With over 100 million people listening to podcasts each month in the US alone, the medium has seen exponential growth, presenting a unique opportunity for businesses to expand their reach and deepen customer engagement. We wondered, can you make money from a podcast? Can small business owners drive meaningful business and growth?
![Molly Ruland, CEO of Heartcast Media on Small Business Matters podcast.](https://www.experian.com/blogs/small-business-matters/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/jul-2024-small-business-matters-podcast-molly-ruland-blog-600x338-1.jpg)
For this episode of The Small Business Matters podcast we delve into the transformative world of podcasting with the expert guidance of Molly Ruland, CEO of Heartcast Media. Molly, a seasoned veteran in podcast production. As you will hear from our discussion, she really understands this space, and knows what it takes to convert podcasts into lasting client relationships.
Watch Our Interview
Key highlights:
- Defining Success in Podcasting – Molly emphasizes the importance of clarity in a podcast’s goals. Whether aiming for thought leadership, enhancing visibility, or generating sales, understanding these objectives dictates the podcast’s direction and content strategy.
- Efficiency in Production – Advocating for efficiency, Molly advises against business owners producing their podcasts. She stresses the value of outsourcing production to professionals to ensure quality and allow business owners to concentrate on their core responsibilities.
- Strategic Guest Selection – Choosing the right guests is crucial. Molly points out that the real value lies not in mass audience appeal but in nurturing relationships with guests who align with the business’s goals. These relationships are more likely to convert into business opportunities.
- Leveraging Podcasts for Business Development – Podcasts are not just marketing tools but also potent business development tools. Molly shares examples of how podcasts have facilitated valuable connections and partnerships, proving their efficacy in business strategy beyond mere content creation.
- Growth Through Quality and Networking—Growth in podcasting comes from quality content and strategic networking, not merely audience numbers. Molly advises focusing on producing high-quality content that guests and their networks would want to share, thereby effectively enhancing reach and influence.
Molly concludes by reminding us that the essence of successful podcasting lies in creating meaningful content that resonates with both the business and the audience’s needs, ultimately leading to sustained growth and business opportunities. This episode is a must-listen for any business looking to understand and harness the power of podcasting to expand reach and grow through influence and connection.
What follows is a lightly edited transcript of our interview:
Gary Stockton: Well, welcome back to Small Business Matters. Today, we’re exploring the power of podcasting as a tool for business development. With over 100 million people listening to podcasts each month in the US alone, the medium has seen exponential growth, presenting a unique opportunity for businesses to expand their reach and deepen customer engagement.
And joining us to deep dive into this topic is Molly Ruland, CEO and founder of Heartcast Media. Molly has been pioneering in the podcast production field for over two decades. Steering her company to become a leader in crafting top tier content for a diverse client roster that includes the Department of Health, DC Government, NATO, and even former NBA players. Under Molly’s leadership, Heartcast Media has mastered the art of using podcasts, not just for marketing but as a strategic tool to boost revenue and build lasting relationships. Now, operating from her scenic base next to a volcano in Costa Rica, Molly embodies her philosophy that listening is the revolution, driving forward with passion and innovation. Molly, welcome to the Small Business Matters podcast.
Molly Ruland: Thank you so much. That was a fantastic introduction. I appreciate that.
Gary Stockton: You’re very welcome. And we’re glad to have you with us. So, for businesses looking to drive, uh, into podcasting, what are the first steps that they should take to effectively use podcasts as a tool for business development?
Molly Ruland: Well, I think it’s really important to be crystal clear on what the goal is, right? What does success really look like? What do you hope to accomplish with a podcast? Because visibility and, um, sales, right, are two very different things. If you’re just looking for thought leadership and visibility. Then you’re going to drive it in one direction.
If you’re looking to fill your pipeline and get in front of more people, uh, that you want to do business with, right? Not just who you want to know about your business, but who you actually want to work with. That’s a very different goal. So I think identifying what success looks like, uh, what is, what is that metric for defining success? And then create a clear path on how to get there.
Gary Stockton: Excellent. So, as a small business owner, I’m sure you can understand why some business owners might feel that podcasting presents a heavy time burden. How do you convince them that the time is worth it and that there are ways to podcast when you’re very busy running a business?
Molly Ruland: Well, the first thing I do is talk people off the ledge of trying to produce it themselves. Um, and I think that’s the biggest misnomer. It’s, um, you know, I was thinking about it this morning before our call, and I was thinking, you know, you would never tell a business owner, listen, just learn how to build a basic website and then just learn how to make basic graphics and then just learn to copywrite and slap something up and see if people like it.
