If you’re looking to evolve in the legal marketing world, this episode is for you.
How a video podcast created digital connections amidst COVID restrictions A B2B podcast will create conversations and relationships in your industry Podcasting is about giving people a platform for their expertise How legal marketing can benefit from a B2B podcast Learn to create conversations people want to engage with
00:00-9:14 | Why start a podcast in the legal industry? 9:14-14:46 | How a B2B podcast can create conversations 14:46-19:02 | A B2B podcast can contribute to your ROI 19:02-26:45 | How to build relationships that build your business 26:45-31:53 | Creating connections in your industry 31:53-40:22 | What is the future of legal marketing? 40:22-47:30 | What are the biggest misconceptions B2B businesses need to overcome about a podcast?
“An effective thought leadership strategy is only possible when there is a culture in the organization that supports it.” - Kap Chatfield “There's nothing that substitutes the ministry of presence.“ - Josh Peterson “We have businesses that want to buy from us or work with us because they got to know us through the conversations we had on the show.” - Josh Peterson “It doesn't matter to me who gets the credit. If you put others first and you promote them through the show, good things happen.” - Josh Peterson “Your audience's attention is the number one commodity that you have. If you have their attention, that's where you can begin the relationship.” - Kap Chatfield “There's no better storyteller than a litigator. They're the best storytellers there are. They know how to unpack things better than anybody.” - Josh Peterson “I think what's so unique about video podcasts is that it gives other people a voice.” - Kap Chatfield “We ascertained that we're giving our guests on the show between $5,000 and $10,000 of PR, depending on how well the show is handled.” - Josh Peterson “What makes the video podcast valuable is the aggregate group of experts that contribute.” - Josh Peterson “We can't do what everyone else is doing and expect to grow at the same rate or higher than them. We've got to do it differently, and I think there's a power in video.” - Josh Peterson- Rveal’s website: rveal.media
- Rveal’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/rvealmedia/
- Rveal’s YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC69p14R2ccMdyUbbmdlWCEw
Full transcription:
Kap Chatfield 0:20
Josh Peterson, shareholder at Exact Data Discovery and a host of a number of podcasts, bro, it's good to have you on the show today.
Josh Peterson 0:29
Thanks for having me, Kap
Kap Chatfield 0:31
Hey, so as we kick it off why don't you just explain to our audience what you know, this show B2B Podcasting, the goal is obviously to help businesses drive revenue through content. Our favorite type of content is video podcasting for a lot of different reasons that we talk about in the show quite frequently. But you obviously you're starting to really get serious about becoming a host and an executive producer of various b2b podcasts and not necessarily just b2b, but different shows in general. So why don't you just share with the audience, what experience do you have what shows you're currently doing?
Josh Peterson 1:04
Okay, well, the one show I did before I podcasted was Texas Boys Outdoors, which is on the Pursuit Channel. And it's got a viewership of a million, and it's for hunting and fishing crowd. And that kind of got my feet wet on the production side of things. We have way more gifted producers on that show, I'm more of an executive producer. But that kind of got me thinking about the power of video, if you will. And then the other podcasts are Decisis, which I have a page on LinkedIn called Decisis Forum that houses those shows. And they're they're like what you would call a "pocket podcast" Kap. I think that was your term. And, and then the other one is called Sidebar, which is kind of a play on words. It's basically another legal show, like much like Decisis. Sidebar is kind of whenever you you watch like Law And Order on television, you'll see like a sidebar called between the two sides, and the judge usually happens in the chambers or at the bench. Why that's that's called a sidebar. And we kind of use play on words, you know, for like a happy hour type show kind of a casual setting for our clients to kind of show what they do and let their subject matter expertise come out in kind of a, again, another pocket podcast format.
Kap Chatfield 2:29
So you already had some experience creating content. I mean, let's let's actually start with the Texas Boys Outdoors one because it's obviously a slightly different format than what we're doing here. So that almost was produced kind of like, it's aired on TV. It's still on TV right now. But it almost was more of like a YouTube series. So very visual, lots of different angles, things like that. Right?
Josh Peterson 2:53
Yeah, I mean, we usually have three or four cameras to film the show. And this is something that, you know, with technology coming up, it's a lot easier to make a great show with these 4k cameras, you can buy inexpensively. So will usually have several angles of someone like whether it's hunting or on a boat fishing, and you kind of feel like you're there. That's the idea. So we saw some of that with the NFL this year, where they had actually 8k cameras in the endzone, and it just kind of brought you closer to the action. So we did that, and our show visual quality has really come up quite a bit.
