Dustin Riechmann 12:15
Yeah, both. So against marriage, it was never, it was it was always made money, it was never making enough money to like, replace my engineering income. Because I didn’t want to do coaching in the marriage business. I never really had like a high ticket into it. It’s digital courses, a book and a membership site. And it still is that and it still runs basically on autopilot with a lot of organic traffic and systems that are in place. So I don’t spend much time on it. I’m actually probably going to sell it at some point, honestly, this year, because I have lost the interest in making that my primary thing I’ve that’s been that’s been the case for a while. So yeah, the way the other stuff fits in against marriage got me into online marketing, and built a lot of relationships. Then, like I mentioned, I left engineering, I was doing a bunch of marketing consulting, and a actually a local butcher shop opened up in my town. And I walked in there one day, and I found some products, I thought were really cool. And I realized that the guy that runs the butcher shop actually makes these products. And as you may guess, if you see the video on my shirt, that’s FireCreek Snacks. So FireCreek Snacks partner, it’s a business partnership with this guy named Ryan Hansen. So he’s a third generation owner of this butcher shop. And he had a really cool product. And he said, Hey, you’re already helped me with the butcher shop. So I was doing brick and mortar marketing with him with that. And he said, Do you have to sell stuff online? And I said, I didn’t figure it out, you know. So I created a Shopify store in 2018. And yeah, so that’s where FireCreek Snacks enters the picture, which is super relevant. Because we basically I was doing marketing consulting and FireCreek partnership for a couple years. I got in there going to trade shows and learn, like b2b and wholesale, I learned learn all this new stuff.
John Corcoran 13:48
That’s a whole new world selling the world
Dustin Riechmann 13:52
doesn’t trade shows in 2019. And as an introvert, you know, sampling 12 hours a day to move. It’s not if I learn a lot about your product. I mean, we learned exactly what people responded to. There’s 5000 samples, toe to toe, you can’t replace the business experience that comes with that.
John Corcoran 14:08
What was the biggest surprise or Aha, from that experience?
Dustin Riechmann 14:11
You know, is that what it took to get the females to step over because a lot of the trade shows we were at were like hardware store golf courses. So the ownership was male dominated, but they would bring their wives and kids and they would walk to a trade show floor. And of course, the snack aisle is where they really want to come. And we would get a lot of this like, hey, try this, you know, and then the the mom would be like, Oh, no, we don’t eat that stuff. And like this is different, because but I shouldn’t I should say, FireCreek is like a healthy meat sick. So it’s kind of like a much cleaner version of a Slim Jim with a really good nostalgic taste. And so I think what we learned was, if we could just convince them to try it once they universally loved it and they will feed it to their kids. And we’ve actually discovered our true avatar is what we call the gluten free mom. And it was not the golf course Pro that was walking down now. He’s good too but like The real buying purchasing power came from his wife. And so that was one of the big discoveries there.
John Corcoran 15:04
Did you end up changing your marketing or your messaging or anything like that?
Dustin Riechmann 15:10
Yeah, we now have a much more premium packaging. It’s kind of a soft touch. It’s looks very different than the other stuff in the category. Yeah, we started a leading with gluten free, leading with allergen free. And it which actually made sense, because the whole reason the product I created was Ryan’s that my business partners, twin boys, one of them ended up having a severe food allergy. And he realized that all the stuff they were trying to eat from his shop that couldn’t eat because it had dairy or wheat, or just like weird additives in it. So you wanted to create a cleaner version of that. And then yeah, so it all kind of clicked once we got into that mode. But yeah, that’s that. And I can tell you kind of where, where that took us once COVID hit because COVID changed everything again,
John Corcoran 15:54
right, which ended up getting you into the world of podcasting. Right. So from from, you know, heavy reliance on trade shows to what do you do once COVID hit? So tell us take us through that?
Dustin Riechmann 16:05
Yeah, so I mean, it was literally driving. I live near St. Louis, I was driving to Chicago. But halfway there in March 2022, an Ace Hardware trade show, and we got a call that this trade show was canceled. There’s this disease and blah, blah, blah, we all kind of remember the weirdness of that time. So keep in mind my revenues
John Corcoran 16:21
and was canceled shortly after that. Yeah, that was the big one. It was crazy.
