Podcasting Lessons Learnt with Sarah Giffrow

Rachael Botfield: 00:00:08

Hi, and welcome to Podcasting 1 0 1 with Rachel.

Rachael Botfield: 00:00:12

This podcast is for busy female entrepreneurs who run their own

Rachael Botfield: 00:00:15

businesses and want to start podcast or who may already have a podcast.

Rachael Botfield: 00:00:20

I want to share practical information and tips on how you can.

Rachael Botfield: 00:00:24

Podcast started and managing it along the way.

Rachael Botfield: 00:00:27

I'll also be interviewing other female podcast hosts to give

Rachael Botfield: 00:00:30

you real insight into what it's like having your own podcast.

Rachael Botfield: 00:00:44

Hi, and welcome to this week's episode.

Rachael Botfield: 00:00:46

Today I have Sarah gif Row, and she is coming to talk about some of the pitfalls

Rachael Botfield: 00:00:56

or do's and don'ts about podcasting.

Rachael Botfield: 00:00:58

And so to start with, Sarah, do you wanna just introduce yourself and

Rachael Botfield: 00:01:02

let us know who you are and what you.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:01:05

So, yeah, uh, my name's Sarah Giro, uh, and I am

Sarah Giffrow: 00:01:09

the owner and creative director.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:01:11

Uh, benevolent overlord, I like to say of Upswitch Creative.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:01:14

I

Rachael Botfield: 00:01:14

love that.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:01:17

Yeah.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:01:18

Um, and we do, uh, website, social media and email marketing for

Sarah Giffrow: 00:01:23

established ethical and passionate small businesses and nonprofits.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:01:28

So that's our main.

Rachael Botfield: 00:01:30

Awesome.

Rachael Botfield: 00:01:31

And so we are here to talk about, um, a podcast that isn't live anymore.

Rachael Botfield: 00:01:37

It was one that you did a couple of, was it a couple of years

Sarah Giffrow: 00:01:40

ago now?

Sarah Giffrow: 00:01:41

Yeah, yeah.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:01:42

Um, yeah, it was a couple years ago.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:01:45

Um, and this was, uh, this was a side project.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:01:48

It was totally unrelated to my business.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:01:53

Maybe it's kind of rare.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:01:54

Um, but yeah, I started it in, uh, March of 2020.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:02:01

It was called Mixed Metaphors, and it was centered around interviews with, uh,

Sarah Giffrow: 00:02:07

mixed race folks, um, which I am one.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:02:10

And so, um, and just the journey of, um, figuring out our identities

Sarah Giffrow: 00:02:16

and how we take up space in various different spaces, whether they're.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:02:23

White spaces or, you know, person of color spaces or, you

Sarah Giffrow: 00:02:28

know, everything in between.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:02:29

And just a lot of the, a lot of the, uh, stories around that.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:02:33

So, um, oh yeah, and I got a lot of good feedback, uh, from the folks I talked to.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:02:38

They, they were like, I'm so glad you're doing this, but, uh, I, I

Sarah Giffrow: 00:02:42

definitely made some choices that made it more difficult than it needed to be,

Sarah Giffrow: 00:02:46

which is why I'm no longer doing it.

Rachael Botfield: 00:02:51

So let's start with, so it's a pa it was a passion project.

Rachael Botfield: 00:02:55

What made you want to start it?

Rachael Botfield: 00:02:57

Obviously March, 2020 was, was it pre covid or just as it hit, was

Rachael Botfield: 00:03:02

like, was the idea percolating for a while pre kind of covid or,

Sarah Giffrow: 00:03:07

yeah.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:03:08

Um, it was something I had had in mind for, uh, for, yeah, probably six months or

Sarah Giffrow: 00:03:13

so prior to Covid and, and I think I had done a couple interviews at that point.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:03:19

I was very much taking my time with it.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:03:21

And then, and then, yeah, uh, COVID started and, and I was like, well, I

Sarah Giffrow: 00:03:26

have all of this free time at home.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:03:28

I can figure out this podcast thing.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:03:32

Uh, yeah, it's, it seemed like a nice idea at the time, but, uh, but

Sarah Giffrow: 00:03:37

yeah, I, I think that it was, uh, it was a mistake in the long run

Sarah Giffrow: 00:03:42

because as the pandemic went on, Yeah.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:03:46

I, I think my capacity, I think a lot of people's capacity to just do

Sarah Giffrow: 00:03:51

anything, uh, dropped precipitously.

Rachael Botfield: 00:03:56

Yeah, definitely.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:03:58

Yeah.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:03:58

Yeah.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:03:59

And I think that's, and I think that's something that's, is, that's a big thing

Sarah Giffrow: 00:04:04

to consider when you were thinking about starting a project of this sort is.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:04:09

You know, whether it's a pandemic or a major life event or even

Sarah Giffrow: 00:04:13

just like a lot of small stuff that's draining your energy.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:04:16

You have to really be real with yourself about your capacity and, and ask yourself,

Sarah Giffrow: 00:04:21

you know, what are you gonna have to put aside in order to make room for this?

Sarah Giffrow: 00:04:26

Cause it's gonna take time.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:04:29

And, and, and that time has to come from somewhere.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:04:31

So, and that country as.

Rachael Botfield: 00:04:33

Absolutely.

Rachael Botfield: 00:04:34

I'm a hundred percent agree with that.

