Ep. 88: Pitch Like a Pro and Gain Visibility Through Booking More Podcasts (Guest Angie Trueblood from the Go Pitch Yourself Podcast) [Stepping Into Your Authenticity Series]

It's time to level up your pitching and increase your podcast bookings! To learn how, we’re joined by Angie Trueblood, an expert on all things podcast pitching! She is the founder of The Podwize Group and host of the Go Pitch Yourself podcast. Angie guides and supports business owners in effectively utilizing podcasts to increase visibility and grow their businesses.  She shares her tips and tricks from preparation to pitch. 

Forget the spray and pray approach to pitching. You'll learn strategic methods to secure more shows with your ideal clients. Get ready to gain credibility and visibility, while delivering massive value to an audience that needs your message.

SHOW NOTES:
Follow or contact Angie Trueblood / The Podwize Group: Website - Instagram - Facebook
The Go Pitch Yourself Podcast: Listen
Podcast Pitches that Convert: Download

Podcast episodes mentioned [Stepping Into Your Authenticity Series]:
Ep. 83: Embrace Video to Build, Influence and Grow Profits  with Elaine Williams
Ep. 84: Discovering Your Unique Voice by Going Live  featuring host, Heather Zeitzwolfe
Ep. 85: Five Steps to Authentically Attract Your Target Audience  with Danielle LaFleur
Ep. 86: Create a Greater Impact for You and Your Client Through. VIP Day  with Terri Levine
Ep. 87:  Standing Out From the Competition Through Television Exposure  with Stacia Crawford

For more info, see complete show notes:  https://www.getthebalanceright.net/blog/episode88

CONTACT HEATHER:
Contact Heather: Instagram - LinkedIn
Get the Balance Right Coaching: Website
Book a Discovery Call (via Zoom) - Click Here
Heather & Get the Balance Right - Link Tree
Zeitzwolfe Accounting: Website - Facebook

Contact Heather: Instagram - LinkedIn - Email: heather@GetRadBiz.com
Get Radical With Your Business: Facebook - Website
Book a Discovery Call (via Zoom) - Schedule
Zeitzwolfe Accounting: Website - Facebook

Transcript

SHOW INTRO:
 
Heather Zeitzwolfe: “Hey, hey hey! Welcome to another episode of Get the Balance Right podcast.! I am your host, Heather Zeitzwolfe. 

Oh man, I'm so excited to bring you my guest today, Angie Trueblood. 

She finally made it to the podcast. I had talked to her about it almost a year ago, and now man, she is here. 

If you know Angie Trueblood, then you're probably a fan, like I am, of her show, Go Pitch Yourself. And if you've never heard it before, well, then you gotta tune in because Angie is an expert on all things pitches. And we're not talking about baseball. No, we are talking about podcast pitching. Yes, she is an expert on that subject. 

And last week on the podcast was guest, Stacia Crawford. And we talked about pitching for television on that show. But this week we're talking about podcast pitching. 

So if you have been wanting to get on podcasts and just weren't really sure how to apply, this episode is really going to help you. Also maybe you have been applying for podcasts. And either you've gotten podcasts that you didn't really want to go on, or maybe the ones that you wanted to get on you weren't accepted. 

Don't worry, you’re going to hear from the best today, from Angie Trueblood. I don't know where my New York accent just came in from. I don't know. It just like came out. 

And then, oh my God, so then next week we are talking to the Queen of Podcast guesting. Yes, oh my God. Okay. I'm like giving it to you solid with all these people that are podcast experts. Wow!

So Christine McAllister, who has been deemed the Queen of Podcast guesting, she is going to be talking about being a perfect guest and how that can transform your business.

Besides the podcast, Go Pitch Yourself, Angie Trueblood is the woman behind The Podwize Group. 

The Podwize Group supports small business owners to help them get onto podcasts, podcast pitching, training, coaching, accountability, and networking. 

Angie has offered us a great download. Just go to the show notes and you can find it and it will help you with your podcast pitching. Please, let me know if you use it because I would love to know how it has helped you. 

So this interview I'm doing with Angie is part of my Stepping Into Your Authenticity Series. And man, I've had the privilege of interviewing some amazing women. And if you haven't listened to those, I really recommend that you go back and listen to the whole series. They were so good. 

Yeah. Um, am I bragging? Yeah. Well, it's not me, it's the guests so yeah totally go back listen to them they’re really really good.

