Idea Climbing: How to Interview Successful People, with Mark J. Carter

Podcasting is a powerful tool to enhance your business strategy.

Embark on a journey with Mark J. Carter, host of the "Idea Climbing" podcast, as he shares his extensive experience of conducting over 500 interviews with successful people that has helped him learn and grow. Alongside hosting a podcast, Mark is also the author of "Idea Climbing," a book dedicated to building support systems for new ideas. In this episode, you'll learn:

• The significance of starting a podcast despite imperfections and the importance of consistency over time 
• How podcasting can serve as an effective networking tool and open doors to new business ventures 
• Why Mark prefers a human and conversational approach to marketing content over highly scripted presentations 
• Key interviewing skills that help in building engaging stories and authentic conversations with guests 
• Strategies for repurposing podcast content to create evergreen material that resonates year-round

Listen to the Idea Climbing podcast: https://www.markjcarter.com/idea-climbing-podcast/
Connect with Mark on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mjcarter/
Subscribe to Mark's YouTube Channel: https://markjcartertv.com/

This episode was produced by Red Cedar Marketing. Need help launching and running a business podcast that actually produces results? Visit www.redcedarmarketing.com.

Transcript

John Tyreman: 0:05

Welcome back business podcasters to another episode of podcasting and professional services. If this is your first time here, this podcast features stories of experts and professional service providers who have created a business impact through the power of podcasting. I'm your host, John Tyerman. And if you're watching this on YouTube, hit that like button, hit that subscribe button. If you're listening on Apple or Spotify, follow the show and leave a rating and review. Um, today's episode features Mark J. Carter, host of the idea climbing podcast. Mark has conducted hundreds of interviews over the last 25 years. And he shared his wisdom of what makes for a great interviewer, how he got started with podcasting. The impact it's had on his business and tips for any expert or professional who wants to get started. With podcasting today, I think you're really going to enjoy what Mark has to say. He's got a great personality. He brings a lot of energy to the conversation. So it was a good one. Um, but the first, before we get to my conversation with Mark, imagine you're able to build trust with buyers. Imagine you're able to accelerate your network growth and create endless content, all from one activity. Well, that's the power of podcasting folks. And if you're ready to explore the idea of launching a podcast for your business, I'm offering a free podcast consultation. Simply go to redcedarmarketing. com or send me a message on LinkedIn to get in. In touch. All right. And now for my conversation with Mark J. Carter. Today, my guest is Mark J. Carter, founder of 180, author of the book, Idea Climbing, how to create a support system for your next big idea and the host of the Idea Climbing podcast, the Idea Climbing radio show in the YouTube series, eight unedited minutes. Is there any other media property that you're a host of Mark?

Mark J. Carter: 2:00

that, that, that covers it. They get, I have enough time for that. That's about it though.

John Tyreman: 2:05

Awesome. Yeah, well you've, you've certainly have your hands full. Um, well, welcome to the show. I'm glad that you're here. I'm excited to interview you about your podcasting experience, um, and your take on interviews, uh, we're going to get to your experience as a podcaster. But first, you know, what I'd love to dive into first is this whole concept of idea climbing for our listeners who might not be familiar with that term. What does it mean?

Mark J. Carter: 2:32

Well, the subtitle says it with how to build a support system for your next big idea and in a nutshell, what it means and where it came from, I started interviewing successful people when I was a senior in college, it was just in my DNA. I didn't even know what mentoring was. I don't think. But if I want to be successful, I need to surround myself with and learn from successful people. So I would cold call at the time, cold email, all that stuff. And I realized there's a book in here, you know, 22 years later or something. But what it means is I realized even the lone wolves, the most successful, everyone from CEOs to multi platinum musicians on down with one exception who said, I've never had a mentor. And I did it myself literally one in now it's 25 years. Even if they look like a lone wolf and they were the face of the company or a personality in the media, they had a circle of people around them to support them and help them do things and bounce ideas off. It was just amazing. That's I realized if I'm enjoying this, I think other entrepreneurs are going to want to know how to, how to build that support system. And that's where the book came from. That's where idea climbing came from.

