time. Well, long story short, they ended their contract with me and went with another service provider. For reasons I won't get into. It was nothing that we did. It was just that somebody promised them the world at a lower price point. And less than six months later, I got an email. Hey, Andrea, what would it look like if we were to rehire you to work on our show? And part of it was because this other company wasn't in the business of it's just not their business model. It's not like they were doing anything wrong. It just wasn't their business model to be listening critically to the content and knowing to flag things and automatically remove things that weren't going to be consistent with the organization's brand messaging. That just wasn't what they do. And so it was the client not understanding the difference in the type of service that was being provided until they didn't have what they had been used to. And they're like, wait, not all editors automatically do that and do it. Well, no, they don't. And so that was them learning the hard way what my point of differentiation was. And so they've come back and they're so like, we're so happy. We're so relieved. Thank you so much. We're so happy to be back.
- [16:15]
B
And it's wonderful. You could hear their tone in the email as well. So that's always nice. Oh, nice to see you again.
- [16:21]
D
Yes, yes. It's very funny when you're here. Hey, it's been a while. I'm like, not that long. Less than six months.
- [16:29]
A
Well, my addition to this conversation kind of piggybacks on that. For me, it's more about when to say no to things I don't want to do or I know I shouldn't do. And I'll just give the example from my first client. I was not looking to be a podcast editor. I was in this community and I was just encouraging people to start podcasts. I was a podcaster myself. A couple of well known bloggers got together, wanted to start a show. They've been talking forever. They're like, hey, Steve likes to help people understand this thing and we'll give them a call. By the end, they're like, steve, we just want to hit record. The rest of this is difficult. Can you do the editing? I'm like, sure, I know how to do it. I can do it for you. Got to charge you for it. Absolutely, Steve. But they also wanted show notes. And I'm just not. I was not good at show notes, which is sad when the community I was in was formed by financial bloggers writing content and I was just not good. And after about three months, we're like, Steve, we're going to do the show notes part ourselves. And that just kind of stung and hurt. But it was probably a good lesson. Like, Andrea, you're saying stuff that maybe we needed to go through and we couldn't go back and change it. It really became part of who I am. How about you guys? Do you ever have a problem saying no? I mean, we're all hungry for the next gig, right?
- [17:40]
D
I think I've only ever fired one client. It was the way, and this is a thing that I learned that I would have liked to have done from the beginning but would not maybe have necessarily known was when I enter into a new contract with a new client, we have a term which is the agreement is for one year. It's self renewing. If everything is great, it just keeps going. We never renegotiate the contract. This is for shows that are evergreen, like, you know, that are episodic and interview based. My shows that are more narrative and seasonal, those have a new contract each season, but depending on the scope. But for my retainer clients, there's a contract, it's one year. It's self renewing. I reserve the right to change my rates once a year and always give a discussion up front, you know, several months in advance. Hey, by the way, my 2027 rates are going to be this or I'm offering this new package which you are eligible for, which would be this, but also within that one year term. I don't want to be stuck with someone who is a horrible client or with someone who I have severely underpriced for a year, if that becomes obvious to me sooner on. And I don't want someone who hires me to be stuck with me for a year if I'm not the right fit for them. Because it's going to be painful for both of us. And so I put a trial period at the front of that contract. And that trial period is give us this many episodes. So depending on what frequency they're publishing, sometimes I'll say three months or sometimes I'll say six episodes. First six episodes are us getting to know each other, establishing the workflow, establishing styles and preferences. And if at the end of that period either one of us is not happy with how the working relationship is going we can end this contract at that point. That's the review period. If we make it past the review period and we're all happy, then that contract period is to the end of the year. And if they want to cancel at that point in time, then they have a cancellation policy and clause. I did not have any of that. I didn't even have retainers when I started. And retainers have been, for me, like, one of the most important pricing strategies to create more stability and peace of mind for both me and for my clients, and also motivates them to be more consistent with sending clients because they know they're paying me upfront for the work ahead in the month. So if they don't send me episodes, they're paying for nothing because they still need to pay me. So it keeps us all accountable.