So the first one in this series, I interviewed Elaine Williams and that topic was: Embrace Video to Build, Influence and Grow Profits. It's a really good one. And that's episode 83. 

Then an episode 84, it was: Discovering Your Unique Voice by Going Live. And that was me. I talked about my journey of going Live on Instagram for 45 days in a row. And I'm still in the middle of doing that. So you got a few more days left. If you want to go Live with me, please hit me up in the DMs. 

And if this is long after that: hey, still hit me up. I would still love to go Live with you and I'm going to be doing more Lives, not just on Instagram. I'm going to do it on YouTube, Facebook, LinkedIn. Please hit me up, I would love to go Live with you. 

All right. So besides that one, okay, so that was episode 84, then there was episode 85. With Danielle LaFleur and we talked about: Five Steps to Authentically Attract Your Target Audience. 

It was a really good one. And then, oh my God, I got to talk to Terry Levine and that was episode 86 and it was called: Create a Greater Impact for You and Your Client Through. VIP Days. 

Yes, so good. And then as I mentioned, episode 87 was with Stacia Crawford and we talked about: Standing Out From the Competition Through Television Exposure. And on that one, we talked about PR television and pitching. 

I really want to help you guys step into your authenticity! 

Plus, I would love to know what you have thought about this series. So send me a DM on Instagram. It's @zeitzwolfe or you can search for the Vegan CPA. And let me know which one of these episodes spoke to you and what you've learned from the episode. 

 All right. Here is my interview with Angie Trueblood from Go Pitch Yourself!”

INTERVIEW

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “Angie Trueblood, Welcome to Get the Balance Right podcast!”

Angie Trueblood: “Hello Heather! I'm so excited to be here.”

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “I am so excited to have you on, because I've had some of the people that you represent on the show. And I've been wanting you on the show because I'm such a fan of your podcast. 

So for the folks that may not know who you are, who is Angie Trueblood? Tell us about yourself and your podcast and your business.”

Angie Trueblood: "Yeah, well, I am a wife and a mother like on that side of things. But in the business front, I'm a podcast host. You mentioned the show is, Go Pitch Yourself. And that very much exudes who I am and what my team and I do. 

So we are podcast visibility, strategists. The company name is The Podwize Group. And we really support established business owners in helping them grow their authority, their network, and their business through podcast guesting. So we pitch on behalf of clients. 

Some people come to us and we just fully handle everything, they just show up to the interviews. Some people want us to really do the strategy and kind of craft their messaging and then they'll take it and pitch themselves. And then we also teach folks how to pitch themselves. We have a community for support and coaching around that.”

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “Wow, okay. So yes, so you don't have to pick, you don't have to do the pitching yourself. You can get help with that. 

But today we're going to talk about all things pitching - not talking about baseball. Talking about, thank God we're not talking about baseball.”

Angie Trueblood: “It’d be a short interview." 

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “We are talking about podcast pitching. I just interviewed a woman who does pitching for television, and I would imagine that there might be some things that are maybe similar to that. But one is a visual medium, and this one is all about audio. But guessing can have video attached to it. 

So this is all part of this Stepping Into Our Authenticity Series that we're doing. So when we want to go out there and be on podcasts, maybe we are a self-employed woman who's like, ‘I've got a business, I need to get some visibility’. Why would somebody want to go out onto a podcast Angie?”

Angie Trueblood: “Well, you mentioned pitching for media and TV appearances. And funny enough, when I started doing this back in 2017, I would pitch clients, it was just me, I would pitch clients for anything and everything. It was blog posts, TV, online magazines. And what I quickly learned and why I love podcasting is, at the root of it, it's a conversation between two people and there is a connection and a relationship.

And a lot of times you mentioned with the media, it's almost like this rat race and having to like drown out what some of the other noise is in the news. And for me, that just wasn't in my sweet spot. I am a super connector at heart, and I love being the facilitator of two people meeting, being able to see that there's some level of complimentary-ness in their two businesses are what they do and they can take that relationship and move forward.

So, first of all, it just kind of suited who I am better. I’m more about having conversations then really just trying to get the story out. Now, that said, you can definitely get impact from local media, national media. 

But a lot of us just starting out when we want to increase our visibility, we want more people to know about us, a podcast is a great way to do it because you get connected to the audience. Right? I don't necessarily have exposure to your audience. Some of them might have overlap. But likely there's a couple of you listening and for the first time you're hearing who I am. 

