450 Episodes and Counting: How Podcasting Became a Primary Source of Leads for Brian Gryn

Today’s guest went to school for something completely unrelated to the health and wellness space, but ended up following his passion instead. That was nearly 20 years ago, and since launching his wellness coaching business, it has evolved notably for a period of being entirely online. As a result of the COVID era, Brian Gryn hosts the Get Lean, eat Clean podcast, and has written a book called The Stepladder System.

In this episode, we cover a unique way he’s selling the book as well as if he’s found the process of book publishing to be worth it. We chat about how his podcast with over 450 episodes became a primary source of leads, and whether it’s a book, podcast, YouTube channel, or anything else when it comes to marketing and growing a business, everything takes time and patience.

I am Joel Oliver, and this is Profits Through Podcasting. Brian, welcome in.

Thanks for having me on.

out. Let’s start with a brief history of your wellness coaching business. When did you start that? Why did you start it?

So, gosh. it’s been like, let’s see, 20 years probably. 18 to 20 years ago. I mean, I, I started just doing it out of a brick and mortar and then, transitioned it to online. I’ve always been passionate about health and wellness.

I’m sure that you get that from a lot of guests, but it was just something that I found that was like profoundly impactful. On like my, you know, daily routine and how I felt and you know, coming outta school you don’t know really what you want to do. And I was in like, the corporate world and I quickly realized it wasn’t for me.

So dove into health and wellness and just never looked back.

And you mentioned that you started brick and mortar and you eventually transitioned it to online. What was happening around that time? Like what prompted you to move it online?

That’s a good question. I think it was a combination of things. COVID, I was a big part of it, I was affiliated with a small studio for a long time and, but I was dabbling online and then. I split ways with the studio and realized that I should just bring it all online.

I have brought it back a little bit more in person but I still do plenty of coaching online and, reaching out through, you know, YouTube, Instagram, things like that. And so it’s like a combination still. But, uh, I think COVID was like, sort of pushed me over that way.

Sure. Yeah. It was great that you were in that position where you could actually switch or transition to more online and keep the business going. So that actually leads into my next question ’cause I was curious then with the, the podcast Get Lean Eat Clean.

 Why you started that as well, and if I’m correct, it looks like you started that in 2020. So was that about the same time, was that during COVID?

Yeah, I just felt like, gosh, the, I just felt like it was something I should do. I don’t know if there was like some big, big reason, it’s a great way to one network and two, just to get your message out there and just another platform.

I mean, some people like to watch. Their information. Some people like to listen, some people like to read. And I think if you can hit all angles and, and um, you know, attract different people, I think that’s, that’s a good way to go.

Sure, and you’re over 450 episodes at this point, which is great. You’ve lasted long beyond one of the. COVID podcast that came and went, I, I presume you’re getting some value from it, so we’ll get more into that as well. But, okay. Now let’s get a little deeper into how this is all working.

So the mechanics of the business. Who is your ideal client that you’re serving? What specifically are you offering now, and how are you delivering it?

I would say my ideal client is, you know, 35 to 40 years. Plus it’s mainly male, probably 70% male. And, you know, these are individuals, ma mainly general population, maybe people that have, you know, dabbled in fitness and health and. Realizing that, you know, now that they have responsibilities with kids and work they’re just realizing that they, they wanna sort of help get their bodies back to maybe what it once was or to, you know, start getting into fitness for the first time.

But I would say that that’s like my ideal, uh, client.

I Offer a, um, a high ticket item. I have some lower ticket items as well. I have a, a book called The Step Ladder System. A while back I came out with a journal and, but right now it’s, I have a Step Ladder System book, which is like pretty much my six month program in one book. So it’s almost like a workbook, maybe, you know, something that you can work along with.

And then. With that, I have a six month program that I work clients through. And that is sort of just like my blueprint for individuals. It’s a system that I’ve put together six steps through taking them all the way from A to Z creating clarity all the way down to, you know, nutrition, meal timing and things like that.

And those are like my main things that I work with clients with.

Yeah. Got it. And so to be clear, the book is kind of like, uh, the, the DIY version where they take that and have to work through it on their own. And then on the opposite side, you’ve got an actual high ticket offering where you are one-on-one with them.

Correct. Yeah.

Are you doing everything or do you have any sort of team, like an assistant or some contractors,

uh, I have someone that helps me with editing the podcast. And another small team that helps me with, YouTube and putting that together. So I try to focus on just putting content and then having other people edit it and make it look.

Good. ’cause doing all of that is just a lot.

Sure. Yeah. And that’s what you should be focusing on. No one can really replace you. So you’re doing that and letting a team handle the rest. Okay. I’m interested to get in more here as well to see how some of that’s performing for you. ’cause as you said, you felt compelled to do a podcast. You’ve got quite a following on, uh, Instagram.