If you get any clients, then invest in your business. No one would ever say that to a business owner, right? You would never encourage somebody to try to wear so many different hats that they have zero experience in. But for some reason, in podcasting, it’s expected for a podcaster or business owner to know what recording software to use, how to edit that content, how to make the graphics, and how to make the copy. In addition, it is important to understand the value of that relationship, who they’re interviewing and why, and how they’re setting the expectations. Are they doing any follow-up? It’s like all the focus is put on production. Well, I think that’s a, uh, a giant disservice to anybody who’s looking to do a podcast. Your focus should be on your business and hiring somebody to outsource it.
And then it’s not a huge time suck at all. It’s very limited because all you’re doing is focusing on who you are interviewing and why, you know, doing the research on them. Like you did, you know, with me, right? You sent me some questions last week, so I knew exactly what to expect. Um, that solidifies our relationship.
I’m feeling valued and heard and, you know, uh, ready to have a great conversation, uh, following up, you know, having all those things is where the business owner needs to put their focus, and they really need to outsource the rest because Um, people go to school to be audio engineers. People go to school to be graphic designers. People go to school to be good copywriters. This idea that you’re going to do it all well and in any kind of timely manner, um, is just incorrect. And I think that a lot of businesses don’t understand that when you try to do those things by yourself, you’re actually cheapening your brand. You’re doing a great disservice to your brand, especially if you have a high ticket item; if your average close is $10k or higher, you can’t, you can’t, you know, you can’t put out bad graphics. You can’t put out bad videos. You can’t put out bad content. It literally works against you.
So I think starting with like, you know, it doesn’t have to be a huge time consumption thing, but what is the, why, what is your average client spend? If you did 15 episodes and you could close one deal, well, then it doesn’t seem like a huge time commitment at all. Right. It was absolutely worth it. So I think it’s perspective.
Gary Stockton: And, and, and also, I think in this medium. Podcasting content itself tends to stay around for a while, right? I mean, I listen to podcasts that have, you know, 250, 300 episodes, and some of the early ones that I listened to, you know, they, they’re, they’re a bit rough.
Even some of ours, you know, I, I, we thought it took us about a year to decide to, uh, uh, take on podcasting because it, it is so involved and working with an outside, um, partner. That’s already got the knowledge that can set you leaps ahead of other people who are maybe just getting into it. Would you agree?
Molly Ruland: Absolutely. Absolutely. I mean why, why reinvent the wheel? And then, on the same token, if you are a larger company, right? Podcasting is not the same as doing live streams or covering an event or something like that. So even large companies like The Atlantic Council, we produce all their podcasts because they recognize that even though they have an AB team No, they’re doing live streams all the time.
That’s very different than a podcast. And it would have to move through too many different departments. And so it doesn’t really make sense. It’s like, let’s just hire, you know, a podcast production company to do all of our podcasts, even though they have an entire team of people.
Gary Stockton: If, if you folks can hear the rain in the background, Molly is, she’s having some storms down there in Costa, Costa Rica. And that’s what comes with the territory. We lost a little bit of signal there. Molly just was smoothing feeling. Yeah, it’s okay. It’s not, it’s no problem. I got the gist of your response. Let’s, let’s move on to the next one about, about, uh, not all businesses will translate what they can do in, into an interesting podcast, right? I mean, it’s a medium that will work for specific kinds of businesses. Are there businesses that are most appropriate and good candidates for driving business from a podcast?
Molly Ruland: I think any business could benefit from a well-crafted podcast when really dialed into who they’re recording and why. I think a lot of bigger brands have made the mistake of thinking that because somebody loves their product, they’re going to love their podcasts. Like I love Slack, never going to listen to a Slack podcast. It’s never going to happen. I work all day. The last thing I want to do is cozy up with the Slack podcast at the end of the day.
So, you know, would that be a crowd favorite? Probably not. Could Slack get in front of a lot of really amazing people, do excellent business development, and see a lot of people up for their pipeline by having them on their podcast? A hundred percent. Is it a great sales enablement tool? A hundred percent. Are consumers going to listen to a Slack podcast? Probably not. Right? It’s just, so I think, being really clear again, what the goal is and how that would benefit a company? Um, because a lot of times it’s not, um, just about talking about your products. In that case, an internal podcast would be better, right? For example, if you have a big insurance company, maybe having an internal podcast would save you so much more time. It’d be much more effective for your internal team, where the interviewing of the potential guests is really more business development, and then you’re not as concerned about downloads and things like that. So it really depends on a small business, though. It’s going to be rare for them to pick up business because somebody listened to their podcast.
