When a friend of mine, and fellow entrepreneur, mentioned the idea of taking my services to Atlanta, it hit me like a ton of bricks.
Like, “Why not?”
It’s a bigger market, and only a 4-hour drive from my home in Charlotte. There are a ton of coaches and consultants in Atlanta who would be willing to pay for video podcast production. Heck, they’d probably be willing to pay more.
It's Been 20 Years Since I Last Visited Atlanta
I never got caught up in the hype that surrounded the city in the late 90’s and early 2000’s. Everybody was moving to Atlanta. It was that shiny city on the hill. The land of opportunity. But I didn’t see it. Charlotte was enough for me. There’s plenty of opportunity here, I thought.
I had already run a moderately successful fitness business as a gym owner. If I can make it in Charlotte with that, I can surely make it as a videographer. And that’s true for certain types of video. But for what I want, and for the cost, I need to be in a certain market. There are not solo entrepreneurs with service-based businesses in Charlotte. Let me correct that. There may be enough. They just aren’t willing to invest or understand what it takes to compete.
How Do I Start Building My Podcast Production Business in Atlanta?
I was fortunate to meet a young lady by the name of Dr. Barbara Swinney on a business trip to Michigan in October 2022. This was a conference/branding event for people looking to break into the speaking business. She stood out to me, for a number of reasons. One, she was smoking hot! Two, she was already investing in her brand. She was a published author and had her own display at the event. I convinced my client to interview her so we could capture that and use the content later. He did, and they created some great on-the-spot content.
In speaking with her I learned she was from Atlanta and she had a unique brand of coaching. We followed each other on Instagram and that was that, at least I thought.
Fast forward to December and the conversation I’m having with my friend. He’s telling me I need to take my services to Atlanta. I immediately thought of Dr. Barbara Swinney. In her Instagram posts, she was already mimicking the look of a podcast. She just needed someone to make it real for her. So I reached out.
What happened after that?
Well, we made magic!
We were able to connect and I produced 5 episodes of her video podcast, Deeper Conversations with Dr. Barbara Swinney. I made sure her audio was uploaded to Apple Podcasts and Spotify. I uploaded the video to her YouTube channel. I even created social media clips from each episode to help not only market the podcast, but grow her social media presence.
Now What?
Not even a month after producing my first video podcast in Atlanta I get a call to do another one. This was actually someone referred to me by Dr. Swinney. It meant so much to me that people were seeing what was in the works on her social media, reaching out to her, and she was passing along my info.
I recently finished production on my second video podcast in Atlanta with a group of ladies who operate an organization geared to women, called Rich Girls. I’ll have more on that later. But for now, here’s a pic!