John Tyreman: 3:41

Uh, that's really interesting. I've heard perspective. About you, you are the average of your five closest friends or the people you spend the most time with. And I thought that that was an interesting way to kind of think about it in that same, I guess, like philosophy or way of thinking about things kind of applies to this concept that you're talking about idea climbing, right?

Mark J. Carter: 4:01

Definitely does. It definitely does.

John Tyreman: 4:04

that's really cool. And so you went out and you interviewed people that you aspire to be people that are successful, people that whose perspective could help you then in turn, become more. If you're able to apply some of the knowledge and wisdom that you're gaining from those interviews, that's really cool.

Mark J. Carter: 4:21

Yeah, at first it was just for me and then it turned into the book and everything else. But at first it was just, let's just learn the book includes and I also included, I would do research. One of my favorite books is Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill. And. He's obviously not here anymore. The book was published in 19, like 32 or something, but I would read entire biographies or autobiographies just to get one story for the book or just to learn one or two things for myself. I taught myself how to speed read. So there's stories in the book also about Napoleon Hill or Michael Dell or Home Depot, things like that, that I got from books and from research. And then a ton of it is, like I said, it's from the interview.

John Tyreman: 5:00

That's really cool. And you've done over, you have over a hundred episodes published of your idea climbing podcast. Um, I'm, I'm going out on a limb here, Mark, and I'm going to say that you've done probably hundreds more interviews. How many total interviews do you think you've done over the course of the last 20 years?

Mark J. Carter: 5:19

Realistically, it started in 1999. So do it just basic math of 25 years. And now they continue. A lot of them are, uh, front, I'm sorry, public face it.

John Tyreman: 5:30

Mm hmm.

Mark J. Carter: 5:31

Even if it's 52, I mean, easily 500 without trying to crunch too much and make my head hurt. 500 would be a very easy number. If you do simple math over 25 years, 52 weeks in a year, two to three a week, whatever that ends up doing.

John Tyreman: 5:46

Yeah. Yeah. Fair enough. And I think that's a good ballpark. So needless to say, you've had, you have extensive experience conducting interviewers. And so what I'd love to explore, Mark, is this whole concept of, you know, what makes up a good interviewer. Interviewer, uh, just in your mind or like, what are some of the key areas that an interviewer or skills that a good interviewer should have?

Mark J. Carter: 6:11

Definitely. And I think this comes with time. It's getting the other person comfortable. Even if it's like my early ones, one on one getting them comfortable, making that, you know, like a safe zone where they can share and get a little vulnerable about here was a pitfall. Here's how I overcame it. But here was a pitfall. Here's how I overcame it. Get them comfortable. And then my favorite things for interviews, and this goes for podcasting, informational interviews for experts or anyone of any age, the two words or questions that I am huge proponent of, or how and why. I mean, you, you get it as far as the podcast, or if you think about it. Basically, no matter what the heck the person you're interviewing said, and then I got funding to start my business. Oh, how did you get fun? Oh. And I struck it out of my own right after. Oh, why did you strike it on your own? By asking how and why the key is it elicits what everyone says good interviews are and good presentations are storytelling. And how and why I would guess 95 plus percent of the time, especially if you, if you're newer to podcasting, you're not in you and you don't want to have just 10 scripted questions, which I'm not a fan of 10 questions for every episode. God bless the people that works for it. That's great. But if you don't have 10 canned questions, that's great. Then how and why, oh my, they're a godsend to combine and use one or both of them.

John Tyreman: 7:28

So I want to pause right there and unpack that a little bit, because I think that touches on specifically through the lens of podcasting. Um, uh, I believe that this was, uh, research conducted by, um, I want to say the, uh, Edison, what is the Edison study that they put out every year? Oh God, the name is just right on the tip of my tongue. Uh, the infinite

Mark J. Carter: 7:51

I'm thinking of like Deloitte or

John Tyreman: 7:54

no, the infinite dial. And I, and I believe that I believe this was, this was from them, but the two, the most common reasons people listen to podcasts are, um, to get inspiration for new ideas, uh, and to learn how to do something. Right. If we're, if we're thinking purely in a business podcast context, right? Those are two of the biggest, the biggest reasons now why and how both directly address those two concerns, right? Or those two reasons for wanting to listen, right? Ideas. Well, why did you do that? Maybe there's some inspiration that listeners can draw from that, or how did you do that? And to me, that's okay. Well, how then, how then can I, as a listener, apply what you're saying to my own situation? So I just think that was just a really interesting thing to point out.

