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Dave: Ron. Thank you for joining us.

Ron: Hey, David, how's it going?

Dave: It's going great. Well, let's go ahead and get started. So my name is David Spray and this is podcasting stories where I interview interesting people who have a podcast or are thinking about having a podcast. And so my guest today is Ronald J. Baker. Ron started his CPA career in 1984 with KPMG's private business advisory services in San Francisco. Today, he's the founder of VeraSage Institute, the leading think tank dedicated to educating professionals internationally, and a radio talk show host on the www.voiceamerica.com show, The Soul of Enterprise: Business in the Knowledge Economy. Ron is the author of seven best selling books, including two of my favorites, the Professional's Guide to Value Pricing and The Firm of the Future: A Guide for Accountants, Lawyers, and Other Professional Services.
Ron has spread his value pricing message to over 200,000 professionals around the globe. He's been appointed to the American Institute of CPAs group of 100, a think tank of leaders to address the future of the profession, has been named to accounting today's top 100 most influential people in the profession, and he was inducted into the CPA Practice Advisor Hall of Fame in 2018. Ron graduated in 1984 from San Francisco State University with a Bachelor of Science and Accounting and a minor in Economics. He presently resides in Petaluma, California. Ron, welcome to the podcast.

Ron: Thanks, David. Thrilled to be here.

Dave: Yes, the pleasure is all mine. Now, the listeners to the podcast may recall that Ron was a guest on my other podcast, the IC-DISC Show later this year. And that was episode 23, if you want to listen to it. That podcast audience has thousands of CPAs who loved hearing about his suggested approach shifting from hourly billing to fixed fee or value based pricing. But because this podcast is focused on people who already have a podcast or considering a podcast, this episode, we're going to focus more on your podcast experience. Sound good?

Ron: Sounds good.

Dave: So I'm going to read some podcast stats that you may or may not be familiar with, but I find them staggering. So this was like a month ago, there were roughly 50 billion YouTube videos, and then you drop down to about 2 billion websites, and then you drop down to about 600 million blogs and then down at the bottom, barely a blip on the radar screen or podcasts only 1.7 million of them. But wait, there's more. Of those 1.7, 1.1 million of those podcasts have not released an episode in the last 90 days. So of the remaining 600,000, only 377,000 of those have released more than 10 episodes. So that's a tiny portion that's done an episode in the last 90 days and more than 10 episodes, but your podcast is much more prolific than that, right?

Ron: Yeah, we're on our 337 episode tomorrow.

Dave: That is awesome. Do those stats surprise you or have you been surprised when you read them before?

Ron: No, I've seen those stats before. They're staggering to me too. They're mind blowing. Why would you take the time to set up a podcast and then not follow through and do it?

Dave: Right. So your first episode, I believe it was nearly seven years ago on the 4th of July, also known as Independence Day here in the US and the title was the Tyranny of Taylorism. So talk to me about... I'm sure it was not a coincidence that you chose July 4 to launch that.

Ron: Yeah, I was approached by VoiceAmerica back in April of that year of 2014 and asked if I wanted to do a live radio show. And I said, "Well, yeah, I would really like to do it," because I've had the radio bug going back to being a kid, I always wanted to be on the radio. And I ran the idea by them what if I did this with a cohost? Then they said that would be great. And so we started a 13 week trial and that's when it started July 4. So we didn't pick that date. They would just happen to be what the station, where they began us. And yeah, that was a fun show. I think your first show is the most exciting, you're the most nervous, but it's probably going to be a great show, because of that nervousness.

Dave: Yeah, because of the energy that, that nervousness generates.

Ron: Absolutely.

Dave: So tell me, how do you know Ed, how did he end up as your cohost?

Ron: I knew Ed going back to, I think, it was 2003 or 2004 when we met. His boss, he works at Sage software company, and his boss had seen me speak at a conference and wrote me an email. And the only thing on the email was the subject line, it said, "Contact this guy," and it had my email too. And so we had a phone call and he invited me to do some work, a webinar and a live talk and things. And we just really hit it off and we've been working ever since.

Dave: Oh, that's awesome. Yeah, you guys have a great banter between the two of you.

Ron: Yeah, we can read each other's mind. Some people say we're like an old married couple with each other's senses. Some people think we share a brain, that's not exactly true, but it's close. We work with one another well enough where I know where he's going and he knows where I'm going.

Dave: Yeah. Well, did you ever watch the Seinfeld TV show?

Ron: Yes.