- [20:16]
C
Yeah, I think for me, I've had to say no at times to people, but it was kind of like with Andrea, you know, well, let's give a shot. Let's see how this goes. Other times I've gotten away without having to say no because they just kind of like, evaporate on me and I'm like, I guess they weren't very serious about it. Now I don't have contracts. I have got written understanding via email or text or whatever. Our conversation was that they know what my rate's going to be and they know what our expectations are. But it's all handshake deals in that regard. And if I was full time doing this, I would absolutely have contracts and retainers and set up ways that I could ensure that stability but also have a trial period. That's a great piece of wisdom there, because I've had plenty of times over the years that I've been doing this at this point that I had someone that it just wasn't a really great fit for either one of us. They weren't jiving with me. If you send me back a podcast that can you clean this up and that up? And I can't even hear what it is that you're talking about is not a good fit. It's just not. And it doesn't mean that you're hearing something that isn't there. It's just a style thing that I can't link to. And so, you know, in those cases, knowing how to say no or having the graceful bow to go, hey, our connection isn't working the way that it's going to serve either one of us. Let's find a different arrangement.
- [21:50]
A
Chris, you got other things on your list. Was Something that you wish you'd known differently or done differently when you start editing for other people.
- [21:57]
C
Yeah, done differently is probably what this would fall under for me having, even if they weren't in the podcast space, but a one on one mentor that could help me on the business management side of things. I have the entrepreneurial spirit, but I am not an accountant. I have never been a manager of a business that had to like do the books or any of that type of stuff. And to this day it's something that I have to fumble with and fight through at times. And just having the accountability or at least outside perspective of a mentor would have been very, very helpful. Now at this point, I still fumble with it, but not as much because again, experience becomes a very great teacher. And to this day I definitely need to hire some type of a part time accountant to look at the financial income versus my business expenses and go, okay, Chris, you need to charge more or, you know, you're putting in X amount of hours, but you're not doing X, Y or Z. And try to get that type of hard number feedback that would give me that kick in the tail that I sometimes benefit from to do better in terms of the business performance aspect of things. Because there are definitely times when I'm not very profitable with the time that I'm spending or with the amount of clients that I'm maintaining or whatever. And I also would hope that that mentor would help me build a bigger client base because I think that's the other thing that I have always struggled with. Tied to all of that is I didn't really know how to cold call. I didn't know how to get out there. That's tied to the marketing thing that we were talking about earlier, but just building a stronger foundation of clients. From the start in my journey to go full time doing this, I always doubted my ability to do so. And I think I would need outside perspective to be able to do that.
- [23:55]
D
I think that's a really good point, Chris, because with the business side of things, before I stumbled into podcast editing, I had a business in a totally different industry prior to that that I had to close after five years because it's, you know, the Dunning Kruger effect, where when you're new at something and incompetent, you have an overabundance of confidence that you know what you're doing. And I took like a six week course in entrepreneurship and I was like, yeah, I can totally start this brick and mortar business, you know, and you know, I don't need that many startup funds and it financially did not go well. I had to close that business and start again. And so I had the benefit of hindsight of what had gone wrong in that first business that I could learn from in terms of how I was going to structure things going forward. And I think one of the things that I learned, and I don't know, Steve, what the personal finance community feels about the profit first model from Mike Michalowicz, but learning the basic premise of paying yourself first as the primary business owner, rather than what I did with the first business was here are all of my business's expenses deduct from top line revenue and what's left is what I get paid. And guess what? There wasn't enough left to pay me. And so I racked up a ton of credit card debt trying to wait for profitability. So this like again, Mike Mallowitz is not my mentor. I just bought and read his book. That's it. It's all, that's all the money he got from me. However, his system. And I don't follow the percentages that he lays out to a T anymore. But in the beginning I set it up with these percentages that he recommended of like whatever, you know, your revenue, this percentage goes to you top line. This percentage should go to operating costs, this percentage should be held aside for tax as an entrepreneur, as a self employed person, and this portion should go for profit for the business. Having those things laid out, I had a better idea of what I needed to charge. Otherwise I would be underpricing things and I still underpriced things, which again, that's one of those growing pains that I think you just have to go through in the beginning when you're learning and as your skill set improves and your track record improves, you can increase your prices along the way. But I would have way undercharged if I didn't have those percentages built in. So even having that mentoring from an online personality, an author, and I don't even remember who turned me onto that, probably a podcast. I probably heard about it on a podcast. Let's be honest, entrepreneurial grad school is listening to podcasts, right? Is your podcast mba. That totally helped me to start in a more realistic place and structure things in a way that was more sustainable over time. And it still took me time to make this my full time gig. And I still have lean moments where I'm like, ooh, this isn't. I can't pay myself that percentage. Like, I need to not take a paycheck. This month. And you know, there's still these ebbs and flows that come with self employment and business ownership. But just having that structure in place for myself has made this, you know, this business has already existed twice as long as that last business business. So having that frame of reference of like treating it like a business from the beginning and knowing how to set up those infrastructures, I think is really important.