Mark J. Carter: 8:38

Well, thank you. And I agree with you. I didn't realize there was a study, but I've, I've always, well, once I got learned about podcasting always since then, but I look at podcasts as two buckets too, and what you did, I think it's, we're talking about the same thing. That's There's storytelling, there's some podcast, they want that. Like I lost a leg and then I ran a marathon or I climbed Mount Kilimanjaro five. They want, and it's great and it's inspirational and it's fun to listen to. I fell into the second one. How to, that's what I'm big on. That's why any stories I talk about, like you and I doing an interview, it would be, okay, you got into podcasts and you got good at it. What's the story? How do you do it? It's a how to story. I never start with. Tell me about your childhood. Cause most, I know our podcasts fall into the same 20 to 30 minute range. If you spend 10 minutes talking about the childhood, unless it's Richard Branson. Okay. I get it fine because he's a celebrity. People want to hear it. I get it. But the average person or someone talking, it's like going about my childhood. Unless I, with the caveat being, okay, I started a lemonade stand and franchised it when I was 10. That's a story to talk

John Tyreman: 9:43

that would be a story worth exploring for sure. Yeah. Well, and I like to say, you know, if people want to read your resume, they can go to your LinkedIn page, right? You know, if we're thinking purely about like the business podcast context, you know, I, I hear that all the time is okay, well, tell me how you got into the profession. And then they go, well, I got my undergrad here and then they got my MBA here. And then I went and interned here and it's just kind of like the same old, where it's like, okay, I'm waiting to get to the insights from the podcast, something that I can take away to apply to my own business. Um, so yeah, it's just a point of frustration for me, um, as a

Mark J. Carter: 10:19

I hear ya.

John Tyreman: 10:20

Yeah, I think we're saying this, we're singing the same tune here. Um, so what else, mark, uh, how and why, uh, I think that's absolutely important, but what are some of the other traits of a good interviewer?

Mark J. Carter: 10:33

I think it's doing, not think, but I know it, at least in my world. And the people I listened to, and I've learned from when I started it, I, I have still owned the domain, but I don't use it anymore because it was too much of a hobby, not money generating, but I did podcastingadvice. com for a while because I wanted to learn about podcasting circa 2000, like 16, 17 or something and interview a lot of people. And as far as it goes, I think. I believe it's what you're doing. You're injecting some of your like this Edison study that's relevant to the conversation, but I don't feel like I'm in the I'm in the your show where it's all about you and I get to answer questions here and there. I've heard podcast was like, Oh my God, I tuned in because of the guest. Let the guest talk. Oh my God. Is it the john show or john interviewing guests? Which

John Tyreman: 11:21

You, you, you've experienced that,

Mark J. Carter: 11:26

I'm just like, Oh God. And I call it grinding mental gears again. You're doing it. I'm guessing you do. You've done this enough that it's, it's, it's a building a story. The idea of climbing in the podcast and the story you're building on the questions and you're learning from them. It's that's the other thing. It's not just rapid fire. I'm just going to ask any question that goes on. I look at that as grinding mental gears. And it bugs me, especially with canned questions. When the interviewer, you see the interviewee, you like get excited and they light up and they're talking about their first business and, Oh my God, I built it to six or seven figures. Next question. Why did it say what just happened? Oh my God. It's grinding mental gears. We were just in second. You just grinded us back to first. Oh, come on. So make it about the guests and ask some questions that are going to elicit some good stories. Definitely.