Dave: So do you remember the episode where George was basically Jerry's dating consultant? He would help him pick the right thing to wear and he would give him last minute reminders, her parents' names and what she did last weekend. Jerry said, "Just think about it, if we combine our efforts and we work really hard, we might actually be as capable as one man if we put our efforts together."

Ron: That's great.

Dave: So you and Ed have gone further than that. So it sounds like...

Ron: One plus one is more than two, but I'm not sure.

Dave: So what's the best part about having a podcast? And I'm going to focus more on the podcast portion of it than the radio show, just because the podcast part is what will be consistent that our listeners are interested in. So what's been the best part of having a podcast?

Ron: There's several things. It's really hard to narrow it down to one, because first off we have a worldwide reach. We're in over 30 countries and I can't tell you what a joy it is to have listeners from Germany or Norway or the EU or even Russia contact us because of the show. That just blows my mind. The same thing with my books. When I have a foreign writer or reader write me from a foreign country asking, "Is your book translated in this language?" So that's exciting to be able to put pins in a map and see how many countries your show is in.
And the other thing I would say is just coming up with the content, it's truly a labor of love. We love doing the show and even prepping for it. And we have about 40% of our shows are interviews. So going after people that have written books like authors or people that have really inspired us, being able to get them on as a guest and have a conversation with them. I don't even think of it like an interview, it's more of a conversation, we're discussing a topic, their book, whatever it might be. And just some of these folks have been mentors of mine for decades and to be able to get them on the show, that was a big revelation to me that because you have a podcast, it opens up your world to go after some really big well known people. I thought, "Well, who would come on The Soul of Enterprise?" I'm amazed how many people we've been able to attract.

Dave: Isn't that something? I had a similar experience. There was a guy that wrote a book that was so influential, it made me millions of dollars. And that guy's name is Ron Baker. So I know what it feels like to have a mentor of yours, someone who you've read their writing to have them agree to be on your podcast. So I know exactly what you feel. In fact, I'm feeling it at this very moment.

Ron: Thank you. That's awesome.

Dave: Well, what else is great about having a podcast?

Ron: Because we are a topic driven show, not an event driven show, to be able to take one on the 40% or so, or the 60% of the shows that don't have a guest, it's just me and Ed, and we take one topic and we dive deep. And that topic might be pricing, it might be strategy, it might be positioning project management, after action reviews. We've done shows on all of these things and more. And just to be able to dive deep and go really deep on one topic is really satisfying, because we have a lot to say and it's hard to do it in a four minute soundbite like on TV or most radio slots you're on. We can dive deep and that's really gratifying, because the audience really appreciates that when you take a topic and dive deep on it.

Dave: I know Tim Ferriss refers to what he does as long form content. And I think that's just his euphemism for he just goes on and on and on. But I think there's a lot to be said for that. By having more than a four minute soundbite, you really can dig deep into something, can't you?

Ron: You can. And it doesn't seem David like... I grew up of terrestrial radio. There was no such thing as podcasts when I was a kid. And you might listen to a three hour talk show or something and they would bounce around on different topics and most of it was event driven, might've been topic driven, but when you can do a podcast, now I listen to some podcasts, Joe Rogan, he might go for four hours. There's a couple of history podcasts that they might have eight hour podcasts on a particular segment of history. And you know what? People-

Dave: Like hardcore history.

Ron: Yeah, people listen to it. You can do that on a podcast. That seems to be more flexibility with a podcast than you would imagine.

Dave: Anything else comes to mind that you like about it?

Ron: The fact that it's a live show, like some of your stats would actually really scare me, because if we didn't have to show up at a prescribed time every week, we might be in that one where we've only done 10. But because we're forced to be there live, we've been really good. I don't think we've missed any shows. And that's just now made it a habit. Now, it would be like cut off my leg if I couldn't do my radio show every Friday. It's really fun. I even like prepping for it. And we spend a lot of time prepping. If we have an author on, we'll actually read the book, we won't just skim it. We both read it. And that's really gratifying, because the authors really appreciate that, because they can tell who's read their books and who hasn't.

Dave: Sure. Well, that is cool. Any other things that you can think of that are enjoyable about having a podcast?

Ron: Yeah. Learning from these people. Just everybody we've had on, it's like a little mini university, it's like going to class every Friday, you learn something from them. And we've had an astronaut, we've had a former Thunderbird, US Air Force Thunderbird, we just did a professional basketball player a few weeks ago. Each one of their stories contains unbelievable life lessons. And so the learning is really exciting and I think it just keeps you fresh and stimulates your mind to better thinking and higher levels of creativity.

Dave: I would totally agree. And you have the choice of your subject, right? Did you get to choose who your guests are?