It just is what’s far more likely. Interview 15 people who fit your ICP and nurture those relationships. You’re far more likely to close a deal than you are from people just tuning in.
Gary Stockton: Yeah. Yeah, I agree. How can podcasting help business owners cultivate those relationships? Do you have some? Uh, examples of, uh, clients that have those because of my podcast business wins kind of stories. Have you got any success stories there?
Molly Ruland: For sure. Uh, one of my clients actually hired a really amazing person because that person had listened to their podcast and reached out and said, I’ve listened to a hundred episodes. I like who you are. I like the company ethos, and I’d like to work for you. Uh, which is one of those unexpected, uh, you know, benefits of having a podcast. Um, In my own business, it works tremendously well. I interview CMOs on my podcast, and that leads to really great collaborative partnerships because they recognize that we’re good at what we do.
So I think, really, where it is, it’s all about preparation, right? If you’re going to go on a podcast, I’m sure a lot of people have experienced this. They get invited to be on a podcast. There’s very little information. Half the time, you don’t even have the link on the day of the recording.
There’s no follow-up. You never know if it’s live or not. Sometimes, I’m scrolling through LinkedIn. I see my face. I say, okay, I guess that podcast episode went live. It’s like the most important part of the relationship is being completely ignored and it’s like. Volume, you know, like quality, quantity is being pushed over quality, and it’s like, next, next, next, and they don’t even notify the guests.
Hey, thanks for coming on the show. Hey, thanks. Oh, here’s some assets. Hey, by the way, can I get that meeting? Can I get an introduction? Would you like to see my new products? Something along, there’s none of that, right? There’s like none of that at all. It’s just more about the next episode, the next episode.
So I think I should do things like researching your guests and doing a really nice introduction like you did for me. Most of the time, people will just read whatever you send them. You know, communicating in advance what to expect. What people don’t realize is that what it’s doing is speaking volumes about how you do business.
Gary Stockton: Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. I, that’s something, um, ’cause I’m a listener too. I’m a fan of podcasting as a medium. And uh, I, I, who’s next? Yeah, I look at it the same way as if I was going to sit down and have an in-person, uh, business meeting with someone. I really do take that posture when it comes to the podcast because everybody’s going to hear it.
They’re going to see we do video as a component of our podcast. They’ll see how we interacted. Uh, and if it was an engaging conversation where we passed on some learnings to the audience. So I, you really got to go into it with that mindset of, of you want to end up with a good experience for both parties.
Molly Ruland: As if you were going on a date or an important sales call. It’s it’s, that’s exactly it. Like, get into it, you know?
Gary Stockton: Yeah. What if I didn’t want to do my own podcast for my small business? Um, are there other ways to benefit from guesting on other people’s shows as a strategy?
Molly Ruland: There certainly is. I think, um, podcast guesting is a great way to, number one, build relationships, and I don’t think people talk enough about that because these podcast hosts are like a treasure trove of contacts. They’ve been interviewing people who might want to do business with you. And so people really are just. It’s almost selfish. They’re like, I’m going to tap into their audience. And it’s like, well, no, actually, they’re the gatekeepers, and they’re the ones with all the keys to the castle. And so it’s not just about impressing their audience and hoping they come over to you. It’s about really nurturing the relationship with that podcast host, like being grateful, sharing the content, following up with them, asking for an introduction, and asking for referrals. Uh, that’s number one, and then number two, the social proof, you know, when other people are talking about you on LinkedIn, that’s always good for business. It’s one thing if you’re just grandstanding and thought leadership all the time. When other people are talking about how great you are or the gem you dropped or the knowledge you have, that’s really great, but it’s not necessarily going to move the needle unless you go, you know you’re really intense about an author, and you’re launching a book if you go on as many Podcasts as you can for 90 days, you’re gonna see some results. If you go on one podcast a month inconsistently, it’s not going to give you any results, just like any other marketing.
Gary Stockton: Yeah. Yeah. That’s a point that you made there about, um, asking for, for, or providing a review or asking for a review. Um, I had a great one yesterday, and I hadn’t really thought about it this way, but I’m asking for a review, uh, on LinkedIn. Uh, really, it could be just about your experience working with me on, on the podcast Um, but then, uh, the other element of actually sharing that, um, review on your Google My Business, uh, site as well, and just showing the, the person how they can copy, uh, the contents of what they had written about you on, on LinkedIn and putting it on Google My Business, and just being smart about getting those reviews out there.
