How to Leverage Podcast Guesting with Jessica Rhodes, Founder of Interview Connections
About this episode:
I'm so excited to have Jessica Rhodes, founder of Interview Connections, and entrepreneur for eight years. In this episode, you will hear her story about how motherhood drew her to entrepreneurial paths, and what her company’s strategy is for booking the right fit guests to various podcast hosts. She is also sharing a few tips on how to be a great guest on a podcast show, and also how to find and live your joy.
Topics Discussed:
How she became an entrepreneur
Insights on how their booking team is working to create the perfect match between their guests and podcasts hosts
What is her Business Coaching Program, how she has developed a team to be experts in their strategy
Why listener trust is important
How to be a great guest on a podcast show.
How she found and live her joy
About Jackie:
Jessica Rhodes is the leading expert on how to leverage podcast guesting for increased brand awareness, more leads and higher profits. She created the podcast booking industry in 2013 when she founded Interview Connections, the first and leading agency of its kind.
Along with her business partner, Margy Feldhuhn, Jessica has quickly scaled Interview Connections to over $1M in annual revenue with nearly no direct marketing or advertising. Their team of in house Booking Agents are the podcast powerhouses behind many successful entrepreneurs and businesses including Ali Brown, Perry Marshall, Aweber, USA Financial and more.
Jessica has done hundreds of podcast interviews both as a guest, and co-host of Rock the Podcast. She is the acclaimed author of Interview Connections: How to #RockThePodcast From Both Sides of the Mic and has been a featured speaker at Podfest Multimedia Expo and FinCon.
Also an active member of her community, Jessica volunteers at her son’s public school, and mentors a 17-year-old girl in foster care. She lives in Rhode Island with her husband, two kids, Nathan and Lucy, and senior cat, Kitten.
Resources:
Click here to read a raw, unedited transcript of this episode:
Melanie Barr Thank you so much for joining me today, Jessica. [00:05:55][15.7]
Jessica Rhodes[00:05:56] I'm so excited to be here. [00:05:57][1.0]
Melanie Barr[00:05:58] Please tell us who you are and what gave you the idea and the courage to make your leap to launch Interview Connections. [00:06:04][5.6]
Jessica Rhodes[00:06:05] I am the founder of Interview Connections, I have been an entrepreneur for eight years, and what gave me the courage to start my business and become a self-employed entrepreneur was being a mom. I worked for a nonprofit organization and when I got pregnant, I was like, I'm going to be home. And I really didn't know what other job I would take because I knew I wanted to be home. My dad is an entrepreneur. He has a business coaching company, and he said, why don't you be a virtual assistant? I've just been working at this nonprofit for six years became director of the office that I was in. So it was nonprofit, but essentially kind of climbing that ladder. And then the idea of being a virtual assistant, I was like, Oh, but when you become a mom, you're like, Well, this is not really about me anymore, right? So you do what is going to allow your motherhood dreams to come true? So I said, Sure, I'll do that. And it took me not very much time to realize, I'm an entrepreneur. I read Carrie Wilkerson's book The Bear. I think it's called the Barefoot Executive, but that just opened my eyes to the business possibilities and potential of having my own business and being a mom and being home and not missing out. So it was really my motivation to be the best mom that I could be. That said, OK, I can do this. [00:07:44][98.8]
Melanie Barr[00:07:45] I think that's a time and a lot of women's lives where they stop and think, OK, what do I really want in my life and what do I want to do and what do I want to build? And what do I want to create? Because I had that moment where all of a sudden having kids and having a baby slowed me down. It made me stop and sit because you're sitting with this being and the beings not talking to you and you love it. But there's no conversation happening. So it's for me, it gives you a lot of time to really think and put things into perspective. [00:08:13][28.2]
Jessica Rhodes[00:08:14] I love it. I don't know what it's like to be an entrepreneur without kids because having kids is what got me to start my business. It's always been with little ones. My kids are six and eight years old now, but I'm so thankful for that because I am a high achiever. I set really high goals. I go for them. I don't stop, but they force me to stop. Like they really keep me grounded and allow me to be present. They keep. I'm not always good at it, but they do remind me just by being here that, OK, there's more to life than this business. [00:08:54][39.8]
Melanie Barr[00:08:55] And they also bring in the humor, too. My kids are my twins are about to turn eight. So around the same age and they just say the funniest things and kind of pop you out of your day. [00:09:03][8.2]
Jessica Rhodes[00:09:04] Yeah, yeah. And I love it. I love, you know, trying to share with them what I'm doing. I love asking them what they think I do. [00:09:12][7.9]
Jessica Rhodes[00:09:13] They're like you podcast. [00:09:14][0.6]
