How B2B Podcasts Grow Up: Your Secret Weapon for Real Business Impact

Lindsay Tjepkema: Stage five is all about impact, and now that we've covered the why, it's time for the how. In this episode we're diving into how you can amplify your podcast content. And trust me when I say we are getting very, very tactical in this one. I'm Lindsay Tjepkema, a lifelong marketer and proud CEO and Co- Founder of Casted, the B2B marketing platform for brand podcasters, and I've teamed up with experts across the top sales and marketing teams in the world to detail each of the five stages of this maturity curve, and what you can do to launch and grow a show with confidence. This is How B2B Podcasts Grow Up, an original series from Casted. In stage five, what really sets these shows apart from earlier stages is the mindset. It's not about the show anymore and it's not just about the brand. Stage five podcasts are constantly asking the question, " How is this impacting the business?" We saw this from Zylo in our last episode and they had clear focus on how they could amplify the podcast content for more impact on their internal and external teams, all leading to more ROI. Now, let's revisit something that the Zylo team brought up the last episode, but take it even more tactical. Remember Meredith sharing how they were enabling their sales team with relevant clips from the podcast? Well, they're not the only ones seeing real business impact from this strategy in stage five. Tim Glomb from Cheetah Digital shares a similar philosophy, except they're taking it one step further. Now, I'm going to put a disclaimer out there on this because I don't want you thinking that I'm turning this episode into a sales pitch, but Tim is going to share how his team is using Casted to enable their reps to apply this strategy at scale. Now, you don't need Casted to do this, but honestly our platform does make it a whole lot easier. It's what it's made to do. That's the whole reason we exist. So listen in to hear from Tim on how his team is taking this amplification strategy to the next level. And regardless of whether or not you use Casted, this playbook is one you're definitely going to want to copy.

Tim Glomb: I have a huge sales team. I'm multilingual. We're in eight different languages. We're everywhere. So being able to get the sales team what they need in the moment where they need it, that has been the most effective and best use of our time. And I got to say, it's the secret sauce of Casted, makes it incredibly easy for my team to make tiny, tiny video snippets that... We have thousands of them, literally thousands. So to enable a sales team to not bug me, or not have to go to somebody say, " Hey, do we have anything on emotional loyalty?" And have this platform where they can just go in and find it. And we scale that out to even our Asana and our digital asset management tools. They can go in where they need it, they can find what they need, where they need it, and get it off to continue that conversation. That's probably the most impressive thing that we've pulled off in the last two years. It was tough to get there, to get everyone to buy in and everyone to use it. It's that trickle down. Three people make video and now roughly over a 150 people can enable it at any given moment.

Lindsay Tjepkema: That's fantastic. And to pull it all together, what advice would you have for somebody who sees what you're doing and wants to get there, but they're like, " It's overwhelming." It can seem like a lot. What would you say?

Tim Glomb: Yeah, you just got to start. That's not an excuse, especially going into recession, your budget's going to go down, your targets are going to get tougher. Hunker down and just do it. It differentiates. It's fairly easy to do. It might be overwhelming because you haven't done it before, but it's like riding a bike. Once you figure it out, you're going to get addicted to it and you're going to put more resources into it. So don't let any excuse get in the way, just try it. And look, if you're failing, call somebody. There's people who can help you, get you off the ground in the first three months, so that you get to your own sustainable path to do it in- house, or just contracting out of house. Put a deadline, once a week, you're going to film something. See what happens, but make it meaningful and promote it. Don't just put it on a shelf either. That's a big part of it.

Lindsay Tjepkema: And start by asking how it could impact the business. Turning their podcast into a sales enablement machine. Man, I cannot tell you how excited I was to hear the impact that Tim and his team have been creating, just by utilizing Casted in this way. But this amplification use case is, believe it or not, just the beginning of the impact that their team is creating.

Tim Glomb: The beauty of Casted, that's turned one single 20- minute or maybe a 30- minute webinar into these slippery takeaways that now are subsets of that conversation, so that's where we're measuring the impact. And I know it's working because I've got a global sales team selling seven products from Tony's Pizza Place who swipes a credit card online to start an email marketing list, to Starbucks, largest technology company on the planet I think, they're amazing. So for us to be able to empower and enable that sales team, and when they say, " Oh man, I just had a great conversation with a prospect, they wanted to know our take on emotional loyalty and is that the future of loyalty programs?" And they can go into Casted and search that term, quotes, whatever, Boolean logic, emotional loyalty, and find 15 or more one to two minute clips, not sending somebody to a 30- minute webinar. So now I know it's working, because my sales team are in the tool and sending out these personalized emails and follow- ups with awesome video content. It differentiates, it looks beautiful, and it's usually an expert. So the sales team is using it, that's how I know it works, because salespeople don't do things that don't work. They're coin- operated, they want to make money. Two, we have a lot of metrics tied into, particularly we use Salesforce, so getting that information of who is actually watching, who's coming to our site, and the Casted player being able to give us that granularity of this person watched this episode, or visited on this day. That's just another signal that the sales development team has at their disposal. Does it work? I talked about a hotel chain finding us. Same thing. A good friend of mine, TGI Fridays, she's the Chief Revenue Officer, same exact thing, hadn't talked to her in 10 years, said, " Why are you all over my LinkedIn feed with these crazy videos? Hey, we should talk." She watched a couple. I sent her some more because she was going into a new role. She's like, " This is great. Get me in touch with whoever I need to talk to at your company." Now she knew me and I could have fast tracked all that, but it was easy for me to say, " Hey, just go watch these videos and these snippets. This is how we feel about this. This is where we're going and why we're building our tool to get over this particular hurdle." And she's like, " That's exactly my problem. Who do I need to talk to?" So video was that first touch. It was that top of the funnel that got her in, and now they're a client. TGI Fridays is a client, they've onboarded and the rest is history. So that's a pretty big contract for us.