- [27:15]
A
A couple things I need to add into that. You probably heard it from Carol Rivera on the Podcast Editors Mastermind show way back in the day. They talked about profit first. I'm all into profit first. I could talk about it for hours. I've got a course on the side, the Podcast Center Academy, that kind of lays it out. Oh, yeah, I give them a template that they can start with. Now, you said that Mike Michalowicz tells you what those percentages are, but I don't want the people who are unfamiliar with it to misunderstand people ask him, what should I start with? So he gives them a number, say, here's what you start with. But then you tweak it every quarter. When you get started, you're going to start to look at your expenses and go, oh my gosh, I've been spending too much in this category. You make some decisions, then you lower the expenses, which means you can bring more money home and you tweak those percentages for each of those, what I call buckets over time to get to the point where you're bringing, you're putting money aside for profit, a good chunk of money, and you're still paying yourself a good wage. But yeah, I could talk about profit first.
- [28:08]
B
I really like what you guys had to say. Both of you on the business foundation, all of you on the business foundation. Looking back, it's like, yeah, I really could have looked into that a lot more. And I will moving forward when I retire and start doing this full time. That's my idea and goal.
- [28:24]
A
Well, Bill, we'll stick with you. What's the next thing on your list?
- [28:28]
B
My next one is kind of two and it's very logistical. And I kind of point this towards people maybe doing this brand new for the first time, spend way less money on plugins. I still have problems with this. I spend so much and I just bought Soothe 2 for 200 bucks because it's going to do these great things. And then Sue 3 comes out and that's only $55 more. And if it can do it a little bit better or more efficiently, I'm fished in and buy it immediately. And I absolutely do it every time. And I tell myself I'm not going to do it. And even just the basics that come with your daw are probably good enough or at the very least good enough to start for a good long time. I would say live with that for a while. And if you're going to spend money, buy better, flat, efficient monitors that are going to truly paint the picture of what is going on with the audio as you edit. I feel like that's more important because things are unbalanced and you can get fooled with really harsh treble and too much bass. And depending on what they want, you have to try to judge and edit and EQ for that. And again, that's very cut and dry. Do these things technically. But that was something else I thought of.
- [29:39]
A
Yeah, great. Stereo monitors and having two monitors, screen monitors, at least two. Yes, mandatory. Chris, what were you going to say?
- [29:48]
C
I was going to say the plugin thing is such a trap. And where we're at today, just out of full transparency, because my clients don't have a large budget to be able to pay me time to put into all of the knit and grit and using my RX10 and all of this stuff, I stopped buying RX. I still subscribe to Waves because I love Vocal Rider and I love WLM plus Meter. So I just have the subscription. So I have everything but links in the show notes. Yeah. And then if you're editing in Final Cut, which, you know, I edit in Final Cut, the vocal option that you can put on an audio track is absolutely fantastic. And I'm going, why did this not exist? You know, eight, 10 years ago, whenever I was starting with all of this, why didn't this exist in the past? And so having those simple tools that are completely built in can absolutely be enough. And then before it even gets into my final editor, I'm doing my cutting in Riverside. Now because all of my captures are in Riverside, it's just easier for me to do the cut there. And then I do its magic audio. So even if someone is sitting 10ft away from their microphone, I can somehow make them sound right like this. And, you know, it's this crazy AI thing that I'm not completely all about. But if I've got crap audio, because it just doesn't sound very good. Me adding a little bit of, you know, usually only do about 50% mix, but if I add that AI assisted audio in there to clean that up a little bit, it really does make a huge difference in the end result. And it's built into the tool that I'm already paying for. I don't really have to do a lot of extra. And same thing with visual plugins. They're for the most part they're completely unnecessary unless you're dealing with a really high end camera that needs a specific LUT or something like that. But most of us are using remote recording and I'm using the webcam from my LG monitor right now and you know, things like that. And so you don't need fancy video plugins to white balance everything or whatever the thing is. And speaking from my other professional experience, which I won't go in depth in, there's a lot of people that get caught in that trap. There's a lot of people that get caught in that trap. And so it's just the plugin thing is just totally not as necessary with today's technology and the recording and editing options that we have today. Every editor has some type of assistant thing in it that will fill most of the holes. Just get started, don't buy a whole bunch of stuff.
