Binge Factor Media

With a lot of podcast shows today, especially during this time of everything virtual, many of them undergo the process of podfading. Some may not be that visible as usual, while others are now completely gone without any update. Tracy Hazzard sits down with Brodie Welch of A Healthy Curiosity Podcast to discuss the right way to podfading without coming as a failure or leaving your followers hanging. Brodie shares how she took a breather from managing her podcast after releasing more than 200 episodes, and now goes according to her own pace and got rid of unnecessary pressure. She also talks about her challenges finding the right guests, how she works with monetization, and balancing her podcasting career with the busy life of a licensed acupuncturist.

—

Watch the episode here:

Listen to the podcast here:

Podfading? Make Time To Affirm Your Purpose And Change Your Pace Just Like Brodie Welch Of A Healthy Curiosity Podcast

I have a podcaster who caught my eye because she was being straightforward and honest about podfading. I thought this is such a good time to talk about that subject. She was so open and able to come to talk about it. She did a She Podcast Live Evade the Fade Talk and also was posted in the She Podcasts group and that’s how I found her. I invited Brodie Welch to the show. Her show is A Healthy Curiosity. She has over 220 episodes so she certainly didn’t podfade early in any way, shape, or form. Let me tell you a little bit about Brodie’s so you get a sense of what this show is about.

Brodie Welch is a licensed acupuncturist, a Board Certified herbalist, and a self-care strategist. She helps self-aware high achieving women break the cycles of stress, overwhelm, and self-sabotage so they can enjoy the lives of working so hard to create and truly embody self-respect. She has been a lifelong student of consciousness. She’s been practicing meditation and yoga for over twenty years, holds teaching certifications and all of these disciplines. She synthesizes ancient techniques from Chinese medicine to Ayurveda and yoga with the latest research in neuroscience, functional medicine and habit change to help her clients thrive.

This is where, in her podcasting, you can see there’s the intersection of all of those in A Healthy Curiosity. Through her coaching program, she helps people bridge the gap between what they know they should be doing to take care of themselves and doing it without feeling guilty. She’s the Founder of Life in Balance Acupuncture in Corvallis, Oregon where she’s been treating patients since 2003. She’s also the Creator and Host of A Healthy Curiosity, the podcast that explores what it takes to be well in a busy world.

I know you’re going to enjoy it a lot because you reach out to me, you like things on Instagram and you’re doing this in this coaching professional world. Some of you are thinking about podcasting, some of you are already podcasting and Brodie’s a great example of what can happen or how a show can go great for a while, and how you can reach the stage of, “Should I keep going? What should I do about this?” She went way longer, probably while she was feeling that than she might. She could have stopped sooner and it would have still been okay. I’m glad she’s taking this break and I’m glad she’s sharing it with us. Let’s go and read about Brodie from A Healthy Curiosity.

Brodie, thanks for joining me. A Healthy Curiosity, I’m curious, that’s how we connected here. I’m curious about what you’re working on. What you’re doing? How are your show is coming in? This is the thing. We have rules about how they’re posting and how regularly they’re posting. You defy the rules but you earn the right to. You have over 220 shows. You earn the right to podfade a little bit and coming back in ways. That’s where I want to start with you. There’s a lot of podcasters who’ve been doing this for a long time, who lost some momentum in 2020. Tell us how you were feeling?

2020 threw us all into unprecedented waters and for me, as an acupuncturist and health coach, I had to close my clinic for a couple of months while figuring out how to treat COVID, what herbs I could be using while trying to keep the coaching business alive and deal with my family. It was a lot all at once. One thing I realized about having to close my clinic is that even though I love treating patients, connecting with people in a deep way, and helping to catalyze them in the direction of healthier and happier. It is somewhat of a burden to take on all of that energy. I felt this weird, “Is it okay that I feel unburdened by having to not do what I love?”

I realize that it’s an important thing to acknowledge the cost that we pay for even the things that we’re most proud of and most cherished in our lives. There’s a give and take there. It’s always been central that my message for people is, “You’ve got to take care of yourself.” We’ve got to take care of ourselves and have permission. We’re getting a lot of women who don’t give themselves permission to take care of themselves and being able to convince people that we have the right to do that. Even if it means it seems selfish or if it seems something that is less important or frivolous compared to the important work that we’re trying to get done in the world that it’s absolutely essential.