Dustin Riechmann 16:27
Yeah. So the trade show was canceled. And then I was like, well, that’s alarming because we already have a bunch of these scheduled this year. This is like how we’re growing primarily. And, you know, we thought two weeks or whatever I like flatten the curve. It’s not that big a deal. But this this trade shows out, well, then, you know, a few weeks go on, I realized that this is much more than that. And my majority of my income was coming from marketing consulting, and the majority of those people were local businesses. So my dentist again, still along my best longtime client, restaurant, real estate brokers, people that were in the state of Illinois shut down for weeks and weeks. So, in short, I lost half of my marketing clients, which was most of my revenue. And we didn’t know what the heck we were gonna do with FireCreek. And we didn’t know anything about EVPs or anything else. You know, I was like, Oh, who knows what in the world is happening? So the good news, the silver lining is that made me think differently. And I said, Well, I’m locked on with my wife and kids. I can’t go to trade shows, I still got a we got a bunch of FireCreek in the warehouse. How can we sell this, and I had, I listened to podcasts forever, you know, going back all the way to Pat Flynn and the early days of Dan Miller. But I had never really even thought about being a guest. But I had heard of other brands in my space, specifically chomps they’re a big healthy Brandon in our same space. I’ve heard their founder story numerous times on podcast, and I was like, you know, working for them. And these guys are like, you know, eight-figure CEOs at this point, and they’re still spending time getting interviewed on podcasts that I listened to. So yeah, that was that was the genesis of summer 2020. I was on my first show, it was The Side Hustle Show with Nick Loper. A lot of us know, Nick, out of these Bay right near me. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And I didn’t know Nick, I knew I listened to the show. But I knew I had a good hook. Because my hook was how I helped a local store, take their product and sell it online, which at the time in the summer of 2020, that was really relevant because the stores were all hurting. And so he brought me on and we had a great interview. I just like my call to action was just like, Here’s a coupon code for some snacks x very untargeted. But I sold snack sticks. I got some some people reaching out and had some good zoom calls. And that set everything in motion. So yeah, from there, I just kept getting on more shows mostly business and marketing and some Shopify oriented shows. Reaching out for yourself at this point. Yeah, just totally me just pitching people getting on refining our offers, figuring out the hooks that people cared about. And some really cool stuff came from that some of it just recently has like, fully realized, as an example, like fall 2020, I was on a show, BiggerPockets Business. And lots of great stuff came out of the show, but one relationship in particular, this guy named Daniel reached out and he said, Hey, I love your story. I’m a YouTuber, can you help me? And he was the first person ever paid me money, like business coach, you know, all this marketing, consulting, it was all like services, but this is like he just wants to talk to me and pay me money. I was like, okay,
John Corcoran 19:22
so that was fun. It was specifically about podcasting, or is it something? Yeah,
Dustin Riechmann 19:26
I mean, it was he wanted to apply it to YouTube as like same stuff would apply for us do an interview style stuff on YouTube. But what turned out by the couple of conversations in he’s like, You know what, I work at Walmart. I don’t really know anyone here I’m in finance. I’m like 24 years old, but if I can find someone for you to talk to you, would you talk to them? And I said, Of course you know, like, we’re not ready for Walmart at that point, but I’ll talk and so he, to his credit, he introduced me to the head meat snacks buyer at Walmart, you know, the biggest retailer in the world via email and said I listened to Dustin story on this podcast. He linked to the podcast and the guy loved it. And we had a one hour private zoom call. I learned a ton about that whole side of the world and what they would be looking for. Yeah. And I won’t bore you with all the details, but he introduced me to his his replacement, who brought us down to Bentonville a few times. And as of about two weeks ago, we are now on the shelves at Walmart. This market in the Midwest, only happened because of Daniel reached out from that podcast and in the fall 2020. And then this is two and a half years or
John Corcoran 20:27
Years sales cycle. It’s a long process.
Dustin Riechmann 20:29
Yeah, but quite accountability. Can
John Corcoran 20:31
I’ve heard some crazy stories about those negotiation rooms with Walmart? Can you say at all? Like, was it? Did it live up to some reputation is it’s a little difficult, you know, get so far.