But there's also then that relationship that you and I have. So we've known about each other, but we've never had a legitimate conversation. And so now we can actually become referral partners for one another, even. And we just tighten that connection that we have, so that down the road, we might be able to benefit one another."

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “Yeah, and when we think about the idea of pitching for television, we have to have these bite-size things that we're going to be talking about. Where in a podcast, you can really dive deep into a subject and really

focus on like different elements of it. You don't have to be like, ‘How am I going to fit this into like 30 second, and they go to commercial and then we come back and then I got to like do my spiel. I would imagine that the pitching would be slightly different anyways.

When we are thinking about being on other podcasts, and it's great for visibility, what would be the first step in doing that? Should we go out and research podcast to be on? Where does one start with this whole thing?” 

Angie Trueblood: “I know this answer is going to seem super lame. The first is to get really clear on your goals and who you're looking to connect with. Because there are people who will go and guest on shows just to have a relationship with that host.

That's not really the approach that we take, that’s icing on the cake. We really leverage podcast interviews to get in front of new audiences, but you need to have an idea of who are those audiences. Even for you and the work that you do with bookkeeping and accounting, do you want to get in front of brand new business owners or people who are starting to think about a business? Or people who are earning a revenue that needs help being managed? I would likely think it might be the second.

But it's first just getting really clear on what types of audiences do I want to get in front of. And then you can kind of like step back from that and say, 'Well then, what types of shows are those people listening to?’. What are some of the spaces, for you as an example, what shows are talking about being profitable in business and growing your profits, but they're not coaching them on the money part and they're not doing the servicing of the money part?

Those would be great places for you to think about being a guest.”

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “As far as tools to do this research, there's things out there like Listen Notes and all different types of databases like Pod Match. 

Do you have any recommendations as far as somebody that, maybe is not on the inside like you are, to research this?”

Angie Trueblood: “Yeah, there’s a couple of different approaches. 

Once you really know who you're trying to connect with, the types of audiences, you have an idea of what you want to talk about and the types of hosts you want to connect with. We still go pretty old school and search, we have a database at this point of over, we might be over 1,200 shows. Because if anyone's out there and they're pitching on behalf of someone else, keep a database. Keep your records of contacts, it’s so important. 

But definitely we search in Apple Podcasts because every client is different. And whereas a lot of these like listen notes as an example, they kind of give you an idea of how big the show is. And we do our own research and look on Instagram as an example, just to kind of get a sense of what type of exposure our clients might expect.

But I think what's really important is not like under valuing the more niche shows. A lot of our clients see great success in getting on smaller shows, but they're really serving a very specific audience. So rather than if it's someone in the business space and they're providing like a business service, you don't necessarily need to be on a giant business podcast.

You could be on a podcast to talk specifically to yoga studio owners. And there are shows out there like that. And if you come in with a service that they might need, then you can really kind of gain some traction. But there are places where you can get a little faster access to shows. 

There's one great one, and I'm actually an affiliate for it, The Podcast Collaboration Club. There's a Facebook group that's free. I think it's Be a Guest, Find a Guest and you can join and interact and network. I find that a lot of those are kind of smaller or newer shows, but it is a great place to network with hosts and potential guests.

But at the end of the day, it kind of comes down to doing your own homework to see: is this host and I like, are we aligned with our energy? Do we see things in a similar light? It goes beyond just finding a show that's in the niche. So it is sometimes more of an art. That's where I think a lot of these services, which I think are great, these databases, but I'm like, well, Apple Podcasts is technically a database, it’s just not in the format that we picture it. 

So there's a lot of things out there to help. But at the end of the day, gaining clarity on what your goal is and setting parameters around, ‘well, what size-ish show is a good use of my time?’. Because not all of them candidly are, you know, we have to make tough decisions.”

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “And when we go to put in place a strategy for pitching shows, do you have kind of a formula? Cause I'm a math person, so I want to know about this. But is there a good formula as far as like how many shows that you need to pitch before you think you'll get a yes? Or does it really just depend on how well you're pitching, who you are, your connections, all of the things?”

Angie Trueblood: “Yes. There’s a lot of disparity and if your listener is thinking, ‘Okay, I really want to lean into this, I want to start pitching myself’. I think a good rule of thumb is to start off pitching anywhere between two to three shows a week. 