There’s a yin and yang to everything. We can’t be an exporting externally focused, what it looks like on the outside, showing up and disseminating information, teaching and nurturing, and all that without filling up the well. I’m sure a lot of people are familiar with that concept. It’s so hackneyed to talk about self-care, but I felt I’ve given myself permission to go through this collective trauma and to take a step back from my clinical work.

You made it all the way through 2020. You don’t see any hiccups in your show until you get to January when there are a few less episodes. In February there’s one less episode, and there’s one in March. You’ve made it far before you gave yourself that permission. I’m going to say that, Brodie. You could have done it sooner.

Part of that is the recognition that people needed constancy. Feeling that the podcast is a way that is fairly effortless. It’s not draining. It’s not holding space for people’s pain and loneliness. Realizing that all that work that I’m doing in the various aspects of my business, that is not in a vacuum. It doesn’t exist in a silo. It’s connected to the rest of my life. Even though I love podcasting, and still love podcasting, and still intend to podcast, maybe I don’t have to do that show every week because people need to trust you and you need to be consistent. Trust is part of my brand. That’s how I want to be thought of but realizing that authenticity and honoring what’s true in the moment is as much a part of my brand as anything else.

No one can say you were flaky with your show after you’ve gotten through 2020. I’m sorry, it’s not. You still lived up to every bit of that. You spoke it She Podcasts Live on Evade the Fade, the podfade. What are some of your recommendations for how to avoid it or how to evade that?

A lot of that idea if you’re going to do something on a regular basis, we all know the importance of systems. It’s making things as streamlined and easy as possible so we don’t have to reinvent the wheel every time. As someone who is recovering Type A with lots of spinning plates that I don’t want to drop, for me that the way that I can count on having consistent energy for everything that I want to do is to make sure that the essential habits that I need to thrive are in place. That happened, first thing.

A lot of my tips that I delivered there are about essentially automating habits that help you show up with maximum energy and creativity, which is everything. It’s the dead simple, totally unsexy basics like getting enough sleep, nourishing ourselves well, moving our bodies, and feeling connected to purpose and to community. It’s things like this that are pretty dead simple but not so simple in terms of the execution because we live in this young addicted society that totally buys into that action, productivity and speed. Where we perpetually feel like we don’t have enough time and we don’t have enough energy.

If podcasting is something perhaps a hobby, then it might be considered optional or if it’s a branch of a business or a way to grow the show, it can be something that you have to do that doesn’t feel like a hoop to jump through instead of something that feels like you’re connected to what you care about in your message. When we get too focused on showing up for the sake of showing up or showing up for the sake of something external and we disconnect from something important. That is our hearts. That is our love of why we’re doing it or we’re connected to the love and why we’re doing it but we don’t have the fuel.

In Chinese medicine, we think about the three treasures, There’s vitality, energy, and spirit. Our vitality is this reservoir of energy that we dip into when we’re doing too much for too long. If you’re not getting enough sleep every night, you start to dip into the reserves. If you’re living on coffee and Cheetos, you’re going to be dipping into those resorts. If you stress out, you’re dipping into your reserves, your cortisol, and adrenaline. That is depleting. Making sure that we’re living within integrity with our own energy is vital to making sure that we’re going to be able to consistently show up. Otherwise, it’s going to be fits and starts or we’re going to have a relationship with our show that’s hostile. It’s like a mean boss, trying to get a reluctant employee to cooperate.

Which makes us like it less. It creates this dissension in your show and you feel it. That’s so interesting that you started to recognize that and said, “This is why I’m going to take a pause right now.” I want to highlight the way that you did it and this is where I would like to invite our audience to listen to certain episodes. Towards the end of episode 220, and 221, you’ll see towards the episode, the last one in February 2021 the first one in March 2021 if you’re reading this way in the future.