Kap Chatfield 3:30
One thing I'll just kind of go off a little tangent here, and I know you're, you know, we have some questions to go over. But I know it's good to have some authentic conversation. One thing that I noticed, though, about the NFL 8k cameras, that's super interesting is you hear this comment all the time when people are seeing that angle, I know the exact angle you're talking about. And now people are saying it's like they're, it's they're saying "real life looks just like a video game now", which is super interesting, if you think about it, because it was only like maybe a decade ago, where, obviously with video game graphics kind of just still being in their elementary phase, every time a new game would come out a new Madden and a new 2k or whatever people would say, "oh my goodness, the graphics look almost as good as real life". But now the graphics are so insane, that you know to be able to keep up with the video game. Now different sports networks are leveraging that camera. I even saw it during the Masters. So it's just interesting how how we're consuming content these days. And speaking about interesting how we're consuming content, your shows that the two podcasts that you were talking about specifically, they're really directed towards the legal industry where we're not really seeing a ton of a ton of that sort of content. I mean, when you put out Sidebar, for example. I haven't seen anybody do anything like that. It's a very casual, LinkedIn focus pocket pocket podcast as we're talking about, very unique. And so my question to you is, you know, without seeing a lot of people doing that already, what made you interested in starting a b2b video podcast?
Josh Peterson 5:08
Well, sometimes stuff happens to you Kap, you know, and I couldn't, I'll just say this, I couldn't have done it without you. So thank you for you taking the time to help walk me through that and be my partner on it, kind of behind the scenes. But it really started through the necessity of what happened with COVID. And we hear a lot of people blame COVID for everything, poor service, poor everything, and poor results in your numbers financially, as a performing business, and we kind of don't want to be victims, we want to be leaders. And when COVID hit, I was lucky to have really good leadership at our company. The guy I report to Nick Ryzen, he's probably the best in the country at what he does, and he kind of like challenged us to figure it out. And let's, let's get out there and be creative. We got our budgets cut, we couldn't travel, we couldn't take people out. And you know, a lot of people were locked down anyway, in Texas, that was less the case. But we still got locked down for a while here. And then our travel budget was killed, I'm sorry, our entertainment budget was killed and everything was, so we had no money. And then we actually got pay cut. Shareholders like myself, along with all the staff, got our pay cut. So it was kind of like battering down the hatches, but still trying to find that result. So it just it just kind of spawned some creative thinking and thinking, "Okay, I'm engaging people through my show. And there's a lot of people that are interested in hunting and fishing". The legal community is more of a static communication community. The people are static there as lively and cool and lovable and interesting is as can be, but their content is all like white papers. And here's a published document I have and and check out this webinar I'm doing and it wasn't so much interaction. There was to my knowledge, there wasn't much going on as far as like podcasting or even pocket podcasting. So we saw a real opportunity to engage our clients, but also promote our clients through that. And so COVID kind of like, beget that. And then when I called you with the idea, I think your response to me was, let's go.
Kap Chatfield 7:21
So usually that's my response. Yes,
Josh Peterson 7:23
Yes. And you're a "can do" person. And then my second call, after you said we can do this was to Jane Funk. And Jane, she helped me launch Decisis. And to say she helped me launch is an understatement, because Jane is the kind of person where you could parachute her in any organization. And she can do any job, she'll learn to do it the best of anyone, she'll end up leading that organization, whether it be the top level of that part of the organization, and frankly, she probably can lead organizations from the top. She's that gifted. She's a great copywriter. She's a great communicator. But she's a lawyer and and she's a believable contributor / show producer herself. So to do it with her was like it was her or nothing for me. And I'm so glad she said yes, because that really launched Decisis, which was the first iteration of our pocket podcast. And then Sidebar came after. The Sidebar story was slightly different. Because that was when I mentioned Nick Ryzen earlier, he kind of got his weight behind the show and said, "Let's do this as a company, let's get behind it. Let's really maximize our reach to our clients and show them you want to promote them". And I just got I can't give him enough credit. I respect him so much. He's He's a monster producer, but he's a great leader. And and he was able to get the top leadership Bob Poulos, our founder at the time. And also David Moran, who helped us navigate COVID beautifully. You know, we had a lot of support from all the C- level ranks. Our general counsel at the time, Kate was always supporting. So we had the top leadership buy into this, because they knew we had to be creative, Kap, they knew we had to do something different.