- [32:33]
D
I'll totally agree on that and double down on what both of you said because my background prior when I was, you know, let's go all the way back. Rewind to the 1990s in which I was studying filmmaking in college. You know, we're talking like 16 millimeter film light meters. We're talking like I was interning at a video production house that had these giant Avid suites, you know, and sitting in on the, the digital edits that were happening in there. And so I have a certain, especially it's for me it's worse with video than it is with audio where I have this expectation of how things, you know, you wouldn't have a jump cut in the middle of a sentence and ah, you would, you would fail your class if you cut things that way. And there was a time at which I felt like every edit of every episode, no matter how simple or straightforward, had to go through the painstaking, you know, moment by moment. Tweaking this in Adobe Audition and tweaking that and adding RX this and filtering and bringing these levels and these floors frequencies and that. If you used a tool like let's say Auphonic, which is one of my favorite favorite shortcuts. I adore the team at Auphonic that I was somehow cheating if I used that on a client's episode or that I was somehow less of an editor if I was using automations, but man, how much time and budget you can save, especially on a show that's fairly straightforward, especially if you have a client that you've coached to at least have reasonably good audio consistently for themselves, if not for their guests, you know, and you kind of know what to expect. And you just need to do some noise removal and some normalization and, you know, some things like that. And it's, it's like, why would you take the time to have to manually tweak it? I always think something edited or not edited, edited, but something mixed and mastered by a human is always going to be superior if that person really knows what they're doing. But is it, you know, what's the trade off? Is it worth the extra time and attention and budget now, you know, on like the more narrative shows where we're putting in sound effects and music beds. And I've got a show that I did that went to the Tribeca Festival, that series. I mean, I had so many tracks, I was like, I've never had this many tracks and I don't have a monitor that is actually big enough for the number of tracks I need to look at at once. And I didn't do the audio mix on that. I did the sound design, but then I handed that off to my technical director to do the audio mix. I mean, there's no way you're running that through a phonic, right? Like, at that point you've really got to like bring down the sound of rainfall and increase the sound of wind and then fade that out here. It's more of an art at that point and it requires the time and attention otherwise, like for most of my interview shows, pop that baby into Auphonic and maybe adjust a couple of settings here or there. Like, you do still need to have the know how to know what settings to. To put and what to tweak. But yeah, use those automations, but don't get bogged down in plugins.
- [35:40]
B
Auphanic, to me is one of those things that I hear people mention and rave about. And admittedly this is completely my ego. I get into a little bit of a headspace of, no, I'm a real editor and I'm gonna do it. And I've spent all this money on plugins and that's the reason why I'm not going to use it. And. And probably when I start taking on more clients, I should be more open to. Okay, it makes sense to do that. Go ahead, it'll be okay.
- [36:04]
A
Yeah, it's that sunk cost fallacy. You're gonna stick with it because you spent so much time and energy on it.
- [36:09]
B
Exactly. Yeah.
- [36:11]
A
I've been in the podcast industry for a long time. Podcasting since 2010, podcast editing professionally since 2016. And in that time, I've learned a lot of stuff. A lot of stuff. And I've also learned you can never learn enough. Everything keeps changing. Look at what AI and video is doing in the past couple of years. The Podcast Editor Academy has a goal of helping you to migrate through all of these changes as well. Draw on my over 10 years of professional podcast editing experience and my more than 30 years of running small businesses. Wait, is that right? 30 years? No, wait, it's 35 years. More than 35 years of running small businesses. Get access to me and other resources in the podcast at our academy. Register now for a 249 quarterly membership. Every week, I send out a weekly challenge. Get some of that windshield university Zig Ziglar always talked about with our private podcast you can take on the road with you, and of course, our monthly office hours where you can get together with other professionals in this industry where the real learning takes place. Join now podcasteditoracademy.com that's podcasteditoracademy.com. All right. We have been talking about what we wish we had done better or differently or known about when we first started editing for other people. But now I want to switch it around and say, what is one thing that you've done right? You're just like, man, I. I did it right. I'm really happy and proud of myself. Let's start with Andrea, because you're perfect, so you never make a mistake. Maybe there's one thing, though, that stands out in your mind. Something you. You really just were like, yes, don't test my ego.
