Mike Downer: Hello, everybody, and welcome to The Unlearning Lab. I am your host, Mike Downer, and I am here with Kevin Wosmansky, founder, CEO, and head parking attendant at JAR Consulting Group.
How are we doing today?
Kevin Wosmansky: Man, you’re really stretching now. Parking attendant? You’re running out of titles for me, aren’t you?
Mike Downer: Nope. I have a nice car, and I need it parked. I don’t want to do it myself.
Kevin Wosmansky: Sure. So when it’s raining at the office, I now expect you to meet me out there. I’ll throw you the keys like they do in the movies, and I’ll pull up right by the door so you can go park my car.
Mike Downer: I’ve got you.
Kevin Wosmansky: Well, that kind of leads into our topic for today, Mike. We’re going to talk about podcasting.
Man, this has to be an important one for you since it kind of determines your job, right?
Mike Downer: Well, it determines whether or not I eat and keep that nice car. So, yeah.
Today, we’re talking about podcasting, which is near and dear to my heart. Specifically, we’re talking about whether podcasting can help your business get recommended by AI.
Is this all just fluff, or does simply starting a podcast make ChatGPT and all the other AI platforms recommend your company?
Kevin Wosmansky: Oh, Mike.
Does simply starting a podcast make ChatGPT recommend your company? The answer is a very definitive no.
Uploading a podcast does not magically improve your AI SEO or your generative engine optimization. Not at all.
The value is in capturing and distributing the expertise.
Mike, the podcast itself is not the GEO strategy. The expertise captured in the podcast is the raw material for the GEO strategy.
Does that make sense?
Mike Downer: It does.
So why is podcasting so valuable for GEO?
Kevin Wosmansky: Podcasting is incredibly valuable for AI SEO and GEO because subject matter experts usually communicate much better verbally than they write.
For example, if I asked a business owner to write a 2,000-word article about their expertise, they would probably procrastinate for six months. They’re not going to do it. I wouldn’t do it either.
But if I put them in front of a microphone and simply ask them questions, like you’re doing with me right now, it becomes easy. It’s easy-peasy, lemon squeezy.
I can definitely explain why GEO is valuable.
Another part of this is that people would much rather listen or watch than read.
This is where we have a whole new medium called podcasting. On weekends, when I’m doing chores in the backyard, cleaning the garage, or going on a long road trip, I’m listening to different podcasts.
That’s the real value. Podcasting is so valuable because, if you’re a business owner or content creator, it’s easy to sit down, talk about what you know, and share your expertise.
Our job is not to manufacture expertise. Our job is to extract the expertise that already exists inside the business.
That is why podcasting is so valuable for your business’s GEO efforts.
Mike Downer: You’re talking about podcasting like it’s a conversation.
What comes out of a conversation that doesn’t come out of traditional marketing copy?
Kevin Wosmansky: Oh, this is a fun one.
Real experiences, real stories, customer questions, industry terminology, processes, comparisons, and my favorite: mistakes and lessons learned.
I could sit here and share multiple examples of real-world mistakes we’ve made. Every business makes mistakes. That’s how you learn.
That’s the difference between having a conversation like we’re having right now and trying to create traditional marketing copy.
Mike Downer: When you’re talking about businesses making mistakes, are you talking about something like the president of a company hearing an idea from one of his underlings and then waiting two years to implement it?
Would that be a good example?
Kevin Wosmansky: Yeah, that would be a good example.
Mike Downer: Okay, something like that.
Could you think of any examples? I’m just saying. I was just trying to come up with an example of a mistake a business might make.
Kevin Wosmansky: This is a great example.
Let me give an example of a mistake I made as a business owner. This is the type of thing you can document through a podcast conversation like we’re doing right now.
I want to say this happened right before COVID. One of my employees came to me and said, “Have you seen these little code things? We could put them on all of our advertisements. Someone could take a picture of it with their cell phone, and then a link pops up and takes them right to the website.”
I said, “What’s that called?”
The employee said, “That’s called a QR code.”