John Tyreman: 12:18

Oh, I, I love that. I love that perspective because you can tell you, you as a, as an interviewer, you should be able to read your guest and you should be able to read that excitement level. And kind of where that's building to, um, by contrast, I've been an experience. I I've had experiences as a podcast host where I'm trying to get some excitement out of, out of my guest. And they're just, it's just not there. And it's, it's sometimes it's really, really hard. Um, to, because you have these questions that you want to dig into, but they're just not kind of giving you really anything, anything. And it's a bit frustrating, but as an interviewer, you need to be able to kind of navigate those situations and know when to let the guests go. When to, when to shift gears, apply the clutch. Don't grind your gears, but apply the clutch. Um, no, that's, that's a really good point, Mark. Um, is there anything else, any other secrets to being a good interviewer that you want to share?

Mark J. Carter: 13:18

when you're getting started. This is what I did when I got started in podcasting is I did a, and I had a lot of people keep in mind, they said, yes, I had a lot of people say this. The first time someone did this, I had prep calls. And part of the prep call really was, first of all, are we going to vibe or, and I've run into them where it's just the short answer is just how do you start your company? I got funding. How'd you get funding? I had a good pitch deck.

John Tyreman: 13:46

That's what I'm talking about.

Mark J. Carter: 13:47

to work at that point. It's my schedule's full. I'll get back to you later, but as far as if you're going to get started in podcasting, using the term, it could be a radio show. It could be technically YouTube, but podcasting for the sake of podcasting, do prep calls and work through when you, if you're new as an interviewer there, I think very few people are inherently skilled interviewer. So it's a skill that you grow just by doing it. What you get through that awkward, get to know the other person, match their energy, pick out their vibe. What do they love to talk about? What are they not? And that's why at least I'd say I needed it through 50 around 8 episode 80. I switched over to video too, because I could do what we're doing now and hold the conversation for 20 to 30 minutes without notes. But in the beginning, I didn't do it because you would have seen I'm going bald in my 80s. Old age. I was looking at notes. It's like, Oh, you know, John, when we were talking about mentoring, you said the first time you found a met and I didn't want people to see me doing this. So if, if you do need notes and you're not comfortable on camera yet, a lot of podcasts, even successful ones are just audio only, but if you're getting started, definitely do a prep. Definitely.

John Tyreman: 14:54

I, I think you may, you bring up an incredible point about the vibe check that needs to happen during that like pre interview call. And that's absolutely, that's a great point to qualify whether or not they'd be a good guest on your show. Um, because as a host of a podcast, you've got a responsibility to your audience, right? To be giving them quality information, quality personalities with your guests. Also that, that prep call allows you to start to build some chemistry. One challenge with an interview show is you need to start for, it's almost like you need to start from zero on every episode to kind of build chemistry with a guest and your listeners need to get familiar with the guest as well. So yeah, pre check. Uh, another good trait for an interview, one that I've kind of noticed over the course of, you know, I've only been doing these podcasts for five years, but being an active listener. Instead of taking notes, you know, you can kind of like actively listen to the conversation

Mark J. Carter: 15:58

Definitely.

John Tyreman: 15:59

find the places to dive into because you have that understanding, Mark, I'd like to shift gears and I'd like to focus on your, uh, your podcast, the idea climbing podcast. Um, I'm curious, like why, why choose a podcast as the medium? You know, what drew you to starting that? Can you go about, can you give us the origin story of how that podcast began? That's exactly right.

Mark J. Carter: 16:28

began because I was having a ton of conversations still doing. And when I was writing, when I was writing idea climbing, which took entirely too long, I was doing a ton of them and a lot of them were not public facing because it was purely informational, getting very technical to get all the details of a story, which you don't want to listen to, but it worked and the podcast where it came from was, I realized I'm having these conversations, I'm getting stories out. And the big thing is there's people out there that have these ideas. And a lot of them fall into like marketing. I'm thinking of B2B entrepreneurs, solopreneurs, thought leaders, people like that, we're networking, marketing, branding, sales come in handy. And personally it was for me, I wanted to keep on learning and keep going. But when I hit 30 and 40, when I was 19, 20, 19 years old or 20 years old, people would just give me every, it was nuts in hindsight, the level of people that would say, yes. Even if it was just a phone, cause like they're, you know, Mrs. CEO of fortune 100 company. And she's like, yeah, we can talk. I'm in my thirties and forties. I'm not that young, young doe in the woods anymore. It's like, you know, pick your brain for B2B service people. It's like, I get paid for people to pick my brain. Can I put you on my podcast and share you with my audience? So I've gotten to meet people in so many tangential stories of groups. I've joined clients, no intention other than I want to learn from this person. But I think podcasting is a nutsoid amazing networking tool to get introduced to people you would never meet. And they appreciate the conversation because you're putting them in front of an audience also. So part of it was just for me, I didn't want to just say, Hey, can I pick your brain, but Hey, can I put you on my podcast and put you in front of some people and now doubling down with the YouTube station, I'm back up to a weekly cadence. We were just talking about both of us, you know, I'm set through the end of the year. This is all good. It is just learning from other people. And where it came from was if I have these questions and I think that's what makes me more effective as an interviewer is I'm asking the same questions that the audience would ask if they got the opportunity to get in front of these people. I'm genuinely so, and I pick people, I don't, I don't have friends. Come on. I pick people that have done more than I have. And that's, those are the people that I, I strive to learn from.