- [37:44]
D
I was a straight A student growing up through high school, so. So one thing that I did early on was that I. Going back to what Bill was saying about marketing, I started out by giving a lot of talks in my community, in my local community. So I think a lot of times when we're thinking about marketing our digital online businesses, we default to online marketing. We default to social media, to the website, to an email newsletter. And all of that can work and is great and whatnot. But my first few clients, well, my first ever client came from me just like saying that I could help somebody launch their podcast on my own podcast. And somebody actually took me up on it and I was shocked. I was like, oh, my gosh, I said a thing out loud. And now they want to hire me to launch their podcast. And I don't even Know what I'm doing. This is great. But how those next few subsequent clients came, and some of these clients I have now been working with for eight years, nine years, is by doing free talks at entrepreneurial centers in my community. So finding places that would host people to come in and give a workshop about how to launch a podcast for your business or how to do. There was this place that was fantastic. It was an experimental community co working space and coffee shop and cultural touch point place where they had all these free workshops for entrepreneurs. And it was sponsored by State Farm Insurance or all state insurance. Oh, no, now I'm gonna get confused as to who it was. It was so long ago. I think it was State Farm. In the meantime, I could go in, I could teach a free class about podcasting and then pitch my services and then have people follow up with me. And that was great market research for me because I could change the title of my talk and see like, oh, 30 people came to this one and only five people came to this one. Well, that topic I'm not going to pitch again. We're not putting that out there. That's not my marketing message. People would come up to me, they'd come, they'd learn how to, you know, how to start a podcast, and then they'd say, oh, this sounds like a lot of steps. Can I hire you to help me? Why, yes, you can. Or people were coming and taking the class and I had somebody reach out to me and they said, well, so. And so was in your class. She decided not to launch a podcast, but her husband told me about your class and I'm launching a podcast. Can I reach out to you? And this was some of the best cold marketing that I could ever do. Meaning, like, people that I didn't know, people in my personal network, because most of my business has come from my personal network or referrals from current clients. But you have to get that ball rolling somehow with people that you don't know. If I had done a few more presentations here and there at different co working spaces, done some online talks, online presentations, and I haven't quite found that same hub where I can really focus in on that audience and give these live talks again. And for a while I didn't need to do any marketing because my business was full. But I'm at that space where I'm ready to take on some new business and I'm like, oh, what am I going to do for marketing? And so I would like to get back, back to that early strategy of being in Person coaching, teaching, training, and attracting new people into what it is that I do.
- [41:11]
B
Do you feel like people are open to that nowadays with the online culture and everything being very based in online?
- [41:20]
D
It's a good question. And I think there are certain pockets of people who are. I know that. And I'm in Chicago, so I'm in a pretty big market, as it were. And there are some. There's like some apps. This is going to sound weird, but there are some tech startups and apps that are tech people, people who work in the tech industry who are specifically promoting in person events. So they're like, we've become too digital, we've become too online, and we're missing something when we miss that in person connection and in person socialization. And so there, there has been a push in the ether, in the entrepreneurial spaces in Chicago to really promote those in person gatherings and opportunities in addition to digital. Like, I still, I love the fact that I can teach my high school program remotely online using Google Meet. It's so much easier than being in person with the students. And yet there's still something that I miss about not being in person. But I think that there are audiences that want that in person connection and that for some reason form a more binding relationship to you as a presenter and expert when they've been in real space with you, rather than you just being a rectangle on a zone.
- [42:39]
B
Like, hey, you're real. Yeah, yeah, you do. Exactly.
- [42:42]
D
And they can come up and talk to you afterwards.
- [42:44]
B
Right.
- [42:44]
D
You know, and there's more of that. Like, oh, you're in Chicago, you're local. Like, there's a thing. I only have one Chicago client. All the rest of my clients are spread all around the country. But there's something about being like, in the same community as the people that you work with. That. That sometimes feels nice and is a value to people.
- [43:02]
B
I look for that in a lot of what I do all the time nowadays. That's why I thought of that.
- [43:07]
A
All right, Bill, let's go to you. What's one thing you just nailed? What you think you did right?