Dustin Riechmann 20:43
So what I’ll say is, I think their play right now is get us into this test market, see if we’ll sell and then if if we sell really well, then I’m sure we’ll have a renegotiation about expansion, but expansion coming of better pricing. But no, honestly, it was. The process was actually, besides being extremely long, because everything is like next year, we’re gonna look at this, and then the
John Corcoran 21:06
world’s biggest retailer, right? I mean, their cycles, a little bit more drawn out cycles
Dustin Riechmann 21:10
very long, but, but now we met him, we’ve had a couple of zoom calls with their buyer, she brought us down to Bentonville for just like an individual meeting, and just to chat. And then then we got called down. That was the opposite. I’m sorry, she called us down for the same they call for the exact name. But it’s basically like this small business showcase. And they bring you down for this two day event. It’s all like, rah, rah USA, we’re going to buy all American products. And they bring these people on stage. And they tell their success stories or celebrities there that have partnered with Walmart as a cool event. And we actually got to interview with our buyer, who already had a relationship with in a Sam’s Club buyer. And yeah, and then basically, that gave her I think, the confidence to say these guys are legit, they’re real people. So four months later, we went back down and actually talked about our product and what they would want to see in a format that would work. And then 10 months later from that were like on the shelf. And it was it was actually a very friendly thing. It just takes
John Corcoran 22:08
forever. So naturally, so this is like a natural progression. Here. We have engineering, we have a marriage business. We have snack, consumable, gluten free. Yeah, that makes sense. And then the next natural leap beyond that is creating a coaching program to help people to get on more podcasts. So you know, I can see the through line here makes total sense. total sense. So talk a little bit about that. Did people start coming out reaching out to you and saying like, Hey, I see. I’ve heard you on a bunch of shows. How do I get on shows? How did that come up?
Dustin Riechmann 22:44
Yeah, that’s basically it. So Daniel was one of the first several to reach out if for that specific reason, like, Hey, how did you do this? That was really interesting offer. That was a really cool story, that sort of thing. And so can you help me with this. So in 2021, so again, I started summer 2020. The Fall 2020 was first time Daniel paid me some money for coaching. By the year 2021. I had 21 on one coaching clients. It’s a mouthful to say, but all end down, I had no website, I didn’t have a brand at all. So I was processing payments through Engaged Marriage, just like that. But there was all just people hear me talking about FireCreek. And eventually, we sold seven, seven figures of snacks with no paid ads, which started to get its own momentum. And I was getting interviewed and had case studies about it. And so that started getting me some notoriety in the marketplace. So I did that. And I really refined as I was like running 90 Day marketing plans with people and then coaching them through the execution. And after a while, they all started to kind of look the same. And they were had the same steps. And they’re the same outcomes and eventually became my framework and what I teach now for podcasting. So 2022, I’d started doing this in small groups. So instead of one on one, it was small groups, but it was still just podcast getting specific. And it was about a year ago that I started to marry that stuff that the really niche II podcasting strategy and tactics, with my much broader sales, offer optimization referrals like the bigger like business optimization side. And so now those two things coexist in a mastermind format. And that’s, that’s my whole business now is running, masterminds for entrepreneurs who want to add six figures to their business as podcast guests. And the podcast guests is the important vehicle that we wrap that around much more impactful. You know, things like I just mentioned, sales funnels, offer optimizations, the stuff I’ve been learning and implementing since 2009. In my own businesses, and all these client businesses over the years, I’ve kind of found my place I feel most lit up and most helpful. It’s like I just joked about how weird these things are. But what’s really special about that is I have a almost completely unique perspective in like, I have a course a membership site business. I have an E commerce business I have a coaching business. I’ve sold six figures of engineering contracts. Yeah, barbecue supply stores and coaches and woowoo spiritual coaches. Like I’ve got all this weird experience that allows me to like in a hot seat setting to have lots of examples, lots of case studies and insights with people. And so yeah, the last year has been awesome, because I finally feel like I’m doing exactly what I want to do in this format. And podcasts. guesting happens to be the vehicle for it. So
John Corcoran 25:26
yeah. Now, I’m sure you’ve had lots of people who have come to you and said, Yeah, but can you get me on to shows? Yeah, and sometimes there’s a there’s a temptation to just say, well, people are asking us for it. Let’s just do it. Let’s build a business around that. Has that been a tension for you? Or is that been a challenge to kind of remain committed to for this business? I want to provide the guidance, the framework that create a mastermind format, and I’m not going to get my hands dirty and actually do the done for you model?