John Tyreman: 18:41

Totally. Totally. Yeah. And I like to think about it as kind of very similarly where the guests that I love, that I want to bring on are a few steps ahead of where I am in my own journey. And then I myself am a few steps ahead of the listeners who are listening to this show. And so I think that that's, I'm trying to bring that expertise and bring that, curate that perspective for my listeners, because, you know, ultimately at the end of the day, like I mentioned, you know, you, you as a host have a responsibility. To your listeners to bring them valuable content. Um, so you bring up some really great points. yeah, so you decided to shift it to a video show and you were talking about the benefits of the video you mentioned about, you know, writing notes and I'm thinking to myself kind of flashing back to one of the first podcasts that I, that I did. That's exactly how I operated. You know, I'm writing down notes and I'm trying to like, come back to things that, that you said, but now that I've seen the power of video shows and how you can repurpose the content, it's just, it's just amazing. Um, do you do any of that? Do you break up your videos into little snippets and promote them on social media? Like how do you, once a podcast episode is recorded, what then do you do with that content to kind of maximize its value?

Mark J. Carter: 20:00

For right now, it's getting into a weekly cadence. The posting on LinkedIn, one of the things that a lot of people on LinkedIn just say, here's my latest podcast, which might work if it's your first one, because people are celebrating you. It's a milestone or your hundredth one. I get it. But what I learned is actually teach something from, which takes a little bit of time because you got to listen to it again, because I know when I'm interviewing somebody, I'm in a different mode than when I'm listening to somebody. So I need to go back and be a listener. And then I pull out like one of the posts, I think it was episode one, I was six that I posted today. It was all about having your customers at hello. So I talked about branding and good experiences. Negative. I gave them something, even if they just read it, that they can learn from. I gave them meat to comment on and like, not just be like another one of Mark's podcasts, final, like it.

John Tyreman: 20:46

Mm

Mark J. Carter: 20:47

doing that and then over the holidays, what you mentioned, I found a couple of programs and I'm going to start doing snippets. That's part of my holidays because what we were talking about before I do evergreen content. So I'm not doing a Christmas episode, a New Year's episode, and everyone checks out. So that's going to be when I start making some snippets up and start that into 2025.

John Tyreman: 21:07

Yep. Yep. That's a, that's a good, that's a good way to use that time, that downtime towards the end of the year. Um, so Mark, let's, let's talk about the impact of your podcast to your business. Obviously, you know, you're doing this at a, you have a passion for interviewing people, but ultimately at the end of the day, the podcast is in service of your business. So what kind of an impact has it had on your business or perhaps your own kind of professional development as you've, as you've grown your business?

