20h • 🎧 Podcast Guests
Host vs Guests
I had a radio show in downtown San Francisco on an AM Talk Show station in the 90s. I started out doing a show on a small station in Concord, but wanted a broader reach for an audience so I thought it would be a good move. I went from no fees to having to cover $600 for the hour show. That meant that I had to find sponsors. It wasn't that difficult to find companies who wanted the exposure. I decided to keep it to 4 sponsors who paid $150 each week, billed monthly.
Finding guests was just as easy! I didn't charge the guests but typically people do. The prep work for the show could take as much as 4 hours. I had to vet the guest, research their background, come up with enough questions to fill the hour and have a conversation with them to make sure they were comfortable with the process. Our show was live and a lot of people are not at ease with a microphone in front of them. I had to learn how to make the guests feel like they were having a conversation with me personally.
The one hour show, with travel time to San Francisco, took about 6 to 8 hours a week. I gained a large audience in the two years of doing live shows. But, it didn't correlate to generating business for me because of the way I set it up. A friend had her show on the same station and charged her guests $300 and she had 8 sponsors she charged $150 per spot. So she did fairly well! She then went on to create one of the first online university formats to share people's intellectual property.
Today, one of the broadest reaches for someone to have their own show is on VoiceAmerica.com. They charge $200-1,000 per show depending on how many services you opt in for. There are many services that are absolutely free though!
However, being a guest is easy breezy by comparison!
Typically hosts find me! I've made myself visible on social media, engage with people who are hosts and guests and will do 2 to 4 interviews each month. I provide my headshot and a short bio for the host to use to promote the show, an introduction, about 10 questions with the number of minutes each answer requires so the host will know which questions to ask prior to a break, my website and social media links and then I just show up!
It's so much easier and I'm exposed to a much larger variety of audiences.
I always request a digital copy of the interview and often post it on my social media and on my websites.
Having a resource like Podguesters is invaluable! All the guest appearances you could possibly need are all in one place!
But you still have to work for your guest appearances. You need to reach out to the hosts, present a solid foundation for why you'd make a good guest and always help them expand their audiences by promoting the show through your lists and social media.
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Host vs Guests
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