Kap Chatfield 9:14
One thing I've noticed, I've read this, this study on the power of thought leadership content, and it's a study by LinkedIn and the Edelman group. And they basically were looking at all these, you know, they gathered all this data, they they, you know, surveyed dozens, if not hundreds of different companies, various different industries, different sizes. And they were looking at the power of thought leadership content and how it affected the sales cycle, how it affected revenue, ultimately, because at the end of the day, if a business isn't profitable, you could have a really, you know, cool show or cool piece of content. But if it's not driving business, it's it's really it's not hitting the ultimate mission. And one of the things that they discovered, well I might have to share the link in this in the description of this episode, because it's just such a fascinating study. But apart from them discovering, you know, I think we could all kind of wrap our heads around thought leadership content done well produced well actually does increase the likelihood of a decision maker purchasing or doing business with that organization that produced that content. But one of the things that they said was a critical factor in a company producing a strategy, a thought leadership strategy that was effective, and and really did help increase business development was that there was a culture in that organization that supported it. And and there was a, there was this buy in, because typically, you know, the people on those shows are creating that content, they're going to be higher in the organization, they will typically be the thought leaders, the vision carriers, the vision casters, and the rest of the team is there to like help either bring input or distribute it and help share it. And so, to me, it's no surprise that, because you had a team that was so supportive, really have a vision that you had, I mean, you thanked me for helping out, but it was your vision. And I was I was grateful just to be a part of it. But you had this unique vision that you knew would would turn some heads in the legal industry. And I'm, I'm excited actually to talk a little bit more about that. But that, that was easy for your team to get behind. And I think that's what would attribute to the success of of your show. And so talking about success, even of your show, I want to go back to that setting thing I just said about turning heads. Let's talk about some qualitative results of of that show. So what were some of the things that your colleagues in the legal world were saying, after you guys started producing this content?
Josh Peterson 11:51
Well, it really created a lot of conversation. And keep in mind, during you know, during this time, we, it wasn't like you're getting in front of people, this is the height of COVID. So you know, I, I can only I can just tell you that it created a forum of discussion. It let me reach so many people on such a comfortable level. Because we were bringing on thought leaders that, we're talking the head of legal for LinkedIn, we're talking the head of legal for General Electric, I mean, we're talking about top level people. And when you bring those people on, they're buying into the format too. What you know, and they're lending credibility to the format too, but they're also I just feel like it's, I do have quantified the quantifiable numbers too that are exciting, but it just created a lot of conversation. And, you know, my dad used to always refer to it as the ministry of presence. He was the pastor at the second largest church in Nebraska, in the 80s, and 90s. And he was the associate pastor, so he's number two. And so he kind of was the guy that kind of made the machine run. And he just took care of the people and pastored them. And so he was in ministry, but he always used to me, he said, "There's nothing that substitutes the ministry of presence, and just being there". So when COVID hit, you can't be there, what's the next best thing? Is video and engagement and zoom calls and zoom happy hours, and just that virtual, reaching out and touching someone is the way he used to say, I think at&t used to say that, if I'm not mistaken. But I think that was the flash from the past. But really, it I believe in that. And I think that my style is sort of a belly to belly business. I'm not someone that is an email blaster, or someone that is a cold caller, I'll do both, if I need to. I mean, obviously, I need to feed my family. But usually I get referrals from people and people know, hey, I really care. And I feed my family by doing a good job at this, you know, this skill. And I also when I network really well, which I think is a skill of mine that I like to take pride in. I want to bring more people in that network so that people that buy from me why I'm going to can connect them with people that will buy from them. And so from working in house that you know XYZ Corporation, I want to bring those outside councils that give me business and meet those people and give them a chance to grow their business as well. And this was a great forum to do that Kap, and still is. And more so now than happy hours or lunches or dinners that we used to do because you couldn't do it. Now we can get back to doing that stuff, hopefully, more so and still have this great vehicle to do it.
Kap Chatfield 14:46
I love that you made an allusion to obviously the qualitative results. You've mentioned the quantitative results that you had to show, why don't you share a little bit about how your shows have attributed to the development of your business.
Josh Peterson 15:00
Well, it's it's been so impactful, Kap. And I can't thank you enough, because you have to get the show right for people to watch it. And so I think I had a great idea. I mean, I have a lot of bad ideas. So it's always good to have a good one.
Kap Chatfield 15:16
I don't know about that.
