Pierson: What's up, everybody? It's Pierson here with the Marketing Is The Product podcast. I'm back again with Brandon Rollins.
Brandon: Hey, everybody.
Pierson: And today we are gonna give you guys a short little run down of what has been going on, what we have coming up, and what you can look forward to in the new year, the new season, and the new season of Marketing Is The Product 'cause we are wrapping up season one of our show. We are 17 episodes in, and we think that this is a perfect time to go ahead and call our first season. We have had quite a few guests on over the course of these 17 episodes, and we've also released a bit of content out there of us going over various topics of marketing, New Year's resolutions, pretty much the whole shebang.
Pierson: With that in mind, though, we are definitely trying to make some much needed improvements to areas of the show. And Brandon and I were just talking about this before we jumped on, is one of the benefits of podcasting is it's something that you can kinda just jump into not knowing a lot about how it works even. And Brandon and I have both learned so much over the course of the seven, eight months that we've been running the first season so far, that we both are kind of at a place where we think it's time to take a step back and really try to hone in on some of these areas that we might have passed up on early on in the process.
Brandon: Absolutely. And when we first started doing this, we used one of my favorite methods of just learning anything, which is jumping in completely blindly with no idea of what you're getting into. [chuckle] So now we wanna just take about six to eight weeks to really hone our craft and see how much better we can make season two than season one.
Pierson: For sure. This is something that me personally, as a host of the show, as an editor for audio for the show, I definitely have seen myself grow and improve over the course of these 17 episodes that we've recorded so far. And I think that we are really growing as a show, and also as individuals within the show. I think that this has brought tremendous amounts of growth to both Brandon and I in the course of just one short season. And we're really excited about what we have on the radar, and we've got a lot of good guests already booked for the Spring. Part of what prompted this push, so to speak, of pushing it back a little bit is a lot of the guests that we've got scheduled are booked for mid-March and early April, and it kinda was just the way that things lined up for the guests and our scheduling, is it was working out for us to kinda have a little bit of time to focus in on some of these areas that we've passed up on.
Pierson: And like I was saying a second ago, we're not gonna be changing the overall structure of the show. We're still gonna be interviewing people, we're still gonna be talking to them about what they do, how they got there, and the shortcomings that they might have faced, as well as the triumphs of starting a business and what that has meant for them personally. And we've had a great number of people come on and highlight those exact things, and we really just wanna keep making it better for you guys. And I think that there are some areas that we're gonna focus in on, and hopefully when the time comes for us to come back mid-March, the show is gonna be that much better for you guys. And I know that that's what I want, I know that that's what Brandon wants, and I'm sure that the guests that come on the show are gonna be a lot happier too.
Brandon: And we're really hoping to lean into the aspects of the show that we really feel make it shine. We know we're better with guests. Just us talking is good, but we know that what really makes this podcast shine is just having people from all kinds of different backgrounds show up and tell us about their stories. It's fascinating to hear how Sam's running a CBD shop in Chattanooga. It's fascinating to know how Sean is building this vast empire of tabletop games and other kinds of media. It's fascinating to have all these different stories and we just really... We are spending the next few weeks finding as many people as we possibly can who we wanna talk to, whose experiences that we wanna capture on audio, record and then release to the internet.
Brandon: Part of our time off is just gonna be we're gonna get a backlog built up and maybe even network a little more outside of our immediate network as well to see who else that we can pull in. We're gonna be making little changes. Like you'll probably see the cover art update, and we'll probably really nail down that intro and really nail down the closer. It'll be stuff like that. Maybe we'll have a jingle, who knows. [chuckle] And we're gonna be focusing on getting better guests, making some simple, mostly superficial improvements, and we're also going to really lean into spreading the word of the show with different marketing initiatives. We wanted to get all the weird stuff, all the practice out over the last several months with no real stress, no real pressure, no meaningful amount of money spent just to build our skill, to build our network and figure out what we wanted to do. And now we've got a much clearer idea of what we actually wanna do.
Pierson: Yeah, spot on, Brandon. I think that when we started this whole thing last summer, or last spring rather, we both were so unsure of the climate of the world. From Covid to the election to everything going on, there was so much change happening and so much of it was out of our control that we definitely wanted a platform to get people on and provide that glimpse into what it takes to reach some of these goals that you guys have. And above everything else, we are passionate about meeting people, finding out who they are, how they got to where they're at and trying to find these similarities that we all share with each other. Because now, more so than ever, we need to take the time to look and find how we're all like.