When you listen to Brodie’s show, A Healthy Curiosity, you did a Q&A show and it was a lengthy show. It wasn’t one of your shortest or anything like that. It was a good show and you address questions from your community and from other things. It’s a great show style to have that you did in one of those shows. It’s a fantastic style so definitely listened to the way she handled the Q&A and did this process of reading the question and giving her answers to them but you slipped in at the end that this the last show. You slipped down at the end of it and said, “I’m taking a pause.” You made an announcement, which is good but a lot of times people don’t make it all the way through the episode so I bet you that you’ve got a lot of feedback after that so what happened that made you come back and do the one in March?

A few things. First of all, deeply respect and appreciate my listeners, my audience, and my community. I started getting emails from listeners, saying, “I respect the way that you’re walking your talk.” Because the way that I put it was not, “I’m going to stop podcasting.” The way that I put it was like, “I’m not going to podcast until it feels necessary and organically right. I’m tired of getting pitched from publicists.” It’s not even podcasting. It’s paying attention to everything having to do with podcasting, whether it’s the tech upgrades, how to publicize your show, or how to grow your show. If you’re listening to this show, you know that there are a lot of moving parts. There’s a lot of things that we could protect that could potentially be clamoring for attention if we decide that we’re opening this door.

Process Of Podfading: Many women don’t give permission to take care of themselves and convince people that they have the right to do that.

I was saying, “For the sake of my own sanity, I need to shut this door for a little while and enter it only on my terms.” I’ll enter it when I feel like, “This person in my community is coming out with a book, I would love to share this on my show.” A lot of people who are writing in were saying how much they appreciated my insights about Chinese medicine in daily life and the way that I danced with that as an applied philosophy and not necessarily what the expertise of my guests had to say. I thought about that. It’s funny because I have this perfectionism that makes me take ten times as long to come up with a solo show than it is to have a conversation. That’s why a lot of my episodes are interviews or conversations but then I thought, “I can talk about Chinese medicine all day long and I don’t mind sharing a bit about my life with my audience.”

If it’s as simple as talking about, “We’re entering the season of spring and what should we be eating this season? What does this mean in terms of the liver, anger, and vision?” This way Chinese medicine looks at life. I can hop on the mic and record a show about that. Easy peasy. It’s no problem and it’s effortless. Going back to that If it’s effortless, easeful, and coming from the inside out, that’s what I wanted to do in the first place.

The point of showing up for the sake of showing up, showing up because saying yes to two interviews that aren’t right fits for my show, for the sake of having content. No. Who needs that? There are so many podcasts in the world. It’s helpful to weed out the things that aren’t totally right fits. It was freeing not only but it’s helping me be in alignment with my personal values, but also professional values, and in terms of clarifying my message. It’s like, “Maybe it’s as simple as being me in public.”

You went on a little search for meaning and little bits and pieces came back to you. It’s like, “I missed that and now it’s time to go and address that.” I love that process that you’ve taken there and the easing off for yourself without completely slamming the door and saying, “I’m done,” without also forcing yourself to commit to one day a month. Something where you still felt it was a commitment. You reduce that pressure on yourself and that was great. If you’re going to podfade in any way, this is a great way for you to find a way to keep it tying through so you may find that one thing that re-energizes you again and closes it off.

Exactly. When we think about that yin and yang and how we know that we need to go into a period of dormancy in order to have a period of productivity. Those seasons that we go in and out of can’t be summer all the time. We do eventually have to let go of things and go into the winter of where things are quiet, dormant, a bit reflective and we’re letting our creativity recharge before in the spring, where we have new growth, expression, and ideas and in the summer when we’re in full bloom.

It’s having the expectation of ourselves that we’re machines, that we are the same in all seasons no matter what else is going on and what stressors are in our lives is unkind. From a Chinese medicine perspective, we are organic living being subject to energy flows and the internal seasons that we go through that don’t necessarily match the external seasons going on. If we’re treating ourselves as machines and having the same expectation day in and day out, year in year out, there’s going to be a point where that’s no longer sustainable because nothing in nature including human beings functions that way.