If you can just get in a good cycle of getting those pitches out and doing the appropriate follow-up, then you start, (I’m a numbers person, too), you start collecting data. And you get an idea of how many shows you need to pitch to get the certain number of yeses. 

And then once you're on a few shows, you can see how well they convert. And figure out, ‘Well, how many shows do I need to be on in order to get the conversions that I'm expecting?’. 

So industry average, I mean, it's all over the board, but it's around like 20% to 25%. We go a little bit higher internally, but that's because we've got relationships with a lot of the hosts. That said, if you're pitching yourself well and looking at a variety, there's a variety of ways to pitch. I just connected with a host that I've been following for a while, and we're going to both be a guest on each other’s show. And he has a pretty big show and my show is a perfect fit for what he does, but it was through Instagram.

So if you do it in a way that's really authentic, then your percentage is definitely going to be above average.”

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “Yeah, so pitching doesn't mean that we have to necessarily send a formal letter or an email attached with a one sheet and all of that? We can actually pitch to one or the other through LinkedIn, Instagram. As long as it's like, we're building a relationship with this person and not just be like, ‘Hey, want to be on my show?’.”

Angie Trueblood: “Yeah, I just changed the tagline on our co-op sales page. And I think it said, ‘leverage podcast guesting for all these things without being spammy or using the spray and pray approach’. Which I do see, I don't know who's teaching it or who's doing it and automating it, but I'm sure you get them too. The emails that are just these form letters and they're not personalized for my show. 

It's just finding that authentic way to connect with them. Now I wouldn't come in hot to the DMs on Instagram, introduce yourself and then in that same message, pitch. It's the relationship that you said is really what makes the difference.”

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “Yeah, through Clubhouse, I've met people just going to like podcast rooms where people are there for that specific reason to connect and be on each other's shows and support each other.

If you're in that sort of forum, then it's expected. Otherwise, get to know somebody first, before you pitch them.”

Angie Trueblood: “Yeah, you kind of have to do that in order to really be intentional. That's the other thing - you can spend all of your time being a guest on shows that aren't actually in front of audiences that would ever follow you back or buy what you are selling.

And that's great if you have all the time in the world. I do not. And so that's the other thing, like a lot of these different groups and matching sites are great when you're first starting to kind of get your feet wet. But when you really want to guest and be very strategic about it, that's when you're going to really have to do some of that legwork of searching on your own.”

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “Yeah, and I've had people in those groups like ask me, ‘Oh, I want to be on your show!”. What? No. Like, you've obviously never listened to my show because if you did, you wouldn't ask me.” 

Angie Trueblood: “Listen, like you didn't even go to the page. Like you didn't even look to see what the title of the episodes are.”

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “Yeah, I think some people are just so desperate to be on a podcast. They're just like, ‘Oh!’. 

Get to know the podcast. If you're going to take the time to craft a pitch, you want to make sure that you're actually pitching something that's going to pan out to be something that's worth your time, like you said.

So when we do go to craft this pitch, you know, we're going to say that it's going to be something that's going to be worth our time. Is it something that we can build a template and then kind of tweak, or does it have to be very original and geared towards that podcast every single time? Tell us Angie.” 

Angie Trueblood: “Yes and… So there needs to be a template because we don't want to write an email from scratch three times a week, right? No one's capable of doing that. That sounds horrible. So I always, internally we do it and we coach people in the program to do it as well, but you come up with a pitch template. 

And it really has, we start typically with like three to five talk topics that you might be pitching, and you really flesh those topics out. So one thing I see running wild in the pitching space is people will send me, they want to be a guest on my show and here's five different things they could talk about. 

Well, I'm not going to go and figure out which of those one, what they mean. And two, which is best for my audience. That's really up to the person asking to be a guest. And so you flesh all of that out in a long, we just do it in a Google doc to start, in a long Google doc. And then we move it over into our email provider, Gmail; we have a Google workspace. And for every show that we pitch, we take out all the topics that we're not pitching.

And then we personalize the top. We personalize the intro to the topic and I always call it kind of making that connection or bridging the gap of like, well, why would this even be important to your listeners? So yes, you start with the template. And yes, you also personalize it for everyone.”

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “That's great. And that's a time saver too, to do it with that approach. 

Obviously it's better if you've listened to the show and you can maybe say something about the host, maybe reference some of the podcasts that you've actually listened to. I get these pitches where they obviously just put in the name of the guest and the name of it, sometimes it's not even grammatically correct. 

