Melvin Varghese:
Hey there, it's Melvin. I hope you're doing well. Before we jump into today's session, just wanted to let you know that STC Elite, our mastermind for therapists creating their first online courses open for enrollment. If you've been thinking about creating an online course and have been a fan of the STC podcast and are looking to launch your online course in a community of other therapists, you can check out the mastermind over at sellingthecouch.com forward slash mastermind. or you can download our free online course starter kit. It's a seven day email course that'll help validate your course idea. That's over at sellingthecouch.com forward slash course kit. We'll jump into today's session. Hello, hello, welcome to today's session, Selling the Couch. I hope you're doing well, having an awesome day. So today's podcast is titled Seven Daily Habits That Changed My Podcasting Journey and Made It Sustainable.

If you've been thinking about creating a podcast this coming year, then I hope that today's podcast session is incredibly helpful for you. I, this is also something if you are already a podcaster and you've thought about whether, man, like I want to keep this podcast going, but I'm not sure if I can keep it going. I think that today's session will be helpful for you. More than anything, trust me, I've been there. Podcasting is one of the best ways to grow your impact beyond the clinical room, but it can also be overwhelming, especially if you don't set it up for the long game. Everything from editing to uploads to actually releasing content and all of that stuff. I have been podcasting for a decade now. Well, it will be 10 years next month. And I remember when I first launched the STC podcast in March of 2015, I just remember one of the things I kept thinking was, oh my gosh, am I going to get stuck on the content creation hamster wheel?

That's the last thing that I wanted to do. But now we're over 380 episodes of the podcast. We are just about to hit 1.82 million downloads. And recently I learned the podcast is now in the top 0.5% of all podcasts in the entire world. And as I was creating this, I think the most important thing is I don't podcast like every week of the year. In fact, it's actually just the opposite. I've really tried to build this podcast around the life that I want to live. versus just releasing episodes for the sake of it. Now, having done that for the first year and quickly realizing how this was a formula to burnout. So if you want a sustainable podcasting rhythm that doesn't burn you out, I think this podcast will be helpful for you. So just in terms of the actual habits. So habit one is designed for longevity and not for growth. Designed for longevity and not growth. In my first year, I literally tried to release a podcast episode every single week. I had some podcasting coaches. I was in the podcasting space. And they all kept saying, the more episodes that you release, the bigger your download numbers are going to be, the faster your podcast is going to grow. All of those things. And those things are actually absolutely true. What they often fail to mention is that Trying to release a podcast episode on a weekly basis for all of the year is a quick formula for burnout.

And now one of the things that I have shifted in my mind is I really try to design my podcast and the STZ podcast for consistency over decades, not just months. So my general rhythm with this podcast is I do two months on, which is where I basically release new episodes. and then I take one month off where we run replays of older episodes some of the most popular episodes from the archives. The summers and late winters I also take off and this is just aligned with our daughter's school schedule because again I wanted to design my podcasting workflow around my life and versus it becoming another thing that was you know, that I had to deal with. This schedule, what I have found, and again, I would say you don't have to necessarily follow my schedule, but really look at your life and mark off and block off the months that you actually don't want to podcast. I think it will set you up for long-term sustainability.

What I found for me is this schedule really keeps me energized and it prevents podcast fatigue. It also lets me come up with new content for the podcast that I am genuinely inspired by. I also get to do like some nerdy keyword research and figure out okay, is this actually stuff that folks are wanting versus this pool to just release episodes because I've got to get an episode out next week or something like that. So the big takeaway with this first point is put your podcasting schedule around the life that you want and don't, not the other way around. So don't end up podcasting, you know, on a unsustainable pace and then you either burn out or it compromises and gets into other domains of your life, i.e. your personal life, your relationships, your hobbies, those kinds of things.