- [43:11]
B
And this is like, yes, Well, I kind of feel pressure in this question because of the amount of jobs in this room. I have the least amount of jobs. But I can say, I guess I have always been a person that has always gone with my guts and really believe in what feels right. That goes from 2012, when I started doing my own podcast. And that led me to having this person on and eventually getting to this person and that person Led me to this other person that eventually said, hey, you know, you could do this as an editor. And I said, yeah, I'm not on the air. I want to do more podcast stuff. So that creative part of me needs to come out, and you've recommended me for that, and I'm going to now take that on. Boy, that feels scary. But I'm going to do it, because usually if it feels good and it is scary, that's the first thing that you should do. And every time I've gone through that in life and I've taken that chance, that feels scary. And like I'm putting myself out there. It seems to have worked out. Maybe you could point to other failures, but it seems like that always works for me. And as far as being the guy getting lots of jobs, I got nothing for that. But that life skill is where I go with it.
- [44:30]
A
All right, Chris, you're up. What's your nailed it moment?
- [44:35]
C
I think for me, it's that I just got started as a business owner, as a business runner. That is the thing that always kind of holds us back at the very start. And so many businesses that could be really fantastic businesses never come to light because the person didn't just get started. You know, those entrepreneurs that are the ones that actually get things done, they just get started. Whether they know that they're qualified or not, they just get started. And sometimes, yeah, we learn a lot on the way. This whole podcast has been about that. This whole session has been about what we have been learning, and I'm still learning new things to this day. I had some false starts, but I got out there and I tried. And podcasting has been one of those things that, had I not done that, there would have been some financial times that would have been really, really hard had I not had the extra income that had come from podcasting and so on and so on. So definitely one of those things. If you're thinking about an idea, whether it's launching a podcast, launching a business, doing just start. Don't let all of the minutiae of all the things that can bog you down and keep you from actually getting going, because, oh, I'm not qualified, or I don't know enough. You'll never know enough.
- [46:00]
A
So you had that glimpse of an opportunity and you took it, and that really turned into something a lot bigger. And you're happy that you did that, because otherwise the train would have left the station. You would have missed it.
- [46:08]
C
Absolutely. Just getting started doing something was the best thing.
- [46:13]
A
I have to piggyback on that that was going to be one of mine is I went to this conference and I put myself out there and I was just, this is probably it right here. The thing that just worked and continues to work for me is as I was out there and I was just giving, giving, giving, giving with no expectation in return. That then afforded me the opportunity to have that conversation with someone who said, hey, we just want to have somebody do the editing. Can you do it, Steve? And it just turned into something that I didn't know was going to become a career. It was 2016. It was more than a Covid ago who knew editing podcasts could become a career. So there's that and then one last key, and I know you're all going to agree with this, is continually educating myself on all the things that are changing in this industry. When Spotify first hinted at, hey, we're going to bring podcasts on, the networking opportunities like Andrew was talking about, that opened up a door for me to be able to say, hey, I've got a client who would be great for the platform. And that came from someone at Libsyn. There was no way I was going to get that invitation to be able to extend, except that I knew somebody from Libsyn. And then when YouTube started, hey, we're going to have podcast channels. So let's organize the podcasts that are on the thing, digging into how that works, because, you know, there's three different ways you can have a podcast on YouTube, which is actually YouTube Music. And then now with Apple HLS, I mean, the whole world's changing with that and AI continued education. And I know we're all getting into those little niches of our industry. We like to learn more about plugins. Right, Bill?
- [47:44]
B
We're going to be the master plugins and everything else. Anybody that says they have it all down is a liar.
- [47:51]
A
Yep. So I'm gonna go ahead.
- [47:53]
D
I just was gonna say, Steve, I love that because I love to tell my clients, you know, I listen to all the industry podcasts about podcasting. I read the newsletters, and I do all of that so that my clients don't have to. That's not what they should be spending their time doing to know what's coming and what's for them and what do they need so I can digest all of that information for them and say, oh, so and so needs to know about this. Or when they happen to hear something or get a random email from Apple that they're like, what is this? They just. They just have learned to send it to me and say, what is this? Do I need to worry about it? Is this something I should do? And I can just say yes or no and they just trust my opinion. Occasionally they'll push back, but most of the time not. They're like, if Andrea has already vetted this and said yes or no, I'm just going to trust what she has to say. And that's how you know you're working with the right clients. You have the right, you know, client service provider. Fit is when they can trust your advice. It is sometimes hard to keep up with all that stuff. I mean, that's what I mean by the industry changing is there's so much happening that wasn't happening in 2016 that it can be a lot to keep up with. And so I think that continuous learning and being curious and exploring the options is, is so key for our, our businesses.