Rachael Botfield: 00:04:36

I think that that's kind of like one of the first questions, um, that I would

Rachael Botfield: 00:04:41

say to somebody if they were thinking about starting a podcast, like say

Rachael Botfield: 00:04:45

this kind of size of a project, be realistic with the amount of time that

Rachael Botfield: 00:04:50

you have to, um, just to spend on it.

Rachael Botfield: 00:04:54

And whether it then at that point, maybe depending on, you know, whether

Rachael Botfield: 00:04:59

you have the funds spending, whether it's a passion project or, or for your.

Rachael Botfield: 00:05:02

Um, whether you could outsource some of those parts or whether

Rachael Botfield: 00:05:06

that's even an option for you, or making it in a way that, okay, I

Rachael Botfield: 00:05:11

can't commit to weekly episodes.

Rachael Botfield: 00:05:12

So let's start with monthly episodes.

Rachael Botfield: 00:05:15

Or just having that knowledge so you can base it if you really

Rachael Botfield: 00:05:19

want to do it in, into, into your, your work, your working life.

Rachael Botfield: 00:05:24

But it, it is a big commitment whether you've got somebody helping you or

Rachael Botfield: 00:05:28

not, you've still got to come up with those creative ideas around what you

Rachael Botfield: 00:05:33

would like your episodes to be and the plumbing and, and the fact that it

Rachael Botfield: 00:05:37

just takes time, recording and editing and all those other things that make,

Rachael Botfield: 00:05:41

and then promoting it that make it.

Rachael Botfield: 00:05:43

So what was the first kind of thing that you came across that maybe

Rachael Botfield: 00:05:46

that you stumbled over or that you started to feel that maybe it was

Rachael Botfield: 00:05:51

a bigger project than you thought,

Sarah Giffrow: 00:05:53

or?

Sarah Giffrow: 00:05:54

Well, the funny thing is, as far as the, as far as the promotional

Sarah Giffrow: 00:05:58

side, I think that's where a lot of people would, would get hung up.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:06:02

But given that, you know, I already had website skills and social

Sarah Giffrow: 00:06:07

media experience, I, I felt.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:06:10

I know how to, you know, I know how to set up the, the website and the podcast feed.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:06:15

I already have a host.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:06:16

I, I know how to promote things online.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:06:20

And so that, that piece I kind of had in the bag, but I think a lot

Sarah Giffrow: 00:06:24

of other folks wouldn't necessarily.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:06:27

Um, yeah.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:06:28

But I think, uh, I think a lot of my, a lot of my issues stemmed from.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:06:35

It stemmed from the desire to, to nitpick at myself, which I think we're

Sarah Giffrow: 00:06:41

all a little guilty of that sometimes.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:06:43

Um, but yeah, I would say don't spend a lot of time editing yourself.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:06:49

This, I feel like you need to kind of brace yourself for

Sarah Giffrow: 00:06:52

the sound of your own voice

Rachael Botfield: 00:06:53

sometimes.

Rachael Botfield: 00:06:55

Uh, yeah, I was talking, I did a post today about, um, perfectionism

Rachael Botfield: 00:06:59

actually, cause it was making me.

Rachael Botfield: 00:07:01

Um, the, like you're talking about, the sound of your own

Rachael Botfield: 00:07:04

voice can be hard to hear.

Rachael Botfield: 00:07:07

I, I still, um, don't always like the sound of my voice or how often

Rachael Botfield: 00:07:14

I might say, um, or so, and, and when you listen to yourself quite

Rachael Botfield: 00:07:18

a lot, you kind of see those things and you pick those things out.

Rachael Botfield: 00:07:21

So you have to kind of try and put those things aside sometimes.

Rachael Botfield: 00:07:28

If you let it get in your own head, it's very difficult when you

Rachael Botfield: 00:07:31

are editing and you're listening to it over and over again.

Rachael Botfield: 00:07:34

It kind of just becomes, oh no, I don't, I don't really feel comfortable with that.

Rachael Botfield: 00:07:38

So that is something that, I mean, yeah, everyone with imposter

Rachael Botfield: 00:07:41

syndrome as well, I think is a big, all those types of feelings.

Rachael Botfield: 00:07:46

Was that, um, were you finding that hard?

Rachael Botfield: 00:07:50

Like was that getting in your head when you were interviewing

Rachael Botfield: 00:07:52

people as well, do you think?

Rachael Botfield: 00:07:53

Or just kind of like at the editing?

Sarah Giffrow: 00:07:56

Yeah, I think, um, I think less so during the interviews themselves.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:08:01

I definitely thought about it, but, but yeah, it was definitely in the

Sarah Giffrow: 00:08:05

editing stage where, you know, yeah, any sort of like, you know, vocal fry or

Sarah Giffrow: 00:08:10

saying, um, or leg or any of that, it's.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:08:13

It's gonna be a hundred times more grading when it's in your own voice.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:08:17

Like your voice doesn't sound the same in, in your head as it does on a

Sarah Giffrow: 00:08:20

recording, and it's just, it's so jarring.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:08:23

You just, it's, it's like you kind of dissociate from it almost.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:08:26

Like, that's not me.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:08:27

I don't sound like

Rachael Botfield: 00:08:28

that.

Rachael Botfield: 00:08:30

Absolutely.

Rachael Botfield: 00:08:31

Yeah.

Rachael Botfield: 00:08:32

I, I definitely felt that I never, one tip that someone says is, is

Rachael Botfield: 00:08:36

really listening to it over and out.