Dustin Riechmann 25:59
Yeah, that’s a wonderful question. The temptation is definitely been there. And I and I’m not ruling that out, there could be a day where there’s a white glove service, we’re just like, for three clients, we just do this for them in our way. That would I would never be a traditional podcast guessing agency. And not that there’s anything wrong with that model. But it doesn’t, it doesn’t fit well with like my ethos with the whole thing. So just to run that out a little bit. So yeah, why
John Corcoran 26:25
not? What how do you what do you not like about that? Or is it just a business model decision for yourself?
Dustin Riechmann 26:31
Yeah, well, that’s part of it. I don’t want to be a staffing company. I don’t want to like, I don’t want to do
John Corcoran 26:35
that have to you in order to scale up you had to hire a lot of people.
Dustin Riechmann 26:38
Yeah. But more than that, it’s not consistent with how we we teach and use podcast hosting is a strategy. In that model, I can have my own version, but it’s going to be very high touch, it’d be very expensive. But in the in the traditional model, what happens is people will say, hey, you know, give me $10,000, I’ll get you on 20 shows, they talk about like a general target market, and then they get booked on shows. Those shows are not picked strategically. There’s no like sales funnel built around it, there’s like all the more in depth things that actually move the needle in the business don’t occur. It’s just like renting some guesting spots that has its place. So if you’re an author, or you’re like a lawyer, like you just want to say, I’ve been on 20 podcasts and put some logos on your website, but you don’t actually need it to drive revenue, you should just go outsource it and get it done. But if you’re an entrepreneur, and you want to have it as an asset of your business, you want to build an actual system with SOPs, virtual assistant that’s on your team, like that’s what we teach, so that the podcast Yes, and he’s not rented, it’s like integral and baked in is like your central marketing system. And so you need to own that and not just outsource it to an agency. So could I provide that experience? Yes, I think I would only provide it to my mastermind members or graduates. And again, it would be a very white glove kind of kept close to the chest thing, because we think about this in a really deep and intentional way. And it’s not it can’t be transactional. So that’s, again, I’m, I have no beef with podcasts, agencies, podcasting agencies, it’s just not what we teach. So yeah,
John Corcoran 28:08
how do you teach your clients then to build that deeper relationship, especially if they’re, I can see if you if you meet someone at a conference, face to face or a small group event or something to develop that, I get bombarded with a lot of incoming emails from different agencies and individuals pitching this guest and that guests and stuff like that, to be honest, it’s it’s very hard for them to break through the noise, right? I mean, for them really to capture my attention. Sometimes they do. But it’s very rare. So how do you? How do you coach them to get around this system and to build a genuine relationship? Yeah,
Dustin Riechmann 28:49
I mean, that’s a great question. There are, I thought you’re gonna ask like, how does how can a busy entrepreneur actually do this? At scale? Given? They’re so busy, busy with other things?
John Corcoran 29:00
That’s another great question. Well, we’ll take that one second. What’s next? Yeah.
Dustin Riechmann 29:04
So I think it’d be helpful to quickly mention, we use like a five step framework. And what you’re talking about is the third step of the pitching, but it’s really dependent on the first two. So just real quickly, we say they’re all P’s. Purpose, plan, pitch, perform and profit. And so the key to what you’re getting at is step one, which is purpose which is completely gets missed if you’re using an agency and most people to do this on their own completely bypass this. And that’s answering why do you want to be on a podcast? Like what’s the actual outcome hasn’t lined up with your goals, your three year vision for your business? How’s your how’s your call to action line up with all that stuff? Because unless you get that sorted out, and you figure out exactly what shows are going to move the needle for you, there’s really no point. So we start with purpose and that’s important. And then we go to plan which is like now I know why I want to be on shows. Now I can go do like the research quickly and find the right shows with the right market. And then Three is pitch. And that’s getting on the shows. So I’ll come back to that and in much more depth. Step four is perform. That is great. They booked me now like, how do I prepare? How do I show up? Well, what stories do I tell? What credibility highlights do I weave in? And like, what’s my call to action? And of course, step five is profit. And so we actually work through our system with people. 