Pierson: We all face similar challenges, whether that be Christopher and English being tattoo artists, or whether that's Kenny Goodman in the UK making tabletop simulators. We all have similarities and there are also key experiences that you guys all share when starting a business that you can hopefully listen to and think, "Wow, that is something that I haven't thought about," or, "That's something that I could improve upon." We wanna provide you guys with the best content that we can to keep helping you guys reach your goals, and I think that with this time off, we're gonna be able to do that that much better.
Brandon: Business owners and entrepreneurs and professionals, they have story arcs to their lives, and you start to see this come out when you talk to enough people. And we think that when you talk to enough people, you really start to see the commonalities come out. And that's one thing that we're really excited about, is just getting as many people on so that you can find somebody who you really, really relate to, and maybe they say something that just changes your mindset for the better. 'Cause you never know. I mean, some random stranger will say something that'll blow your mind.
Pierson: Yeah. And some of the moments in my life over the last couple of years that have really made me stop and really think for a while, honestly, have come from listening to other people's stories and listening to what they went through. Whether that be listening to Jaco talking about the benefits of getting up at 4:00 AM, which is not something that I actively practice, or listening to the chaos that goes on within David Gogan's mind of running 100-mile races just to prove that he can. You get glimpses into that person's soul and what they're made of, and there are important takeaways that you can have from those moments. And above all else, we wanna keep giving you guys those moments to have.
Brandon: Yeah, and we're getting this just out of people we meet. It's not just these big media personalities, it's literally everyone. Jamison is why I'm getting up at 6:00 AM right now. I'm not even joking, this is not an exaggeration. Literally 'cause we had him on as a guest, I was like, "Huh, there's literally no reason I shouldn't be doing this right now." And I started to see tattoos more as artistry because we had Chris and English on. And I had already known it was a creative work, but I started to really see how much went into it and how much thought goes into it. I know that a lot of people who listen to this didn't even know it was possible to make digital simulations of board games, let alone that it was profitable. Yet we have Kenny Goodman on twice, and we all can see that he's actually doing pretty well.
Pierson: I didn't even know about it before we started, and it's something that... I was thinking about it a lot this past week. Probably my favorite part of this whole thing, Brandon, is the perspective that we get to have on this, is we get to see so many different perspectives of life. And that is so valuable, guys. Just taking the time to understand where other people have come from, it can really shape who you turn into. And Brandon just highlighted from the podcast that we had with Jamison, he had been...
Brandon: Hitting snooze five times. Let's not dance around it.
Pierson: But he's now been encouraged to start changing the way that he's starting his days. And whether that be from Jamison or somebody else, that's a shift in perspective. And the same thing with the tattooing and the art. With me and the board games, I have had a world of new perspective open up to me since I've started for Brandon, let alone interviewing so many of these gamers. It's just a world that I'm not familiar with, but there's valuable truths to be found within that. And that's what we're really going for, guys. We're not changing anything crazy up on you. It's still gonna be the same show, same guests... Not same guests. Same interview type of stuff, but hopefully, we're gonna improve upon it and make it a lot better for you guys.
Brandon: Well said. I've got nothing else to add.
Pierson: I have nothing else to add either. And so you guys are aware, we will be coming back in mid-March, expect that the second week of March to come out. Until then, feel free to check our backlog of shows, we've got 17 recorded. This will be our 18th show coming out, and this one will release on February 1st. Right, Brandon?
Brandon: Yeah, that is exactly right, February 1st.
Pierson: So guys, we are on Spotify, iTunes, Stitcher. Anywhere that you stream your podcasts, we are there. Check us out. Leave us a five star review. It helps tremendously. I know that you hear it from everybody that has one of these, "Leave us a five star review," but it does, it goes a long way and it really helps out. So if you have the time, take a couple seconds and leave us a review. We would really appreciate it. And we both look forward to creating new content for you guys that is meaningful and hopefully can improve your life in some capacity.
Brandon: So that's it. See you guys in the spring.
Pierson: Yeah, with that in mind, we will see you guys in a few weeks.