Building an Audience Takes Time — How Long Should I Wait for My Show to Give Results.

The Talking Silkworm Podcast

Show Notes

Question: As a health and wellness coach, how do you make your podcast profitable and popular in a few weeks?

Or

How do you make your blog, youtube channel, instagram account, big in a few weeks?

Well, the answer is very simple: you don’t.

Because we see online content that goes viral or influencers with super large social media followings, we compare ourselves and our work with that. We feel an urge to go big with little effort, to become overnight hits. It’s a normal thing to have this urge, I’ve been guilty of this myself. But this feeling is not grounded in reality given that, first, a lot of this content belongs to contexts apart from the health and wellness industry and, second, what we’re seeing is merely the result of a process, not the time and effort that lead to it.

To begin with, as a health and wellness coach you’re aiming at a specific audience with a particular kind of content. This means, there’s no cat videos or challenges where you eat spoonfuls of ground cinnamon. Even though this generates millions of views and shares, there's no benefit from it other than shallow entertainment. Same situation happens with influencers you might have as a reference, many of them belong to other contexts and have different purposes. And still for those who appeal to entertain a generic audience, you’re just seeing the tip of the iceberg, not the hard work and all their years of creating content while still relatively in the shadows. You can read about comedians, sportspeople and businesspeople say: “it took me 10 years to become an overnight success”.

In his book Content Inc, Joe Pulizzi explores the stories of content creators in different fields who generated large businesses from their content creation strategies. He talks about entrepreneurs in areas as diverse as backyard poultry, fiberglass pools, and photography. They all have in common the fact that they generated valuable content on a specific topic, for a specific audience, in a consistent manner for months or even years.

In his case studies, Pulizzi identified that a content marketing strategy will take around 9 months to take shape, and an average of 15 to 17 months to yield results.

Let me say that again:

In his case studies, Joe Pulizzi identified that a content marketing strategy will take around 9 months to take shape, and an average of 15 to 17 months to monetize.

This means that after a nine month period you will have gotten all the necessary feedback and done all the necessary adjustments to your content to have built the type audience that will potentially boost your business in terms of your reputation, online presence, authority and income.

So, if you’re in the first few months of creating content around your health and wellness practice, set yourself for the long game: Show up, even if it feels very few people can see you. Listen to your audience, do the adjustments along the way, be consistent and valuable. It takes entrepreneurs in this industry a long process to build up their audience, career and reputation while spreading a message and helping people along the way.

We have as a very close example entrepreneur and content creator, Liz Moody. We interviewed her in one of our episodes, and she told us it took her a long time to take off and become well-known with her content.

So, to wrap up, I’ll share this quote by Joe Pulizzi from his book Content Inc:

Without a doubt, the biggest reason content marketing fails is because it stops. I’ve seen business after business start a blog or e-newsletter or white paper program or podcast series and stop after a few months. Content marketing is a war of attrition. It’s a process. Success does not happen overnight. You must commit for the long haul if you want to be successful.

View your content creation as a vehicle in constant motion, not as an end in itself. Reputation is not built overnight. If you’re just getting started, keep it up!

If you haven’t started yet, the best moment to begin is right now.

If you liked this episode take a screenshot and tag us on Instagram at @Audience.Coach. If you have questions or episode ideas reach out at audiencecoach.com/contact or [e-mail].

My name is David Perez and I will see you in the next episode.

Links and resources:

iAcquire — An Interview with Content Marketing Institute’s Joe Pulizzi

Neil Patel — When Can You Expect Your Content Marketing Efforts to Bear Fruit?

Content Marketing Institute — 6 Steps to Content Marketing Domination

Content Inc.: How Entrepreneurs Use Content to Build Massive Audiences and Create Radically Successful Businesses — Joe Pulizzi

Counter Weight Creative — The 3 P’s To Growing Your Podcast Audience…Slowly

The Podcast Host — Growing Your Podcast Audience: How Long Does it Take?

Related Episodes:

6 Lessons on Building an Audience in the Health and Wellness Industry with Liz Moody

A 9 Step Roadmap to Create a Great Health and Wellness Podcast

Build An Audience First—Offer Your Products And Services Second