Being able to see it not as a failure and not as an all or nothing black or white. I’m either doing this or not doing this, it’s that idea of, “It can be a more yin season where occasionally I’ll pop up and have something to say. I’m sure that over time that will shift and I’ll be excited about exploring a particular topic in a particular way.” I will come back and it already started as soon as I gave myself that permission. As soon as I let there be a little bit of space, nature abhors a vacuum. There were already some ideas percolating. It’s important to set ourselves up for consistency but to recognize that it’s okay for it to not be summer all the time.

It’s okay for it not to be an arbitrary consistency. You mentioned something that I want to tie in now to the five things that we go over with every podcast because you drop something that I didn’t touch on because I knew we’re going to get to it here. One of the reasons is  you felt that the pitches you were getting on guesting were not good fits for you. Thinking about that is you even said the term “mediocre guests” and you said, “I didn’t mean that they’re mediocre,” but they are not something that fits what you are about. If you don’t have a healthy curiosity about them, it’s not going to make for a great show so it wasn’t a fit for you. We’re going to go through our five things and the first thing is how to get great guests. I’d love for you to answer that in terms of, do you have a set of criteria? How do you deal with these pitches? How do you screen through that and say, “Is this going to be a fit for me?”

We do have a guest application that we asked people to fill out. We only offer that to people that could be in the ballpark. They are things that are clearly boilerplate generic, “Your show is in the health space, I’m going to email you.”

“I’m going to mass email you along with any other podcaster.”

It’s clear that’s likely not a good fit or people who are solely wanting to sell a product. I’m not interested in people having to buy a product in order to get benefit out of spending their time with me. That’s one of the questions on the guest application. How will this benefit someone’s life without them having to buy a product? If someone doesn’t have a good answer to that, they do not make the cut.

You’re being discerning about it. You’re doing what you’re curious about, and what you know your audience is going to be interested in.

On the guest application, I spell out who the show is for and what kinds of things we’re covering because anyone who’s going to be pitching in a conscientious way is going to want it to be a win-win. It’s going to want them to be how can I best serve your audience? Who is your audience? If you can’t answer that question, it’s hard to know that it’s a good fit or a good match.

How do you increase listeners? How have you been doing that over the years? You started your show in 2016.

It was in 2018 when I guested on over 100 other podcasts and online summits. I went on a mass guesting spree. A lot of times it was that. It was talking to finding like-minded audiences or resonant audiences and usually with people who are not doing exactly the same thing as me, but it may be some overlap. Sometimes it was a small show with a dedicated niche or following and such things would resonate. For example, for some reason, what I have to say in the Chinese medicine space, I do a lot of overlap with functional medicine and with Ayurveda. Finding out that so many people are reaching out to me are doctors, physicians, nurses or other Chinese medicine people. Realizing that’s interesting and helping me craft what shows are they listening to because it’s not always obvious.

Once you start to learn about your audience it makes them more obvious where you might want to spend your time if you ask them. You’re been increasing listeners through this, I’m going to call it a guesting spree, which I love the idea of. Maybe we should think of it like a sprint. One hundred might be a lot for some people out there but go on a little guesting sprint and try that out to increase listeners. The next one we go over is producing like a pro. In your case, what I love for you to focus on because so many people are like, “Get a good mic.” That’s great, but I would love for you to focus on, as a health practitioner with a practice, how do you manage to still produce this show? How do you manage to get that out every week with that busy schedule?

Process Of Podfading: Living within integrity with your energy is vital to make sure that you can consistently show up.

Systems are key so I do have help, thankfully. In my clinic, I have an office manager who is capable of doing things. First of all, having an online forum where I request information in advance about my guests and having my office manager take that and turn it into a document. As I’m preparing for an interview, the websites there and everything I need is all in one place and I can make notes in that document, which is then shared in Dropbox. I do have editing help so my wonderful podcast editor has all the access to the cover art, the headshots, the bio, and all of that. There’s this shared spreadsheet so we know where we’re at. There’s a weekly timeline that we follow. It’s a system that works rather well. It’s a system and a team and relatively. At this point, the system is saying, “Is me remembering to mention we do or we don’t have an episode this week.”

On a side note on this, you don’t scripture shows. It seems obvious to me that you don’t, but do you make any notes for yourself or thoughts before you go in?

