In partnership with
100 Genius Side Hustle Ideas
Don't wait. Sign up for The Hustle to unlock our side hustle database. Unlike generic "start a blog" advice, we've curated 100 actual business ideas with real earning potential, startup costs, and time requirements. Join 1.5M professionals getting smarter about business daily and launch your next money-making venture.
THE SCORECARD
Hey crew, this week the score card is resetting. More on why below.
List: 9,963
Open rate: 25.
Replies: 24
Dollars made: $7.68
I realized while writing this that I am teaching you to monetize with a podcast and this is not a podcast. Are you still interested in seeing how I monetize it? Or should I just focus on the teaching? Hit reply and let me know!
I switched from Kit to beehiiv this week. I was having a hard time designing things in there and I am very picky about how things look! So far, this is better. You’ll be able to see my development over time, I guess! More goodies to come soon, as well as maybe a paid section of the newsletter. You’ll still get the meat and potatoes for free, but perhaps there’s a side dish you’ll want as well!
THIS WEEK’S LESSON
Digital Products
One of the BIGGEST questions I am asked is, “How can I grow my audience?” And while this newsletter isn’t really about audience growth, today’s topic can be great for both growth AND monetization.
WHAT I DID: In 2013, after I did a few interviews for my Lady Business Radio, I wanted to grow my audience. So I changed my intake form. It had the typical requests, headshot, bio etc, but I had an idea. I added a question to the intake form.
“What’s one way you broke the typical business “rules” and came out on top anyway?”
The results from this question were absolute gold. I created a PDF entitled “20 Business Babes that Broke The Rules and Came Out on Top” and I ran a Facebook ad to the free download.
Business Babes was not as cringe then. But I digress.
The result? I increased my email list by 4,000 people.
Now, you can do the exact same thing with your intake form. Or, if you have a question that you ask every guest, consider making a fun download or quotebook with it. OR, if this advice is absolutely invaluable to your niche, charge for it. Make an e-book and charge anywhere from $7 to $47. Then, mention it on your podcast. You can also run an ad to it, but start out spending just a little and see if it works.
THE PLAYBOOK
Follow My Lead:
Add one question to your guest intake form. Make it something only your specific guests could answer well, and something a stranger would want the answer to. Mine was about breaking the rules. Yours might be about the worst advice they ever took, the tool they'd never give up, or the thing they'd do differently.
Ask it of every guest going forward, and go back and ask past guests too. Twenty answers is enough. A one-line email to old guests gets you most of the way there.
Package the answers. A PDF, a quotebook, a swipe file, a one-page cheat sheet. Put each guest's name and show next to their answer. They'll share it, which is free distribution you didn't have to ask for.
Decide: free or paid. Free if you want the list. Paid ($7 to $47) if the advice is the kind of thing your niche would actually buy. If you're not sure, go free first and watch how people react to it.
Put it everywhere you already talk. Mention it in the episode, in your show notes, in your email signature, in the pinned post. Free promotion before paid promotion, always.
Then test an ad, small. Start at $5 to $10 a day for a week. If your cost per email is under a dollar or two, spend more. If it's not, fix the download or the landing page before you spend another cent.
The point: you're already collecting something nobody else has. Guest answers, listener questions, DMs, poll results. That's a product sitting in your inbox. The only work left is packaging it.
AI PROMPT OF THE WEEK
ASK AI:
“I do a podcast about ______. Can you give me 10 ideas for irresistible freebies I can use to grow my audience?”
I hope this was helpful! I’m going to follow up on Thursday with some things that might help for this week. Hit reply with any questions.
Until next week,
Jess