You’ve got the book. So if you were to, without even having to dive too much into data, like. If you were to say, what is your biggest source of leads right now, would you know the answer to that? Like where are they mostly coming from?

Yeah, I would say that it’s a, it’s probably a combination between the podcast and I’ve, over the last year I’ve focused on YouTube and so probably a combination of those two.

For YouTube, are you making dedicated YouTube content or are you just repurposing stuff from the podcast episodes or full episodes?

Yeah. Both, so the episodes are on YouTube. I also do a micro podcast pretty much every week where it’s just myself talking maybe 10 minutes long and so that as well. And then I’ve been trying to put out like different types of videos, maybe workout videos. So a combination of the podcast and, and then a little bit of extra content as well.

Okay. I wanna talk about the book a bit, the stepladder system, because that’s something unique that not everyone has, and I noticed specifically the way that you’re selling it. Made me curious. So it is, I, I suppose where , typically you would find books like it’s on Amazon as a paperback.

You can get it for Kindle, but I noticed it’s on your website as well as a digital copy. People can buy it right from your website and get that download. So I thought, first of all, make sure that I understood that, right. I think that I did. But would you say this kind of acting as a lead magnet on your website?

Because when people get it that way, then you’ve got their email and you can follow up with them further versus if they buy it through Amazon. Do you get any further traction from that or they just buy the book and, and that’s it, you know?

Yeah, that’s a, yeah, that’s a good point. That’s, that’s pretty much the idea. I think it, well, originally when I developed a book, I, I work with a company called Peaceful Prophets and, they’re big program was to develop a book because, you know, you’re building trust and if someone.

Reads a book and, and you know, learns about learn about like what you do and, and like, you know, your program, you know, you’re sort of, you’re sort of screening people that way and, and then it, it’s almost like that be a good lead magnet. So, yeah, I think getting the PDF is, was the initial draw. Being on Amazon it’s there just, you know, it is almost just like a place to be.

But, but the focus is driving traffic to that. Funnel because within that stepladder system website is also other things that sort of, uh, compliment the book to help that individual get to where they want to go.

Right. So ideally they would buy it through the website, but if Amazon kind of helps make more people aware of you, then that’s beneficial as well, as opposed to never having heard of you.

exactly. Yeah.

Some people are old school, you know, they like to have an actual book. They don’t want, I’m a little bit like that myself. So I think that was another part of the reason why I wanted to have it on there.

Mm-hmm. How have you found the results overall? Let’s say like the, the time and effort that you had to actually put into creating that book versus what you’re getting back from it.

I would put it as about, it’s getting there. I wouldn’t say it’s performing like. Like crazy, like, like anything else, gotta get eyeballs on it. You gotta, you know, you build a funnel, it’s like, that’s great. It could look pretty and everything, but you, you know, the key is getting eyeballs on it, marketing it, and getting it out there and, and you know, that’s probably the most difficult part, but it’s about adjusting the funnel. I don’t think anyone will just build a funnel and it’s like a perfect. A hundred percent, you know, a plus. So, so that’s, that’s a work in progress and, and always tweaking stuff and making sure that it’s like, you know, optimized So.

Yeah, and that’s a great point to highlight because, whatever it is, we can be compelled to do something like start a podcast or a YouTube channel or write a book and think, you know, this is the solution. This is how I get all this business. But it’s not like that at all because for, you know, a book takes effort and then like you’re saying, the marketing is a big one.

You start a podcast that takes a lot of time and effort. For that to start paying dividends. So whatever it is, there’s no simple, quick solution. You have to invest in whatever it is. So, yeah, good to highlight that

and I would just say this, just from my experience, you know, I’m assuming Mo most people listening are business owners are looking to get, you know, looking to become entrepreneurial is like, you know, you’re gonna put money, you’re gonna put money into things which is, you know, just part of the game.

what I would say is, is like. It might sound like I’m in a lot of different things, but you wanna focus on one thing initially and just like really focus on that until you start seeing results. And if you don’t see results, you might have to shift. ’cause even with myself, you know, you run into stuff where you pour money into something for too long and you realize that it’s just not worth the money and the effort.

So you gotta be able to pivot a little bit too.

Yeah, I think it’s great that you bring that up because yes, that is common advice you do here in the beginning, especially. Don’t try to be everywhere. Find out where your audience is. Try to actually focus on a couple things, but then over time, as you get those. Kind of built up and sustainable, you can start to explore additional outlets.

So that’s more the, the phase where you are right now

when it comes to your following, we can talk about Instagram. I know you have about 14,000 followers here right now. Do you have anything that stands out to you in terms of how you actually manage to get it to that level? Or is it more just putting content up and people were resonating with it?

What do you think?