Rachael Botfield: 00:08:39

By listening to it over and over again, you kind of get used to the

Rachael Botfield: 00:08:42

sound of your own voice is one way.

Rachael Botfield: 00:08:45

There's a guy that, um, Tom Dun hope, he was talking about video as well,

Rachael Botfield: 00:08:49

about how we we're uncomfortable in a video about seeing ourselves.

Rachael Botfield: 00:08:53

Um, but it's because we don't often see ourselves from that angle.

Rachael Botfield: 00:08:57

Um, only when we look in a mirror we don't really think about it.

Rachael Botfield: 00:09:00

So when you're like presented with this image of yourself, it's, it's

Rachael Botfield: 00:09:04

kind of the same as the voice, as your.

Rachael Botfield: 00:09:07

Um, and he kind of recommends like listening to yourself, um,

Rachael Botfield: 00:09:11

to get used to the sound of your

Sarah Giffrow: 00:09:13

own horse.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:09:14

I definitely agree with that about video too.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:09:17

There fan.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:09:18

Uh, a few instances where edited video of myself and yeah, you're not, like,

Sarah Giffrow: 00:09:22

you're not usually talking to yourself when you look in the mirror, so like, no.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:09:25

When you're watching a video, it's like, what is my face doing right now?

Sarah Giffrow: 00:09:29

It's, it's

Rachael Botfield: 00:09:30

really out there.

Rachael Botfield: 00:09:33

I get so distract.

Rachael Botfield: 00:09:35

By my own face sometimes just like stick a post-it note over my own face.

Rachael Botfield: 00:09:39

She's like, no, I don't wanna look like that.

Rachael Botfield: 00:09:42

Why is that?

Rachael Botfield: 00:09:42

But yeah, there are things that you, things that you do

Rachael Botfield: 00:09:45

need to like get over that.

Rachael Botfield: 00:09:47

So to get into the next, the next hurdle.

Rachael Botfield: 00:09:50

So how did you find it from, I mean, you being a website designer, you are

Rachael Botfield: 00:09:54

pretty tech savvy, you know, so did you find the process of editing fairly.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:10:00

That's the thing is I don't think it was, and a lot of it

Sarah Giffrow: 00:10:03

was just obsessing about those details.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:10:06

Um, and yeah, there is a bit of learning curve with the, with the

Sarah Giffrow: 00:10:10

different editing tools that, you know, I, I didn't, I didn't ever feel

Sarah Giffrow: 00:10:16

like I really got the hang of it.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:10:18

Um, so, so yeah, it's, it's definitely, um, it was definitely a learning

Sarah Giffrow: 00:10:23

experience in, in that regard.

Rachael Botfield: 00:10:26

What did you use for.

Rachael Botfield: 00:10:29

Have interest.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:10:30

Yeah.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:10:31

I, how was it called?

Sarah Giffrow: 00:10:33

Oh, yeah.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:10:34

I used Audacity

Rachael Botfield: 00:10:36

a card.

Rachael Botfield: 00:10:36

Oh yes.

Rachael Botfield: 00:10:37

Yep.

Rachael Botfield: 00:10:38

Yes.

Rachael Botfield: 00:10:39

I'll use Audacity.

Rachael Botfield: 00:10:40

That's what I use.

Rachael Botfield: 00:10:41

I've, I've real life audacity.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:10:44

Yeah.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:10:44

Yeah.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:10:45

Um, yeah, and I think this is also, I think it's kind of a pitfall of my

Sarah Giffrow: 00:10:50

experience too, is that, well, my husband has a podcast called The Weird History.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:10:56

Huh.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:10:56

Podcast.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:10:57

Okay.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:10:58

We already had good equipment in the house, but then I, I was also like,

Sarah Giffrow: 00:11:02

he uses Audacity as she use Audacity.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:11:05

He hosts his feet on blueberry.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:11:06

I should hosted on blueberry, and I was, and I don't know if those are

Sarah Giffrow: 00:11:10

necessarily the right tools for me.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:11:15

And I think I, I think, I wish I would've thought harder about that and maybe done a

Sarah Giffrow: 00:11:20

bit more experimenting, um, just because.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:11:23

I know from like the webs, the website worlds that, you know, they're like

Sarah Giffrow: 00:11:27

different site editors and different tools and, and what's intuitive to one person

Sarah Giffrow: 00:11:33

is not gonna be intuitive to another.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:11:35

So, um, I could have tried harder in researching editing software

Sarah Giffrow: 00:11:40

to make sure I was using something that really worked for me.

Rachael Botfield: 00:11:45

It's, there's a lot of information out there about

Rachael Botfield: 00:11:47

different podcast hosts, uh, platforms.

Rachael Botfield: 00:11:51

Um, and editing tools.

Rachael Botfield: 00:11:53

So I know a lot of Mac users.

Rachael Botfield: 00:11:55

I'm not a Mac user myself.

Rachael Botfield: 00:11:57

I don't use f I'm Android, but, um, garage Band, um, apparent

Rachael Botfield: 00:12:01

is really good for, for editing.

Rachael Botfield: 00:12:03

A lot of people I know use that.

Rachael Botfield: 00:12:05

Um, I used Audacity, but I have used that in the past.

Rachael Botfield: 00:12:10

Years and years ago my degree, so I kind of had some familiarity with it.

Rachael Botfield: 00:12:14

So, but you, there are some, I think even with an canal.