- [49:05]
B
That's super great. And you could bring that up at your seminars.
- [49:10]
A
Yes, let's drop the mic on that moment. Let's ask Andrea, what are you up to? What are you excited about, where people can find you and what you're doing? Where are you going to speak next?
- [49:19]
D
I don't know where I'm going to speak next. Actually, I am currently making a pivot. Not that I'm going to stop doing production and editing, but right now what I'm looking for is clients who would like some strategy consultation. So maybe it's a client who already has an editor and editing team that they're happy with. Maybe they're diying it and they're happy with that, or that's they have to because that's the budget that they're working with. But they could use an outside perspective of somebody who has listened to all the podcasts and read all the articles in the newsletters about all the things and can help them tune out what is noise for them and focus in on what is going to be most effective. That is something that I would love to partner with editors who are not necessarily offering strategic consultation or, you know, they might have clients that have those types of questions that they're not really sure where to send them. That could be a really great partnership. And so I know one thing that I had sent to you that I would love to offer to our community here of listeners are free podcast editing business consultations. There's a link that Steve has for that, but it's just 30 minutes of Zoom time with me where you can bring me what your biggest business challenge is right now, what you're thinking what your clients need that you could use some direction on. It's not a sales call. It's not anything like that. It's literally just us problem solving and kind of masterminding together one on one to figure out if we have some ideas about a direction that you can go to help better support your clients with those strategic choices, as you're doing an incredible job editing for them. Because I would like them to keep paying you and keep hiring you. And so if I can keep them podcasting, then they can keep you editing.
- [51:06]
A
Is that a URL that you can share verbally or is it one of those?
- [51:08]
D
It's like, yes, it is.
- [51:11]
C
No.
- [51:12]
D
I'm a big fan of the bitly links. And so that is bit ly podbiz with Andrea. So bit ly podbiz with Andrea.
- [51:28]
A
All right, Chris Duckett, what are you excited about? What's big coming up on your roadmap?
- [51:34]
C
Nothing big coming up on my roadmap right now. Always looking for new opportunities. My website is up and running so that for anyone that wants to reach out, my email and contact information is available there on the website ducketproductionservices.com I do specialize in video and conversational or interview style podcasting. Yeah, if you just need a subcontractor, I'm happy to be that subcontractor. That's not a problem for me.
- [52:04]
B
All right, Cousin Bill, Bill Stewart, Aunt Sally says hi.
- [52:08]
A
Oh, good.
- [52:09]
B
Yeah.
- [52:09]
A
What's coming up in your business and where can people find you if a podcast sitter wants to find out more about plugins?
- [52:16]
B
Well, my answer is what Chris said. I'm looking to take more people on and I have a full time job that I do during the day with the network and I enjoy that. But I would sure like to get a few more people, at least a few more that I can handle and get more experience. And I feel like I do very good things, creative stuff. I think my stuff sounds good. The podcast I do is totalbabble. That's totalbabble.com I would warn you that the content is edgy. It's not offensive just to be offensive, but it is edgy. Know that going in. But you can get an idea as far as sound quality and that kind of thing. Beyond that, I have other examples of stuff I've done for clients and I can send you my SoundCloud page, whatever you'd like. But you can email me. It's getstew g e t s t e wmail.com and we can talk and work things through in that regard.
- [53:07]
A
Well, I appreciate all of you being here in this conversation. Andrea. I feel like I got free coaching just by having this conversation with y'. All. Continued education. That's going to be my key message to everyone who's watching this. Don't be afraid of what you've done wrong or what you wish you would have done better. Just continue improving yourself. If you want to reach out, find me at the Podcast Center Academy or email me directly. Steveodcasteditoracademy.com that's the resource center where you can get all kinds of training education that'll help you become a podcast editor and run your own podcast editing business. Once again, thanks for being here. We'll see you next time on the Podcast Editor Mastermind Show, Podcast Editing News, Podcast Editing Events and Podcast Editing Tips. You can get all this information free by subscribing to the Podcast Editor Industry Newsletter. Sign up@podcasteditoracademy.com Newsletter that's podcasteditoracademy.com Newsletter.