What do you recommend? Should they go through, how many podcasts do they listen to? We want it to be sincere and all that, right?”

Angie Trueblood: “I think right now we have five clients, we send between 12 and 15 pitches a month. We're definitely not listening to those shows, we may have in the past.

And we might, I recommend, I don't think you really need to listen to an entire episode, start to finish. But what you can do, that's really going to set your pitch apart: one, you don't have to name drop, like you said, the guests that have been on the show. Like that does not communicate to me that you actually understand my purpose as a host.

What we do, one, make sure the host actually interviews people. Because there are definitely shows that don't and they get pitched to have guests on those shows all the time. 

Then go over to their website, see what they sell. For me, that is such an indicator of what role this podcast plays in their business. Understand like what's in it for them. Get a sense of like how you can help support them and really understand their business and how your expertise can compliment that. Or you can look and see what their previous shows were on. 

And then what we do a lot of times is while we're doing all of this kind of poking around, definitely look on social. Especially over the last couple of years in the political spectrum, we've uncovered situations to where our client and that host might not be a good fit. You got to really look cause you're tying your name to that person a little bit. And that's an important piece of it. 

But we always like to listen to the show in the background. So you can kind of be researching for me more about the energy and like how the host shows up. Like I knew coming into this, we were bringing the heat with Heather, but that's really important. If I had a client who was super shy or reserved, it might not be a perfect fit.”

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “Yeah. Okay, good. This is all great stuff. Now, I had mentioned a one sheet. I think a lot of people out there probably know what that is. It's almost kind of like a resume. 

But how important is a one sheet? Can you actually explain what a one sheet is for the folks that aren't sure what that is?”

Angie Trueblood: “For podcast fishing, I really think it should be one sheet. If you've spoken a lot of times, if you have a speaker application. People who will submit one sheets are like two or three pages long, which is always amazing to me. But that's kind of warranted because they don't really know you, you might not be sharing a ton of other stuff with them.

Yeah, for podcast pitches, I really see this one sheet, which is a one-page document. We built ours in Canva. It's a very visual representation of that person's personality and expertise. So, whereas typically you're writing an email pitch, super boring to look at, you know what I mean? Like it's definitely not conveying personality visually.

The one sheet gives us the opportunity to do that. So we use brand colors, we use photos. And we use photos of the guests in a variety, like maybe family is super important and a part of their brand, we'll pop those on there. Then we include their bio, sample questions and general topics. 

So for me, it's more to create a better surround sound and let the host get a real sense of who that person is and whether they would be a good fit.

But we didn't offer one sheets, we didn't do those for our clients until, I don't think until 2020. You and I have people coming to us inside of the Pod Wise co-op that are just starting pitching. I tell them, ‘You do B+ work first. You get those pitches out the door, and then you can circle back around and get your one sheet later’. 

You need to get the momentum. You can definitely get accepted without a one sheet.”

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “And when we do the pitch, what types of information should we be supplying? Should we have like other podcasts we've been on with a link or a photo or a video? What would be helpful?” 

Angie Trueblood: “Yeah, so from a host perspective, when I get a pitch, I want enough information to be able to decide if this topic suits my audience. 

And then if this is the right person, like if we would really mesh. And so we include their bio, our client's bio, we now put it at the end. Because I want our pitch to be very clear that this is not about our client. This is about how this person can serve your audience. So we really like to lean into: This is the topic and why we think it would be a good fit. 

It is content marketing. So we're really doing a lot of messaging work in that pitch. And then the things that the host typically would like to know is: give them access to a website. So hyperlink your website. If you have a show, hyperlink, like we hyperlink to whatever we can. 

Definitely if you have been a guest on other shows, include one or two relevant types of shows. So either in the same niche; we have one client who interviews both a lot on male hosted and female hosted shows. We like to put one hosted by a man and one hosted by a woman in her pitch so that is very clear. 

We also put the cover art on the one sheet. So that's a great place to communicate that you have been a guest before.” 

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “Yeah, this is all very important because I get pitches all the time. The other day I got one, it was like all about the guests and all that. And then it had links to her website and they didn't even work. So check the links first and make sure it's not an old site, like don't copy and paste and things.”

Angie Trueblood: “Crazy. We've actually had Courtney, who's our executive assistant, she manages our inbox for pitches. But we now have a form. But there's been times when we get a pitch and it doesn't even say what they are literally pitching to talk about. So we'll respond back, ‘What topic do you think would be great?’. 