Rachael Botfield: 00:12:18

So ANCA is the free platform that's slight linked with Spotify and, and

Rachael Botfield: 00:12:23

I think there's like ALI two as well and you can edit, it'd edit in there.

Rachael Botfield: 00:12:27

And I find those a little bit clunky to, to edit if you, depending on

Rachael Botfield: 00:12:32

what type of editing you want to do.

Rachael Botfield: 00:12:35

To make it simple.

Rachael Botfield: 00:12:36

If you want to kind of put conversations on there that you don't wanna take too

Rachael Botfield: 00:12:41

much out bar, maybe if there's like, you know, some, some interruption in

Rachael Botfield: 00:12:45

the middle, you can click the ends.

Rachael Botfield: 00:12:46

And some of them even have like, um, a, a sound processing thing where

Rachael Botfield: 00:12:50

they'll do like a general thing for you, um, to make that easy and easier

Rachael Botfield: 00:12:56

for you, which I think is great.

Rachael Botfield: 00:12:58

If that's, if the, if the, and if you can have that all in one.

Rachael Botfield: 00:13:02

And, and often that's a big barrier for people to, to starting and like

Rachael Botfield: 00:13:06

say, you faced with this decision.

Rachael Botfield: 00:13:08

I'm not sure what to do without.

Rachael Botfield: 00:13:10

I mean, I spent lots of the time researching.

Rachael Botfield: 00:13:13

I mean, mainly as well being a podcast manager, I wanted to see what, what

Rachael Botfield: 00:13:16

was out there and what tension I could suggest to different clients and stuff.

Rachael Botfield: 00:13:21

And then you start diving into all of that and you think, oh

Rachael Botfield: 00:13:23

my gosh, like I'd not heard of blueberry when you mentioned that.

Rachael Botfield: 00:13:26

So there are so many different ones out there with different functional.

Rachael Botfield: 00:13:31

I'm not surprise you when the one that your husband had, because

Rachael Botfield: 00:13:34

it's just, it's just like, well, it works for him, you know?

Rachael Botfield: 00:13:37

And um, so I guess that's one kind of thing is making sure the, the tech

Rachael Botfield: 00:13:43

works for you and exploring, maybe exploring anything you, couple of

Rachael Botfield: 00:13:46

different options before you sell on one and getting some, some advice

Rachael Botfield: 00:13:51

off, uh, a few different people.

Rachael Botfield: 00:13:54

So what, what, any other things, what other things did you find that any of

Rachael Botfield: 00:13:58

the problems that you kind of came.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:14:01

I think I had a fair amount of overthinking at play as well.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:14:06

I, so I, I definitely overthought format and it's really going to be

Sarah Giffrow: 00:14:13

better to keep it simple at the outset.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:14:16

Um, so because my podcast was centered around interviews with mixed race, I

Sarah Giffrow: 00:14:23

mean, I totally could have just recorded our conversation and posted it to the

Sarah Giffrow: 00:14:28

feed and voila out there, but mm-hmm.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:14:31

I don't know.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:14:32

I was probably listening the too much, 99% invisible or this

Sarah Giffrow: 00:14:37

American Life for whatever.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:14:39

Um, and I, I just came in with this like really grandiose vision of

Sarah Giffrow: 00:14:43

storytelling and I'd be like, narrating like Roman Mars and sending Oh really?

Sarah Giffrow: 00:14:49

Oh wow.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:14:50

Yeah.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:14:51

And it, it just added so much complexity that I didn't anticipate.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:14:56

So, you know, that turned into like hours and hours of tedious editing

Sarah Giffrow: 00:15:01

and like splicing clips together.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:15:04

And, and I, I absolutely hated it.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:15:07

And it's probably the major reason I let go of the project is, is that, yeah,

Sarah Giffrow: 00:15:13

I just, I was expecting way too much out of myself, right out of the gate.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:15:19

You know, a lot of those, a lot of those, um, really well known podcasts, you

Sarah Giffrow: 00:15:23

know, they have entire teams behind them.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:15:26

They have, yeah.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:15:27

They have people doing their research.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:15:29

They got the sound engineers and editors and their entire job to do that one piece.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:15:34

And so expecting all

Rachael Botfield: 00:15:36

that wire.

Rachael Botfield: 00:15:37

Yeah.

Rachael Botfield: 00:15:37

All the hearts doing every Yeah.

Rachael Botfield: 00:15:40

They've got a massive production team.

Rachael Botfield: 00:15:41

Producers.

Rachael Botfield: 00:15:43

Yeah.

Rachael Botfield: 00:15:43

Everyth.

Rachael Botfield: 00:15:45

Everybody there.

Rachael Botfield: 00:15:45

So what was the format then?

Rachael Botfield: 00:15:47

So you had the conversations with the, with the different folks that

Rachael Botfield: 00:15:51

you had on, and then what did you, what bits were you narrating over?