Ron: Absolutely, yeah. Some guests do lobby to be on the show. Like the basketball player we just had actually sent us a video of him talking to us saying, "Hey, Ron and Ed, this is why I want to appear on The Soul of Enterprise, this is the value I can convey to your audience." And it was really compelling. And so yeah, we invited him on. So yeah, but we do get to control who comes on. And it's over time, I have to say, and I'm not trying to sound conceited, but it's become a bit of a high bar. We've had some incredible guests on and I want to continue to aspire to that level. So that's really exciting.

Dave: Oh yeah. Well, what do you wish you knew seven years ago that you now know in regards to podcasting?

Ron: Wow, don't be afraid to reach out to people. Most people, even if they say no, will appreciate the offer and might even say, "Contact me back in another year or so, whatever, I'm working on a book and I just don't have time." I also realized that being a national lockdown with COVID is a great way to attract guests. We've probably had on more guests in 2020 than any other year, because we were able to get so many different authors, because they weren't doing anything else. So that was interesting, but I would say don't be afraid to reach out to people. If you have a favorite show that you listen to, go after the host, we've gone after our... My favorite podcast is a show called EconTalk hosted by Russ Roberts.
And we had Russ on the show and we've had a lot of the guests that he's had on his show on our show. In fact, we refer to ourselves jokingly as the poor man's EconTalk. And when I started, I didn't realize that. I felt so insecure about, well, it's just a piddly show, who's going to come on this. Well, you'd be surprised you reach out to people and they want to talk, especially if they're authors.

Dave: Yeah. And especially when they get to what's the old saying, talk about yourself for five minutes and people soon grow bored, but let them talk about themselves and they'll talk all night.

Ron: Right. All the ideas that they're passionate about.

Dave: Sure. Yeah. I have had that same experience and I tell people who don't have a podcast, and tell me if you agree with this, but when you invite somebody to be on your podcast, it's like it goes in the same part of their brain as if you said to them, "I don't know if you know, but I'm guest hosting the tonight show next Wednesday, just curious if you want to pop by for a few minutes and be a guest?" It's like they respond, it's the same part of the brain. They're like, "Oh, I get to be famous, I get to be on this worldwide platform." Do you find the same enthusiasm that you get from maybe the people not so famous?

Ron: Yeah, absolutely. People that don't normally go on podcasts, oh, geez, they love come on and then share with their audience their social media platform. There's something really powerful about that-

Dave: Their mother.

Ron: Yeah, exactly. I got the radio bug by being on a local show in Palm Springs. I had a buddy who lived down there and I got on the radio in '96 and '97 three times. And it was for a three hour show. I didn't do all three hours, but I ended up doing two hours each time I did appear and I was hooked. We had live callers call in and we're talking about mostly economic issues, political issues, but it was just a blast. And oh, jeez, I wanted a radio show of my own ever since.

Dave: Yeah, no, I understand. So if you're like me, my biggest podcast regret is that I didn't start it sooner. Do you have similar feeling?

Ron: I do. We started the show in 2014 and I never really thought about doing a podcast prior to that. I've made some attempts to get a terrestrial radio show, but was never able. Yeah, I've done KQED interviews on that type of thing, but I've never been able to score my own show. But so when this opportunity came along, I was like, "Yeah, I'm going to try this. And we'll give it a shot and see if it works." And seven years later, almost here we are. So yeah, it's been an amazing ride.

Dave: Yeah. And I mean, and you may have a different thought on it, but in my experience, even if you did not have the radio show and you and Ed were just doing pure podcasts, I suspect you would have still had some of the many of the same experiences. Is that right?

Ron: Yeah, for sure. I believe the only thing the radio show does for us is takes away some of the back office stuff, like we have a sound engineer does all that. And it keeps us coming up every Friday at the same time. So it got us into that routine. But if we didn't have that and just had to do the podcast on our own, it still would have been a labor of love. I don't know. I would like to think we'd stuck with it. I'm not sure. I tend to be a procrastinator and a lazy person. But yeah, it's a great experience. It really is. If you've got content to share and just to talk about ideas.
Eleanor Roosevelt's got a great line. She said, "Great minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events and small minds discuss people." And we wanted to dedicate our show to great ideas. And so every guest, we talk about ideas. And people love that. And that is something you can do on a podcast that I think is really hard in any other medium, except perhaps a book, you can dive deep into a book obviously on ideas, but podcast gives you that flexibility.

Dave: I want to just make sure I have that quote. Could you just say it again by Eleanor Roosevelt?

Ron: Sure. She did say this, and in fact she wrote it her column I believe, she had a newspaper column called My Day.

Dave: Yeah, I remember that.