Yeah. And that’s, that’s another thing I, when I initially, you know, I was focused on Instagram for a while and was able to build it slowly, but yeah, I mean. I think it’s one of those things, like anything else, not gonna happen overnight. I mean, there’s people, you can obviously buy followers, but I think what’s most important with Instagram is like building engagement.

And, whether you have a thousand, 10,000 or 80,000 or a hundred thousand, whatever it is, like if, if you don’t have an engaged audience, there’s not much value behind it. Right. So, I built out Instagram earlier in sort of my start, and it’s been good. But you know, I just started to realize I wasn’t getting the ROI from it and so I, you know, I’ve gotten away from it a little bit.

Now I’m sort of getting back into it again, but it’s like any other piece of content or like social media, it’s like, it’s all about just being consistent over a long period of time.

Yeah, and one thing I’ve struggled with those platforms as well is wondering like, is it not working because of me or is it not working? Because it’s not really going to, my audience isn’t there. You don’t want to give up too early. I. But obviously, you know, have you faced that, that question.

Yes. Yes. I think everyone in, in the space has, has probably faced that question. we’re in the attention age, ’cause like I said, you could have a big audience, but if you’re not grabbing people’s attention, then you know, it’s, it’s like nowadays, I mean, I don’t know what the average length of someone watching something, it’s probably five seconds, whatever. So like, you really gotta stand out. But I think most importantly, I think with social media’s consistency and, and just trying to be genuine.

And if people know that you’re coming from like, a good place and you’re being yourself and you’re doing that consistently, I think people will resonate with that. , you do have to sort of be different a little bit. I think, you know, sometimes I think with me, some times it’s probably, you know, especially in the health and fitness.

Arena. It is, it’s a very crowded market space and you do have to stand out. But you know, if you can grab people’s attention and be genuine and, and consistent, I think those are, those are good traits.

Mm-hmm. I think it’s something a lot of. Pro, probably entrepreneurs in any space struggle with as well, is they kind of just want to do what they enjoy doing. Perhaps, you know, like you want to work with people and improve their lives, maybe you don’t really want to be a content creator. But then when you look at like what’s required to actually grow on Instagram and there’s people testing five different hooks, five different openings, and you know, you gotta do this every seven seconds in the video or people turn it off, they’re like.

A lot of us probably are thinking, I don’t even care about that. I don’t want to do that. I just really am not interested. So you can find other ways like putting some podcast content on there and that sort of thing. But yeah, it’s like if you really want to be a content creator and grow a huge following does come a point where you gotta start thinking about things in that way versus just posting casually.

Right, which is not for everyone.

 yeah, I think you get into, you know, say you get into health and fitness and you know, you like to help people, but you don’t realize that like, in order to grow, you probably gotta be on social media. I mean, I could, you know, like as much as I, I’m on it, I could do without it.

But I. I think that if, you know, you focus on a platform that you know, you find, that resonates most with you, I think, and just stick with that over a long period of time. I think that’s your best bet. But yeah, it’s sort of just part of the game now.

Sure. Yeah. Okay. Let’s talk a little bit about your podcast life now. One way to grow a podcast and grow your following is making guest appearances on other shows. You and I connected on Pod Match, so I presume you do some guest appearances, but can you shed some light on that? Do you do a lot of guest appearances?

How have you found them? What’s your experience with them?

So I did do a year of guesting, which was a good learning experience. I can’t say a ton of business came from that but. You know, I got out there different, it was a way to connect with other podcasters, but also get your word out. I think it’s a great place, you know, a great way to get your word out.

And I think the one maybe mistake that I made from, you know, I did a year of guesting, was, in order to understand if, you know, if you’re connecting with people from these other podcasts is have some type of like lead magnet or something that, you know, you can tie in from that guest appearance.

And I, I think I just went into it and just tried to be myself, which is what you want to do. But like, you have some things that you wanna market, like a book or something, but. Then it’s like, well, how many people went to visit my page that, learned about me through a guesting appearance?

And I think if you’re gonna start guesting a lot, it’s a good idea to maybe have some type of lead magnet that you can track. It’s simply just for that one thing that you’re doing

Right and kind of enticing to the audience as opposed to just a general come book, a call with me, something they would actually want to take that step.

Yeah, exactly. I. Yeah, so have something that you wanna give away for free, and it’s just for people who listen to the podcast to you on that podcast. That way you can get a feel for like the impact that you’re making from guesting.

And yeah, you know, this goes back to what we were already talking about, like building things up. Because again, and, and guesting can be a great strategy, and let’s say if our only way of generating business was guesting, we would go all in. We would figure it out, we would optimize it, we would do it, but.

It’s not a simple overnight solution either ’cause and the people who have that, the business interest in saying, we’re gonna get you on a bunch of podcasts and this is gonna, you’re gonna grow your business this way, you don’t need your own podcast. Well that’s also, yeah, it takes time because you gotta build yourself up, you’ve gotta practice, you’ve gotta build authority to where you’re getting booked on bigger shows and then you’ll get some more results from there.