I said, “That’s nuts. That’s never going to catch on.”
In my defense, it really wasn’t that popular until COVID came around.
Then, all of a sudden, people were putting QR codes on advertisements. They were appearing on television. Stadiums were putting QR codes on big screen boards.
I remember telling that employee, “Well, maybe these QR code things are going to stick around and catch on.”
So, yes, that would be a great real-world story of a mistake I made.
Mike Downer: Well, it sounds like, at one point, you had a very intuitive young man working for you.
Kevin Wosmansky: I wouldn’t say he was too intuitive. I think he got lucky on that one.
Mike Downer: Well, I know that man, and I think he’s pretty intuitive.
Anyway, those are examples that come out in conversations. If we were doing traditional business copy, that would not show up.
Let’s say we have this conversation, we record the podcast, and we do it the right way. What should happen after the podcast is recorded?
Kevin Wosmansky: This is where all the work really begins.
Again, if we’re talking about how podcasting can help your business with AI SEO or GEO, this is how I would define the process.
This is where a company like JAR Consulting Group comes in.
After the interview is recorded, you either need to livestream it or publish it. Obviously, you need to produce the full podcast and get it onto YouTube, which is where many people publish their podcasts.
From that video, you should create transcripts. From those transcripts, you can create definitive website content, FAQ content, short-form video content, social media posts, and possibly email content.
You definitely want to build internal links and supporting service-page content.
Another thing I would create from the original content is schema markup. You can inject that into your website to make it easier for bots and crawlers to understand what you just created.
After the podcast, if you want to use that real, live content, you now have authentic content from a subject matter expert that you can disseminate and share with the world.
Mike, we don’t look at a podcast as one piece of content. We look at it as an authority content engine.
That’s really important.
You can certainly record a podcast, upload it to YouTube, and be done with it, which a lot of people do. That’s fine.
Or you could do a whole lot more with it.
Mike Downer: Why does distributing the expertise across multiple platforms matter so much?
Kevin Wosmansky: Customers consume information very differently.
One person loves to watch YouTube. Another reads Google. Another asks ChatGPT. Someone else jumps on LinkedIn. Other people like to listen while they’re driving, which I mentioned earlier is something I do.
You’re taking one authentic source of expertise and making it accessible in formats that both people and machines can discover.
The key is to create the expertise once, structure it correctly, and distribute it everywhere your customers search, watch, read, and ask.
Mike Downer: Let’s say I decide to do this and I’m all in.
How do you choose podcast topics for GEO that will actually matter?
Kevin Wosmansky: Great question.
Again, we’re framing this around how to choose podcast episodes that will help with generative engine optimization or AI SEO.
Under that framework, don’t start with, “What would be fun to talk about today?”
There are a lot of podcasts where people just talk about fun things. I follow several of them, and that’s fine.
But if you’re doing this for GEO, the most important place to start is with the questions your customers are asking.
Most of our episodes come from that. We’ve said many times, “Customers are asking us these questions.”
The best topics often include comparison questions, best-provider questions, and cost questions.
For example, “How much does it cost to produce a podcast?” That’s one we should probably cover in the future because we get asked that a lot.
Other good topics include problem questions, alternative questions, how-to questions, and buying-decision questions.
Those are absolutely going to be the best topics.
For GEO podcasting, we do not start with topics. We start with the questions that influence buying decisions.
Mike Downer: That’s very smart and logical.
Let’s wrap this up. You and I have had a lot of fun talking about topics we both enjoy.
Here’s the big question, though: Who should not start a podcast for GEO recognition?
There has to be that person out there who just shouldn’t do it.
Kevin Wosmansky: This is the hard one to answer, but it goes back to that mirror concept we’ve talked about.
Look in the mirror. If this describes you, don’t do it.
You know what’s funny? My daughters told me, “You should have to get a license to buy a microphone.”
I said, “What?”
They said, “Yes. Everybody gets a microphone, and now they’re a podcaster.”
Mike Downer: It’s true.
Kevin Wosmansky: I thought that was funny. A license to buy a microphone.