Ron: And she said, "Great minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events and small minds discuss people."

Dave: I love it. Yeah. And just for the record, I don't specifically personally remember her newspaper series, because I think it was probably in the 30s or 40s. Well, certainly it was somewhere between 1932 and 1945 we know that or at least I suspect it was while she served as first lady.

Ron: Right. And maybe even UN ambassador, I think she kept that column going. I can't remember when I saw it.

Dave: Oh, I think you're right.

Ron: Yeah.

Dave: That's great. So what else do you wish you knew about podcasting seven years ago that you now know?

Ron: So this is a big one, to not over-prepare. When we first started, I had 10 pages of notes. Well, bottom line, you're going to be lucky if you get through two. And when we had a guest on in the early days, I had 42 questions. Well, you'll be lucky if you get through seven. So I over-prepare, and to this day, I probably over-prepare, but I'm much more cognizant of more serendipity, to go where the conversation goes. Don't be constrained by a checklist, don't be constrained by a set of questions that you feel the need to ask, don't make your questions the same to every guest if you have a lot of different guests. Engage in a conversation, yes, they should talk more, but that doesn't mean you can't input things. And a lot of times they'll really appreciate that. And we've even had some guests turn the tables and start asking us questions. That just is a very enjoyable conversation when that happens that way. So allow for spontaneity. And I wish I would have probably understood that a lot sooner than I did.

Dave: Now, that's...

Ron: And one more thing.

Dave: oh yeah, go ahead.

Ron: It's only going to apply to people who maybe have a co-host like I do with Ed. When we first started, when you go back and listen to the first four or five guests, I think it was, because we have three breaks throughout the show, at the quarter hour marks we break, so there's three breaks. When we had a guest on, Ed and I would just trade off with the guests on each segment, we'd ask them questions and then maybe I would jump in if there was a pause. And that was like ganging up on the guest experience. So we figured out, "Wait a minute, you should take the first and third segment, I should take the second and fourth segment." So we're not ganging up on the guests. And we stay at one train of thought and he doesn't have to worry about, "Well, who asked me that? Was that Ron or Ed," because he doesn't know our voices yet or whatever. And we didn't figure that out quick enough. We should have done that from day one.

Dave: So I'm going to jot that down. So if you have a cohost instead of alternating questions alternate segments?

Ron: That's right. Even if you don't have commercial breaks, which most podcasts don't, put a clock on it and just alternate, because I think ganging up on the guest is really disjointed and it doesn't come across unless it's a round Robin conversation, then that's different. We will do that sometimes like on a bonus show, we might bring on a guest and we don't trade off there, the three of us are having a discussion. But as you know, David, when you're on Zoom or whatever platform you're going to use, you're going to talk over one another, which is fine. It makes it more like sitting in a bar, but just realize that yeah, it's a pain digitally.

Dave: Well, so any other things you wish you knew then? This is great information for people who are earlier in their podcasting journey.

Ron: We do show notes and pretty extensive show notes on every show. So when we post it onto our website, it's usually anywhere from 1200 to 4,000 word show notes and that's where we post additional content. We might post a white paper or links to videos or other websites for more information on this topic that we discussed. And putting that together is a lot of work. I'm tasked. I've been doing the show notes practically the whole time and that's been my responsibility in that. I spend a few hours working on that every week after the show drops. Yeah, that can be time consuming.
If we have a guest on, we take the transcript and we edit the transcript, and since you don't read the same way you talk, that's a challenge to edit the transcript so it's readable, so it's an enjoyable reading experience. Now, I'm the official show historian because I've listened to every show probably multiple times because of that. I know what guests we've had. I can have a pretty good recall of what they said or what their main points were. So that's been gratifying, but if you're going to do show notes on your own, realize that, that's going to take some time, that's a commitment.

Dave: Okay, that is good to know. Yeah, we don't do as extensive of a show notes, but we do a transcript and we now I have somebody on the team that does the conversion from the spoken and removing all of the Ums and Uhs to make it more readable. So I think that... Go ahead.

Ron: That's incredibly valuable by the way that you edit their transcript like that. And the other really cool thing for your listeners about that transcript is they can search it by key words or they might say, "Well, gee, who said..." I know you said that Eleanor Roosevelt line, well, now if you went in and typed in Eleanor Roosevelt, you'd be able to pull up that quote.

Dave: I never really thought about that, but that's a really great point. Yeah, I've got a record now of all of my published conversations. I can go back and... Well, that's really cool. And so is the part that you wish you knew seven years ago was that the show notes would be such a time commitment? Is that what were pointing at?