Habit two is capture ideas daily. So, is a little bit embarrassing. But the very first months of the podcast, I would literally sit in front of a computer. And I would just stare and I would go, Okay, what am I gonna come up with? What am I going to talk about? And the truth is, that is really, really hard to generate content off of. So instead I do is I have a private Slack channel that's just for myself and within the Slack channel I have a little section that just says podcast episode ideas. And where do I get these ideas from? So the ideas are basically when listeners or SGC newsletter subscribers email me back with content we usually try to check in once or twice a year with regard to you know what episodes would be helpful for you. There are also just conversations I have with colleagues that I'm like oh this would be a really interesting episode because you know it just would be beneficial for for others. The other ones that I see are you know I'll look on like things like Reddit or when I post on LinkedIn the posts that tend to do well or have a lot of engagement and well is not always like number of likes, it's actually more looking at comments and engagement and as sort of a way to inspire me of whether it's a potential podcast episode. Other things I look at are, you know, I try to do daily hikes, so seven days a week. I'm usually at that point, if I'm not talking to someone on the hike, I'm usually listening to either a podcast or a book on Audible and or some sort of YouTube video. And that also allows me to just find new inspiration. Biggest thing I wanted to just share with you is never rely on inspiration in the moment. Capture ideas constantly so that you can have a constant pipeline when it comes to podcast content. So the big takeaway is a steady idea bank means that you're never scrambling for an episode topic. Habit three is to follow a repeatable episode outline. So I used to wing it when it came to podcast episodes. And part of this is I feel like every podcaster goes through this journey in the initial stages. You're just trying to figure out your own bearings and what makes the most sense for you. But now what I do is especially when they are, if so, you have probably noticed on the interview based episodes, I always come in, I do an intro, then we actually do the interview, and then I do an outro episode where I reflect and share some of the insights that I picked up on the podcast conversation. So that's what those interviews look like. On the solo episodes, what I generally do is I follow a framework, which is basically I introduce the episode by posing a question of what the episode is going to be about. I usually then share a little bit of a story, and then I do either 3 points, 5 points, or 7. In most scenarios I like to default to 3 because I'm trying to get in 5 and 7. That's just a lot of content. Like this episode has 7 points and I know that I always like try to balance that because I know that it's a lot of information to consume. But after that, I usually then just have a call to action. So what I really try to do is down, not all the time, I you know, I try to really rely on inspiration. But a lot of the solo episodes I tend to do tend to be focused on either podcasting or online courses. And those are things that I live and breathe, lived and breathe here over the past decade. It's also things that we have products and services related to. So it's just something to think about when you create your own solo episodes, think about products and services that you offer, and create episodes around that, and then have an invitation to, to join that product or a service. So the biggest takeaway is a structured outline means that you just get clear episodes and sort of a faster production time. So even as I am listening to content or looking on Slack, I'm like taking the idea and I will take the idea and I'll be okay, what's the story I can come up with? What are three talking points and what's the call to action that I can implement as a result of that? So habit number four is batch record on my off months. So instead of recording week to week, I actually batch record multiple episodes in advance. I found the most I can do is three episodes in one sitting, but usually two is a nice sweet spot for me. And so for example, for me is I'll record January and February episodes in November and December. This lets me take like real breaks in even in January and February while my podcast still runs. January, February also tends to be the months where our online course Mastermind launch is happening. So the thought of both recording solo episodes or interviews of the podcast while trying to do a launch, I learned that the hard way four years ago and I was like, I got to figure out something a little bit more sustainable. Hey, it's Melvin. I hope that you're enjoying today's podcast session. Just wanted to also let you know that STC Elite, our mastermind for therapist course creators, is now open for enrollment. If you've been thinking about creating an online course, and specifically if 2025 is the year that you want to create your online course, definitely encourage you to check out our mastermind. It's over at sellingthecouch.com forward slash mastermind. We launched this back in 2021 and since then over 60 of our colleagues have gone through our mastermind. It includes a ton of support all the way from live teaching, live feedback from colleagues and from our team to build out and structure your online course all the way to mindset coaching, all the way to access to our video editing and graphic design team so that you don't have to hire everything separately. We made it really super comprehensive and I think you're really going to enjoy it. Again, the link is over at sellingthecouch.com forward slash mastermind. Enrollment does wrap up at the end of August. So definitely encourage you to check it out and consider joining us. And again, we have a free email course. It's seven days. It'll help validate your course idea. I know that's the biggest struggle many of us are navigating of whether the course is actually going to make money. And we put all of this into a simple to understand email course that you can check out over at sellingthecouch.com forward slash course kit, sellingthecouch.com forward slash course kit. We'll jump right back into today's session. So why does this batching method work? Basically, it reduces stress. It kind of keeps my energy high. It also creates a little bit of a buffer for emergencies. Just a side note, one thing that colleagues will often ask me is, like, how many episodes, Mel, should I have in the bank so that it feels good? I find that the sweet spot is somewhere between three and six episodes in the bank. Six if you're, like, more, like, conservative and just want to be, like, extra cautious. three, I think three to four, I think is a really nice sweet spot. And I think beyond that, I find that there's usually things just in the world of news and things like that that are changing. And so if you get too far ahead, it's really hard to then go back. I suppose you can always create an episode and just plug one in, but it just makes it gives you enough flexibility to be like, hey, I'm far enough ahead, but I have some flexibility if I want to release an episode because something is inspiring me in that moment. Now, so the big takeaway is record ahead so that you can take guilt free breaks. And I feel that that's going to be just a lot more sustainable. Habit five is warm up my voice and energy before recording. So if you've ever listened to a there were some episodes in the past where I would just kind of my energy would be really low when it comes to recording the podcast episode. Now, I'm not a quote, unquote, like high energy in your face voice at all. But what