And that's why we created the form was to have potential guests really take the time to see, like come up with a topic that's relevant. My show Go Pitch Yourself is literally about pitching yourself for podcasts, interviews and visibility opportunities. So if you can’t figure out how your expertise relates to that, like, we're not having a bunch of life coaches on, like I'm not having a bunch of ads people on. It's too far removed.”

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “Yeah, and when someone is going to be applying for a show, I guess some would be considered like a cold pitch. And then there's warm pitches. If it's a hot pitch, you really need to go through all that formality, I guess it depends on your relationship with the person. 

And is this mostly these pitches that we're talking about with the one sheet and all that they're more cold to warm pitches?”

Angie Trueblood: “For sure, yeah. And like warm pitches, for shows and hosts that we have a relationship with, sometimes we'll just shoot them an email that's like, ‘Hey, we have these two clients that we think might be a good fit, here’s a potential topic for one, here's a potential topic for the other. If you want more info, we'll send over’. Like, that's how important the topic is.

It's more based on that than their resume. I mean, we've, I've boxed heard friends before, ‘You know that I just ran across this person, I think she'd be a great fit for your show, let me know if you're interested and we can tackle it’, you know?”

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “Oh, that’s cool. I know a lot of podcasters in there like, ‘I never take pitches’, they just have to know somebody first.

So I would imagine that there is some sort of barrier to get into some shows. I'm not talking about John Lee Dumas. I'm like talking about just Joe Schmoe's podcast, but they're like, ‘Oh, I don't take pitches’. 

Have you been finding that resistance or it's not that really that prevalent?”

Angie Trueblood: “No, I mean, we definitely see it from time to time.

And it's not always the bigger shows. It's just, it's kind of random who is open to it and who is not. So many of them have been burned because the influx of pitches that is they're paying for someone to navigate through that inbox, I can kind of get it from that perspective. 

And even a couple of hosts, you mentioned John Lee Dumas, you pay to be on his podcast. It's not just a f’ill out a form and we'll get back to you’. There's an appearance fee. 

So there's definitely things that people are putting in place to make sure that guests are serious about providing value to the listeners. But we haven't really seen it as a huge obstacle.

We have seen the lead time of people, one saying yes, two then scheduling the interview and then three having it go live, it's definitely become a bit more of a longer game. That's great because the people that do this consistently, like you’ve just always got that plate spinning and you've always got shows coming out.”

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “As long as you can get on a show, then you'll know it will probably come out. As long as you have a really good interview. 

When someone is going to be pitching a show, what should they have ready if the podcaster says, ‘Yes, I'll have you on tomorrow. I want a high res picture. I want links. I want all these things’.

There must be certain things that you can expect. What should you have in your back pocket ready to go?”

Angie Trueblood: “Yeah, so we have a whole section on this inside of the co-op, it's called Prepped to Pitch. If you do it ahead of time before you get those first yeses. And a great time to kind of prep, some of these is once you've sent the pitch and you're kind of waiting to follow up and to hear back. 

Definitely a headshot, and it doesn't have to be professionally done. It just needs to look as professional as your brand is. Right? So it just needs to be reflective of you as the leader of your brand. Ideally, you should have a website and social links ready to kind of send off. One thing that I think is important is doing some self-reflection of your digital presence.

And just making sure that it looks consistent, right? So if your website is done in one color scheme and one type of personality, and then the Instagram that you're going to be sharing with people looks totally different. You need to kind of flesh those out. You don't necessarily need to hire anyone. But just sort of get some of these things more aligned, so it creates a really solid picture of who you are. 

We always like to share, and this is something that is not B+ work, but it is what I recommend everyone do when they send out a pitch, is either have something where you can directly link to you speaking. It could be as simple as a Facebook live, or if you host your own show, figure out a way so that that host can actually hear you.

What we do, right? We talk instead of you know, that you have a voice where you can articulate thoughts and your voice is pleasant enough, so having that ready. And then really the opt-in, a lot of times it's important that something to offer the listeners at the end, because some of them might fall in love with you. And so give them the opportunity to stick with you. And so having that ready ahead of time, it's just less stressful, like working up to the interview. 

