Play #001: Leveraging the Power of The Founders Brand

Welcome to the first play of the Founders GTM Playbook Newsletter. Each week I will bring you one GTM play that is tested through scaling multiple 7-figure B2B businesses that you can put into action to scale your business.

In today's issue, I want to talk about how the founder's personal brand can be a superpower for startup growth. This is something I used to underestimate as a first-time founder. My wife Kelly and I scaled our first business together from 0-5M in annual revenue in twenty-six months. If I knew what I know about the power of a personal brand back in 2010 we probably could have scaled to 10M+. The fact is that people want to follow people nowadays and not brands so it's critical that you find a way as a founder to to invest in building you brand an be the Chief Creator of your company.

The most common excuse I hear from founders is "I'm too busy to invest time into my personal brand". I even once said that myself so I get it

At one time I was running three companies and still made time to make my personal brand a priority. Podcasting was the answer to growing my personal brand efficiently and effectively while having fun.There are two ways to leverage podcasting to grow your brand and drive more revenue for your business.

1. Start A Podcast

Podcasting has a low barrier to entry, pretty much anyone with a smart phone can start a podcast these days but 9 out 10 fail.

Starting a podcast has many benefits for growing your personal brand as a founder. Your podcast gives you a voice and platform to share your story, your experiences and vision as a thought-leader in your space. One of the main reasons I fell in love with podcasting was how the single activity can serve you in so many ways. Podcasting gives you the ability to take content from your podcast and repurpose on every social platform, your blog and YouTube as well as the podcast platform of course.

Here is a list of the basics you need to get started

• Podcast Name

• Podcast Cover Art

• Podcast Host Software

• Recording Software

• Mic & Camera (total under $300)

If your have more tactical questions you can join the free Salescast podcasting community.

2. Guest on Podcasts

There are almost 4 million podcast and it can be overwhelming on where and how to start guesting.

As a founder, this is a very time-efficient way to grow your brand. Podcasting is a growing medium and there are new shows being launched every day. The major advantage of guesting on shows vs starting your own show is that you can tap into existing audiences in your niche. Think about the shows that your ideal customer would listen to. You can build a list on Listen Notes and even buy credits to get the host email address.

So you have your list, now what?

Last year our team made over 1,000 podcast placements and I personally gusted on 154 shows. We have created a framework for outreach that works and stands out as most people are reaching out like a PR agency from the 90's. The key is to touch on the four things that podcaster care about most

Podcast outreach framework

• Their Show (listen to the show and mention something you learned)

• Reviews (these are gold, so drop a 5 star review and let them now)

• Their Listeners (suggest some topics their listeners could benefit from)

• Quality ( send a video so they can see your setup, your mic and video quality)

See you again next week.

-CM