I noticed is a lot of time there were times previously where I would just be fatigued and then I would try to record a podcast. What was happening behind the scenes is I was not doing any sort of a warm up. So I would just sit down, turn on my audio or now like turn on my video and then start to record without ever actually warming up. So I do a couple of things now. So I will usually drink warm tea or warm water with lemon. That's good for vocal cords. I usually do that before I even record and I usually will even have like a tea with me while I am recording just in case I have my, you know, I get a frog in my throat or something like that. Then I do a couple of minutes, usually about two minutes of deep breathing where I'm just centering myself. What I really try to focus on is not just the thoughts that are going through my mind, but just really focusing on gratitude, just the opportunity to record a podcast, to be able to share my thoughts, all of those things. And then, then what I will usually do is I will do some sort of a, you know, tongue twister, Sally sells seashells by the seashore, something like that, just to just to warm up my vocals a little bit. And something I've done in the past, which I don't do as much now, because just because my setup kind of limits me to have more of a sit down setup, I could do it into more stand up, but then it would just be more moving stuff around. but I have in the previous times when I've just recorded an audio only actually stood up to record a podcast episode. This is where a standing desk and then comes in really handy and also if you have one of these like mic clamps that you can just clamp to your desk as your desk moves up the you know the mic will move up with you so you don't have to then go and adjust like multiple things and all of those things. The biggest thing takeaway from this is treat podcasting like public speaking. Your voice just needs that warm up time. And I think doing that just can be incredibly helpful. Habit six is promote my own offers first and not just sponsors. Early on with the STC podcast, I relied on sponsors and we're always so grateful for sponsorships. I try to be super discretionary in terms of even the sponsors that we get on. But if I'm just being completely honest, and I think by and large, we did a good job. But in the early days of STC, because most of the revenue that STC was generating was coming from sponsorship income, I felt more pressure to accept sponsors because I wanted to keep the podcast going. And then I also wanted to pull back from clinical work over time, and I needed to replace that income. But over time, what I came to realize is we've worked with some amazing sponsors, and we continue to work with some. Of course, I try to, again, do my best to filter and sort, because I know how much trust that you have in me. But by the same token, I don't want my income tied to the marketing budget of a company, no matter how great the sponsor is. I did that for the first couple of years and income that I was expecting for to come in, didn't come in. And it just left me scrambling and stressed out and all of that stuff. And I just realized, yeah, that's not the game that I want to play. And I also realized that, I've mentioned this study a couple of times, but there was a study done in 2023-2024 by ACAS Media, and they studied all media personalities, both traditional media as well as digital media, and they found that podcasters are the most trusted media personalities. YouTubers are the second most. And so what I realized is there's The nature of podcasting is there's a level of trust that gets built. And so I just thought, why not start to just share my our own products and services on episodes. Now, here's kind of a next level. Now, we use captivate to do this as our podcast host. If you go to selling the couch calm for captivate for selling the couch calm forward slash captivate. There's a discount code there in like a free seven or 14 day trial. But basically, our podcast host allows us to run dynamic ads across all the episodes. So for example, if we have a, you know, even as you're maybe listening to this currently, we are mastermind launches happening, right? So I can run those ads across all our episodes versus just this one episode. So it doesn't matter if someone is listening to this episode or another episode, they'll still hear the ads for the podcast on the podcast. So generally what I have found, and I'll maybe do another episode on this, but we have found that not just like inviting to the paid product, but inviting to something that's even more valuable. So for example, any time that I do an online course-related episode, I'll share an invite to sign up for our free seven-day email course. This helps therapists validate their course idea. And it's an action-packed course. I spent almost $10,000 creating it. And it's just a high-value course. There's graphics and all this stuff that comes over email. That's just it's not like a typical email course. And so the big takeaway from this is be your own sponsor. Don't wait for external ads to make money. Finally, the seventh habit that I would share with you is engage with listeners on some sort of a regular cadence. It doesn't have to be every day. but really try to aim for it on a weekly basis. So what for personally for me is I try to set aside about 10 to 15 minutes every week to respond to listener DMs that come to me on LinkedIn or emails. And a little thing on this, I usually send like loom videos back. So I'll send a video response back. One, I just feel like in this world of, you know, social media and where the human connection, it's so easy to get lost, I think getting a personalized video from somebody, especially someone that's taken the time to write to me, I think it's a nice touch. I try to do that as much as possible. And then at a practical level, I find that the videos just take a little much less time for me to create than actually sitting down and like writing an email out. The other things that you can ask your listeners are what topics they want covered. You can also like check, you know, we have, I think, almost over 300 reviews of the podcast and 250, let's just say 250. I'm pretty sure it's over 300, but let's say 250. And so sometimes when I'll look on Apple podcast and see what the reviews are and what's like resonating for folks. So when I look at those reviews also, like it keeps me motivated, ensures my content is relevant to serving our field well. So the big takeaway is podcast isn't a one-way street. So engage your listeners on some sort of a cadence, whether it's daily or weekly like I do. So the seven habits again to sustain your podcast for the long term is design for longevity, not just for growth. Two is capture ideas daily. Third is follow a repeatable episode outline. Four is batch record on my off months. Five is warm up my voice and energy before recording. Six is promote my own offers first, not just relying on sponsors. and seven is engage with listeners on some sort of a regular cadence. If you enjoyed this episode and you are like Mel, I am wanting to start a podcast. I've been sitting with this for a long time. We actually have a free podcasting workshop. This takes a lot of lessons I've learned over the past 10 years, puts it into a 90 minute presentation. When I do these presentations, I believe in like high quality teaching. And so you can actually learn a lot of the tools and tips and how to record and all of that stuff in this free podcasting workshop. You can sign up for a day and time that works for you. It's an evergreen workshop, so it's got a bunch of times and slots available. It's over at sellingthecouch.com forward slash podcasting workshop. Have a great rest of your day and I will see you next time. Bye.

