How I signed with PodcastOne…

July 27, 2017 I was fired. 

That day the company’s stock was trading over $10.  Today, less than two years later the same company’s stock is trading at $3.55 and no this is not a joke.  I was the Chief Revenue Officer then and when the CEO who I had worked with for 14 years became ill, he elevated his daughter to CEO.  Clearly, she wasn’t a fan.  That day I felt like I had lost everything.  The funny thing is I was wrong.  I wasn’t the one that had lost.  However, I didn’t know it at the time.  

It took two days for me to realize that no one knew that I had been fired.  When I had this realization, I posted about being fired on every social media platform I had.  That catapulted me forward quickly.  I landed on the Elvis Duran show where Elvis asked me about the book that I was “obviously” writing.  Funny thing is I wasn’t writing a book, that is until then.  I hopped on my flight home, I googled how do you write a book and then I began writing.  For three months I wrote every day and then I taught myself the self-publishing process. For six months I worked around the clock to get my book out.  May 22nd, 2018 I launched my book Confidence Creator not knowing if people would love it or hate it.  I knew I loved it and that was enough for me to go for it.  

My book did really well taking #1 on the Business Biography list on Amazon its first week out.  I even “Trumped” Trump’s Art of the Deal!  I was feeling really good and I realized I needed to lean into promoting the book and breaking through all of the noise in order to get some traction and  drive revenue.  It didn’t take me long to figure out that going on Podcasts was the single most powerful thing I could do to sell books.  Luckily, while I had been writing I had been going on different podcasts to familiarize myself with being a guest.  By the time my book was live I had been a guest on hundreds of shows. Mind you, most of the shows were small but I had experience now and I knew the steps to take to ensure a good show. I had learned to listen to the podcast at least a few episodes ahead of time so I would know the cadence of the show and the potential questions.  I knew to ask about the audience and what they were looking to learn from the show so I could add value.  I knew to google the host before I went on so I could relate things back to them and their life.  I had learned a lot and I was ready to go to the next level.

During this time  I started getting booked on bigger shows. When you begin to go on bigger shows other big shows want you as a guest.  Because I had so much experience, I felt confident and was able to add value. At one point someone told me I needed to have my own show.  I was a brand new entrepreneur and while I had my book out and it was doing well it hadn’t reached that tipping point yet where it would just sell on its own.  I would study the metrics closely and if I didn’t have a speaking engagement or a show that I was on my book was not moving.  I liked the idea of having a show but I realized I needed more bandwidth to take more on and I was not in a financial position to hire a team yet.  I would thank others and kindly let them know that I was not going to launch a podcast on my own.  Instead, I had decided I would launch a show with a marquis podcast company, I just didn’t know who that was yet.  I knew I wanted to join a team of experts that could help me where I lacked experience and I knew there was no way I could take on another job on my own.  I began asking questions.

One of the first people I spoke to about this is a friend of mine from Miami who now lives in LA.  He is a producer on a big TV show and he has a lot of experience with agents.  He agreed that I needed an agent and he also was kind enough to take my book and give it to his agent.  His agent submitted Confidence Creator to his team for review and the response was fantastic. Two months after giving Joey the book I received a message that his agent Sid would have a phone meeting with me.  

My call with Sid went great! He was interested in the book becoming a tv show.  He even mentioned that they had a podcast division and a speaking division and could handle all of my needs.  Then CRICKETS.  It was nearly Thanksgiving last year and I painfully learned thanksgiving through the new year is a time when no one responds.  During that same time I had reached out to one of my clients from my media past. Lauren had a been a great client and an even better friend since I had been fired.  I called her to ask her to introduce me to a few different podcasting companies to see if I could get booked on more shows.  She did exactly that and one of the companies she introduced me to was PodcastOne.

PodcastOne responded immediately and booked me on Dr. Drew and The Lady Gang.  The Lady Gang was exploding at the time and I was getting the chance to get on a show that was absolutely taking off.  I was so grateful to Lauren!  Both of the shows went great.  The Lady Gang Show went so well that it was in the top 50 podcast episodes on Apple that week and the response I received via book sales was MASSIVE.  That is when I reached back out to PodcastOne asking for a meeting with the head of the company to thank him for putting me on his shows.  I set the meeting up and we met.  They were excited to meet me as The Lady Gang Show had done so well.  I wasn’t there 15 minutes before the conversation turned to the success of the episodes I did with them and the idea of me joining the team.  Important to note here:  I had credibility by delivering results before I walked in to pitch them.  That was October and we began our negotiations then and suddenly CRICKETS.

PodcastOne was adding so many celebrity shows during this time that my potential show was getting lost in the shuffle.   There is a fine line you walk between annoying people and staying top of mind.  If you don’t stay top of mind you WILL be forgotten. It can be very challenging staying top of mind with a company based in LA when you live in Miami.  Since I couldn’t be there in person I decided to send a life size cutout of myself to the head of PodcastOne to remind him that I wanted to be there in person but I needed him to help me accelerate the process and sign the deal.  This was a good decision.  I did receive follow up immediately and our discussions picked backup.  

Still no signed deal and now it was February 2019.  Luckily I had booked myself to do a number of shows for International Women’s Day this March in LA.  I used that trip to schedule a follow up face to face meeting with the team and go for the close.  Closing in person is always the answer.  I arrived at PodcastOne and we both signed the contract that day.  This process has been lengthy and at times I didn’t know if it would work out or if I was letting go of other potential options that could have panned out.  Here is what I do know:  when you follow your instinct things will inevitably work out in the end.  I couldn’t be more excited to launch Creating Confidence with PodcastOne today!  My first show is LIVE today and I am so proud of it!  I told the team I would go BIG or go home and I went BIG!  My first guest is Gary Vaynerchuk and our interview is live right now.  It would mean the world to me if you would subscribe to my show and let me know what you think.  Each week I will be sharing my struggles and how I overcome them, my guests will do the same and I will answer your questions.  If you have a question you want me to answer on the show leave it below.

Subscribe here and let me know your thoughts!  No one succeeds alone and that includes me.  Thank you for your help and support!

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/creating-confidence-with-heather-monahan/id1462192400