Should I Start A Business Podcast with Ewell Smith

Josh (00:00:03) - All right. We got five minutes on the clock. What is your name, sir? My name is Ewell Smith. I am from New Orleans, and I am the host of the Closed the Deal podcast. Awesome. Today we're going to be talking about why you're going to start a business. Why should you start a business related podcast, right? So if you're in the world of business out there and you're thinking about, should I start a podcast or not? That's why we had Mr. Ewell on the show. So what is your thoughts? Why should you start or why did you start a business podcast? Well, I'll tell you.

Ewell (00:00:34) - I first learned about podcasting in 20, right after the BP oil spill. I was head of the Louisiana Seafood Promotion and Marketing Board, and we were taking media calls from across the globe dealing with it. And then I had one guy come up and said he wanted to do a podcast interview, and my answer was, what's a podcast I saw? So I learned about podcasting back then, but didn't do it till recently.

Ewell (00:00:59) - But I remember the the I call it the power of podcasting because because you get to connect with so many people. It's a great connector. And if you're in business, we use podcasts in media back then to tell our story to the world, to let people know the seafood was safe, come back and enjoy Louisiana seafood. But for a business, it's an unbelievable tool. It gives you access to people, to people you would never dream of meeting to, to do podcast, interview. People have communications, conversations with people. And that's the part I love. That's that's where I think the real power podcasting comes in is because you're connecting with others.

Josh (00:01:41) - Yeah, yeah. So cool. So it started for you as a mission driven thing. We're going to use media to let people know the food safe come back to New Orleans. That's right. And then one day you had this brilliant idea is I'm in the world of business brokering and franchising. Why not start a podcast? So talk to me about the day you had that idea because you have a great domain.

Josh (00:02:03) - What's your domain?

Ewell (00:02:04) - The domain is closed. The deal and actually put it in the name of the podcast. I call it the Closed the deal.com podcast, not the Close the Deal podcast. The closed the.com podcasts. Want people to remember that. Hear it over and over and over. So yeah, I bought the domain many years ago. I ran trade associations for nearly two decades. So I sat on the domain for for many years and then said, you know what, I need to? I came back to that conversation with the guy with podcasting ten years ago, said, you know, it's time I do this. This is crazy. I shouldn't be, I should be doing this. And I actually started a little pilot podcast, a few episodes, just to see if I liked it. And when I realized and I didn't like it, I loved it. I said, I'm going to use this domain now, close the deal. So I put up the domain, and the domain obviously lends a level of credibility.

Ewell (00:02:54) - So people started reaching out to me organically to be on the podcast. I'm like, okay, I've got something. So then the franchise and peace just made a natural transition to add that bolt, that bolt those two together and was interviewing entrepreneurs. Now I'm interviewing entrepreneurs and franchisors and it's just a natural progression.

Josh (00:03:15) - So this became a part of your sales funnel because if you're cold call. Yeah. If you cold call people all day long you're going to get a lot of no's. Now people are coming to you. That's right. I'm a business owner. I'm a franchise. Could I be on your show? What changed in your business model after you incorporated the podcast?

Ewell (00:03:35) - Well, people reach out to you for they start reaching out to you for not just to be on the show, but they all start reaching out to how can we collaborate with you or we would like to sponsor your show? I'm sorry, I just started getting calls for that. I'm relatively new, right? I just got my first email with somebody wanting to collaborate and pay money to be a sponsor.

Ewell (00:03:57) - So that's the beginning. And that's how this grows. And it takes time. It takes work, you know that. And I know the possibilities of this because I've seen the power of the media. And this is just a platform that really has tremendous potential if you stick with it and grow with it. But it takes some time and some work to put into it for sure.

Josh (00:04:18) - For sure. Now, how long ago did you start your podcast and you just got a sponsorship like proposal? How did you start the.

Ewell (00:04:28) - Well, I started, I was only doing one. I was still working in the trade association world, so I was doing it on the side and I was only doing one episode a month, but I was getting great guest. You know, I've had some fantastic guest who, who kind of well known. And I'm like, you know, this is I've got something here. So it's about a year and a half. So I was just doing one show a month, just I'm like, no, I got to start doing so now I'm trying to go weekly and I'd like to get even more frequent than that.

Ewell (00:04:53) - To be quite candid.

Josh (00:04:55) - 10s left name the name your show one more time.

Ewell (00:04:58) - The Close the Deal podcast. Close the deal.com.

Josh (00:05:02) - Awesome guys. Check out his podcast. Make sure you subscribe, give him a raving review, and if you're a franchise or someone in that industry want to be on a show, close the deal. Podcast.