Rachael Botfield: 00:15:55

I'm just interested to see how you kind of came up with

Rachael Botfield: 00:15:57

that, um, type of, uh, format.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:16:01

Yeah.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:16:02

Um, I essentially did the, I like had questions that I would ask them and, and I

Sarah Giffrow: 00:16:08

would sort of look for the story in there.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:16:10

I mean, I really, I was really focused on.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:16:15

Creating a space where they could just talk about what spoke to them.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:16:19

And I just held space for them and listened.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:16:22

And so it's, oh yeah.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:16:24

It wasn't so much like a back and forth of like, of us having

Sarah Giffrow: 00:16:28

a conversation necessarily.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:16:30

I was just, I was more just like listening to and looking for the story.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:16:35

And so I would, I would like put the pieces together in a way that made

Sarah Giffrow: 00:16:40

sense and, and then, You have a little, you have a little bit of context.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:16:45

So

Rachael Botfield: 00:16:45

the episode would be more of them with Aroy telling

Rachael Botfield: 00:16:50

their story, not like a, not like a question kind of answered kind of thing.

Rachael Botfield: 00:16:55

And then, um, have you doing the mill parts in there?

Rachael Botfield: 00:16:59

Yeah, that's really, you should, you should try.

Rachael Botfield: 00:17:01

Um, I know you said it might not be available anymore before

Rachael Botfield: 00:17:04

we hit record, but it would be really interesting to, to listen.

Rachael Botfield: 00:17:10

To the podcast as well.

Rachael Botfield: 00:17:11

Yeah.

Rachael Botfield: 00:17:11

Um, just to see that type, that's not something that I, I guess the

Rachael Botfield: 00:17:16

type of podcast that I've created is, is not the same as the type of

Rachael Botfield: 00:17:20

like, what the idea of the concept of the idea that you wanted to do.

Rachael Botfield: 00:17:24

If you could like, redo it again.

Rachael Botfield: 00:17:26

Like, like what things, how would you like to see the format now to make it,

Rachael Botfield: 00:17:31

to still get across what you want to get across in your podcast, but make

Rachael Botfield: 00:17:36

it easier for yourself so that you.

Rachael Botfield: 00:17:40

Continue to get back content out there.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:17:43

Yeah, I think that, I think I would definitely start with just having

Sarah Giffrow: 00:17:49

a more or organic format to my interviews and interviewing people is, is a skill.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:17:55

It's more of a skill and I think people realize sometimes and mm-hmm.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:17:59

And yeah, I think, I think I would want to have it be more conversational.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:18:04

I think I had a.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:18:06

Due to the, due to the nature of like the subject matter, I, I had a certain

Sarah Giffrow: 00:18:11

amount of hesitance about taking up too much space in, in the interview.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:18:16

And, and so I think, uh, I think that would be, that was something too, uh,

Sarah Giffrow: 00:18:21

that I needed to get over myself about.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:18:23

Mm-hmm.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:18:24

Um, oh yeah.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:18:26

I, I think that's, yeah, having a more organic conversational flow.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:18:31

Make would really trickle down and make everything simpler.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:18:34

Um, it would make the editing go more quickly and, and yeah, it would be

Sarah Giffrow: 00:18:40

able to actually stick to a schedule and not go overwhelmed at audits.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:18:45

Um, and it would be, it would be very tempting to, uh, hire someone

Sarah Giffrow: 00:18:51

to handle the editing for me.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:18:53

Um, if it ever got, if I ever got to a point where I felt like that

Sarah Giffrow: 00:18:58

was in the realm of possibility.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:19:01

But yeah, as a, as a passion project, it's, you often just feel the Oh, yeah.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:19:06

Out.

Rachael Botfield: 00:19:07

Yeah, absolutely.

Rachael Botfield: 00:19:08

Yeah.

Rachael Botfield: 00:19:08

It's, yeah, as a passion project, it's not, um, something that you

Rachael Botfield: 00:19:13

can, it's a lot of money to spend on something that's a passion project.

Rachael Botfield: 00:19:18

But do you, do you feel, do you feel, um, that you'd still be able

Rachael Botfield: 00:19:23

to get across, um, what you wanted to achieve with your podcast if

Rachael Botfield: 00:19:27

you had the conversational side of.

Rachael Botfield: 00:19:30

Yeah, I think

Sarah Giffrow: 00:19:31

so.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:19:32

Um, because the, I mean, I was focusing on a group of people of which I am a

Sarah Giffrow: 00:19:38

member, so, um, but yeah, I think, um, I think that a lot of, I think a lot of

Sarah Giffrow: 00:19:45

the themes would still come through and I would just, yeah, I would just need to

Sarah Giffrow: 00:19:51

get more comfortable with interviewing.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:19:54

Having that conversation so that I don't feel like I need

Sarah Giffrow: 00:19:58

to spend hours and days out,

Rachael Botfield: 00:20:00

down.

Rachael Botfield: 00:20:00

Yeah, it's, it is hard with interviewing and, and you're

Rachael Botfield: 00:20:05

right, it is, it is a skill.

Rachael Botfield: 00:20:06

And I got inside.

Rachael Botfield: 00:20:09

I wasn't, um, having the same kind of conversations that you,

Rachael Botfield: 00:20:13

that you were having in your podcast, but I still felt a bit.

Rachael Botfield: 00:20:18

Awkward.

Rachael Botfield: 00:20:18

And I did look at it like, like a bit more of an interview.

Rachael Botfield: 00:20:21

Um, my first podcast was, um, into different virtual assistants and

Rachael Botfield: 00:20:27

learning about their journey and how they got from where they were to

Rachael Botfield: 00:20:30

where they were now and, and what's evolved in their business and things.

Rachael Botfield: 00:20:33

And I did keep looking at it more, it's more of a, it, it ends up being, it's more

Rachael Botfield: 00:20:39

of a conversationalist, um, podcast and I, but I was looking at it like a, like

Rachael Botfield: 00:20:43

an interview and that really kind of made.

