Hey Reader,

A family walks into a talent agency, and says, “Have we got the act for you…”

If you’re familiar with this opening to a joke, you may have had a visceral reaction to it — either you think it’s hysterically funny, shamefully disgusting, or both. It’s the opening to the joke, The Aristocrats, and if you have a weak stomach, I don’t suggest you look it up.

See, the point of this joke isn’t actually the punchline, which is right in the title. The point is to see how long you can improv a shocking, disgusting, offensive story.

You can think about it as a secret handshake among comedians, that became not so secret after a 2005 documentary came out about it.
It going me thinking about the importance of telling a story.

This week, I got to speak to my friend Nick Benson’s college classes about Digital Storytelling.

Don’t worry, I didn’t tell The Aristocrats.

Instead, I spoke to them about why storytelling is so important in any content you create, especially podcasting.

Top Takeaways

• The Hero's Journey is integral in telling a great story that resonates with your audience.
• You need to make your listener the hero — not you, or your guest. That's how you get them to root for themselves.
• Taylor Swift is great at turning real life events into compelling story. We breakdown All Too Well.

Listen Now

Behind the Scenes: Doing More with Solo Shows

Over the last few weeks I’ve been telling you how I’m working to improve the overall production and storytelling on How I Built It.

I’m working with a video editor for short form videos (and maybe long form…more on that for members).

I’ve broken down my interview into a 3-act story, which I talk about in today’s episodes.

But I’ve also started doing more with my solo episodes.

Listen to the back catalog of solo episodes and it’s mostly me talking uninterrupted for 20-25 minutes.

But since I’ve started doing more solo deep dive episode for the Podcast Workflows Podcast, I’ve been experimenting with adding more sound effects and audio clips to make them a little more dynamic – adding pattern interruptions to keep listeners engaged, etc.

For Podcast Workflows, I’ll add audio cues for important points, sound clips from interviews or other podcast episodes, and supplementary music.

For this solo episode, I reference Taylor Swift’s All Too Well, so instead of reciting the lyrics, I play the clips from the song (I’m not a lawyer, but I think since I’m playing specific clips and commenting on said clips, it’s considered Fair Use).

My plan is definitely to do more of this in solo episodes first, and get a solid process in place for it – there’s a fine line between helpful and too heavy handed. But I know that little production touches like this can really elevate the quality of a podcast.

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Free Webinar This Thursday, Oct. 26th!

Join me for a free webinar that gives you the exact blueprint you need to launch your podcast and stay consistent.

It's all due to —you guessed it —solo/mini podcasting.

Here's what you'll learn in this 60 minute webinar:

• ​Why a mini podcast is easier to launch than other formats
• Defining the mission of your mini podcast
• How to come up with episode ideas
• Staying consistent through batching
• How to monetize a mini podcast

​...plus a Q&A session where you can ask any question you'd like.

​Oh! And you'll get a BONUS download: The full checklist and recommended tools to get started.

Ready? Join me for free on October 26th at 2pm EDT. The replay will be available for 72 hours after the event.

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Until next time,