I do. I encouraged people to send me some questions that they might want to be asked. It’s not an interview show at all it’s a conversation. I’m not good at playing dumb I’m going to have an opinion and I’m what I’m going to have some things to share from my background. I look for the overlap. What is it that I’m curious about? What is my audience going to be curious about? What in what they want to talk about stands out for me from Chinese medicine? A lot of times those will jump out at me. In the course of the conversation, being able to let it flow into letting it be organic, but to have at least a few pillars of some things, a vision of how to get through it in a cogent way.

I’m glad that you do that because it shows because there’s clarity to the episodes that you create. You seem to get questions. You have a series of questions. Somewhere along the way, you’re doing something right encouraging engagement. What do you do there?

I feel like sometimes when I ask questions, I get crickets. Sometimes it’s nothing back at all. Also, making it crystal clear how people can respond to a call to action because a lot of times people aren’t in front of a computer when they’re listening to a podcast. They’re not ready to shoot me an email, a voicemail or something like that. There are times when I ask, “What do you want to hear more about? I want this to serve you.” I’ve never gotten much in the way of feedback as far as that goes. If I ask specific questions people are more likely to feel like it sparks something in them. It makes it an easier thing for them to answer. I don’t know that I have a universal answer, but I will say that when I ask people more pointed questions, I often get a better response.

Specific and pointed questions, that’s a great way. It’s a call to action that is more in that realm. It’s smart.

Sometimes emails will come in that I haven’t asked for at all.

You’ve got a thriving practice, courses, a lot of online tools and resources, and you’ve got a book. You’ve got a lot going on your website and all of that is available to all of your listeners. Is that the primary way you’ve monetized the show is through your own things or are there any other ways?

I have not gone and searched out sponsors for the most part. The way that I’ve monetized the show is essentially by opening the doors for people to connect with me as a coach. Certainly, if I’m in the clinic half time and my acupuncture practice has been full with a waitlist since 2003. I haven’t needed to grow that at all but wanting to help people and realizing that I can do that from a distance and I certainly have room to do that, a few coaching clients a month that talking about that I’m available for that. I also have an online in Qi Gong and in the basics of Chinese medicine, which are pretty nichy.

There’s not a lot of people teaching Qi Gong online and there’s not a lot of people trying to democratize Chinese medicine for a layperson audience. That’s partly why I feel that maybe my show is not the best model of how to monetize because it’s for laypeople and health professionals. It’s for Chinese medicine people and allopathic people. I’m a generalist. I love overlap and systems thinking so I’m a niche person’s nightmare in terms of being able to figure that out.

This is a perfect time to segue to your binge factor. I’m going to ask you, “Did you know you had a bingeable show? Did anyone reach out to you? Did you realize they were binging on your episodes?” If so, what do you think is your binge factor?

Yes, people have binged the show, and that when they discover that it exists, there are certain themes that they can search for. If some people want all the women’s health episodes or some people want all of the personal evolution, personal growth, personal development, mindfulness shows, and some people want the specific health condition that they want to learn more about. A lot of times people will start with some of the things that hold us back because that’s what the show was supposed to explore in the first place.

Not only how do we take care of ourselves, what do we need to be doing, how can we make this as easy as possible, and how can we automate it, but also what gets in the way? What gets in the way of us doing the things that we know that we should do gets at the heart of the things that we don’t necessarily spend a lot of time interrogating in ourselves. It gives people a safe place to be with some of those shadow issues or some of those things. I want people to be kind to themselves.

We may never get over our people-pleasing, perfectionism, or whatever, but if we can make friends with that part of ourselves and have it be a softer relationship with these things that we think of as obstacles, the people appreciate being seen and empathized with. That’s the comment that I get all the time. It’s like, “I have all these people telling me that I should be hacking my life so I can be more productive but you’re one of the only voices that give me permission to do that because I’m worth it and because you want me to enjoy my life.” I have a coaching client who had been listening to my show for four years before reaching out to me. She said, “You were the only voice in my head, telling me that it wasn’t selfish to do the basic things like to get enough sleep, to exercise, and to make time for joy. Not because not for any other end, other than it’s your life, and you are worth it.”