Josh Peterson 15:17
I, the good ones help, right? So I when I when we went to do this and get it executed, righ, and it starts with Decisis with Jane, who I can't share enough credit with. She's She, she deserves just as much credit as I do, if not more, because she really helped steer it to a direction that was really relevant to attorneys. And then what we learned in Decisis, we're able to use in Sidebar. But the quantitative results were north of a million, I would say conservatively, 1.2 million in a year of new business generated from, you know, the interaction created by the show. And and we have a lot of unfinished business here, we have businesses that want to buy from us or want to work with us, because they went from not knowing us to getting to know us on through the the conversation we had on the show. You know, keep in mind, let's say we do a pocket podcast in five minutes. But we carve out 45 minutes, and you're on this show and your guards down. And you're really just trying to say how do I promote you? How do I get your message out? How do I out you are the expert, I'm going to get out of the way and let you be the star. That's the show. And by the way, no one wants to watch me, they want to watch my clients, my clients are awesome. And so I just do a good job getting out of the way. And through the course of doing that, they just say, this is someone I want to work with. If I have to buy this service from someone, I actually got a comfort level working with this guy. And without that show and that interaction in that, that moment in time, they wouldn't have necessarily thought that. And in when you have Jane Funk, who's one of the best in the industry, right by your side, Heck, I probably should give her the credit. They probably want to buy from her more than me, that's fine. You know, I'm glad she you know, it doesn't matter to me who gets the credit. I think it's just great to be on a great team and have a great forum. And really, if you put others first and you promote them through the show, good things happen. And good things have happened for us, 1.2 million. I want to say we have, we do an email campaign and 90,000 emails per show, I want to say we've impacted over a half a million individuals through our different channels, whether it be LinkedIn or Vimeo or website or email campaigns. So we've reached a half a million people. And we've, you know, we brought in over a million dollars. And you know, some organizations probably don't blink at a million dollars. But for us, it's like it just we just started this and we don't have that much invested in it. Our ROI is like, you know, I can't I'd have to figure out the ROI, we could edit it in later. But it was a lot.
Kap Chatfield 18:02
Yeah. No, that's, that's awesome. And one thing that I remember I was talking about previously, too, was, you know, and this isn't necessarily a bad thing, because you know, what I'm about to say someone could could take as it's it comes off as manipulative or ingenuine. But having a show that's produced really well can make you look 10 times bigger as a company or 10 times whatever, than you already are. And sometimes that's you know, if you don't have the chops to back it up, then obviously that creates a problem. But a lot of organizations I mean, the reality is, the internet is a crowded space, right? It's there's so much information, it's an avalanche of content, to break through and to grab attention. It's the number one commodity, as we say. Someone's attention, your audience's attention is the number one commodity that you can have. Because if you have their attention, that's where you can begin the relationship. And hopefully, at the end of the day, you'll do business with them and create some sort of partnership. And so, you know, obviously, it wasn't about creating a show that made you guys look, quote unquote, 10 times bigger than you are, because you guys are already a very successful organization. But what did you see in regards to maybe building relationships that you thought otherwise, you probably wouldn't have been able to build with some of the people that you had on your show? You don't necessarily need to name drop, but did you see any sort of any sort of personal relational success and being able to, you know, create relationships with some really interesting people because of the show?
Josh Peterson 19:36
Yeah, there was a lot of that. And I want to make sure I'm sensitive to the people involved in, you're right. You don't want to seem like you're being manipulative. What you really want to do is when people go in-house, meaning they go work for a corporation, and they're no longer working at a law firm. Some of these people can feel like they're on the island because they're used to being influencers. They're used to being out there. They're used to be in kind of gunslingers for about lack of a better way of saying it, doing seminars. And and you want to basically, I think there's a hunger and a desire to say, "Hey, listen, I'm shaping, thought leadership". A lot of the people that are going in-house right now that are people of color, diversity is on top of mind. And they're really trying to influence the direction of that, and they're passionate about it. One name that comes to mind is Jason Brown at GE Appliance, formerly a general counsel at Dyson. I think a lot of people know the name GE and Dyson, this guy's a big time influencer, and he shapes culture. And he shapes law firm culture, from where he sits. And that guy needs a mic in front of them. He he is a thought leader and and he'll he'll, he wants to influence people because he wants to make a positive change. And then in his organization, he's already doing it every day. But to give them a platform and put him in front of 100,000 people is, it's it's justice being done because this guy needs to have a voice. He's a, he's a great person, and he's doing great things. So that's a good example. And I wouldn't have known him had we not done the show. And, and I think he he's, I'll just say this, like, we're working with him now. And we're working with other people like him. And, and this opportunity is, is created through the forum of doing the right thing, which is getting subject matter experts out there, training younger people that are lawyers that want to learn from these people, outside counsel, like the law firms, learning what in-house people want to see from them. And we just feel like we're doing a public service for everyone involved. And we're having a great time doing it. So I don't know if that answers your question, but I think it does a great powerful conversations. A lot of you, you mentioned on the podcast, I've watched with you Kap. You mentioned the power of storytelling, and there's no better storyteller than a litigator. Let me tell you, they're the best storytellers there are. They know how to unpack things better than anybody.