Melanie Barr[00:09:17] I love it. So they might grab your microphone. Mine grabbed my microphone. Sometimes you know their own show. [00:09:23][5.4]
Jessica Rhodes[00:09:23] I was about to record our podcast yesterday, and I'm sitting down and I'm like, Oh, wait a second. My microphone was over on the couch because Lucy will take it and she'll play with it. And they just start unscrewing it. I'm like, No, no, no. [00:09:36][12.1]
Melanie Barr[00:09:37] I need that to work the next time I got to do something. Exactly what are the services that you offer? And if you could turn back time, what is one thing that you wish you would have known when you started your business and why? [00:09:49][12.5]
Jessica Rhodes[00:09:50] We offer a service where we book entrepreneurs as guests on podcasts and we provide all this strategy and support they need to monetize the mic. We saw that there was a big need in the podcast booking space that wasn't just podcast booking, but also how to monetize how to make sure that the interviews people are doing are leading to revenue, leading to leads, and are worth the entrepreneur's time. So we've crafted our services to fill that gap. We also do business coaching, so we launched a business coaching and mastermind program as well. My business partner, Morgan, I have scaled our business to multi seven figures with over 20 employees, so we like to take all of our lessons learned and help other entrepreneurs who are scaling their service-based businesses learn from us. And if I could go back in time. I think to pinpoint it, I wish I knew way early on that having in-house full-time employees is the key to achieving freedom in your business. I did switch over. I built a team of contractors and virtual assistants for many years and then switched over to having employees in 2017. And as most entrepreneurs can probably relate to, there was that fear of like I have for payroll. Do I need benefits? Do I understand the world of being an employer? I know I'm a good business owner. I'm good at sales and marketing and doing this service. But can I be an employer? And if I could go back in time and knowing what I know now, it's actually not that scary. There's plenty of people and experts and service providers, from accountants to H.R. consultants, payroll services that are there to help you with all the things you don't know how to do. And having full time employees has been the greatest thing for our business. [00:11:56][125.4]
Melanie Barr[00:11:57] That's such good advice because you can think, Oh, I should probably be doing some of these things myself, but. You should get out from underneath them so that you can do the things in your business that bring you joy and the drive revenue and the drive profit. But you're right, it can be scary to make that leap as far as payroll. Yeah, and moving forward. [00:12:16][19.7]
Jessica Rhodes[00:12:18] Yeah. And what I found, because with contractors, they're typically charging a much higher hourly rate than an employee because you're not covering any of their taxes, you're not paying them,you're not giving them any benefit. So I mean, a virtual assistant could be 50, 80, 100 dollars an hour because they're specialized. And so I had I think at our peak, we had 12, 10, 99 contractors that were all, you know, sending their hourly their invoices at the end of each month. So what we found was it was actually more expensive than having a full-time employee who I could control the hours they worked. I was in control of the results that they were producing and we were able to improve the quality of the service because I could be in control of how they were delivering the service versus just sending me an invoice for getting a certain number of bookings, which is what it looked like before we had employees. [00:13:07][49.6]
Melanie Barr[00:13:09] You mentioned that you have an in-house team that doesn't just book guests on any podcast, but they specifically target for the right fit. Tell us about your strategy for managing your team and why is that important to you? [00:13:20][11.2]
Jessica Rhodes[00:13:21] Yeah. So our strategy for managing our team is we really develop our team to be experts in this strategy. And that's part of why we wanted to have employees is we want to make sure our team and our booking agents and our show researchers and our client care reps really understand the whole approach that they're not just people on a, you know, a line just kind of delivering one thing. They can talk intelligently about the whole strategy and the programs. So when we hire a booking agent, they go into a 30 day boot camp where they're learning all the ins and outs of the business, the strategy, how we do what we do, why we do what we do, who were the clients we work with, what are their goals, what are their needs? What are their pain points? How do we solve all that? So before a booking agent that we hire really does any of the work, they're going through a lot of training in that first month. And then we are meeting with our team. Every team has a daily meeting. They're doing pay check ins with their leads, they're doing one on ones and trainings with their team leader. So there's a lot of effort and work that goes into developing our team members. So then they can deliver an amazing service to our clients. [00:14:34][73.1]