1/3 of our time is spent on first four steps, which is actually like the podcast guesting system and getting it running. And then we spend two thirds of our time on the last step, which is profit. And that’s like, yeah, that’s answering the second question. But basically, we get the entrepreneur to have ownership of the purpose, go through this once themselves and learn it and get the nuanced about, like, what they want to talk about who they want to talk to, then we outsource the legwork part of that to a virtual assistant that we can train, we train for them, or we can actually place the question about the that’s the second time issue. Yeah, so that’s how the entrepreneur does it, they spent about 30 days really getting their hands dirty with it, and then someone else does all the legwork. And their role just becomes showing up and doing the interviews. And then we move on with them to all the money making parts of it, right the leveraging those appearances. But to scale it back to Step three, how do we do this differently, then what all of our inboxes all of our LinkedIn DMS look alike, which is cold pitch outreaches. It’s actually have a resource we’ll talk about at the end that people can go just watch me do this, because that’s my, that’s my call to action today is called Podcast Pitch Playbook. So we’ll we’ll give that to you for free. But in essence, what it is, is taking your pitch and putting it into three, three pieces. And so the first thing is the most critical is relational anchors. I’ll come back and talk about what that means. The second piece is what’s in it for the person reading the email, which in this case is basically three to five bullet points that are really juicy, like shownotes, I’ve show outline, I should say, for the hosts like this is what your audience is going to get out of this. And those are like copy written. So they’re curiosity inducing, they’re cool, they’re different. And then finally, a call to action, like, are you interested in having me on there going back to that relational anchor, that’s different in every pitch we sent out, it’s customized to the host, it requires some effort. And so the virtual assistant is empowered to do this. But they really get to know about the host about the show, they might even listen to an episode that seems really relevant. So that they have things to reference back to the host that only someone who actually knows the hosts, to some extent, would be able to pull out. So
John Corcoran 32:26
and hopefully, when they referenced that episode, it’s not always the most recently. Like 99% of the time, it’s the most recently.
Dustin Riechmann 32:36
And it’s like, I really enjoyed your episode on and it’s a different font, because we actually, they may not listen, they may just go through the shownotes. But we’re having them go and find a really relevant episode. So for FireCreek Snacks, you know, I was on bigger shows is a very small business. So my angle is usually finding shows where they had interviewed bootstrappers. And basically be like, we’re a bootstrap business. Much like Carl, who you interviewed in Episode 231, his tip on drop shipping or whatever, it really changed the game for us. You’re wanting to pull out those kinds of specific references to episodes that are relevant to tie right into how you can then expand on that and help their audience. And the other thing you can do is like this, find some other relational anchor. Like, if I spent five minutes looking at your bio, or looking at your LinkedIn, I could make a Clinton joke or I can make some kind of something about
John Corcoran 33:28
two or you lived in the same city at some point. Yeah, exactly.
Dustin Riechmann 33:31
My wife is went to the same school or a lot of times if I there’s some podcasts that’ll have husband and wife host I can always referencing gauge marriage of all my very first business was with my wife. And I really value that. So that the whole idea is like this guy is not a random weirdo from the internet. He has spent some time to give me the read the next sentence in the email, and it’s like, Oh, they’ve actually taken time to like review an episode and they made it really relevant. And now I’ve got these bullet points, I can scan and be like, Okay, this is different. Like, this is interesting. This will fill some I think my audience actually find this really interesting. And then are you interested, so that when John gets this email, it’s not I have to like schedule it today. And like drop everything. It’s like, Yes, I’m interested in talking to my assistant. Yes, I’m interested, you’ll fill out this form. Yes, I’m interested. Let’s book it you gives you optionality? It kind of makes it hard for you to say no, because like, I’ve spent time I’ve, you know, I’ve been I don’t get read like we do get an 80% acceptance rate. So that’s amazing. Like, it’s not like we get 100, but it’s pretty darn good. Yeah, yeah, it will. And I describe that as like an email and that could be one email. If someone’s active on LinkedIn, we might shoot that as like three separate subscale subsequent DMS, like the first DMS just, hey, I really I saw you do this. I really admire this I get this result from your from your work. And then when they respond to me, like actually have some ideas for how I could help your audience and like, here’s some bullet points. What do you think of those? So yeah, we kind of creates his master template, which, again, I’ll give people in the training. And then we can multiple we can use that multiple ways to further the relationship. And we do all this to kind of get the flywheel rolling. And then what I always tell people is once you get to five or 10, shows, we have other strategies for leveraging those shows, to be the relational anchor, to shortcut this whole process. And then ultimately, you start getting known as an authority and connections happen to you. And I didn’t pitch you like we met in a group because we have common interest. And then it’s most of it just starts to happen without having a pitch
John Corcoran 35:32
generally. Yeah, I mean, I, I started going on other shows around 2013. And, yeah, once you start to get 510, under your belt gets a lot easier, you can start swapping names with the gas, like, what other shows should I be on? You know, and then they introduce you or you introduce them? Yeah, it’s great. To talk about the last piece, the Prophet peace was the recommendation there.