We mentioned monetizing a podcast, and for a small business, it may be difficult initially, but let’s not discount that totally. Can you talk a little bit about some of the monetization strategies podcasters could have and how, uh, new podcasters could start generating income from their shows?
Molly Ruland: For sure. So I think from a podcaster standpoint, you know, monetizing your podcast is extremely hard. It’s just like, you know, You see these posts from musicians who are like rolling stones. And they’re like, we made 27 from Spotify last month. This idea that your content is going to make money is tricky. Right? Especially when you’re talking about Spotify and people like that, they’re just really not trying to give up any money. So you’re traditional, like spins, right? Like in the radio world, if you get X amount of spins or plays or broadcasts, you get X amount of dollars. Well. Your number has got to be really high for you to get any kind of money on things like having ads on your podcast and other things.
You have got to be reeling in some serious downloads. And so if you’re not trying to be a podcaster, I wouldn’t really focus on that. I think if you are trying to build a personality, you could always go for sponsorships, direct sponsorships. Like, who is listening to my podcast? Who else is trying to reach those people?
And let me go directly to them and say, listen, my audience is exactly your target audience. It’s like. I can produce the content and I can, you can be the sponsor, yada, yada. Right. And so that’s a great look, but in general, I’m kind of opposed to this idea of monetizing a podcast because the podcast is the monetization tool. It is the business development tool. And like, you’re not going to make money off your downloads, but if you interview the right people and you nurture that relationship and you follow up with them and you close that deal, you’re going to make a lot money off of closing one of those deals than you are off of getting paid for your download. Right now it’s like an absolute bloodbath in the podcast industry, uh, even just over the last week, the databases have all changed. So, for podcasts that showed that they had 4,000 or 3,000 downloads, 132 downloads per episode were shown. Because what’s happened is, you know, the whole Apple automatic download thing got taken away.
And so all these huge contracts with these big guys, like big famous podcasters and stuff. It’s an absolute bloodbath because Apple was automatically downloading the podcasts onto people’s phones, but that doesn’t mean they were listening to them. So this means the ad industry is on, you know, its head; all these big contracts are getting obliterated because they don’t have 10 million downloads or 10,000 downloads an episode. It’s really like a thousand people actually listening. So this idea of getting lots of numbers and being big in that, and those companies keep in mind, is putting tons of money behind those podcasts. They’re paying to play. They’re doing ads, billboards, bus stops, all that. And they’re still not getting those numbers. So to me, it’s like, you don’t monetize the podcast. The podcast is money. The podcast is the money tool. It’s not about monetizing it. Yeah. If that makes sense.
Gary Stockton: Yeah. I think people do business with people that they know, like, and trust. Um, I’ve gone to conferences that Mike Stelzner, uh, put on his, you know, his social media conference.
You know, I know, like, and trust Mike. Um, I know, like, and trust Ann Handley. I wanted to go to her conference. You know, I’d heard her, you know, I listened to the Marketing Profs podcast. I know, like, and trust that organization. That was business for them. And, you know, the value that I get, um, on a weekly basis is marketing training and, uh, thought leadership from them.
So it can, it can materialize in, in lots of other different ways. How do we grow, um, the audience? What, what are your top tips for growing a podcast audience? Is it literally posting, you know, the short reels on, on Instagram? Is it, um, posting on Twitter? You know, how, how do you grow, get people to listen and, and subscribe?
Molly Ruland: Well, you know, if I’m being fully honest, I don’t really encourage people to worry about that too much in my space because, you know, the downloads aren’t going to close deals. However, we make content that’s meant to be seen. And so we make SEO-rich content and we make lots of social media graphics for that purpose.
But the trick is to make good content. You know, if you interview somebody and they’re a million-dollar company or ten million-dollar company, and you have a bad graphic of them, they’re not going to share it. So, everybody knows people on LinkedIn that are like new podcast alert, new podcast alert, right? And most of the time you’re probably just ignoring it, right?
You’re it’s. The new podcast alert is not bringing me in. If it says something like how to overcome anxiety, how to double your revenue this year, or how to do this right, you’re more likely to be interested in it. Now, if it’s somebody you follow on LinkedIn saying, Hey, I was on this podcast, and we’re talking about how to W revenue now, I’m even more interested. Right? So I think like the short answer is SEO-rich, like take that transcription of your podcast. Turn it into blog posts, turn it into newsletters. Like it’s all about SEO. Rewrite all your descriptions and all your metadata. Get rid of all the adjectives. Tell chat GPT, no more adjectives, no more mavens, no more maestros.