Melanie Barr[00:14:36] You have sent me some guests and I get so many emails every day about potential guests for the podcast. And I know when I open up Interview Connections, 99% of the time, it's someone that I want to have on the show. [00:14:50][14.6]
Jessica Rhodes[00:14:51] I'm so happy to hear that. [00:14:52][1.1]
Melanie Barr[00:14:53] So what you're saying is really it's really happening. [00:14:55][2.5]
Jessica Rhodes[00:14:56] Yeah, we have a lot of systems on the backend that allow us to pitch the right guests to the right hosts. I'm sure, you know, we've probably asked you, what types of guests are you looking for? And that's something that we do regularly is, of course, we'll find shows and look at who they're interviewing and the topic of the show and pitch people. But we also are every single day reaching out to host, just asking Who are you looking for? And then host, say, I'm looking for these type of guest. And then all of our booking agents come together like, I have this person, I have this person and we like hand-select and send a customized list of people that we think are a good fit. Rather than saying, here's all of our clients, and then you have to do all that work to figure out who's the right fit. [00:15:38][41.5]
Melanie Barr[00:15:38] Right, that's really smart. It makes it so much easier on the host. And then when the host sees your emails, they think, Oh, who are they sending our way today? Which makes it so much easier for the guest and the host? [00:15:48][10.2]
Jessica Rhodes[00:15:49] Yes, exactly. Yeah. [00:15:50][1.1]
Melanie Barr[00:15:52] To you, how does being a podcast guest or host amplify someone's business message and story? [00:15:58][5.8]
Jessica Rhodes[00:16:00] Yeah, so the biggest way that being a podcast guest and host amplifies their message is people are able to feel a sense of connection with the person that they're hearing. When you follow someone on social media, I like to say it's sort of two dimensional. You're seeing their pictures, you're seeing what they're writing. Maybe you can even see a little 15 second clip if they're doing an Instagram Story and videos are great not bashing videos, that's an amazing way to establish that connection. But there's nothing quite like listening to a full 45-minute, 30-minute conversation between a host and a guest, for the listener if they subscribe to that show. You know, for your listeners that are listening to all of your episodes, they have very high trust in you. They know that you're not going to bring someone on the podcast that you don't believe in, that you don't think is a trusted resource for that person's expertize. My exposure here to all of your listeners is that much more effective as opposed to just them finding me on Google and being like, Let me evaluate this person. So you have that tacit endorsement from the host. You have that trust already built-in and people are listening in their earbuds, in their car, they're really consuming the content long-form, which they get so much more information than just something that's in a really short form. [00:17:23][83.0]
Melanie Barr[00:17:24] It's so great that you can get to know someone's story and you want to buy from someone. Honestly, once you know who they are and you trust them and you know more about them. [00:17:34][10.1]
Jessica Rhodes[00:17:34] Yeah, I like that too. That with podcasts, you really get to share your story and share your background. And just like in this interview, being able to share that, you know, I worked for a nonprofit and I'm my mom and all of that, that's not information that's necessarily in my marketing collateral. But for somebody, hear me on a podcast and hear that aspect of my story, if it's a mom or a dad like, they'll feel more of a sense of connection. Knowing that I value being with my kids. Like, it's those little things that people want to do business with people that they aligned with value wise. And so podcasts are the perfect place to share that. [00:18:15][40.1]
Melanie Barr[00:18:20] What is one thing that your business has done for your clients that you didn't realize would happen? [00:18:24][4.1]
Jessica Rhodes[00:18:26] So the first story that popped into my mind, we have a client named Jyotsna. And after about six to nine months into her contract with us, we were asking her like, How's it been going? What type of results are you seeing? And she goes, she has an agency style business and she goes, I'm actually learning so much being your client and I've had multiple clients say this. They're like, Oh, I love your onboarding. What form and what automation are you using? That brings me to the contract that gets me the welcome email. So that's been really cool because we have spent so much time and money and effort, with the systems of actually how to deliver a done for you service and improve the client experience. And so I love when clients say Oh, I'm actually learning from you just by being your client, like going through the experience of how you schedule the calls with all of that. So that's been really fun because yes, we have a business coaching program. They can invest in our business coaching, but just by being a client of our agency, they're learning about how we run the business, which is cool. [00:19:28][62.3]
Melanie Barr[00:19:29] So I love that story and I love that you mentioned her because I am actually now a client of hers.