Ron: Yeah. But also really valuable for the listener. We get a lot of comments from the listener saying, "Wow, thank you so much for the show notes, this extra paper that you cited or linked to or whatever." We get lots of really positive feedback on the show notes. And just another thing, because we've had on two Ronald Reagan speech writers.

Dave: Really?

Ron: Yeah. One of them is a guy by the name of Josh Gilder who wrote Reagan speech to Moscow State University that he delivered in the last year of his administration, 1988. And that's what we start the show with. We lead in with a clip of Reagan's talking in that speech, because it's a phenomenal clip and it fits in with the theme of the show, the economy in mind and all that. And we've had him on and he's told the backstory of that speech. But we've also had on Peter Robinson. And Peter Robinson wrote Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall speech. And when we had Peter on, I've been going after Peter since day one of the show, he's been on my bucket list. I'm dying to talk to this guy, because he has his own show and he's just a terrific guy. Well, he told the entire backstory to that speech, the tear down this wall speech, about how the State Department kept removing the line and they kept putting it back in-

Dave: I heard that part.

Ron: ...and it is phenomenal story. In fact, there's a documentary of it somewhere of that whole speech. And when we got the transcript for his show, we posted the whole thing, because I told Ed, "This is living history." And so I did a really thorough job editing it. Now, we have that whole story up on the show notes, because normally when we post the transcript, we take out the guests part, we only put in our questions, but that's a different topic. But for that one, I said, "This is living history, I want the whole thing in there." And so that's what the transcripts allow you to do.

Dave: Well, I'm going to go look for those. So the first speech writer, what was his name?

Ron: Well, the first guy we had on was actually Peter Robinson and then the second guy was Joshua Gilder. I'm sorry, I forget the days. I think Peter came on in December of 2020, and then Josh came on in February, I think, or January. And just to keep the theme going, we've got the boss of all the Reagan speech writers, Tony Dolan, coming on in another month or so. And he also wrote some of Reagan's most iconic speeches like the Evil Empire speech and Westminster speech to the UK. And he was the boss of Joshua Gilder and Peter Robinson, because they were just young kids. They were in 20s or something. And he's a really interesting guy. So we've got him coming on the show. But I would have never thought I would be able to get people like that to come on my show and we've gotten lots of that. So that's been really cool.

Dave: That's awesome. I really appreciate you giving such a thorough answer on that. And yeah, so it's funny if I was following my question outline, I would ask you this next question, but I realize you've already answered it. And that question was, what advice would you have for someone who's just looking to start? And I think you've already answered it with the lessons you've learned or that you wish you knew from seven years ago, which in summary, don't be afraid to reach out to people, don't over-prepare, engage in a conversation, if you have a cohost, alternate your segments, use show notes and what was the last one? And I guess have interesting guests.

Ron: Don't be afraid to go after interesting guests, because most likely they'll say yes.

Dave: Yeah. And what do you have to lose?

Ron: Yeah, exactly. You might get a turndown big deal. We've had our fair share of turn downs. We have a wishlist of guests that we've wanted to go after, we haven't gotten all of them, but we've gotten a good chunk of them.

Dave: That is awesome. So as we had talked about before we... I'm sorry, I completely lost my train of thought. Oh, I know. So as you know, since I had you on my last podcast, we've actually launched a business helping people who want to start a podcast and that's yourpodcast.team, but one of the questions that people always have for us is, and especially the accountants in the group and given that you and I are both former CPAs or currently practice CPAs, is they always want to know what the ROI is going to be on the podcast. And I always tell them, it's not like I can just easily say, "Oh yeah, because of this podcast, these three clients called me the next day and specifically said, because of this podcast we want to hire you." Is that been your experience too? Or do you actually have some specific situations that you can point to that you know it was because of the podcast?