Dustin Riechmann 35:57
Yeah. So basically, what we’re doing, we’re getting the thing running with the four steps and the VAs run and steps two, and three, which is the research into pitching. And so again, as an entrepreneur, you define the purpose once, and then you show up on the PErforM part, step four, and that’s really your role. So beyond that, we get them, we get them bought in the entrepreneur, and we get them rolling with that. And then we say, Great, yeah, next first, first step is scalability, we’re going to remove you from 90% of the process and have a virtual assistant, again, that we train, or we have a fractional VA that we can place with them if they want. And then we get into offer optimization. So now you’ve got a marketing system running. So you’re getting on shows, and that’s in process, and we like to shoot for about one show a week. That’s really that’s kind of the magic number in our programs is we can get you on one show a week. Now you’ve got 50 audiences a year if the host 50 guest lists, which is a huge part of what we do is getting on a show and then using the guest list, or we should probably come back to that. But using the guest list as a resource for leads, referral partners and strategic partners, which again, I know is something you guys talk a lot about it at Rise25. So we’re we’re gonna optimize their offer, then we’re going to build a sales funnel, which is what I was just describing is one version of that, like, how do you with each of these podcasts that get published? How do you actually make sales, referrals, and find strategic partners from that, and that’s, that’s an automated system that the VA helps with. And then the last part of our mastermind, is referrals. So if you’ve been doing this for weeks with each other, you really understand each other’s offers, you’ve helped optimize each other’s offers. And now you can make referrals to podcasts that you’ve been on. That makes sense. You can make business referrals, we’ve we often
John Corcoran 37:40
have, with the with the host of the shows that you’re on, or you’re talking about with others who want to be
Dustin Riechmann 37:45
with others in the group is what I’m talking about in the mastermind group. So specifically in my group, the fifth P is like the emphasis. And that kind of referrals, kind of the Capstone part of the group is like now that we’re really rolling with this, how can we accelerate the process for each other? And so that’s happening within the group? Yeah, but I mean,
John Corcoran 38:03
how do you see this is, I love being a guest on other shows. But the challenge I have with it is, is. And part of the reason I’m such a big advocate of having your own shows when you are in this takes people a while to sometimes realize, but when you’re hosting, and you’re having someone else on your show, you’re actually doing a favor to that guest. Because you’re giving them exposure, you’re giving them a platform a pedestal, right, you’re, you’re telling your audience about them. And so the principle reciprocity kind of motivates people don’t want to repay that favor. How do you as the guest on lots of shows, then repay that favor or not build an indebtedness to all these different shows that you’re on? Is it through some kind of referral program? Or is it just through straight trying to, you know, be a great guest, of course, there’s that right and deliver great value to their show? How do you how do you reconcile that? That yeah,
Dustin Riechmann 39:02
actually, it’s funny you say that actually, I actually view the way that we approach testing that, if not equal, actually, that the guests provide so much value to the hosts that the host feels indebted to the guests. So it’s kind of funny that we were both looking at that. But yeah, I mean, practically speaking, is obviously showing up doing a good job. It’s been a really cool host is trying to make referrals for the host where you can whether business referrals, or other guests good
John Corcoran 39:27
one, yeah, introducing. Yeah, I’ve definitely tried to do that when I’m a guest on someone else’s shows then turn around and introduce him or offered to introduce him to someone else would be a good guest on their show.
