040: How a Podcast (accidentally) Transformed his Marketing Company – James Carbary of Sweet Fish Media

Background on James Carbary of Sweet Fish Media:

James Carbary is the founder of Sweet Fish Media, a done-for-you service that guarantees new relationships between B2B companies and their ideal clients. He’s a contributor for the Huffington Post & Business Insider, and he also co-hosts the B2B Growth Show: a podcast dedicated to helping B2B executives achieve explosive growth. When James isn’t interviewing the smartest minds in B2B marketing, he’s drinking Cherry Coke Zero, eating Swedish Fish, and hanging out with the most incredible woman on the planet (who he somehow talked into marrying him).

Where James Carbary began… He was working for a tech start-up in 2014. They were selling their product only to the government, so the sales cycles were long. He couldn’t close enough deals to make the investors happy and as funding dried up, he was laid off in late 2014. While he was with them, he was studying marketing to help the company grow. James kept hearing people talking about content marketing and coaching people on how to do it. The problem was actually finding the time to do the marketing.

So James thought he could offer a done-for-you solution for companies, “a business owner might spend four hours trying to craft a blog post, because they’re not a writer, that’s not their strength.” He thought what if they spent 15 minutes talking to someone from our team? Then we record it and send it to a professional writer to have it written in their voice. That’s how James started Sweet Fish Media with his two friends.

Time-Stamped Show Notes:

[1:10] James is the Founder of Sweet Fish Media, a producer of Podcasts for B2B companies. He is also a co-host to a Podcast named B2B Growth.
[2:25] Right now, they produce shows for 25 clients.
[2:54] “I learned everything from actually doing and starting my own thing.”
[4:13] James met an entrepreneur named Jeff whom encouraged him to start his entrepreneurial journey.
[8:53] Currently, Sweet Fish Media has now 11 manpower including James.
[9:55] They find people who fits for their service, invite them to be interviewed in the Podcast and eventually reach out to them and offer their service.
[10:44] They charge $15,000 upfront for a 7 episodes series and for helping their clients become a contributor for a larger business publication.
[16:16] Their B2B Growth Podcast started in January, 2016.
[18:52] “Don’t so much worry about building a massive listener base because it’s just going to take you awhile to get there.”
[22:55] They started charging $125 per blog post
[27:40] “If you would gave away your product or your service to a handful of people that you would really want to work with and allow yourself to prove the value of what you’re bringing to the table, people will end up paying you for it.”
[29:14] James was really good at building a relationship and just recently developed the audacity in taking part in sales discussion.
[34:33] James believe that there is more value in making a good relationship with guests rather than focusing on the amount of listeners.
[36:29] “The results that you get from social media are directly correlated to the amount of effort that you put into creating content on those platforms.”

Fabulous 4 Questions:

📖📚 Favorite Book(s)? Love Does: Discover a Secretly Incredible Life in an Ordinary World by Bob Goff
🙌😎 Favorite Amazon.com purchase? WizGear Magnetic Car Mount Phone Holder
🌱💸 Favorite Tool that's GROWN your Business? Mailshake.com
💭💡 BIGGEST Challenge keeping your Business from GROWING? Selling something that our target market doesn't want.