Your Podcast Is Going to Fail with John Lee Dumas

The StartupCamp Podcast with Chris Graebe

How one man found and dominated the business podcasting market

After returning from his tour in Iraq, John Lee Dumas fell in love with podcasts, and especially podcasts that interviewed entrepreneurs. But he would binge all the episodes and would become dismayed when he’d run out of content. He saw a market for a podcast that brought fresh entrepreneurial perspectives every day. That’s how Entrepreneur on Fire was born.

Now, John Lee Dumas (or JLD for short) makes six figures a month on his podcast and lives it up in Puerto Rico. He shares a snapshot of his journey and drive to create a successful podcast. Listen now.

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“I had to have trust and faith that my daily shows were building to something.”

For 2,000 days, JLD posted an episode – that’s nearly five and a half years of daily content. But, for the first nine months, his podcast barely made any money. Remember that nine months of daily content is nearly three hundred episodes. And weekly podcasts would only put out fifty-two episodes a year. After nine months, he felt the momentum grow, and after thirteen months, he’d reached his tipping point.

“Your podcast is going to fail.”

If you’re just out to copy a successful podcaster, you’re probably going to fail. Remember that JLD started his podcast because he was willing to do something no one had ever done before – release an interview with an entrepreneur every single day.

You have to operate in what JLD calls the “Zone of Fire”. Essentially, the place where your passion AND your expertise meet. JLD offers free podcast courses on how you can create your first podcast, but, if your heart isn’t in it, it’s going to show.

As an aspiring podcaster, you might be tempted to play it safe with your questions when you have a guest on the show. JLD shares his number one question to ask a guest to get them off-message and engage with them on a deeper level.