62. How to Fill Content Gaps Without Interviews - Podcasting Tips for Solo Episodes and Expert Positioning

Are you wondering how to keep your podcast content schedule full if you reduce or stop doing interviews like I suggested in Episode 60? Today, I'm sharing podcasting strategies for creating solo content, as well as an alternative style of episode that’s not just you delivering a monologue.  Tune in to find out how to position yourself as the expert that your audience wants to learn from week after week!

Mentioned in this episode:
Episode 60 - Why You Should [Probably] Stop Doing Interviews On Your Show…Podcasting Hot Take!

This episode was produced by me, The Podcast Teacher™! Contact me at Hello@ThePodcastTeacher.com.

Transcript

Hey. Hey. And welcome back. Today, we're talking about how to fill the gaps in your podcast content schedule if you decide to stop or reduce doing interviews on your podcast. In last week's episode, I shared why doing interviews on your podcast may not be the greatest idea, and I recommended a 3 to 1 content ratio of positioning yourself as the expert 3 times as often as you interview someone else as the expert. If you haven't had a chance to listen to that episode yet, you might wanna go back and check it out. It's a good one. Episode 60.

Okay. So if you bought into my idea of reducing the number of interviews on your podcast, your next question was probably, well, what do I do instead? And so I hear you. Today, I'm gonna give you some strategies for creating solo content as well as an alternative style of episode that's not just you delivering a monologue. So let's start off with those solo episodes. I know it can be intimidating to turn on the mic and deliver a monologue into a microphone. If you are nervous about it and you tend to ramble or go on tangents when you're nervous, that's me, I suggest using a script or a detailed outline to help keep you on track. Think of your solo episodes like mini lessons. What can you teach your audience within an episode? And solo episodes don't have to be long.

Something that's only about 10 minutes is totally fine. My solo episodes here are pretty short and sweet, and I get really positive feedback about that. Alright. So what are you supposed to talk about in these solo episodes? I said a moment ago that you can think of these like mini lessons. So what does your audience want to learn? If you're not sure, ask them. Pull your email list or your audience on social media. Sometimes you can be direct and ask them, what do you wanna hear about on the podcast? But you can also mix up the questions so that it doesn't get stale and you're not continually asking them the same thing. You can ask them what they're struggling with right now related to your topic.

You can ask them where they're stuck. You can ask them what's the next goal that they're working towards. A few other ideas, mindset issues are applicable to just about any topic. So you can incorporate some solo episodes focusing on mindset. You can also share your personal experiences. Maybe you give a recap and a summary of an event that you attended that's relevant to your audience. Maybe you talk about something that you're personally struggling with and how you're working through it. If you do that, just remember to frame your story in a way that benefits the listener, because a successful podcast always comes down to value to the listener.

You can also do case studies of clients or students. These are great to do right before or during a launch or a promo for a particular product or service that you offer. This kind of episode is basically you talking about someone else's success and highlighting your role in getting them there. It's most effective when you have data or some other type of tangible result to illustrate their success. You can do this as a solo episode, or you can bring the person onto the show with you, and you can discuss the process and the results together. This is what I did with my client, Lisa, in episode 50. Alright. Before we move on to talking about an alternative style of episode, let me tell you a little secret about your solo content.

You don't always need to come up with new ideas. You can talk about the same topics over and over again. For some reason, I find that a lot of podcasters think, here's an idea, but, oh, I've already done an episode on that. You can and should talk about topics more than once. As your podcast grows, you're going to accumulate new listeners who maybe weren't around back when you first talked about that topic the last time. And most people need to hear the same content multiple times before it really sinks in. Repetition is an actual component of teaching pedagogy, so talk about things over and over again. Once you've been posting for a while, look back at your previous episodes and see what you can revisit.

You are growing and learning as a leader in your field, and so you probably have new ideas and new insights about a topic that you talked about a year ago. Incorporate those new ideas, new insights, and create a brand new episode around that topic. Alright. Solo episodes are great, but another way to position yourself as the expert on your podcast is to do coaching style episodes. I learned about these coaching style episodes from my mentor, Adam Scheible, so I wanna be sure to give him a shout out for the concept. A coaching style episode is where you bring someone onto your show and you help them with, you coach them through something related to your area of expertise. Even if you don't call yourself a coach per se, We all coach our clients. Right? You can think of it as mentoring or guiding or teaching if the word coaching freaks you out a bit.

But not only does a coaching style episode help to break up the solo content from time to time, but it's also the ultimate opportunity to position yourself as the expert. You're literally demonstrating your skills and knowledge and applying them to a real situation. You should be doing most of the talking during the session. You're giving advice, suggestions, you're problem solving, etcetera. Then you're airing this on your podcast and essentially saying, hey. This is what it looks like to work with me. This could be you in the coaching seat receiving support and making progress towards your goals. So you get on a call with someone, ask them where they're stuck right now in this moment, and then you help them through it.

You don't have to come up with a topic to cover like you do with a solo episode. The coaching guest will give you the topic by talking about where they're stuck, what their problem is. And if you're a planner like me, you can ask some questions in your scheduling intake form so that you can adequately plan for their topic. Now it's important to note that you're doing this for free, and it is a strictly no sales pitch zone. You're simply showing up and helping them. You're not asking anything of them except for the permission to air the conversation as an episode of your podcast, which should be a box that they check and agree to when setting up the call. Sometimes these folks may naturally turn into clients, but that's not the expectation here. A couple other important things to note when doing these types of calls.

1st, set a time limit. I recommend capping it at 20 or 30 minutes. This is to help set a boundary for a free opportunity, and also to keep it within an easy listening length when you air it on your show. When you first start offering them, it's going to be crickets. No one's going to know what this is or how it works, and it's going to take some time to get cold volunteers. So start by reaching out to some current or past clients and ask them if they'll do this with you. Put out the offer on your email list and on social media, as well as talk about the opportunity routinely on your podcast. Give it time and persevere.

And finally, give the call a fun name. I call mine podcast optimization plans or POP calls. Schedule a free call with me to talk about how we can make your podcast POP. By the way, if you would like to sign up for one of these calls, you can do so by going to the podcastteacher.com/pop. Alright. So there you have it. I talked about some strategies to help you with solo episodes and introduce the idea of coaching style episodes, so that you can reduce or stop doing interviews on your podcast and still have plenty of content and position yourself as the expert. 

Until next time, happy podcasting.