I agree with you on all those fronts on what you’re feeling about your show. The true binge factor from a binge listener and a binge listener is someone who’s going to listen to most of your episodes. They’re not skipping around. They don’t want to miss anything because there are these deep little pockets of insights that you bring out so they don’t want to miss what you say. That’s a true deep binge listener. You’re going to still find them even though you’re slowing down a little bit. They’re going to come, they’re going to find your show, they’re going to start at the beginning of they’re going to go all the way through. Because you’re not posting every single week, so they have time.

They can catch up.

You may not see a drop in your listener base but you may see it still stay level for a long time. That’s because you have a good catalog of it. From this particular case, the real binge factor in this is what you’ve set out as your title, A Healthy Curiosity. You set out the permission to be curious about things and to go deeper into this. When you have two experts together, you and your guest coming together, we’re getting a sneak peek into the interplay between how experts start to talk to each other, how their minds are working, how each of you is bringing insights and stories to each other. That interplay of experts is beautiful to get to sit on the sideline because it’s like, “I didn’t know how to ask that. I wish I had known to ask that because look at the answer.” We’re getting this flow through a thought process that we maybe have a little bit of but maybe we don’t aren’t as far as intuitive in deep into it as you are. Getting you to ask those questions for us, you’re our beautiful guide.

That’s a fun perspective and it makes perfect sense to you. We don’t know what we don’t know. If you have the opportunity to be a fly on the wall overhearing a conversation between two experts in something, then you’re going to learn things that you didn’t even know or existed.

Process Of Podfading: Asking specific questions that spark something in people makes it easier for them to give an answer.

I have a serious curiosity in all kinds of things to the point where I shouldn’t deep dive into this. This is probably why I was six shows of my own, which I need. I’m managing 500 shows and I need six of my own. It is that case for me, that curiosity and asking questions is a way to do that. Sometimes only we can ask those questions. That’s where you are in the space. If it’s not expansive for you, and that’s where I feel that some of these guests that had been coming to you were not expanding your curiosity. That’s where they fell often being inauthentic for you. When you can find that space, you’re going to be back doing the interview because you want to ask those questions.

You are a curious person. It’s obvious. You have a fabulous point at which you identified some of the histories of how Chinese medicine came into the US and came into our country. You explained it as being a whitewashed story. You told this wonderful story about Tupac’s stepfather. His stepfather is responsible for bringing this in and not the public way we know about it now. I was like, “That’s a brilliant story and diversity at a moment of something that we needed to hear and something that I had no idea about.” I didn’t even know I wanted to know about it but I did. By the time I was done listening to it, I had taken that story and, and thought, “Wow.” It opened my perspective.

Part of that came about with Black History Month and me trying to educate myself about the history that I never learned. It’s appalling to me that as someone who is passionate about both Chinese medicine and history that I am learning this now. Shout out to Tenisha Dandridge who had written about it on her website, who’s an acupuncturist. It takes digging into the things that we are individually curious about as human beings not as professionals and being able to share that. A lot of times, if your audience is going to resonate with you, they’re likely going to resonate with some things that fire you up or they get you interested in things. That’s part of it.

That’s why it’s so essential that you’re not phoning it in the show. That’s why what you’re doing now, with this slower pace is right for your audience as well. You need to take your lead from that. I’m thrilled you’re going through this process the way that you are and you’ve been public about it. You went out there. Many people who podfade, never tell their audience. They never reach out. They don’t tell a community, which is how I found you. They don’t tell anyone else that they’re doing it. It’s like, “I’m quitting my show. I’m embarrassed about it.” No, you went out there and said this is right. I appreciate that for you bringing that on board to all of us podcasters to take a lead from you as well, Brodie.

Thank you and that part of the reason that I was willing to be transparent about it, not only because it’s part of my message is to do less than you’re humanly capable of you’ll like it is the fact that I didn’t see it as podfading. I saw it as an intentional choice to give myself permission to do it at my own pace that feels organic and right. I want everyone to feel that. I want us to all feel we’re in choice and that giving ourselves permission to do that especially after 2020.