Dustin Riechmann 39:37
Yeah, the other thing, it sounds kind of silly, but you’ll probably be able to back it up like people guests are really bad about just leaving iTunes reviews, like as simple as that is. So if I can, if you publish the show, I’ll leave an iTunes review. I’m going to share it to my LinkedIn following. So I’m going to do what I can to promote the show and be cool. I’m also going to follow up with you and just see how I can help you. So that’s all Like at the host level and the, yeah, we look at the impact or the like the audience that we’re talking to you in three different levels, I can go through that. Or if that’s too in depth today, we don’t have to, but
John Corcoran 40:13
just, yeah, quick version of
Dustin Riechmann 40:16
level one is the audience. And that’s what everyone thinks about with with is they’re like, that’s I got on guest opportunities to sell snack sticks to the audience. And like, that was the whole thing. I didn’t even think any deeper than that. And that’s good. And you should do that. So you should have a call to action that speaks to the audience and gets them on your email list, etc, all the stuff everyone talks about. But level two is peer to peer. So peer to peer could be the host, it could be like, I want to become friends with this host, I want to be really cool to them, I’m gonna invite them to speak as an expert in my thing, I’m gonna highlight them to my audience. If I can, however, you can develop that relationship, because usually, the host by default is like an influencer in your space. And so you just want to be really good to the host. And make this a streamlined, make it really easy for them. Give them the show, outline, show up and nail the interview, make them excited to share with their audience, leave the iTunes reviews, ask who you can refer them to highlight them on your LinkedIn, like all this stuff to make the host cool. But you can also speak out to referral partners and strategic partners. So as a real quick example. So That’s level two, and level three is high ticket sales. So but as a quick example of all three levels, I’m like Sam, a Facebook ads agency, and I work with FireCreek brands like craft food brands, I get interviewed on a Shopify podcast, that’s a great opportunity to speak to all three levels of awareness or influence, I should say. So level one is the audience. So there’s probably some brands that own that, that run food, listening, because it’s a Shopify podcast. So if I get on there and talk about why we’re special case studies, tricks to get better return on adspend for food companies on Facebook. And then I have a call to action that’s like we do free audits or whatever. That’s, that’s speaking to that audience in the same episode I can throw in, by the way, John, like we only were very niche, we only work on the Facebook ad side for these companies. If there’s anyone listening that does like Google ads, or SEO, like we love making referrals? Well, you say that on the episode. And there’s some other agencies that work in the Shopify ecosystem listening, they hear that and they’re like, I want referrals. But what actually happens is you give each other referrals. And so you get those people to reach out by calling out to them that just that’s just another example. And then, at the highest level here, the high ticket sales, I mentioned guestlist earlier, this is getting to like how this actually makes makes direct sales and money. In this same show, Shopify masters or whatever they’re, they’ve interviewed, say, 200 people, they’ve probably interviewed some food brands, and that are Shopify Plus level food brands. So if I get on there, and I’m talking about Facebook ads, it opens up the opportunity for my virtual assistant to go through and screen all the past guests, and monitor it and screen all the future guests. It’s evergreen, because they add new guests every week. And the ones that make sense for me, as a potential client, I then pull over into my own prospecting bucket and run and that’s where the sales funnel comes in. So let’s say I find a coffee food brand, a beer food brand. And I connect with them on LinkedIn, for example. And I say, Hey, John, we’re both on Shopify masters, I see you have a food brand. We love food brands, I’d love to connect with you. And it’s not like a cold outreach from an agency because I have like, we’re both in the cool kids club. But I have either the authority and credibility of having been on the same show. So the very highest rates. And then I have a few
John Corcoran 43:36
times the shows I’ve been on where other guests have reached out. I’m sure it’s a system or process that Yeah, yeah. So I mean, I do I would do on a Warren, though, that you have to be careful with that. Because there have been some companies that have scraped my guest list. And I get these emails from my guests, saying that these other third parties come in, they pitch my my guest list. And boy, does that piss us off?