Narrator: Thanks for listening to the Selling the Couch podcast. For more great content and to stay up to date, visit www.sellingthecouch.com.

Melvin Varghese: Hey there, thank you so much for tuning in to today's session. Just wanted to also let you know that we have a free email newsletter that goes out every week. You can download it over at sellingthecouch.com forward slash newsletter. Basically that newsletter contains some of the stuff that's happening behind the scenes with STC and also with my life and how I'm balancing and trying to balance being both an entrepreneur as well as building a life around my family and my health as well. And it also contains the latest podcast episode and some of the stuff that I'm doing on LinkedIn, some of the strategies and things that are working for me. And then finally, a brand new section called On Mel's Mind, where I take a video or a book or a blog post or something like that that's inspiring me for that week, and I share how I'm implementing it both in my life and in my business. Again, you can download that over at signthecouch.com forward slash newsletter. And if you are one of the 3700 colleagues that have been a part of the email newsletter is so appreciate you and I'm grateful for your support. We genuinely try to make these helpful and and just based on the data and based on the feedback we're getting, it seems like we're doing a really good job. So appreciate you and I hope they have a great day.

00:00:00 – Introduction to Sustainable Podcasting
00:01:57 – Habit 1: Design for Longevity, Not Just Growth
00:05:06 – Habit 2: Capture Ideas Daily
00:07:17 – Habit 3: Follow a Repeatable Episode Outline
00:09:49 – Habit 4: Batch Record on Off Months
00:12:50 – Habit 5: Warm Up Voice and Energy Before Recording
00:15:30 – Habit 6: Promote Your Own Offers First
00:19:22 – Habit 7: Engage with Listeners Regularly
00:21:41 – Conclusion and Free Podcasting Workshop Invitation