We’re all likely handling more stress, more anxiety, more loneliness, more something, and maybe that’s not the case, but for certainly a lot of people I’m talking to you it is, but it’s giving ourselves that grace. When we can share that we give other people permission to be real too about their struggles and recognizing that anytime, even if it’s in alignment with who we are and even if we can intend to continue, maybe, especially if we intend to continue that we don’t have to be acting on everything that we believe in 24/7. There’s also this access of time.

That’s the next question I want to ask you. Now that you have a little bit more breathing room have you thought about ways to repurpose what you have? You have a giant show catalog with some great episodes in there that are old to you, but not old to the new people who’ve started following you or your new friends on Facebook. Have you thought about making sure that they have some more visibility?

I haven’t yet. That is more when I’m clear about why I would do that. When I’m clear as to what the why is then that would be a great question. I love the idea of repurposing content.

From a podcast strategist standpoint, I sit there and I look at what you’ve created, and I think, “I want to get my hands in there and move stuff around.” I want to create show spin-offs for you. That’s how I look at it because from my standpoint, you’ve created a beautiful catalog that didn’t get all the recognition that it should have as you grew it. It should be bigger than it is and there’s no reason for it not to. You shouldn’t have to do more new work. You could be reusing the stuff you already have. Off the top of my head ideas, you mentioned that people sometimes want to go through all your women empowerment episodes. You can have a separate feed for those that have a special page on your website that ties into some of your special products that are for that or special programs for that.

You could also create advertisements that run on the shows because I guarantee there’s a lot of programs you developed as virtual support for people that weren’t available in 2016 when you started the show, but there are episodes there that relate to the topics. How can you put past ads in? Admixing systems are one of our expertise here. By doing things like that there are some ways in which your community gets more nurtured by it, that it’s not more work. You’re being of more service to the listeners that are coming on still.

That seems brilliant.

Not to tell you that you need to work with me but the excitement of what you’ve built, that’s what I don’t want you to lose in this process. Sometimes people shut that door that you were talking about, they do a few new episodes and they move through it, but there is still this tug that they don’t realize that the listeners are tugging on the other side and knocking for you. You don’t see it, you miss it, because you think, “That’s old for me.” We don’t look at it as old, we look at is still a living thing, which it is in the podcasting world then we have a better opportunity to actually be open to some things that actually give us the why for now for us and give that audience that’s still there and we honor them in that process.

I love that idea. As soon as there’s a bandwidth that sounds like an excellent course of action.

You don’t need to do that now. This is something that I really want to say to people and I want you to hear this as well. You have a show that podfaded. You have a show that stopped. I had a show on 3D printing that I did in 2014 and I stopped it in 2019 at the beginning of the year. A year later, I got asked to do a segment for HP and we did 25 episodes for Hewlett Packard. I came back and I did it because it served the community that I loved so much. It did regenerate a lot of listenership. It re-energized that for us. At the same time, I also realized now that I did this thing, I don’t need to keep doing it. It’s not for me. That’s not my community. It’s not why I’m here, but doing that part of it was like a final give back for me. It gave me the closure that I didn’t have.

Creating a body of work, allowing it to be available, and allowing it to be available again to a new audience and then realizing, “That chapter. It’s okay to close it.”

Sometimes that’s what we need to do. We need that final closure piece. That may be something that you end up finding. You find that this is the final closure point. This is what I needed to do, this event or the series of podcasts that now feels capped for me. That might be that too. You’ve given yourself space to search for that. I would love for you to give our audience a piece of advice, especially the professionals out there, the doctors and the health care and those that are building practices from it. What is your advice for them on how they should explore starting a podcast whether or not they should start podcasting?

Like anything, it’s connecting with why. How and why does this serve you? Who are you trying to reach? How could it serve them? It’s getting really clear on that because it’s a noisy world out there. Everyone has their own valid take.

Everyone should be a podcaster.

Process Of Podfading: If your audience resonates with you, they’re likely to resonate with some things that fire you up or get you interested in something.

I remember Pat Flynn. There was a talk that he gave and the punch line was, “There are no unique messages, only unique messengers.” I loved that quote because it was the kind of thing where it’s like, “My voice is valuable, too.” Making sure that you have a clear, who is this for and why do I want to do it? Because there’s plenty of especially the same guests going on different shows and having the same conversation. It’s like, “Why add to the noise? Why should someone tune into your show, as opposed to the 100 others out there that are talking about the same thing?”