I’ve never met so many mavens and maestros of marketing in my whole life until I started using AI, right? It’s, you know, focusing on keywords, less on adjectives, and really getting your SEO content. But the social proof is not going to come from my posting. Hardcast Media has 20,000 followers on Facebook. When I post stuff there, do you know how many people see it? Seven or eight, maybe, if I’m lucky. Right. It’s, it’s, it’s, it’s ridiculous. Right. But you know, what does get attention? When I interview somebody, I write a thoughtful post about it. I tag them in their company on it. It has a nice graphic that they’re interested in sharing on their own LinkedIn profile. The video of them looks good. The video clips of them make them look smart. They’re a lot more likely to share that content on their profile, which is going to get me a lot more visibility in the business world, which is exactly where I want to be, rather than me focusing on the downloads. Right. So I think it’s, again, it’s all. It’s always going to boil down to that relationship, but also. Producing content. And we’ve all been there. Like when you agree to speak for something and they send you the graphic, and you think to yourself, I’m not putting this anywhere near my social media; this is terrible, right? This is it, you know, like, and we’ve all been there, or it doesn’t match the aesthetic, or it’s just, you know, it doesn’t look like the image you’re trying to portray.
We all have, we have brand guidelines and marketing people. So you really gotta create something that’s high quality. If you want people to reshare it, because. You know, nobody wants to bring their brand value down with your bad content or your poorly designed graphics because you wanted to save some money on Fiverr. Right? So I think it’s, it’s just like anything, it’s like showing up to a business meeting in workout clothes. It’s the same thing. You really want that content to be high end and to match the caliber of the people that you’re interviewing. And that’s how you’re going to grow your audience. And that’s probably the audience you want.
Like, I don’t really care if people on iTunes are downloading my podcast. I’m far more interested in the people on LinkedIn, understanding that I have a pretty revolutionary way of looking at, you know, podcasts and business development, and I’m showing people exactly how I do it. And that, to me, has much more value than looking at my RSS feed and saying, Oh, we got 500 downloads on that episode.
Because, at the end of the day, those downloads are a one-way street. You can’t communicate with people on downloads. You can communicate with them on LinkedIn. You know what I mean? It’s immediate feedback on iTunes. It’s like if you wanna reach those subscribers, you gotta make another podcast. So I, to me, and then iTunes isn’t even paying you for that. You’re building their database, giving ’em all this data, all this information, all this demographics that they’re making G billions, and that’s a technical term of dollars off of us. Right. And they don’t give the creators anything. So, I think you shouldn’t even focus on growing your audience. Focus on growing your influence, focus on growing your, your Rolodex, you know, and think about maybe not just interviewing people you want to do business with, but like who are aggregators, who are people that have lots of people, you know like I love working with fractional CMOs and interviewing them for my podcast because I know they probably have a couple of clients and they might want to refer me to those clients and maybe they have past clients and maybe they have future clients.
So that’s not just one person that might hire me. They could bring me five or six clients from that one person. So I think thinking along those lines and not thinking about, well, uh, people like to talk about failure, so I’m going to start a podcast about failure. No, you know, not at all. Your podcast is a great example. You’re giving really great actionable business information. This is an interview right now. People can take this. They can start a podcast. They can fill their pipeline. They can see real results. This makes a lot of sense for Experian. It’s right on brand. It’s right on target. Your audience wants to know this content. But if you’re an insurance broker, why are you interviewing people about failure?
Gary Stockton: Yeah. I think you made an excellent point there also about growing your influence and really just making that the focus. Um, and that’s really what we try to do here on Small Business Matters.
We, we didn’t really have, um, a true sense of, you know, who, who that audience was that’s running. credit reports on their business. And we wanted to have more conversations about the actual small businesses and, and have, uh, uh, folks like you come on and share your, uh, your insights. Let’s let’s switch a little bit to the legal side of a podcasting.
How important is it for a small business to have contracts in place for their podcast related to who owns it? Uh, where it’s hosted, et cetera. You’ve, have you got any, um, case studies where business owners haven’t covered their, uh, their bases legally?
Molly Ruland: No, not a single one. And I work with guys who are; I work with the government agencies.
I work with people who are attorneys. I work with the number one largest law firm in Washington, DC. Um, it’s really, you know, sort of implied it’s our content. You’re coming to our show. I mean, you could have them. Are terms and conditions on a booking form or something? But I think it’s pretty much well-known.