Kap Chatfield 22:08
Wow. Come on. That's. So you hear that? Lawyers, it's time to start a podcast and to start sharing your stories. An opportunity As long as they're closed cases. But yeah, I didn't know that you and Jason were doing business together. That's amazing. I remember I remember seeing that episode and I thought, he brought such a such a great perspective. So yeah, it's really cool that you were able to to really develop that relationship. I think one thing too, that's interesting. It may be you've sent this
Josh Peterson 22:38
His relationship is through outside counsel right now. But when it had, okay, he had reached out to Jane, and Jane had done the show, and said, "Hey, I'm glad we're working together. You know, and this is great. And there's, you know, a lot of different affirmation on future opportunity there." So it kind of happened, in a familiar sense of we were doing a lot of things and that worked out. But the show didn't beget that actual projects happening. But I think the show actually laid the framework for him to feel great about what we're about when we started working through outside counsel. And I think ultimately, what we love to do, is you always like, selfishly, you want to work with the I want to work with somebody, I want to work with the coolest people. I want to work with the best influencers, I want to work with the winners. So he's a guy that you want to work for. I mean, you love that guy. So but yes, I just want to clarify that one point.
Kap Chatfield 23:33
No, that's but it's good that you did, because I think one thing that's important to think about too, is whether you've already begun a working relationship with a client or a prospect. Or you've you know, you how should I say this, whether you're, you're you're hoping to build that relationship to do business, or you've already begun doing business with that person and working with them. I think what's so unique about this, this mode of communication, is that it gives other people a voice. Like you're saying, so what you're doing is you're actually by by creating this show, and anybody can watch one of your episodes and see that you know, your statement about you getting out of the way is true. You do a great job as a host, and bringing on really remarkably interesting talent onto your show, asking them questions that that really just give them a stage to share who they are. And that obviously, it's a gift to your audience because they're interested in that content. But then it becomes it becomes a gift to your guests as well. I remember some stories that you shared about some of the people you've had on your show that would take that episode and they would share that with their own organizations, they would share that with their own clients and their own prospects. So it becomes rather than asking for somebody's business, it becomes a way to give something away and develop relationship with that person further.
Josh Peterson 24:52
We kind of ascertained that we're giving them between five and $10,000 of PR, depending on how well the show is handled. And, and you know, during the COVID world to be able to create that kind of value for people, where they if you were to approach them and say do you want to pay for this? I think a lot of people would take pause and say, I don't know, but is that what I really want to do right now? I wasn't looking, I wasn't setting out to do that. But it you could see by who joined on, jumped on the podcast, you have the head of legal at LinkedIn. I mean, you have, you know, like mentioned that the head of legal for Dyson and, and GE appliance. You have that the general counsel of YMCA, I mean, come on, you have people that believe in the platform, if people say does this work? I could give you a list of people that we brought on that you don't, you know, bring them on unless you have something that's valuable to them. So and what makes it valuable is the aggregate group of experts that do it. And then the audience. And it's, it's not me, I'm just facilitating, and you're helping me produce it, which is awesome. But really, the buy in is there, and the genre is bought into that's, that doesn't need to happen, that's already happened. So I was thinking about some of the great shows we've done, and the great stories that have been told. And you know, I'm the biggest winner here, because the revenue afterwards, it feels almost like accidental success, because we really never asked for the business. People just want to work with us. And we just basically build relationship, and we had to have a vehicle to do that. And with COVID, we had to be creative. And so we were kind of lucky and fortunate and blessed all at the same time.
Kap Chatfield 26:45
That's amazing. One thing I want you, you mentioned your episode with Jason Brown. Clearly, that was one of the most impactful for you. Are there any other episodes that you had done that really, you know, maybe not caught you off guard, but you just really enjoyed doing the show with that individual?
Josh Peterson 27:03
You're getting you're gonna be in trouble here because I I kind of feel like I'm friends or friendly with everyone. I've done. I've enjoyed them all. Sure. They're all
Kap Chatfield 27:12
So no favorites, but like, was there one that even just today,
Josh Peterson 27:16
The show the shows become your kids, they become your children. You love them all. And that's love every single show you do because you have so much invested in it. But yeah, I'll just give some highlights: Jeff Vance, Jeff Mansur from Perkins Kui. He got caught in a tornado. I mean, oh, that was so goodwhat an amazing storyteller that guy is. John Mailee, as a young kid that was, you know, he was he was I got the impression he was slow to to get his grow spurt. And he got invited on the court at a Harlem Globetrotters event. And this guy. I mean, he's he's got a nonprofit that touches millions of people in Indiana. He's an absolute stud. And I did that with my good friend Jim Norman, who I mean, anytime you can do something with Jim Norman you jump at the chance. He's he's an impact player. He's he's an all star, one of the best guys in our business space. And so that was so much fun. The last one I did was Noelle Reed, who she was with her former colleague at Skadden Arps. Skadden is like one of the top names in the legal profession. And she's a powerhouse, just total powerhouse attorney. And you kind of get the impression Noelle's an introvert. And yet she's such a great communicator. And I've seen her in the courtroom. And she is absolutely powerful beyond belief. But she gets out of herself. And she's just got a great story to tell. And she's a great mother. And she was with Heather Loman, who she worked with for 10 years. And they had