In that process of figuring out your why and also getting clear as to what makes your show and your perspective unique that can also amplify your confidence and your desire to do it because you’re also in touch with the service that you’re going to provide the people. Maybe they could get the information somewhere, but they’re not getting your perspective or they’re not getting whatever it is your special sauce on it. If confidence is an issue, especially that getting your ego out of the way because it’s about your message. It’s about who you’re trying to reach and it’s your mission.

Brodie, thank you so much for coming on the show. I appreciate your honesty and your ability to give insight, share and give us a little taste of what it’s like to listen to your show too.

It’s been a pleasure talking to you, Tracy. I appreciate the insights that you have about working smarter not harder with my show. That authenticity of it being real and sharing is one reason that my audience likes to listen to me and it’s part of my superpower in the world. It’s feeling like I can be real in a world of Instagram, whitewashing, and image. You don’t have to buy into that. It’s not a prerequisite to showing up and doing the work.

A Healthy Curiosity, you’re going to want to check that out. Thank you again, Brodie.

Thank you so much.

—

I told you that was going to be interesting. I told you about her openness about sharing what she did. My favorite part about what she’s done on the show right when she ended it and what she’s done in the first new episode since she took a slower pace to her show, is there’s a little bit more rawness to her authenticity. She was always authentically her before. As you read from her interview with me, she’s got this beautiful tone and pace to how she thinks and how she does that without notes and all of those things. It’s truly a great podcasting tone, style and voice that she’s got going there.

She brings all of that together, but she’s doing that now with this little bit of rawness to how she’s showing up in the world. A little more sharing of who she is. In doing that, she’s going to find herself creating a more popular show than she had even before. This is going to be an interesting stage for her to find meaning. I hope she does because the last thing we want is to have a voice like Brodie’s silence. I want her to ask the great questions. I want her to explore and where her mind goes, what she’s reading. I want to know more about that. That’s what’s so beautiful about a healthy curiosity in what she’s created. She’s given herself the openness in this show, in terms of its topic base, her experiences, and her expertise areas to be able to blend them so well together and shift the show as she goes around.

There’s a shift in place. She may not see it yet and that’s okay. She needs to take her time. She needs to take that pause and move through that but I see a brilliant shift coming for her, where she’s going to find the next voice the next way she wants to show up. I want to hear it. The only way you’re going to do that though is to subscribe to the show. You’re going to need to subscribe to A Healthy Curiosity. Check out Brodie Welch’s episodes, her style, and what she’s doing there, and be sure to share it with other people who you think can benefit from it. Because a truly good podcast doesn’t matter what stage it is, and whether it’s a start, or it’s in a podfade slow pause stage deserves good listeners. That only comes as you know if you’re trying to grow your own show from you sharing it with people who need it.

Please do that for Brodie. You can find all the information about her at TheBingeFactor.com. Also, don’t forget that there’s always a follow-up article in Authority Magazine and there should be some BuzzFeed articles coming out soon so you’ll be able to check those out. Thanks, everyone for reading. If you think you belong on The Binge Factor, don’t forget you know where to find me. I’ll be back next time with another great podcaster, another great angle and discussion about how podcasting can grow your business, you, and help you find meaning and help you serve in the world.

Important Links:

• A Healthy Curiosity – Facebook
• Brodie Welch – Facebook
• Brodie Welch – LinkedIn
• Brodie Welch – Instagram
• She Podcasts – Facebook group
• A Healthy Curiosity
• Life in Balance Acupuncture
• Instagram – The Binge Factor
• Episode 220 – Q+A – 5 Elements for Personal Growth & Getting out of the Way
• Episode 221 – Momentum, Inertia, and Self-Kindness – Lessons from Winter
• Tenisha Dandridge
• TheBingeFactor.com
• Authority Magazine

Love the show? Subscribe, rate, review, and share!

• Here’s How »

Join the Binge Factor community today:

• Facebook
• Instagram
• LinkedIn
• Pinterest
• Youtube