Hey crew! Told you Fridays were my love language. Here's where we're at:

Apparently telling you about my Medication Oopsie did more for my open rate than any subject line formula ever has. Noted. Honesty: 1, Marketing gurus: 0.

When most podcasters think about making money, they think ads. And ads need downloads. Lots of them. But we don’t need sponsors, remember?

A party doesn't need downloads. A party needs a room. And a small show with 40 listeners who adore you can fill a room (or a Zoom) a whole lot faster than a big show full of people who half-listen at 1.5x speed while folding laundry.

There are only three ways a party pays:

WHAT I DID: When Elsie and I put together a women's workshop the day before Podcast Movement, I didn't start with "how many tickets can we sell?" I started with "what is this going to cost us?"

Lunch for 80 women: about $1,200. Branded She Podcasts notebooks: about $850. Add it all up and we needed roughly $4,000. So that was my sponsorship goal.

Then I built four sponsor packages: $1,000, $750, $500, and $250. Each one went down in exposure as it went down in price. The top level got an audio ad, a full-page ad in the workshop booklet, a banner on our site, their logo on all the workshop graphics, and a dedicated email to our list. The bottom level got a lot less. I named them Supreme, Stupendous, Superb, and Super because I was in a hurry. You can do better. Or not! Nobody cared.

And who did I pitch first? Not big brands. Friends of the show. Women who had businesses that served podcasters. One could only afford the lowest level but really wanted an audio ad, so we added one for an extra $100. Another said she couldn't pay, but offered to promote the workshop to her audience instead. Both of those are wins.

Later, Elsie and I took that same thinking and scaled it into She Podcasts LIVE, where I raised $50,000 to get it off the ground and another $100,000 in sponsorship money. Same math. Bigger room.

(The full story of how we paid for that lunch is coming in a future issue. It's a good one.)

Here's the thing nobody tells you: an event is ad inventory. The program, the signs, the slides, the swag, the lunch, even the giveaways. Sponsors should pay for the privilege of giving your audience free stuff, because they're getting a room full of exactly the right people.

And it doesn't have to be in person. A live virtual recording, a Q&A, a workshop, a listener happy hour on Zoom. All parties. All sellable.

NaPodPoMo is coming up! See where podcasting can take you during the 30-day global podcast challenge. You basically post one thing a day for 30 days. Even if you don’t hit all 30 days, it’ll be just the workout you need to build those podcasting muscles.

Brand new to podcasting? This is just the push you need. Been at it a while? Try a little mini-series that compliments your work or start something on a completely different topic. I’ll be trying it for the first time with all new content - join me! Go to NaPodPoMo.com and find out more!

The point: you don't need more downloads to throw a party. You need people who like you in the same room, and a sponsor who wants to meet them.

Hit reply with the word PARTY and tell me what kind of event you'd throw. I'll answer every one.

"I host a podcast about ______ for ______. My most engaged listeners are ______. Give me 5 small event ideas (virtual or in person) I could host in the next 60 days. For each one, suggest a ticket price, three sponsor package levels with what each sponsor gets, and the types of businesses most likely to sponsor it."

That's exactly the kind of thing we work through in the Podcast Money Lab: a small group (10 people, max) meeting twice a month to build real revenue for your show. Sponsors, events, memberships, all of it. Our first session is October 15th.

Rather go one-on-one? Book a Podcast Money Map session and we'll map out your next six months of monetization in 90 minutes.