Ron: No, I think trying to compute the ROI of a podcast runs into the same problem as trying to compute the ROI on your telephone. It's just a ridiculous question. That's the wrong question actually, because with the famous John Wanamaker line that half of my marketing budget is wasted, the problem is, I don't know which half. Marketing is communication and podcast is a phenomenal form of communication. Yes, I've made money off the podcast. I've gotten business, I've gotten speaking engagements because of it because people who are fanatical listeners want either Ed or me to come and speak to their organization or conference or whatever, but that was the furthest thing from my mind when I started it. I didn't expect any of that. So it's just been absolute icing on the cake.
But what it does do is it elevates you, I think, in whatever field that you're discussing. And I hate the term thought leader, so I'm not going to say that, but it does elevate you as somebody who is knowledgeable about this topic, even if you're not an expert per se. And the fact that you talk about it or a body of ideas that you talk about, I think, it just elevates you. And the other thing, David, is it's such a personal medium. This is why I've always liked radio over TV. TV appeals to the eye. And in radio, you have to appeal to the ear and you also have to construct that theater in the listener's mind. And it's a much more sober medium where you can deal with complex and nuanced ideas unlike say, television. This is why they sell junk on television, right? You don't see though NBC shopping network on radio, because it wouldn't work. It's just not the right medium for it.
And because of that personal connection with each listener, it's an incredibly intimate medium. We get contacted from people in another country may be or even in the states and they say, "I feel like I know you guys, you're just a voice I can relate to because you're in my workshop every Friday or whenever they listen to the show or I'm out jogging with you or on my Peloton or whatever." It's an incredibly intimate medium. And that's a huge responsibility actually, because you don't want to waste people's time. I want to deliver that.
But I remember watching a standup in Vegas of Jerry Seinfeld on TV. And he finished his set and he said, "I'll open it up to Q&A." And one person asked him, "What's your favorite Seinfeld episode? And he said, "There isn't one." He said, "All of them. They're like your children, all of them are special." He said, what we tried to do is make each one better than the last. And that's how I feel like the show. I just want to get continuously better. So we do an after action review after the end of every show. Ed and I will stay online after we dropped the recording and we'll talk about what went right, what went wrong, if we screwed up, if I wish I would have said this or whatever. And that's really helpful. So even if you're doing the show alone, have your spouse or maybe your parents or whoever listens, regularly debrief with them and find out how they're receiving the show, because that's really helpful to to know. And so you can make adjustments.

Dave: Oh, that's great advice. I really appreciate it. Yeah, because with my podcasts I'm the sole interviewer and I always do a debrief with the guest afterwards, but that's a completely different perspective because they're in the action, they're not a spectator. And so you don't get that same objectivity that a spectator would. I really appreciate that insight. Boy, you've just been full of good information today.

Ron: Well, and there's one more thing too because I find it more interesting, because a lot of times you think that you'll get done with a show and you'll say, "That sucked, I was off my game, I paused, I lost my train of thought a couple of times." And it happens to all of us. It really does. And you are like I just didn't ask this and it was just obvious, I should ask this question or talked about this point or whatever it is. You're going to be your own worst critic. But because I listen to the show again after it drops to do the show notes, my cohost, Ed, does not listen to our show. And from what I understand, a lot of podcasters don't listen to their own shows. They never go back and listen to them after they're in the cancer to speak. But I do.
And I've learned that, "You know what? It's never as bad as you think it is." When you listen to it after maybe a day or two goes by and with a fresh mind and the nonprejudicial mind, you go, "You know what? That was pretty darn good." So expect to be your worst critic. And I'm not saying don't listen to that criticism of yourself, do, but realize that it's not going to be as bad as you think. So get over yourself consciousness about little flubs you make or getting tongue tied. It's all part of being human and it just comes off as more authentic. And that's part of the intimacy of the medium.

Dave: Right. Yeah. Because it sounds like just like ours, we do ours as if it were a live radio show. We don't do any editing, it's just the full recording. Do you guys edit for the podcast or is it just the retransmission and the live radio show?

Ron: Just a retransmission of the live. Radio station actually drops it to the podcast feeds and we do not edit it at all. And even when we push it out to our Patreon members, we don't edit it.

Dave: Excellent. Because that's something I hear that some people will talk about that they feel... So what am I trying to say? People I've talked to who have wanted to have a podcast for a long time but don't have one, I usually find it's because they become overwhelmed with either the technical aspects of it or they're letting the perfect potential podcast push out the good podcasts that actually gets released. And that's the biggest message I have for people is it's not going to be perfect, but it's going to be real and you'll get better and just go with it. And the thing is your competition doesn't have a podcast at all more than likely. It's not like there's 20 podcasts in your space and you're competing with some NPR production or how I built this. You probably don't have any competition.

Ron: Right. That's a really good point. I just love the idea of the service that you provide, because I'll tell you there is some back room work on it and if somebody else could handle that and all I had to focus on was the content delivery, that would make life a lot easier. So I think it's a wonderful service that you're offering.