a great story. I love that. Byron Bright, So this guy's company built half of Houston, KBR, he was the president of KBR, they're running NASA right now. They're putting rockets in space. This guy's a stud. And then he was well, one of my buddies, Brandon Rankin, who's a Partner at Block Lord. And I felt like that pocket podcast could have been the biggest pocket of all those guys could talk for an hour and you'd stay with it. It was so great. Like that was the hardest episode to cut, because there's so much great content. And they were just fun. Amy Smedley, she talked about how, you know, chemical companies is actually helping the environment and not the other way around. And she's she's running point on the legal department, the legal department at Huntsman. And I'll just tell you, Amy, and I hit it off so well on the relationship side because her son's going to play college football. He will be and so we the show really connected us in a really profound way. And we ended up merging with another company that is already getting the work but had that not happened I think Amy Smedley would have been an incredible client of ours just on accident because we just had such a personal connection after doing one show. And if you know her, she's she's impossible not to love. And then one of my favorites was Courtney Fong he adopts, he adopted a kid that had no ears, and just one of the best people. If Courtney Fong is not, not going to Heaven, none of us have a chance. You know, he's, he's incredible guy. I love his guy. And CompTIA is a company we're working with. And he's he's an incredible guy. I can't say enough. If I had to pick one show that really got to me the most, it was probably Mindy White, Quanta Services. Mindy, Mindy will be a CEO of a company someday. She's got all the talent in the world. She's lovable, she's likable. And if you could pick one, you pick likable every time because you can love someone and still have a problem with them sometimes. But she's impossible not to like. She's a great leader. And she played football. And if her stories are incredible. She's one of the best storytellers. She's, she makes you smile, and you'd follow her anywhere. She also believed in our show with the same information you and I had. And I thought for someone to have such a belief, they can make a show good without seeing it. I gotta give them all kinds of mad props. So if you put a gun to my head and said, Pick one, it'd be Mindy White.
Kap Chatfield 28:13
Wow. That's great. And I love you were able to rattle off all the other episodes. So Well, clearly. You know, those? I know. Give me guys. Yeah, no, I for sure. And Gina Koosman. And all of them.
Josh Peterson 31:45
And we had Joel who belted out Karaoke in the middle of the show. You gotta see it to believe it.
Kap Chatfield 31:51
Oh, my gosh,
Josh Peterson 31:52
don't believe me. Just watch it.
Kap Chatfield 31:53
Yeah, there's there's a, there's so many good ones. And, man, I'm excited for what's gonna come in the future, man. One thing I wanted to ask you, because you know, this, as we talked about earlier, what you're doing with Sidebar and Decisis is really unique in the legal space. To be honest, you and I love how you said this: lawyers aren't static, but the way that legal for law firms are marketing themselves marketing, their expertise. It is static, it's it feels dated, it's. And you know, I actually have a lot of empathy for people and professional services. Because this shift that we've seen in digital communication, it's it's been like a torrent that's just happened over the past decade. It's, you know, this wasn't like some sunrise, form of, you know, just transition to marketing. This happened very quickly. And then last year, 2020 was almost like, just put everybody into high gear, where digital communication was literally the only form of communication that businesses could do. So I understand why professional services are kind of our or I wouldn't say necessarily behind, you could say that if you wanted to be really candid. But I would say there's not a lot of incentive for them to try doing these different things. Because they because previously, they had done marketing a certain way for so long, and it worked just fine. But I think things are changing. And I think you would probably agree too. So what I would ask you is, what, out of out of your experience with doing this show and, both of these shows, and, and really kind of being a pioneer when it comes to legal marketing. Where do you see the world of legal marketing going? And what would you what would be your your advice? Or, you know, how would you employ employ, excuse me implore legal firms to be thinking about communicating their message in the future?
Josh Peterson 33:48
Wow, that's, that's a that's a great question. Kap. Let me let me give it a second thought. Let me let me just say this to start the answer the question. Our chief marketing officer at Exact, Bob Lorem. He's a he's a great guy. Fun guy, fun guy. And just, I give him a lot of credit, because Bob Lorem did stuff that worked for years. It wasn't like we're like, wow, this isn't working. He was the leader in educational content for our industry. He worked with Matthew Varga who is an incredible attorney that put out great white papers. So he did what the industry was asking for. And he delivered consistently. When we win, thanks to Nick kind of throwing his weight behind it when I started talking to Bob and then I roped you in, of course. Bob told me in retrospect, the single proudest he was of any project he worked on in 20 years was was Sidebar, the project he did with you and me that podcast. He felt like we broke new ground and I think that says it right there. I think you can respond to the market or you can lead the market. And you can see what's working now and just keep rolling with it, or you can take chances. And look at Gina Guzman, she's the fastest, she's a top 10 fastest growing law firm in the country. And guess who's taking more chances with, with these types of forums? She is. Why? Because she wants to grow. And I'm not saying other people don't want to grow. But she's taking more chances, because she's saying "we can't do what everyone else is doing and expect to grow at the same rate or higher than them. We've got to do it different". And I think right, I think there's a power in video. You know, I want to say, I heard somewhere that video consumption is much higher than, you know, static consumption. I know for me it is. And I think that I want to say over 50% of video, if not 70% video on I don't want to try to make up stats as I go here. But it maybe 70% of video is watched in silence. So, you know, you and I have been captioning video. Is it 70%? You know, that figure Kap?