Mike Downer: I have two microphones.
Kevin Wosmansky: I have one sitting back there.
So, who should not start a podcast for GEO?
Do not do it if you do not have expertise.
Do not do it if you won’t answer meaningful questions.
Be honest about it.
Do not start a podcast for GEO if you’re unwilling to talk about what customers actually care about.
Do not do it if you expect immediate rankings.
Do not do it if you only want promotional content.
Mike, we’re doing this because we want to educate people. Customers ask us these questions every day and every week. That is how this podcast started for us.
If you only want to push promotional content, don’t do it. It will not work. You’re wasting your time because large language models will see right through it.
If every answer is a sales pitch, you are not building authority. You are making a commercial.
That’s who should not start a podcast.
Mike Downer: I get it.
We do like to have fun on these episodes, but we also get to the point and want to educate people. At the same time, you can have a little fun on the side.
Kevin Wosmansky: Absolutely.
This goes back to the question of whether everyone should go out and start a podcast.
If you’re doing it for the right reasons, then yes.
Are a lot of people starting to create content and podcasts specifically because they want to show up in large language models? Yes, there are.
That’s a good thing.
I keep saying that we are unlearning everything about business and marketing from the last 20 years.
AI is forcing businesses to get off their duff and actually do the work.
We’re talking about our own business right now, Mike. We do podcasting for clients because we want to help them create original content.
We want to help them become recognized as experts because we work with experts. We work with companies that are extremely knowledgeable in their spaces.
So, let’s tell their stories. Let’s build their brands.
That’s one thing I love about AI and how different it is from traditional SEO and showing up on Google for keywords.
AI sees through the fluff. It is identifying who the experts are and recommending them.
As consumers, we get to cut through the fluff and get the answer to the real question: Who is the best company we should work with?
From a consumer standpoint, that is exceptional.
From a business standpoint, you need to put in the work and do it for the right reasons.
Mike Downer: I’m going to share one real-life experience that I think will make you smile.
I was telling my sons about all the things we’ve been doing. Of course, you know my youngest very well. He said, “Okay, let’s see.”
I’ll leave the names of the innocent out of it, but he asked, “Who is Mike Downer in Ankeny, Iowa?”
It said, “Mike Downer is a local podcast host who has years of experience in digital marketing,” and so on.
You and I have only been doing this for five months.
Kevin Wosmansky: Yeah. Five months ago, if you had asked, “Who is Mike Downer in Ankeny?” it might have said, “A guy who used to sell cars.”
Mike Downer: That might be what it would have said about me.
Now it gave this long resume about digital marketing experience and all these other things. I thought that was pretty cool.
So it does work.
Kevin Wosmansky: Which large language model did he ask?
Mike Downer: ChatGPT. He has ChatGPT.
Isn’t that crazy?
Kevin Wosmansky: It is pretty cool. It’s cool that it can give that answer so quickly when someone asks the question.
Mike Downer: Yeah.
I’m not saying ChatGPT was right, but it did say how handsome I was.
I’m kidding. I’m kidding.
Anyway, I just wanted to throw that in because I thought you would find it interesting.
Kevin Wosmansky: That is pretty interesting.
We may need to do more episodes about podcasting, Mike. This has been fun.
I know you do this with a number of our clients, and you probably have some great stories you can share. We may have to come back to this topic.
The interesting thing is what we just talked about. Our podcast episodes come from the questions our customers are asking us.
That makes it easy because this is what we do every day.
Mike Downer: The nice part is that I do have some good stories I would love to share.
There are also some good off-air stories that I’ll have to share with you on the side.
Kevin Wosmansky: Sounds good, buddy.
Mike Downer: All right, man. Thanks so much for joining us again today.
We learned a lot about podcasting. I even learned something, and this is what I do every day.
Thanks again, Kevin.
Kevin Wosmansky: Thanks for the opportunity. I always have fun talking to you.
Mike Downer: All right, buddy. We’ll see you next time. Take care.
Kevin Wosmansky: All right, buddy. Take care.