Jessica Rhodes: Oh my God, I love that.
Melanie Barr: So it's really working. Yeah, I will. I am just starting the process and I can let you know how it goes. [00:19:44][15.1]
Jessica Rhodes[00:19:44] Oh my god, amazing. I'm so happy to hear that. [00:19:47][2.3]
Melanie Barr[00:19:47] Yeah. [00:19:47][0.0]
Jessica Rhodes[00:19:48] Happy self-publishing. Yeah, it's like, yes. [00:19:50][2.0]
Melanie Barr[00:19:52] What are a few tips that you can give us for having a good podcast interview as a guest or being an incredible host if you have a podcast? [00:20:00][7.5]
Jessica Rhodes[00:20:01] Yeah. So OK, so let's talk. I'll give you a couple of tips on how to be a great guest. So the first thing is what you're doing before the interview. Get yourself centered. So to really give a good podcast interview, you have to be present. You have to be able to sink into the conversation. You have to be listening. And as business owners were in different modes throughout the day in my day today, I've had meetings with the team. I've had calls with my coach those are different sides of my brain. I would say that I'm using different energy levels so that 30 minutes before this interview, I went outside. I have chickens, I'm watching them. I'm like, I had to get my self centered because if I'm going to show up and give a great interview, I can't be rushing from my team meeting into this. So that's number one. Make sure you have time in your calendar to be centered and present so you can show up and be your best. The other thing would be just sharing stories, make sure you're dropping people into moments you're sharing about yourself. Sometimes there can be a lack of confidence or people just want to, like, give the best answers and tips and all of that. But share about yourself share your personality. And lastly. Know when to end your answer. And this comes with practice you don't want to ramble on so long. But you also don't want to give answers that are super short because the host is going to be like, I need 50 questions just to fill this interview. So just make sure that you know when you've given enough information and then pause and let the host jump in. [00:21:44][103.3]
Melanie Barr[00:21:45] So speaking of getting to know you, you mentioned you have chickens. [00:21:47][2.1]
Jessica Rhodes[00:21:48] I do. Oh my gosh. I, OK. So I moved here to North Smithfield, Rhode Island, in June.We lived in the city, in Providence, and we just totally turned our life around, left the city life to essentially have a little farm. We have three cats. We have five chickens. I had a foster dog for about a month and I love it. I love it so much. We want to get goats were thinking about where are we going to put more livestock? So I love it. It's so meditative to have chickens and we get their eggs every day and they're so fun. And yeah, they [00:22:26][37.8]
Melanie Barr[00:22:26] Fresh eggs would be amazing and the space, right? We are so busy in your business and we're also connected virtually that having the space when you're done with all that has to be amazing. [00:22:37][11.5]
Jessica Rhodes[00:22:38] Yeah. It's very grounding and it's it's helped me so much, just mentally and emotionally and physically. It's great. So I highly recommend chickens. [00:22:54][15.3]
Melanie Barr[00:22:55] I love it. Our family fell in love with Heartland. It's the story of a Horse Whisperer through COVID because it was something we could watch as a family. My seven-year-old twins could watch it too. And some horses and just so much nature. And I think it was a happy positive story. We needed something happy and positive because so much was not happy and positive and there was so little, you know, too much togetherness at times. I know people either went one way or they didn't see anyone, but we had a little too much togetherness at times. But seeing the show and the horses just really helped us through that time. So I see happier where you are. It's probably so nice. [00:23:35][39.8]
Jessica Rhodes[00:23:35] Yeah, yeah, definitely. I'm so grateful. [00:23:37][1.5]
Melanie Barr[00:23:39] Magic happens when we focus on the part of ourselves and our business that brings us joy is one tip that you can leave with us today about how you find and live your joy. [00:23:46][7.6]
