Should You Crowdfund Your Next Podcast Season?
Here's Why I Decided to Do It
Baldwin & CO. Coffee Shop in New Orleans-It has a beautiful podcasting studio as well.
Let’s Talk About Crowdfunding
I love podcasting. Any opportunity to speak to new people, take a deep dive into a topic that otherwise wouldn’t be discussed or covered or just to learn something new is so exciting for me. In fact, a few years ago I decided to spend 13 episodes in a uniquely designed season all about the potential for “Student Loan Forgiveness” before the policy was created by the President.
In that season I spoke with people who were for and against the policy and it is one of my favorite pieces of creative work. I frequently share that work now as we see the continued conversation around the policy now that it was passed.
Important Lessons Learned
Once I recorded the bulk of that content I then worked to find sponsors to help cover the expense of running that season. Here are some of the lessons learned from that process.
Lesson #1-It’s better to fundraise before recording the season-I did find and work with brand partners afterwards but it was very difficult to do during the summer when that project was being released.
Lesson #2-You want to connect with brand partners while “fresh”-I was so tired after working on that project on the heels of working on other podcast content. It’s better to work on a monetization strategy while you are energized and ready to go.
Lesson #3-Work on the monetization strategy BEFORE you start-It’s painful to admit but my monetization strategy for that project was kind of an afterthought.
Lesson #4-Not giving myself enough time to fund the project-It takes time for people to make decisions to fund your work (I’ve shared the different ways below) You’ll have more success raising funds if you set a reasonable fundraising timeframe. Help people to help you by giving them time. Especially these days when money feels tight to a lot of people.
Sponsorships
Grants
Donations
Subscriptions
Lesson #5-Recognizing the different types of support that you can get-There are people who will fund anything that you do because they are supporters of you. There are people who will shout you out and share your work. And there are people who will share you with the people on their platform.
All of these forms of support are priceless. ALL of them.
Being clear about why you’re pitching the different people and entities that you’re pitching to raise funds for a creative project.
This Time I’m Crowdfunding
Here’s Why
Right now I’m working on a new podcast season tentatively called “Vixens, Virgins and Vigilantes: The Impact of Policy on American Women’s Money” This is a pretty ambitious project that I will be sharing from February-October, 2024 (before the Election). It’s A LOT of work but I’ve wanted to bring this project to life for the past year. Now it’s time. Feel free to check out the donations page:
Here’s the link: michelleismoneyhungry.com/support
I’ve decided to crowdfund this campaign for several reasons.
The upcoming season’s content (in my view) is not a good fit for most brand partners-unless they reach out to me-Because of the political nature of this project, it’s not a good fit for most corporate organizations or small businesses unless they are comfortable sharing that type of content on their brand. While there are businesses who do make their politics known: Ben and Jerry’s is an example of this, I don’t want to put that emotional labor on anyone else to turn me down and share something that I already know.
I’ve de-monitized my personal finance platform-I’ve decided to focus my monetization strategy in different areas of my online brand that are much easier to make money with instead of my personal finance brand. Currently, I no longer focus on sponsorships, affiliate marketing, etc. with my Michelle is Money Hungry Brand. Unless, a company reaches out to me LOL!
Build a community of stakeholders-Folks who are literally invested in the project. I knew that people cared about the topics I plan on covering. But, did they care enough to invest financially in the work? I love PBS, NPR and other organizations enough to invest financially. People who pay have become the frontline of people that I will share bonus content with, any online events that I host and they will more easily share the project that I’m working on…because they’re financially invested.
What It’s Like to Crowdfund
Paid Subscribers
What if I told you that I decided to start my crowdfunding campaign in October? Partly because I was attending a large conference where I could start the “could you support my work?” conversation in person? Below I share in a video more of what that felt and looked like and the strategies I’m using for this campaign.