Mark J. Carter: 21:41

There are so many stories. One that stands out. I met somebody that runs a networking group, a really successful one, vetted invitation only. And the only reason I met this guy, Michael, was because I said, I want to, I want to have a podcast about growing communities. I think there's a lot of people out there that will, even if it's 20 people, they want to know how to grow a community, maybe even have membership. Met him fast forward a few months. After he guessed it on the podcast, then he guessed it on my radio show, which is 40 minutes, not 20 minutes. I ended up joining his networking group. Once I got into the networking group, now referrals are starting, but this whole chain of events. Never would have happened if I didn't say, I need to guess, talk about how to build community. And I meet people that it's maybe it's three months later, we're just keeping in touch and I launched a new suite of services this year. So it was people that are just reaching out that I met on the podcast. They're doing that once every six months, once a quarter check in or I'm checking in with them. It's like, Oh, that's what you're doing. I didn't know that when we recorded your podcast or you weren't doing that. Oh, now that you're talking about, you know, marketing videos, I think I know people that need help with marketing videos. And like I said, sometimes it's three months later, six months later. But again, the bigger part of it is just meeting people. I would never want, I would never get to meet. Without the podcast. So with business and it builds brand, it builds awareness. And now I'm moving into paid podcast hosting where I'm the host of other organizations, podcasts. And that's coming from me having 106 episodes under my belt. And I call it the educated consumer realizing you don't just, well, you know, this, you don't just turn on a camera, plug in a microphone and get a good show.

John Tyreman: 23:14

That's

Mark J. Carter: 23:15

And it's those groups that are saying, yeah, we want you to do it because they were guests not knowing I wouldn't I didn't had no plans even 12 months ago of going that route until people started saying, I want a podcast, but I'm not a host. Could you do it? But that came from the surprise of, oh, I had, you know, 80, episodes. So that led to a whole new service offering. I never would have had if I wasn't doing podcasts for those for those years.

John Tyreman: 23:40

You're highlighting a really, in, in my mind, an important Economic kind of situation that's going on where there's a supply, a limited supply of good podcast hosts and an increasing demand of companies who want to launch a podcast. And, uh, I think, you know, you, because of all the points that we mentioned earlier about what goes into a good interviewer and what makes a good interviewer, the role of a podcast host is, is challenging and it's not for everybody. I think, and especially if you want to construct your show around being an interview based show, as opposed to a monologue or co hosted commentary or, you know, a different kind of structure. Um, so I think you're, you're highlighting an important point. So if folks. If folks want to learn how to become a better interviewer, is that something that you coach people on? Yeah.

Mark J. Carter: 24:37

through friends now. People have brought it up. It's not a formal service. It's something that comes up just like this. We talked about before. It's a little bit meta. I'm on a podcast about podcasting. He's interviewing me about interviewing. That's kind of cool. So that happens as far as an official service. No. And I know on my side, a part of it was. That I didn't realize until now, 15 years later, I took an entire year of improv classes. It's a place called IO. It's, it's, it's like second city, all the famous, almost all the famous people went through both at the second city is just the brand, but it rewired my brain that there's something as simple as the yes. And I'm always like, what am I going to ask next? How can I help them next? Just like, if you're on stage, like you come up to me and say, daddy, I had a at school and an improv stage, I got to respond. So part of it is also, a lot of it came from that where it's like some of my advice, well, take a year of improv. But as far as the hosting and going on shows like this with the how and the why, or even telling someone always yes and, get your next question from the last answer. Watch what happens. It flows better. You get momentum going. So I don't, that's a long answer to say no, at least at this point, I'm not saying never, but at this point it's not a service I offer, but it's something I do on shows like this.

John Tyreman: 25:57

That's really cool. Yeah. I would, I would imagine it would be a good fit, but you know, um, I think you're doing a great job with your, your media company, so how do you help? Um, other businesses, you, you mentioned that you were a podcast host for hire, but I imagine that you do have other services as well.

Mark J. Carter: 26:14

The one I'm focusing on now, I call sizzle reels. And I decided a while ago and hired a coach to do it, that I'm only going to only for business offerings. Only going to do things that involve interviewing people. That's my superpower. That's where I'm happy. That's what gets me jived and coaching doesn't do that. So as far as offerings, what we came up with was sizzle reels, everyone, not everyone, but most people, especially marketing professionals are going to tell you, you need video for your website so people can get to know you. And what I found is that some people just don't want to write, memorize and recite a script. It's just not going to happen. Or even some professional speakers, you give them 55 minutes, a thousand people, a microphone and a stage. They're going to rock that room. Ask them to break it down into a 90 second or a 30 second clip, including a 300 page book they got up here on top of their speaking topics. It's like, well, can you look into a camera? Let me do what I do best. They get comfortable. We have fun before the camera goes on. I do what I do. But instead of asking questions for my listeners, I'm asking questions for their potential clients. What would I want to know if I was going to hire John? And we do that. My producer cuts them down. We do an eight unedited minutes as part of the package. So people can see them in an interview to 90 second clips to 30 second clips, but what it comes from. And I love when people see that we just started doing it or people that will say, I never would have said that if you hadn't brought it up. It's like, that's what I'm here for. Exactly.