Lindsay Tjepkema: Podcast content turning into intent data. Yes, you heard that correctly. Tim and his team are using snippets of their video podcast content to one, support top of funnel conversations, two, determine their intent to purchase based on how much of the content they actually consumed. Seriously, your podcast, your little show that you started just as a brand play, is now turning into insanely valuable intent data that is helping you close deals. Let me say that again. Your podcast is helping you close deals. This is the power of stage five podcasting. The data piece always gets me so excited. This is why I love sharing stories like Tim's. Let's hear more from Zylo's team on how they're turning their podcast too into real revenue impact. Here's Meredith

Meredith: Revenue is where the rubber meets the road, and we are still fairly new in our journey in the sense that it feels like it's three years, but literally it was May when we launched our first episode. And then I think the snowball effect took into place of SaaSMe, the conference, and our webinars, and our talking head videos, and all the additional ways we have been able to use Casted. Really being able to see sales qualified opportunities and closed one business in Q3, appearing in the insights platform, knowing that the podcast in our audio and video content was a part of that was incredible. I will say that at a high level, we set a record as a business the first half of this year for revenue, and then beat that number by 30% in Q3 and SaaSMe Unfiltered, SaaSMe the conference. All these things that we've been doing are a part of that. It's a huge win for our entire team at Zylo, from our customer success team to marketing, to sales and product. But definitely what we've been doing with the amplification of our content is a huge, huge part of that.

Lindsay Tjepkema: Now is revenue the most obvious impact that we can be making that will keep a C- suite happy? I'd argue yes. It's definitely one that will keep everyone happy with little explanation, but is it really the only business impact that you can make? No, absolutely not. Of course not. Meredith reminds us of that right here.

Meredith: For us, taking this approach and being thoughtful about this strategy was definitely a shift in thinking. So I think there is that element of making sure that the team is bought in. It's not our sole concern of how many email addresses we captured this quarter and how many of them turned into MQLs, and that is a shift for some businesses and some marketing teams. So I think that really thinking about that, how can you educate and get the rest of the team and the company bought into that, and your executive team, is really important. But just like the question we were just talking about, is being very clear with your goals. What do you really want this program to serve? It may not be revenue, that may not be what you're trying to make an impact on, and you want to make sure that the goals that you're really striving for align to what your strategy and what you really want the outcomes to be.

Lindsay Tjepkema: Company education and buy-in is a never-ending process, and it's why we've brought it up in almost every single stage of this maturity curve. You will always have rotating stakeholders, you will always have changing business priorities. And in order to really prove impact from your podcast, you'll need to constantly keep educating your team on the impact your podcast is creating. And guess what? That impact will likely change over time. That's why it's so important to keep an eye on the data that you're capturing around the podcast. Who's listening? What is resonating? How many pieces of content are being amplified internally? And how are those pieces of content performing? All of this is precious data and it will inform your decisions as you continue to grow over time. Because if there's one huge takeaway from stage five that Nicole is actually going to sum up for us perfectly, it's that you're just getting started.

Nicole: It's a longer game for a longer time to return, and just stay committed, and stick through with it. The other would be just get creative. This is a chance to do new things and each season gives you an opportunity to do that.

Lindsay Tjepkema: From experimentation to amplification. This is How B2B Podcasts Grow Up, and by now you know that they definitely don't grow up on their own. You nurture them. You sprinkle your magic on every single episode. You create amazing guest experiences. You come up with new strategies. You amplify the content and you collect the data. You listen, you grow, you pivot, you relentlessly keep making it better. Now, I know you've heard me say it in literally every episode of this series, so say it with me this time, a podcast is never just a podcast, right? But I did leave a very crucial line out of that mantra. So here's the big reveal. It's never just a podcast. It's your secret weapon for real business impact. I cannot thank you enough for joining us for the How B2B Podcast Grow Up series. A huge thank you to Zylo and Cheetah Digital and their teams for amazing stage five insights, as well as all of the B2B podcast experts who have shared their wisdom throughout this series. If you missed any of the episodes, please go back and listen. Every single stage has such valuable insights that are honestly applicable to you no matter where you are on the podcast maturity curve. So speaking of, if you haven't gotten around to it, take the quick assessment to figure out where you fall on the curve. You can find that link on the show notes and whether you're in stage one or stage five, or anywhere in between, I'm so grateful that you have been brave enough to start a podcast, and that you want to grow it to new heights. You are so far ahead of the curve, pun intended, and it's going to do big things for your business. Your curiosity inspires me, and I cannot wait to see what sort of amazing business impact your podcast creates. I'm Lindsay Tjepkema and you can find me on Twitter @ CastedLindsay, on LinkedIn at Lindsay Tjepkema. And as always, you can find the latest and greatest B2B podcasting best practices over on the Casted podcast feed and at casted. us.