Kap Chatfield 36:13
I think it's probably closer to 80%. And you know, there's this, you know, let's just go for 100.
Josh Peterson 36:20
Let's say 100 if no one watches it and listens to it. Like right now.
Kap Chatfield 36:23
I think what we can say is Yeah, well, I think we can we can agree upon it. It is definitely a high number. I do think it's around 80%. Yeah, but anybody who's listening right now, who owns a smartphone, which is practical, it's literally every single person that's listening right now, you know, if you're scrolling on LinkedIn, or on Instagram or Facebook, you're most likely scrolling with the audio off, especially if you're in public. So that's where subtitles become very important.
Josh Peterson 36:48
Yes. I totally agree. And think about this, like, I'm a little attention deficit. And so I have a hard time calming my brain down at night. And sometimes I'll be lying next to my wife. And I'm thinking I don't wanna be insensitive two in the morning, I can't sleep my brains racing. So I'll just what's what's going on LinkedIn. And LinkedIn will put you to sleep, you know, without a video product. I mean, LinkedIn is, is famously packed with boring content, that also we're trying to change. Sorry, it just it is it's changed for sure. But that was the the stigma for a while. But you would just scroll through video. And you know, you'd see video with captions, you could watch and enjoy a video and stay with it the whole time. Because the there's words on the screen captioning it. And that really is powerful. And I think just video engagements powerful. And getting back to what I said earlier about the ministry of presence, like, just imagine I'm on the receiving end at two in the morning of engaging with someone on on LinkedIn, like, you know, Gary Vee. I think everyone knows Gary Vee. He's kind of like a pioneer in his own right on just how people consume media. And I just get the impression he just cranks out product, he doesn't even care about QC and like, what's been out there. He just like he's, he's a content machine. But he believes in it. And I think there's more of an appetite for that than there used to be. The thing about legal is, it's a game of precision, and people want to be known for, you're gonna see more people proofread. On the legal side, you're gonna see more people care for with images, and rightfully so they're selling themselves, right. And then lawyers aren't supposed to really necessarily sell from ethics standpoint, they just are available, but they want to get their names out there. So this is kind of a way to marry all that together in a in a in kind of gift wrap it for people and engage people through it and engage people in it.
Kap Chatfield 38:47
And I think it also has a very genuine touch to it when you're doing a video podcast, it really does. It's patient, it you can go deep. It's not it really doesn't come off salesy, which I think is it's critical. You know, you've heard me say this all the time. We at Rveal Media, we say there's only two types of content on the internet. There's the content that you want to consume, and the content that interrupts the content that you want to consume. One's a show and one's a commercial. And commercials, they're they're loud, they're in your face, they can be muted, they can be bypassed. But what they do is they repel audiences. Yes, but shows build audiences. And so I think that form of communication is a really unique way for not just people in the legal industry, but again, professional services billed by the hour, experts that that need to show not only do they have the expertise, I think this is important too, Josh and I think your Show Sidebar particularly is what comes to mind has just done a tremendous job of showing this other side. Where you know, a thought leader, to be a thought leader, you need the you need expertise, but you also need personality. You need to be somebody that that people would feel comfortable doing business with and not just a transactional encounter, but over the long run, because typically for law or for hiring CPAs, or insurance, or anything like that, it's going to be some sort of relationship that you're building. And I think, you know, what you guys are doing is just mastering the art of building that relationship and demonstrating expertise. So I couldn't give you guys kudos enough. But hey, I know your time is sensitive. And we're coming to the end of our show here, I want to ask you just one final question. Because one thing that we're working through, is we're trying to educate people in the b2b space. That's why I call our show B2B Podcasting, we wanna make it very simple for people who are interested in this topic to be able to find our content. One thing that we've discovered is in the b2b world, in general, there's so much decision making that needs to happen. There's there's a, for lack of better words, there's a lot of red tape, there's, you know, there's committees to make decisions about, you know, starting a new marketing initiative. And you can understand why: there's a there's a lot at stake. And so that will keep some organizations from actually taking, taking leaps of faith and trying new things, and perhaps even starting a b2b video podcast. So what would you say, for someone who's on the edge who hears some of your success, who's who's heard even some of the names that you got to share about people that you have been able to build relationship with, through your show. What are some of the biggest misconceptions misconceptions that b2b brands have about starting a video podcast that maybe you were able to overcome? Because you just started?