Jessica Rhodes[00:23:49] My tip is to do the thing that you have been thinking about doing but haven't done because you don't feel like it's important enough or you don't have time for it. And I'm going to give you an example because I have done this. So I have been thinking for years I should take a dance class. I did musical theater when I was a kid, took dance class when I was in high school because I was doing musical theater and I thought I wanted to go to college for theater. But I just loved learning how to dance and I'm thirty-three. So for the last 10, 15 years, I'm like, I should get by actually dance. I've been thinking about it forever. And finally, the dance studio that my daughter goes to now posted that they are doing an adult tap dance class. And I was like, I'm going to do it. I need to stop thinking. I never would prioritize my own hobbies. I'm a mom. I'm a business owner. Like, I don't have time for hobbies, you know? So I stopped it. I signed up and I got to tell you my two classes. I'm having the most fun. I'm having so much fun. So do you find your inner child, that's where you're going to find the most joy. [00:24:57][67.8]
Melanie Barr[00:24:57] Yes, I am. I have fallen in love with Peloton. Cody Rigsby has the Mickey Mouse tattoo. He said it reminds him of his inner child and to not be so serious all the time. So I love what you're saying, and that you just made that leap to take that dance class because it's probably so freeing. So like nothing else you do during the day. [00:25:28][31.1]
Jessica Rhodes[00:25:30] It's totally like yesterday. My day was so packed. It's like a million things. And then I had my dance class at 7:00 last night and then. But when I stopped working at around five or whatever, I put on my tap shoes and I just practiced the twenty five second routine, it took me so long to figure just Brexit, but then actually getting it down. I felt so good. And I have to say I don't do Peloton, but I've gotten to know Cody Rigsby because I watched Dancing With the Stars, and he's on it right now. I don't know if you're watching it, but we're super into it here on the Roads House, so. [00:25:59][29.5]
Melanie Barr[00:26:00] Yes, and he is my favorite. He's so I'd love him. [00:26:03][3.1]
Jessica Rhodes[00:26:04] Yeah. And she has a podcast. His pro, Cheryl. She is a podcast where she debrief set. So I've been loving listening to that to [00:26:12][8.4]
Melanie Barr[00:26:13] have to check that out. I like it. I love Cody. He keeps making the workouts not boring. [00:26:17][4.2]
Jessica Rhodes[00:26:18] And he's so fun. I see his little videos on Tik Tok and stuff like that. People post like little clips of it. I think there's an account called like Peloton Mom and they were exposed to clubs, and they're so funny. [00:26:29][11.4]
Jessica Rhodes[00:26:40] Yeah, I really want to get a rower because I'm super into that. I'll use the concept to rower at the Y. So that's another tip. Like, find your workout thing and do it. [00:26:48][8.0]
Melanie Barr[00:26:48] Yes, as a mom, I struggled for so long I couldn't get consistent. And then finally, with Peloton, I'm like, OK, I could do anything for 20 minutes. I scroll in my phone for 20 minutes and I started with that because I ran marathons before having the kids and then after the kids, I couldn't get consistent. And now I'm up to doing forty five minutes a day and right, [00:27:07][18.1]
Jessica Rhodes[00:27:07] so I'm like that with the rower. Every day, I'm like, OK, I'm going to add a minute. Every time I do it, I add a minute. And even if it's a bad day and I'm like, I do five, it's such a good full-body workout in that short amount of time that I still feel good about it. [00:27:20][12.9]
Melanie Barr[00:27:21] Yeah, I was just going to say, that's a total that's a full-body so I see why I see why the rowing would be good. [00:27:26][5.2]
Jessica Rhodes[00:27:26] Yeah, yeah.
Melanie Barr[00:27:28] Thank you so much for joining me today, Jessica. This has been such a fun and inspiring conversation. Love the business that you have built and are continuing to build and grow. Can you please tell our listeners how and where they can find you? [00:27:41][12.3]
Jessica Rhodes[00:27:42] Yeah, so we have, If you're interested in podcast guessing, we have free training on our monetize the three part framework and that is at monetizethemictraining.com, so monetizethemictraining.com and you can apply to get that free training out. So it's for entrepreneurs that want to learn how to monetize their podcast interviews so would love to see over there. At Interview Connections and you can find me Jessica Rhodes on any of the social platforms. I'm LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram. [00:28:13][31.6]
Melanie Barr[00:28:14] Great. Ok, we are done.