Rachael Botfield: 00:20:47

Really nervous about, um, doing the interviews.

Rachael Botfield: 00:20:51

And I still do sometimes get inside my own head and sometimes I'm so focused

Rachael Botfield: 00:20:55

on the questions that I wanna ask.

Rachael Botfield: 00:20:57

I'm not, not really listening to what somebody's saying to

Rachael Botfield: 00:21:00

be able to ask those questions.

Rachael Botfield: 00:21:03

Um, that might just come up naturally in the conversation.

Rachael Botfield: 00:21:06

Um, and that is some, this Janet Murray that I mentioned earlier, she talked

Rachael Botfield: 00:21:11

about she, um, well she used to be a journalist as well, so she's got kind.

Rachael Botfield: 00:21:16

But she was like more of a print journalist than an

Rachael Botfield: 00:21:17

interview, um, journalist.

Rachael Botfield: 00:21:19

And she was talking about getting some training, like interview training, and I,

Rachael Botfield: 00:21:24

I'd never thought of that of a podcast, but actually depending on the subject,

Rachael Botfield: 00:21:28

that the people that you are interviewing, having some kind of training and, um,

Rachael Botfield: 00:21:32

really been able to, to, to listen to what they're saying and then think of

Rachael Botfield: 00:21:36

other questions to ask rather than ones you'd already previously thought is,

Rachael Botfield: 00:21:40

is a skill and would be something that could be, um, a really good investment.

Rachael Botfield: 00:21:45

As well, couldn't it?

Sarah Giffrow: 00:21:46

Yeah.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:21:47

Yeah, I think so.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:21:48

And, and, yeah, I definitely had a similar issue to you was just with

Sarah Giffrow: 00:21:53

the whole thing of like, oh, I've gotta make sure I ask these questions.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:21:57

And like, getting to the point like, especially because I'm like ADHD and

Sarah Giffrow: 00:22:02

I will just like go off on a tangent if I let myself, so I, yeah, I think

Sarah Giffrow: 00:22:06

getting like overly focused on like, these are the questions I have to ask.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:22:11

It was hard to also like, hear what they were saying and, and

Sarah Giffrow: 00:22:14

actually have the conversation.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:22:16

So that's, that's a very real issue too.

Rachael Botfield: 00:22:19

Yeah, I totally get that.

Rachael Botfield: 00:22:21

Would you feel more comfortable now doing, doing some interviews or

Rachael Botfield: 00:22:26

conversationalists now, or what kind of things do you think you could do

Rachael Botfield: 00:22:30

to help you feel more comfortable?

Rachael Botfield: 00:22:32

Or would you be more comfortable?

Rachael Botfield: 00:22:35

You know, having had that experience before and knowing kind of how you felt

Rachael Botfield: 00:22:39

then, like what things would you maybe do differently in the future if you were

Sarah Giffrow: 00:22:43

to do a podcast here?

Sarah Giffrow: 00:22:45

Uh, I actually like the idea of interview training now that you've,

Sarah Giffrow: 00:22:51

now that you've brought it up, I think that would've been a huge health.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:22:55

Um, and it still would be.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:22:57

Um, but yeah, I, I'm one of those people, crew.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:23:01

A lot more comfortable in writing than I am in like verbalizing so, so the getting

Sarah Giffrow: 00:23:07

into the overthinking space when I'm like having a conversation, it's just something

Sarah Giffrow: 00:23:11

I do when I'm having normal conversations.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:23:14

So yeah, having more of a framework around just like how to approach interviews

Sarah Giffrow: 00:23:19

would be massively helpful and or that's definitely something I would wanna look

Rachael Botfield: 00:23:25

at doing.

Rachael Botfield: 00:23:26

Yeah, it's something that I thought about as well.

Rachael Botfield: 00:23:30

Thought it would just be a really valuable skill to, to work on and also help with

Rachael Botfield: 00:23:35

your, could help with like, not that I do a lot of presenting or speaking,

Rachael Botfield: 00:23:39

but you know, there's a potential for doing that as well and or I dunno,

Rachael Botfield: 00:23:43

if you end up getting on a paddle somewhere at a conference or something

Rachael Botfield: 00:23:46

like that, those kind of skills would, would come in handy there as well.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:23:51

But yeah, I think I would feel more comfortable just

Sarah Giffrow: 00:23:54

having done it once and and experienced all of these various ups and downs.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:23:59

That's the cool part of mistakes is that you can learn from them and do

Sarah Giffrow: 00:24:04

things differently the next time.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:24:05

So I feel like if I were to try it again, it would go a lot

Sarah Giffrow: 00:24:10

more

Rachael Botfield: 00:24:10

smoothly.

Rachael Botfield: 00:24:11

Yeah, well you, you're not kind of, you're not starting from square

Rachael Botfield: 00:24:14

one like previously you, you, you didn't, cuz you don't know what

Rachael Botfield: 00:24:19

you don't know really, do you?

Rachael Botfield: 00:24:20

So yeah, you've made the mistakes and you know, but I think it is important.

Rachael Botfield: 00:24:27

Make those mistakes cuz you'll never learn or get that experience.

Rachael Botfield: 00:24:31

And if you don't just start, you could pontificate, uh, forever about what

Rachael Botfield: 00:24:37

I was saying about perfectionism, about not starting the podcast or not

Rachael Botfield: 00:24:41

letting it out there cuz it's not.