Josh Peterson 41:34
Wow. That's a great question. Oh, one that comes to mind is too expensive. You can spend as much as you want, and still get a return, I believe, if you do it right, with the right partners and the right approach. But you can do a video podcast, very inexpensively. The equipment to do this, equipment I'm running right now on this in this podcast, I think my camera's $200. And it's a 4k camera. My microphone here, it's a Yeti Blue. That's the one you recommended. Kap, so thanks for that. You bet I got a couple of them. Because I collect stuff like that, a degenerate on technology. You know, it's just and everyone has a laptop, you'd hope. But it's really not that you you probably should get like an inexpensive light. But it's not that much to do. And it just needs careful planning. And then you have to have a direction. But I think more people should be doing it. And I think you've said this before, because I watched a couple of your shows you got great stuff. Kap, I mean, there's no one that does a better original show than you. And you say, you know, "be the show, don't be the commercial". And I think when you're the show, there is a sincerity there. We don't sell anything. We don't have a "brought to you by" on any of our stuff. We the our product is the people we bring on and we say we're here to promote you. And then by the way, that's how we make a living. And if you have this service that you spend money on and you're spinning it elsewhere, and you like us better by the time we do the show, great, if not great. I'm not the best salesperson in terms of closing on that front, because I really want people to buy because they want to. I want people to partner with us, I don't want all the business, I want the right business. I want the right partners, the people that want to be with us. And I think when it comes to legal when it comes to service, it's about fit. But to get back to your question. Sorry about that little tangent. No, it's not hard. And it's not expensive. You have to just ask questions and get with people that have done it before, they should call you. They want to call me they can call me. I'll be calling you on that too. But it's not tough. And I think more lawyers should be doing it. The one thing I think is funny if I can say it this way, is I've pitched the idea to other law firms, not to make money off of them, but just to say, hey, we can do this. And the answer is always the same. Once the lawyers love it. But once it gets escalated to marketing, marketing's like, oh, we can do this. You know, what happens? Nothing. It dies. Because I think they're like, well, this doesn't seem that hard. And they're right, but there's a way to do it. And we got the rep since we kind of know how we can, you know, help them do it. And, and I think honestly, there is something to it, but it's a it's not tough and and I think if someone wants to jump in, they should reach out to you Kap, because I think it'll change the trajectory of their trajectory of their business, legal or otherwise. I would say my humble opinion is any professional services where you're paying someone by the hour. What are you buying? You're buying that expertise, you're buying that person. Those people to be leading the charge on podcasting. So I don't even bill by the hour. What what makes my show interesting, in my opinion, I think it's interesting I hope it is, is the people I put on are subject matter experts. They are people you want to hear from. If it was just me and a bunch of my buddies, it would be out of business already, there wouldn't be any business case for it. Although I have some pretty interesting buddies, we probably could make it a two or three episodes, probably fizzle out and be canceled, but, but really, it's like, we would think fine, you know, we would love it but they probably wouldn't go anywhere. But the way we do the show is you get the right people on and lawyers are the right people. And then their colleagues are the right people, and then they talk about issues that matter. So on issues that impact people, how to get through COVID, how to get through these other things that we're dealing with, these challenges we have, and we're in a highly political world right now. But a lot of the things we're wrestling with aren't political. They're just hard things. And people need subject matter experts and people they trust to weigh in on these things with confidence and be themselves. And not everyone's gonna agree, but that's okay, too. You know, but more of this and less of, you know, a canned product on, you know, terrestrial TV, I think is where things are headed personally. People are watching more stuff on these devices than they are on the devices hanging on your wall. And, and we can lead the charge on that, you know, and that's the goal. That's the hope.
Kap Chatfield 46:26
That's amazing, man. Josh, this has been such a great time. Love your insight. You're such a great leader in, in business, but also in production. And I know that you got a ton of ideas in your heart, and I'm excited to see what else you produce, man. So thanks for taking the time to join us today.
Josh Peterson 46:43
Thanks for having me, Kap really appreciate you. And I wouldn't be able to do what I do without your guidance, leadership and all the insight and the creativity. And if you like my shows, you can thank Kap because he's alright.
Kap Chatfield 46:58
Well, yeah, that's why we don't need to do a commercial on our show because we just need to have you come on and do it. But yeah,
Josh Peterson 47:04
You know, the, you know, $1,000 check would be great. The advertising. Just kidding.
Kap Chatfield 47:11
You got it. We'll send it your way. Thanks, Josh.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