Dave: Well, I appreciate you saying so. I heard a marketing person once say if you build something that you want, then you guarantee you'll have at least one customer, but more than likely you'll have a lot more, because you're not the only one that has the same issue. And the way that happened is initially our first podcast piggybacked on another company that was doing some podcasts and I just said, "Hey, just let me piggyback on what you're doing." But then over time it just started evolving. And after a couple of years, I ended up with something very different, like when the continents split hundreds of millions of years ago. And even though we started off in the same place, I ended up with a very different structure. And so yeah, that was what I was trying to replicate was I was trying to make it such that all somebody had to do was schedule a guest, record the interview, record the two minute intro at the end, and then go back to doing whatever else they were doing.
Yeah, it is funny though, because sometimes I'll meet people though that say, "We need something more polished than that. We need something that's more, so we're going to go in a different direction and we're hiring this voiceover talent, we're hiring this production firm." And I always so badly want to say, "Hey, do you want to make a wager that a year from now you still won't have any podcast episodes live?" But I don't. But I think it though, because I've been there myself, I mean five years ago, I first wanted to start a podcast and I went through the same process. You get overwhelmed and you don't even know where to go beyond a microphone. And you're just like, "Where do I go next?" And so yeah, I think that's a mistake that people get too caught up in perfection. And there's some quote about that, that perfection is the enemy of-

Ron: Of the good. Yeah. I forgot who said, it was one of our founders. I think one of the authors of the Federalist Paper actually said that. I forget which one, Hamilton, maybe, I'm not sure, but yeah, that's a famous line. Another thing I would say to folks thinking about this too, is you probably listened to some podcasts, I'm just looking at my feet, I don't know how many podcasts you regularly listen to and I'm talking about whenever they drop, whether it's a weekly cadence or some are even daily, I've got some 30 podcasts in my feed. They've taken over my drive time. I used to listen to the radio and now I'm always listening to podcasts. And there's going to be some in there that you really, really aspire to.
And I was saying copy, but emulate, learn lessons from, because some of the most creative podcasts that I listen to, they change things up, they're not always talking about the same thing, not on different types of guests. They'll try new things even if it doesn't work. They're willing to try and experiment and try different segments or something like that. They get audience feedback. You'll get a lot of ideas for your podcast just by listening to others.

Dave: Yeah. And that's part of what prompted me to start the podcast was I would listen to other podcasts and after a while I got to be just arrogant enough that I thought I could do a better job than this Yahoo. He keeps talking over people, he puts words in their mouth. So yeah, it's funny. If I had to actually pay for podcasts, I could probably justify it as a business expense to improve my own podcasting capabilities. But that's the other cool thing about podcasting is the freeness of it. I think I've got about 40 podcasts in the feed that historically I've got probably five to eight. The one I listened to every week is John Warrillow Built To Sell Radio.

Ron: Yes, he's great. We had John on the show. He was fantastic. I really enjoyed having him.

Dave: Yeah, he really is. But partially because his is on a weekly cadence, it's always on Friday that it releases. So you just get used to it. Some of the other people I listen to, they don't seem to have that same cadence. And I've pretty much listened to all of Tim Ferriss's episodes and Built To Sell Radio is a favorite of mine too. I really love hearing those stories. What other podcasts do you enjoy?

Ron: You mentioned cadence. That's really important, isn't it? To be consistent. We get to the point where if we don't have a show drop for whatever reason, we actually start getting emails on Friday night or Saturday, "Hey, where's the show?" I just think it's so important to be consistent with that cadence.

Dave: Yeah. In fact, we tell clients who invariably want to start with our main services, either one podcast a month or two podcasts a month. And if somebody really is committed to doing them weekly, we'll talk to them. But our advice is always start with monthly, because it looks way better when you're two years, three years in the future and people are going through your feed. It's way better to have a progression, increasing frequency, as opposed to those million plus podcasts that go the other way. And I know you've seen them, they start, they're doing it weekly, then it goes to every other week and then it's monthly and then it's every other month and then it's twice a year and then it's gone. So do you agree that it'd be better to increase your frequency over time than to decrease it, all things being equal?

Ron: Yeah, that's a great point, because you get in that cadence and you're probably in some type of routine when you listen to various shows depending on that cadence, like you're out jogging or walking the dog or driving to this, you're commuting or whatever it is, and if that podcast doesn't drop when you expect, it throws off your whole routine, it's like, "Well, wait a minute, what happened?" I listen to Rabbi Daniel Lapin and we've had him on the show actually four times. He may be our most frequent guest on the show. And he had COVID for the last three or two weeks. So he missed two weeks of shows. And then that two week time span I'm like, "Where's the Rabbi show?" I'm checking my feed to make sure I'm still subscribed. It threw me off because it was like, "Well, something's wrong because this guy never misses." His showed drops every week. And sure enough, when he did come back on, he explained, "I had COVID, I was down for two weeks." It really put him down. And so that was really interesting, but yeah, I think that cadence is really important.