John Tyreman: 27:40

unlocking information. That's right.

Mark J. Carter: 27:42

And it doesn't sound like, or some scripts, I know some of the tops here and by tops here, tens of thousand dollars a keynote, people can pull it off. Speakers just getting going, maybe it's a 10, 000 marks. Sometimes I've heard them where it's technically a good speech. It's not bad by any stretch and I don't do keynotes. So God bless them for being able to do it. Well, you can just tell it's so memorized. The energy has just been drained because it's the 66th time they've given the same speech. And that is what I help people get out of their heads with. As it's not robotic answers, and they, those are the ones that I don't want to sound like I remember, even 90 seconds. It's like, that can be a long time depending on your viewer. So if I got 90 seconds, I got to pull them in with some energy, some passion, some purpose. And writing and standing alone in my office, or even in a going into an offline studio, they realize it's not going to work because I'm going to sound like a robot. So I break that cycle.

John Tyreman: 28:37

It's, it's, you're bringing a more human and conversational approach to, you know, these, these experts, these B2B. Business leaders who like to your point, they do sometimes get caught up in like very robotic or, you know, buzzwords that don't really mean anything because they've been washed through reviews and revisions of messaging and, and things like that. And, you know, the sharpness kind of gets watered down over time. So I like your approach of extracting. Kind of the essence of what the value is that they create for their audience and then bringing that to life in a conversational and a human way. Um, I think that's, that's the direction of, in my mind, that's the direction marketing should go and needs to go, especially today in this age of, you know, AI generated content that's flooding the interwebs. Is there anything that we didn't talk about today that you'd like to, uh, that you'd like to dive into? The floor is yours.

Mark J. Carter: 29:36

The biggest thing I'd like to say, because I say, I sat on wanting to do a podcast literally for years. 2016 was when I started outlining it. I keep notebooks and whiteboard charts. I just cleaned my wall off. It used to be tattered with those big old, uh, post it notes that are like, you know, three feet by two feet or something. So I had one on there and it was a 2016 dated one. If I, if you're thinking of YouTube station, podcast, radio show, eat, You, depending on if you have to pay for the radio show or they pay you, I'll leave that out. Let's say a podcast or a YouTube station, you're thinking you might want to start interviewing people. The best advice I can give you, because I did it the wrong way. Just start doing it. It's never going to be perfect when you start. Never. You can read a bunch of books when it comes to interviewing people. It is a learned skill. It's muscle memory that only gets good as you go on. And I know I realized that when I was updating my website for the eight unedited minutes portion of the site. And I was putting, and I just, it was like, I know I did more than this. I just, so I went back into YouTube and I looked around for it and I found one. It was four or five years ago. This was a little while ago, four or five years ago. Thank God I hit play first. I was watching and I just, I watched like two minutes of it. Hell no, that is not going to the top of my site. And I realized I learned a lot in four or five years. I am not, they can find it if they want to dig into YouTube, but I'm not showcasing that. But I would never got to the point where now I'm doing video and it's improvised. I do have certain things like closes and questions. I know we're going to come up, but I never would have gotten there. If I wouldn't, I wish to God in 2016, I would have, someone would have just gotten through my thick skull. And just tell me, turn on the damn camera or at least record the audio version and just start putting it out. That's the best advice I can give you people. If they're thinking of doing it, just go do it. It's never going to be perfect the first time around the first 10, 20 episodes. And also expect it to be a long haul. If you have a good mailing list, great. If you don't have a great mailing list with a high opt in rate, great. It's going to take time, but if you do it consistently, and I didn't do that at first, now it's what we were talking about. It's back to weekly now, at least biweekly, but with the guests I have through the end of the year, weekly consistency is king. Just keep doing it, keep doing it, keep doing it, and you'll find your way. But that's 1 thing I think with consistency and time being king is realizing. If you, if it's just, Oh, I'm going to go set up in my garage and hit record with my friend and talk about sports. We're going to get it. We're going to be the next blah, blah, Joe Rogan, whatever it might be. It's like, it's not the way it works. You've got to be wanted for the right reasons. And what the reiterate, what I mentioned before, networking. It's awesome. When I got started, I heard no one's from a death in the family, which I let go. And then somebody was the co founder of a hosting service for a podcast. So he was too deep in the trenches. He's, he did say, come back after however many shows, but besides that, Everyone said yes.