With our clients, actually we create sub podcast guest information email, and once the interview gets scheduled, we actually proactively, no matter what that guest or host collected during the scheduling process, we send the email and it has all of my links, my bio. You want to have like a two to three sentence bio. In case the host is going to formally read it. You want to have your headshot listed in there. And we actually include my opt-in in that email so that it kind of sets the host up to where we can have a conversation like, ‘Oh, would it be okay if I shared this at the end?’.

Cause you, you want to be able to do that. But sometimes if you share it ahead of time, it kind of plants the seed that you'll be doing that.” 

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “Yeah, that's great. Yeah. Those are all things that I need. 

Now you mentioned about circling back with people and I mean, that's an important piece because it could be that they're very interested, but that that email gets lost or whatever.

So that you're not like really bugging them or all of that, how soon after sending the pitch, should you contact them again and be like, ‘Hey, by the way…’, and do you have an approach that works for that?”

Angie Trueblood: “Yeah, we actually recorded a whole episode on Go Pitch Yourself on following up. It was a couple of months ago.

So our timeframe for following up is: we send the pitch, and then two weeks later, we do a really informal circle back to where we actually reply to the original pitch email, if that's how we sent it. And it's really, ‘Hey, Susie Q, I wanted to pop back in to see if you've given any thought to having Susie B on your podcast to chat about XYZ, looking forward to hearing your thoughts’.

That's it like we don't need to re-pitch them. It just needs to be fast. And really it's just to get back in the top of their email inbox. And then if we don't hear anything from that, we follow up four weeks later. And that is more of a, ‘Hey, we're circling back one last time, we’d love, if you think this is a good fit, to go ahead and get the ball rolling, but whatever, either way, have a great day’.

And it's really just to give them that opportunity, like you said, we just ideally want a decision. We would love to have that decision communicated to us. Yes or no. And so if we can pop back in and get that decision, cool. And if not, after we've sent three emails, you don't want to harass people. And so then we just don't send them any more.

Yeah, we've never, we've had one person. It was so funny, it happened right before I recorded that follow-up episode. And I was going to say on that episode, no one has ever complained to us about following up. And we got one and the woman said, ‘No thank you, please take us off your list’. And I'm like, ‘It's not really a list, it’s an actual individual email’. So, one time.”

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “And don't be snarky, I'm not telling you not to be snarky, but I've had people come, it’s like, like two days later and they're like, ‘Have you had a chance?’, And it's like, ‘No, I haven't. And who are you?’. 

Angie Trueblood: “Like, give me a second.”

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “I haven't heard from you. I'm like, what, like I'm busy. Like, I dunno what you're talking about.”

Angie Trueblood: “I’ve definitely gotten those too, it’s super annoying.” 

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “Well, Angie, you have a great program. You've got a great podcast. Tell people how they can work with you and where they can find you.” 

Angie Trueblood: “Yeah. So the podcast, like I mentioned, is Go Pitch Yourself and that's probably the best place to go if you're trying to figure out who I am and our approach to pitching and guesting. So definitely hop over and subscribe. 

I do have a free offer for your listeners if they want to see pitches that have been accepted. So I know we talked about a variety of ways to pitch like the formal versus the DMs, and this file has some of both. And there's actually, there's technically a DM pitch that I sent to Pat Flynn on behalf of a client that did get accepted. And so I think that's important when you're starting out to know. 

And I put my very first pitch when I had a totally different business in there. I think it gives perspective and also helps lower the nervousness and like the intimidation of people who are thinking of doing this for the first time. 

They can go to thepodwizegroup.com/pitches, and that's Podwize with a Z pitches with the P, and they can get access to that.

Then if they want to check out the services that we offer or the membership program, which is called The Co-Op, that's over at thepodwizegroup.com.”

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “Very cool. And I think that the person that you were talking about was, was it Rachel Cook?”

Angie Trueblood: “It was, yeah.”

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “And she was on our show, so you'll have to check that out people, if you haven't heard that episode. 

Thank you so much, Angie. This has been so great. We'll have all the links in the show notes and people, if you've not listened to Angie’s show, please do it's really, really good. 

And even if you're like a podcaster or you're on the other side of the mic. I always get confused, are they on this side of the mic, or behind the mic with a different mic.”

Angie Trueblood: “I'm like both sides of the mic, but are there two sides? Like my mic only has one side.” 

Heather Zeitzwolfe: “Anyways. Awesome. Well, thank you so much, Angie!” 

Angie Trueblood: “Yeah, it was so good to meet you, Heather! Thank you.”