Dustin Riechmann 43:59
Yeah, we don’t do that. This is like high touch is done by virtual city. It’s not that difficult. But it’s all real. It’s not there’s nothing automated. Yeah, it’s
John Corcoran 44:09
being selective and very selective particular, or
Dustin Riechmann 44:14
because these are high ticket sales, right? We don’t need a lot. So if I’m a Facebook ads agency, then that’s when I started leading with value. So I connect with this person, we exchanged pleasantries. Now we’re, and then I say, you know, I checked out your facebook ads account. And I don’t know if you guys have ever ran this carousel, or this headline or whatever, but we found a ton of success with it. I hope you try it. Just try something a lead with value, no pitch, and then they’re gonna be like, that’s a really, you know, cool, have you? Do you have time to talk? We’re thinking about switching Facebook ad agencies, you know, like, that’s when the sales process picks up. But that’s like one bucket from the guest list would be prospective clients. Another bucket would be those referral partners. So maybe I go find the Google ads and the SEO people that have been interviewed on the same show and I say, hey, We were both on the same show, hey, we have referrals, you guys, you want to talk. And then the third would be in that same guest list, there’s gonna be some influencers in there that have their own platform, their own podcast, where it’s like, Hey, you were interviewed on the same show, as me, I see you have a podcast, you can listen to episode if you want, but like, these are the things I would love to come to your audience. And again, it’s like, once you especially once you score one good show, like it gives you so much credibility and, and a really rich guest list. And so you can just do this, and none of this is salesy. It’s all like organic, and it’s all relationship driven. But most people get on the show. And if they may, they might share it on LinkedIn or something once, like, that’s it like, yeah, I could live off of one really good show. And like,
John Corcoran 45:41
That’s really smart. I haven’t heard someone talk about that before about that having a VA go and look at the all the past guest lists, go into the future, looking at future guests, and creating those unique, individualized outreach to other other guests there. I know, we’re almost out of time here. And so this has been really great, really interesting. I usually warn my guests about this last question that I’m going to ask, I forgot to ask you, but I’m gonna ask it anyways, because I think you’re gonna be okay with it. So I’ll just explain it like I usually do beforehand. So I’m a big fan of gratitude, especially expressing gratitude publicly to those who’ve helped you along the way. We all have people that helped us along the way. Now, when I asked that, what to ask people about who would they want to shout out and just thank, you know, for helping them along the way, people tend to default to mentioning their family, or mentioning their team or something like that, which is fine. But really what I’m getting at when I asked this question is I love to hear about other peers and contemporaries, others in your industry or beyond, and you’ve been in a bunch of different industries, who kind of helped you or mentored you or guided you, or at those times, like, you know, march 2020 times like that, that you could turn to them. And you could, and they helped you through some rough period. So I’d love to hear who in your life you would want to thank and express your gratitude to.
Dustin Riechmann 47:05
That’s a good one, because my default was like my grandpa. But to be a little more focused on the business, peer to peer stuff, I would say totally Tony DiLorenzo, who actually mentioned earlier, who from the 2009 accepted my request to be in a collaborative ebook, we had a business together fit marriage. He stayed consistent. He’s still does marriage, one extraordinary marriage, he and his wife have just built an amazing business over there. And the him and I VOXI on Voxer. Every day, we’re all we’re constantly like, in each other’s corner. He paid to be like I said, you can be on for free. He paid to me in my first mastermind group. Yeah, he’s always he’s always got my back. We traveled at Podfest back in January, even though it wasn’t like a great timing for him. He’s like, I want to be there to use. I’m not there to sell anything. I just have marriage podcast. But I want to be there to introduce you to people and vouch for how good you are at what you do. And yeah, so tons of gratitude for Tony, I’ll definitely point them to this episode and have him have them. Have him here because obviously they you and Tony would really hit it off. He’s in California,
John Corcoran 48:07
as well. Cool. Cool. That’s great. It’s so nice. Having someone like that, who’s been in your corner for such a long period of time and still helping you out? That’s really cool. That’s great. Where can people go to learn more about you and connect with you?
Dustin Riechmann 48:20
Yeah, main site is simplesuccesscoaching.com. You find everything there. But you won’t see this this resource that I was talking about earlier. So that’s the Podcast Playbook. So if you go to podcastpitchplaybook.com, it’s kind of a mouthful, but podcastpitchplaybook.com. It’s free resource I put together it’s like over the shoulder training of how I actually write these emails to get on podcast and a really cool way. And I include three actual emails I’ve sent to you on some big shows, with one single outreach. And so yeah, podcastpitchplaybook.com. People can grab that. I’m an open book, I love to connect with people. So feel free to come to the website, shoot me an email, respond to any of the newsletters if you do sign up, and we’d love to chat with anyone in the audience.
John Corcoran 49:03
I love meeting recovering engineers. I’m a recovering lawyer, you’re recovering engineer who have gone in this crazy wild west world of online marketing and podcasts and blogs, and all that kind of stuff. The stuff that we can’t have been explained to our family. They have no idea what we do now. It was so much easier for them when it was just engineer lawyer. So kudos to you for for embarking on the Wild West and pleasure talking to you.
Dustin Riechmann 49:29
Yeah, you too. John. This has been fantastic. So thanks for the great interview. Thank you.
Chad Franzen 49:36
Thanks for listening to the Smart Business Revolution Podcast. We’ll see you again next time and be sure to click Subscribe to get future episodes.