Dave: Yeah, it's interesting when you have somebody on the show. So I had John Warrillow on my show as well after he was on yours. And that's the other tip I have for people. If you want to get somebody famous, ask him right after they've released a new book, because you'll find they seem to be more open to those things. But that was what was interesting when I had John on the show, because I literally have listened to every one of his episodes. And so I really feel like I know him. And as I'm interviewing him, he's talking about different examples and I recall the episode. So I'm chiming in, "Oh yeah, and then they said this and then they said that." In a way, "Are you sure John? Are you sure that you have your facts right on that one? Come on now." But it's weird though, because he didn't have a relationship with me at all. And that's the interest. And that I think goes back to you're talking about the intimacy of the format.

Ron: That is it. It's exactly it, isn't it? It's just wild.

Dave: It is really cool. So I'm going to steal two questions that I've heard from other people as we wrap up. So one is, and this has really nothing to do with podcasting, this is like a lessons on life question. If you could give some advice to your 20 year old or 25 year old self, what advice might you give them?

Ron: Oh geez! Yeah, somebody else asked me this and it's such a difficult question. I said, first off, it wouldn't be one thing, I wrote myself off for six hours and give a lecture about don't do this, don't do that. Wow, that's really a great question. I guess it would be don't be afraid to take risks, take more risks. Don't be afraid to get on a different path, take that proverbial fork in the road when it shows up. Pursue an opportunity, even though it doesn't have maybe anything to do with what you're currently doing or requires you to reimagine yourself or come up with a new image. And since I ended up doing that, a couple of times went from a practicing CPA to an author and then a consultant and now even a podcast or I'd say has been another fork.
Something else happens, I wish I understood earlier. So this gets to the heart of your question. When you do make a pivot like that, when you change from going from one thing to another, whether it's a career, a job, your social capital is going to change. You're going to run in different circles with different people. Now, that doesn't mean that you have to give up the old social capital, I'm not saying that, but sometimes it does. Sometimes you have to let go to move forward. So if you're in relationships that aren't really going anywhere, relationships are either growing or they're dying, and if they're dying, let them go. Jeez! Let them go. Don't give them any more thought, just move on and realize that you have to have new social capital when you take on a new endeavor, because connecting with people is how we grow and connecting with new peoples brings even more opportunity. So I wish I would've understood that earlier.

Dave: In denial also give one piece of advice to your 20 year old self too?

Ron: What's that?

Dave: So I'd also like to weigh in on the other advice for your 20 year old self, that would be to move away from hourly billing sooner. Is that a fair piece of advice?

Ron: Oh geez! Yeah. You opened up a can of worms with that. If we're talking about running a business, I would have done a million things differently, when I started my own CPA firm coming out of the big eight, yeah. But I guess that's a show on your other podcasts we should do.

Dave: Exactly. Well, Ron, I cannot believe how quickly the time has passed, but it always does, doesn't it? You told me that in preparation for the show that you're always amazed at how fast the time goes.

Ron: That's another really good point about this medium is it is literally the fastest hour of my life when I get on a show, whether it's we have guest or don't, it is an unbelievably fast hour. And that's, boy, because you're in that flow state. I haven't even looked at the clock once since we've been talking David. This has been very engaging.

Dave: Yeah, it has been fun. Well, why don't we wrap up? So if people want to reach out to you or learn more about you, what's the best place for them to go to?

Ron: Well, since we've been talking about podcasts, probably the best place is thesoulofenterprise.com and they can see all 336 shows that we've done. Listen to them right there. Check out the show notes, check out the show with Peter Robinson and Joshua Gilder if you're into Ronald Reagan speeches. And we've had a lot of other really phenomenal guests on authors, economists, professional pricers, wow, just a whole group of really great guests. So that's probably the best place. Obviously I'm on LinkedIn. I'm one of the influencers. I got lots of articles up there. And I'm on twitter @ronaldbaker. And you can also find me at verasage.com, which is the think tank I run.

Dave: Well, that is awesome. Well, we will make sure that's in the show notes. So, Ron, thank you again for being on my podcast on this new podcast as well as being on the old one. It's really has been fun. And I always enjoy listening to you, because you have an enthusiasm and a melding of your different crafts that create a really unique perspective on things. So I always appreciate talking to you.

Ron: Well, thanks for having me, David. It's been an honor to be on both of your podcasts. And good luck with this new venture. It's really exciting and it's going to bring a lot of value to a lot of people.

Dave: Well, that's the plan. Well, you have a great day. Enjoy the day in Northern California.

Ron: All right. Thanks, David. You too.

Dave: Bye. Take care. Bye.

Ron: Bye-bye.