Rachael Botfield: 00:24:44

I had this as well with both mine.

Rachael Botfield: 00:24:46

I was like, oh, who's gonna listen?

Rachael Botfield: 00:24:47

And I don't know whether like, what I sound like is alright

Rachael Botfield: 00:24:52

or if I, I just say, okay.

Rachael Botfield: 00:24:54

But until you kind of do it, you are not gonna know.

Rachael Botfield: 00:24:57

And that's, we all learned by doing.

Rachael Botfield: 00:24:59

We all didn't like walk as a toddler, like straight away, didn't not

Rachael Botfield: 00:25:02

stumble over or anything like that.

Rachael Botfield: 00:25:03

As you keep trying again to get it done, so at least you'll know you've got that

Rachael Botfield: 00:25:08

experience under your belt and that if you were to go forward, you can draw on that.

Rachael Botfield: 00:25:14

Was it, so there's no mistakes, you're just failing forward

Rachael Botfield: 00:25:16

or something like that.

Rachael Botfield: 00:25:17

Like, yeah, not, not failing forward, but you know, that kind of a sentiment.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:25:22

I feel like the things that, the things that have come to

Sarah Giffrow: 00:25:24

my mind and just like thinking back on this are like, are one that done

Sarah Giffrow: 00:25:29

is better than perfect and Yep.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:25:31

And I think the other thing is that like a lot of people like to say

Sarah Giffrow: 00:25:34

comparison is the thief of joy.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:25:36

And I feel like, I feel like it's also like comparison is

Sarah Giffrow: 00:25:39

the road to abandon projects.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:25:43

Is just thinking too much about what other people doing and, and it sort of sucks

Sarah Giffrow: 00:25:47

the joy out of it for you, so Oh yeah.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:25:50

Definitely better to just do it and see what happens.

Rachael Botfield: 00:25:53

Yeah, definitely That comparison game Oh, is, is, uh, I often

Rachael Botfield: 00:25:58

find myself sucked down that comparison game, and even earlier this year I

Rachael Botfield: 00:26:05

was trying to kind of like think about my business more strategically, like.

Rachael Botfield: 00:26:10

Comparing myself constantly to other things or outside influences or

Rachael Botfield: 00:26:13

someone that's got like, you know, 10 more, 10 more years experiencing me.

Rachael Botfield: 00:26:17

It's like you've given yourself that hard time thinking that you should

Rachael Botfield: 00:26:20

know all that stuff and that you should get it perfect the first time around

Rachael Botfield: 00:26:24

because you know about their mistakes and obviously they would never have got

Rachael Botfield: 00:26:27

that had they not made similar things.

Rachael Botfield: 00:26:30

But yeah, you can get a bit, well I can get a bit paralyzed by that.

Rachael Botfield: 00:26:34

Um, and then trying to think of, um, I did some C B T last.

Rachael Botfield: 00:26:40

And I had some, uh, kind of like different exercises to do.

Rachael Botfield: 00:26:44

A lot of my problems.

Rachael Botfield: 00:26:45

It was overthinking, um, like stress caused by overthinking.

Rachael Botfield: 00:26:49

So some of the tools that she gave me, I use in my business as well

Rachael Botfield: 00:26:54

to help me when I am overthinking.

Rachael Botfield: 00:26:56

I've got like a worry tree and like thinking about like,

Rachael Botfield: 00:26:59

can I do anything about it?

Rachael Botfield: 00:27:01

They know so okay, park, it's all this and they've really helped me.

Rachael Botfield: 00:27:05

While I do have those kind of.

Rachael Botfield: 00:27:08

You know, day to day things in my s where I end up feeling like, oh, I

Rachael Botfield: 00:27:12

can't do this, or I can't do that.

Rachael Botfield: 00:27:14

So those kind of exercises have really helped try and get over that

Rachael Botfield: 00:27:17

or stop the, uh, overthinking because you, your brain just goes like

Rachael Botfield: 00:27:22

million miles an hour, doesn't it?

Rachael Botfield: 00:27:23

And then,

Sarah Giffrow: 00:27:25

yeah, yeah, it does.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:27:26

Yeah.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:27:27

I, and something that, something that has like been really illuminating from time

Sarah Giffrow: 00:27:33

to time is like if you're listening to someone, Podcast when you're like looking

Sarah Giffrow: 00:27:38

at their art or whatever and you're thinking, oh my God, they're so amazing.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:27:42

Like, go like way back to like episode one or version one or, or like the very

Sarah Giffrow: 00:27:49

first comic strip they drew or whatever.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:27:51

And you, it just like, it looks totally different.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:27:54

It sounds totally different.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:27:55

Like you can sort of, if you go from like the beginning to now,

Sarah Giffrow: 00:28:00

you can like see the difference in.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:28:03

That comes through and then builds up as they get all of that experience.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:28:07

So, you know, they were, yeah, they were starting from a much different place.

Rachael Botfield: 00:28:11

Everything can evolve along with you.

Rachael Botfield: 00:28:14

I've been saying this as well that, I mean, my podcast has evolved over

Rachael Botfield: 00:28:18

time, and like I said before, but you don't know what you don't know, and

Rachael Botfield: 00:28:23

I think that it's a great thing for your podcast to evolve with you as

Rachael Botfield: 00:28:28

your experience and your knowledge.