John Tyreman: 32:36

Podcasts unlock conversations you wouldn't normally be able to have. And to your point, it's, it's, it's a networking accelerant. Um, totally a hundred percent. Uh, you met reps. Absolutely. I love that point that you made about reps and consistency. Um, And then it, and then I think like you going back and watching that video highlights another important point of this, of a process of continuous improvement. One thing that I like to do is with every episode that I publish, I like to say, okay, what's one thing that I can do to get, get a little bit better. know, if I can get 1 percent better with every single podcast episode that I put out there, then a year from now, it's going to, it's going to be an exponential growth, right? In terms of the quality of the content, the quality of the audio, the quality of the video, um, the surrounding content around it, how the podcast is promoted. If I can get better in any one of those areas, um, Then I'm in the, on the right direction. So I think you bring up some really great points, Mark.

Mark J. Carter: 33:41

Thank you. And I mean, and that's where, like I said, it only, it only came out of doing podcasts enough to realize, Oh, that works my older podcast. I would just say, Hey, you know, thank you for being here, John. We're going to talk, talk about business podcasting and how to start market a podcast. I would, and I would say, I, my thing was, I'm going to jump right in. And I just like, Oh, me. And then I realized after doing it a couple of times with unconscious competence, doing the, Hey, John, you know, as far as podcasting goes, you've got one, you're marketing it. You're doing something right. What's your story? How'd you get into podcasting? So now every episode starts with a relevant how to, or why story directly related to growing a business. But that only came from at least 50, if not 60 plus episodes of doing the, I'd love to jump right in. And when I realized it was like. It's almost too much, too quick. Let's ease in and everyone loves a story. And, but that, like I said, that only came from at least 50 plus podcasts. So you start to realize, or my closing that I do are certain questions that come up, not every time. But I realized, okay, I know, I know what question to ask next. This is going to be a con like people talking about networking and sales. Well, how do you bridge the gap between he's someone I know? And he's a client. Oh, boom. So that's one that comes up with salespeople more frequently, but again, it just came from doing it. No, I just. At first it was sporadic. So consistency, even if it's sporadic at first, if you're serious about it, just do it. That's the only, it's, it's like public speaking. There's there, you can read all the books in the world until you get on stage and bomb a few times. You're not going to learn.

John Tyreman: 35:10

Exactly. Yep. Yep. Experiential learning. Uh, well, Mark, thank you so much for your time today and sharing your wisdom about interviewing, you're sharing your experience about your podcasting journey. For folks that are listening to this, go check out Mark's podcast, the idea climbing podcast, wherever you get your podcast, check out eight unedited minutes on YouTube. Um, and your website is markjcarter. com. Correct?

Mark J. Carter: 35:38

com has an idea coming media section that includes my guest appearances in the three shows. As far as if you wanted to just start perusing quicker, there's Mark j carter tv. com will take you directly to my youtube station mark j carter tv. com. No searching needed Boom, you're right there.

John Tyreman: 35:54

markjcartertv. com. All right. If folks that are listening to this podcast episode, want to go and connect with Mark, go, go to that URL. It'll be in the show notes as well. Mark, thank you so much for your time.

Mark J. Carter: 36:07

Thank you. I appreciate you having me john

John Tyreman: 36:10

All right. Thank you so much for listening to my conversation with Mark J. Carter. If you found this episode insightful, please leave a rating and review. Subscribe to the YouTube channel and follow along on LinkedIn. Happy podcasting.