But in those initial stages as well, and I had the exact same experience as you. You’re kind of doing a lot of work that doesn’t really feel like anything. You know, you’re making some connections, but it doesn’t always turn into anything. So then it’s like your own judgment. What’s my time better spent doing?

Okay. So you’re not doing a whole lot of it these days, and your own setup is working fine.

Yeah, I have met some great, made some great connections through like pod match and, and I still go on shows here and there, but it’s not like my full, sole purpose right now. It’s not, it’s not guessing.

Yeah.

Got it. So let’s talk about your podcast a little bit more because you’ve got Yeah, al like coming up on 500 episodes, which is, is huge. You don’t get there if you don’t have a proper workflow, if you don’t enjoy it, if it’s taking too much time to create it. So, and if you’re not getting any benefits from it.

So let’s unpack that a bit and hear about like. Why have you continued doing the podcast for this long? First of all, do you feel it’s providing some, some good value to your business? You mentioned leads are coming from it.

Yeah. You know, it’s like anything else. It, it was, obviously it still is. It’s, it’s a bit of a slow build. I would never tell somebody to get into podcast and get. If they want like some like instant lead magnet, you know, or just instant leads from podcasting. But I think what it does is it just builds some social proof builds some authority, like you were saying.

And it’s a great way to just. Not only like meet other people in your space, but just to sort of get your word out there and, I’ve not really taken on any sponsors. I mean, I get sta I get a lot of stuff sent to me, and then I’ll get people reaching out and I haven’t really done that.

I feel like, you know, if I’m gonna market anything, it’s just gonna be like. Some of my services. And so that’s just the way I’ve gone about it. But I also, if I’m gonna take on a sponsor, like it really has to align with something that I really believe in. And I’ve tried a few things here and there, but it just hasn’t resonated with me.

So I, yeah, I use it as a lead magnet. also just, you know, as a marketing machine and, just a way to, get my word out there. But I, I, I like spreading other people’s words, you know, as well. And, and I’ve had some great guests who I’ve learned a lot from. So.

Right. Yeah. So you have guests on there. Do you, you mentioned the micro podcast episodes you’re doing as well. Are they on that feed? Are you doing a mix of interview and solo with your podcast?

Yeah, so both and, what we’ve done with the Micros is instead of just putting in my YouTube and I’m just talking into a mic, we’ve done a little bit where we take those micros and turn ’em into the YouTube video.

it’s just a little bit different way of a twist on it. So if someone watches that, it’s, it’s, yeah, it’s a podcast, but it’s also like a YouTube video that’s a little more entertaining than just me speaking.

Mm-hmm. And great way to repurpose that content. So you’re doing the prep for the episode and then getting more mileage from it, which is great. So. To wrap things up here, you’ve been doing this a long time, as you said, you know, going on 20 years, you transitioned to online, so you’re, you’re doing well. You’ve got a life built through your business, but it’s always changing. There’s always something that we need to be thinking about, something evolving.

What would you say is a current, either a challenge for you or a priority for you right now looking into the future?

Yeah. So I mean, right now I think the, the biggest challenge is just coming up and making content that, you know, really resonates and that, people sort of relate to you know, ’cause I think there’s, it’s, there’s a lot of eyeballs out there that are looking not only your content, but other people’s content.

And I think that you gotta just find an area and a niche. That, that first, first of all, that you resonate with and that people in your audience wanna hear and just trying to, you know, double down on that. And not try to be everything that everyone, so I think you do have to like, niche down a little bit and make sure that you focus, you know, whatever that that audience is, and, try to find something that, they wanna hear, but also that obviously makes sense for you.

So it’s like. It’s a mix. You gotta find something that you’re passionate about, but also that people sort of resonate with as well. So that’s like the struggle, you know, you’re always trying to find good content that people you know that gets views and that people want to hear.

Right. And it’s kind of like a moving target. ’cause things are always changing, the attention spans are shortening. So you think you figure it out, then that’s everyone’s doing it, so you gotta do something else. So yeah, never ends. When you’re in this business of putting content out, hey.

Yeah. And you know, you can, and just to piggyback up that, you can get a feel, obviously you put a video out and, and it gets a lot of views and it gets engagement. Like they’re sort of giving you hints as to, as to what do they wanna hear. So the more content you put out, I wouldn’t worry so much about, oh, is this one gonna hit or not?

Just like. It is almost like self experimentation, right? You gotta throw stuff out there, see what sticks, and then sort of once you find sort of that niche, you can just double down on that.

Review the data, see what’s been performing best, and do more of that.

Yeah.

uh, brian gryn.com, the Get Lean, eat Clean podcast. Thanks so much, Brian. This was very insightful, so I appreciate your time.

Yeah. Thanks Joel. I appreciate you having me on.