Rachael Botfield: 00:28:31

Your podcast is, and I'm sure if I listen back to that first

Rachael Botfield: 00:28:35

interview I did for my first podcast, oh my gosh, I was so nervous.

Rachael Botfield: 00:28:40

I remember thinking afterwards, I'm so sorry because this is so a bitch.

Rachael Botfield: 00:28:44

Because I felt like he was really well bitched.

Rachael Botfield: 00:28:46

I felt like I really got into my, like, have my questions and all of

Rachael Botfield: 00:28:49

this come stuck into my head and I thought, you know, but then again,

Rachael Botfield: 00:28:52

I, if I hadn't started doing it, you know, you won't be where you are now.

Rachael Botfield: 00:28:56

So the moral of the story is don't give up.

Rachael Botfield: 00:28:59

Yeah, try and work it.

Rachael Botfield: 00:29:01

Start, yeah, just do it.

Rachael Botfield: 00:29:04

Have you got anything else?

Rachael Botfield: 00:29:05

Um, or any other advice maybe that you'd like to give to somebody

Rachael Botfield: 00:29:10

who's, um, thinking about starting, um, a podcast or for their business

Rachael Botfield: 00:29:15

or for a, as a passion project?

Rachael Botfield: 00:29:18

Um, more

Sarah Giffrow: 00:29:18

than anything, I would just say be like, do

Sarah Giffrow: 00:29:20

your own thing, whatever it is.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:29:24

Yeah.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:29:24

Nobody is, nobody's gonna have your ideas, nobody's gonna

Sarah Giffrow: 00:29:27

approach it exactly the way you do.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:29:29

So just roll with that.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:29:31

Yeah.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:29:32

Just figure itself out.

Rachael Botfield: 00:29:34

Yeah.

Rachael Botfield: 00:29:34

I, I think, um, when I was starting my podcast, I knew there was another

Rachael Botfield: 00:29:38

person, another lady, um, who was doing something similar to, and

Rachael Botfield: 00:29:42

she thought her before me and.

Rachael Botfield: 00:29:44

We'd met, and I knew her and I was worried that she was gonna think

Rachael Botfield: 00:29:47

that I was copying her podcast and I really got into my own.

Rachael Botfield: 00:29:51

But I remember somebody talking about, um, obviously there's a need for if

Rachael Botfield: 00:29:55

some, if there's more than one podcast about something, because obviously

Rachael Botfield: 00:29:58

there's more than one person in the world thinking or talking about that,

Rachael Botfield: 00:30:01

that, but, um, particular subject.

Rachael Botfield: 00:30:04

But you are gonna do it the way that you are gonna do it.

Rachael Botfield: 00:30:07

Like you just said, it eats.

Rachael Botfield: 00:30:09

Um, it's not gonna be the same as help podcast because I'm completely different

Rachael Botfield: 00:30:12

to her and I'll do it in a different way.

Rachael Botfield: 00:30:15

Um, but again, I suppose it's going back to that comparison game to

Rachael Botfield: 00:30:18

um, not letting it get in your head and, and say be, um, do it with as

Rachael Botfield: 00:30:24

much of you in there as as possible.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:30:27

Yeah.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:30:28

Yep.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:30:28

Exactly.

Rachael Botfield: 00:30:30

Great.

Rachael Botfield: 00:30:30

Well thanks so much for coming on Sarah, and sharing your

Rachael Botfield: 00:30:34

experience with podcasting and.

Rachael Botfield: 00:30:38

Would love to listen to the podcast.

Rachael Botfield: 00:30:40

If you can find it out or if you have a link or anything, I can

Rachael Botfield: 00:30:44

pop a link in the show notes.

Rachael Botfield: 00:30:45

Um, yeah, it'd be really exciting to, to have a listen to it and

Rachael Botfield: 00:30:49

see How many episodes did you do?

Rachael Botfield: 00:30:50

Out of interest, how many, how many did you do?

Rachael Botfield: 00:30:53

I

Sarah Giffrow: 00:30:53

did four.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:30:56

Do you know that's, did a lot more than fired up

Rachael Botfield: 00:30:59

but's.

Rachael Botfield: 00:30:59

Still a lot more.

Rachael Botfield: 00:31:00

I'm looking at some stats today actually.

Rachael Botfield: 00:31:01

And that's still a lot more than a lot of podcasts.

Rachael Botfield: 00:31:03

I only have one episode.

Rachael Botfield: 00:31:06

But you started and you did it, so you still achieved four episodes.

Rachael Botfield: 00:31:10

So I think that's really great.

Rachael Botfield: 00:31:11

Anyway, did four.

Rachael Botfield: 00:31:13

Thank you.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:31:14

Appreciate that.

Rachael Botfield: 00:31:17

Cool.

Rachael Botfield: 00:31:17

Well thanks for coming on,

Sarah Giffrow: 00:31:18

Sarah.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:31:18

Catch up with you soon.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:31:20

Thank you for having Thanks.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:31:22

All right.

Sarah Giffrow: 00:31:23

Take care.

Rachael Botfield: 00:31:26

Thanks for listening to the show.

Rachael Botfield: 00:31:27

If you'd like to connect with me or get in touch, then head on over to my website.

Rachael Botfield: 00:31:31

If you like the episode, then I'd love it if you could leave me a

Rachael Botfield: 00:31:34

review in your chosen podcast app.

Rachael Botfield: 00:31:36

Your feedback is much appreciated.