I think more people are concerned about, uh, maybe having the first right of approval on the content. Like, you know, some of my clients are talking about like, you know, relations in the Middle East and like, but you know, very, very touchy subjects at certain times. Right. And so sometimes people might want to review it first before it goes out, especially lawyers, right? It’s like they really want to triple everything before it goes out. But I would say that in regards to this, and I see this a lot in the podcast groups, people say I’m going to trademark my podcast. I’m like, Hey man, why don’t you get through 20 episodes first and then get back to me? You know, because, right? Unless you’re going to be doing, uh, uh, your podcast show live and making merchandise and stuff, you don’t need a trademark. That’s a waste of time and money. And I, I mean, you know, you could create just a little form that says like, Hey. But I’ve been on countless podcasts. We’ve produced countless podcasts. And I would say maybe 3 percent of people have a legal form.
Gary Stockton: Yeah, I was, I was actually thinking about the, the scenario where it’s, it’s a person that wants to have this podcast. Uh, I’ve heard some horror stories about folks that had someone managing the podcast for them, like the feed and where the podcast took off and, um, But then the person was, you know, no longer with the organization or that they, they lost possession of the podcast.
And I think as a business owner, I would want to make sure I would want to view that as, as an asset of the company. Um, and yeah, cause there’s an audience that would come with that. If I did want to sell the company down the road, I was just thinking about it from, from that perspective.
Molly Ruland: From that perspective, absolutely. I mean, we’re really big on that because a lot of companies popped up, and they’re like, we own your content, and we’ll put ads on it, and then we get paid for some of the downloads. We’re the opposite. Everything is in our client’s name, and it should always be that way. You should own your RSS feed. You should have access to all these things.
And it’s another reason to, like, don’t hire somebody on Fiverr, like, I, I get the inclination, but like, you can find very affordable services that are not predatory. And like, if you’ve hired somebody on Fiverr, like, next week they might not be there. And so you should never just like, hand over the keys to the castle to anybody. And so I would definitely encourage you if you’re going to hire an agency to be very clear about that. Um, because there are some companies out here pulling some tricks, you know for sure, but I think it’s probably the small unregulated editors because know, again, there’s misnomers everywhere, but a lot of people think that just cause you can edit audio means you’re good at marketing or means you’re good at strategy.
And it’s like, listen, you can find a million people all over the world that can edit your audio and edit your video. That does not mean that they understand the key points each time in each conversation that mattered most to your audience. And those are very different worlds, right? And so, the best thing you can do to protect yourself legally is not to work with individuals. I do not work with people like that. And then be really clear when you sign your contract: Hey, this is my content. I own it. And I want, you know like we build websites for people, and we send them an email, and we say, here’s your login and password, but for the love of God, please do not log in and touch the website, but you have it, you have access to it. It is yours, but just fill out this form if you want us to edit it. We always make sure that they have a login and password, and they can do anything that they need at any time because it’s their website and they own it. And so it’s the same thing with podcasts. We do. They have access to their RSS. They have access to the Trello board. They have access to everything. If they stop, if they move to somebody else, they’re happy to do it. There’s nothing we even need to release because we don’t own it in the first place.
Gary Stockton: Yeah, Excellent, well Molly this has been so enlightening and, and it’s really got me thinking about the many powerful ways that, uh, small businesses can grow and scale through podcasting and grow in their influence. Uh, tell our audience where they can reach you and, uh, start a conversation.
Molly Ruland: Absolutely. Well, you can check out the website if you want to see our, you know, offers and things like that Heartcast Media. It’s a great place to see our content and what it looks like, um, heartcastmedia.com. And then, of course, on LinkedIn, I’m always open to chat. I love doing discovery calls with people and strategy sessions because a lot of times, even 20 minutes with somebody, I can really kind of, um, you know, one of my favorite quotes is you can’t read the label from inside the jar. And so, you know, if anybody’s thinking about a podcast, but they’re just like, I understand it could be valuable, but I’m having a hard time connecting the dots to see exactly how that would work. Hit me up. I’m happy to spend some time with you and help you figure that out. Whether you hire us or not. Uh, I’m really good at the uh branded podcast speed dating. If you will, it’s one of my favorite things to do.
Gary Stockton: Great stuff. Thanks so much for coming on the show and sharing your insights with us. Molly we really appreciate it.
Molly Ruland: Thank you. Thank you very much for having me.