Podcast Strategy Coach: Why Small Conferences Change Careers (and How to Network Without the Awkwardness)

**Junaid Ahmed** (0:00)
Thank you for tuning in to Hacks and Hobbies with your host, Junaid. We are visited by our amazing guests coming from all walks of life. Want to learn their story, their struggles and their journey on how they got to where they are today. So stick around. You can watch hundreds of tutorials, lessons to dozens of podcasts and collect pages of notes. But sometimes one conversation in the right room can collapse years of trial and error. The problem is that most people attend conferences passively. They listen, collect business cards, take a few pictures and return home without turning any of it into real progress. Hey, I'm...
What's that word?
I'm known to do that. But by the end of this conversation, you'll know how to approach an in-person event with the intention to build a meaningful relationship without awkward networking and convert what you learn into skills and opportunities that continue growing long after the event ends. We'll also take you behind the scenes of Empowered Podcasting Conference 3, happening August 21st through the 23rd in Charlotte, North Carolina. Today I'm joined by my good friend Jason Cercon, Podcasting Strategy and Mindset Coach, Founder of Bomb Track Media and Chief Operating Officer of Empowered Podcasting. Jason has spent more than a decade working across podcasts, strategy, production, communication, networking, operations, project management, and brand development. His strategy first approach helps professionals use podcasting with clarity and purpose instead of jumping into the medium simply because everyone else is doing it and that's what I did.

**Jason Cercon** (1:53)
My story is even worse than that, but I have 11 years of experience on it now.

**Junaid Ahmed** (1:59)
Jason, you and I met at the inaugural Empowered Podcasting Conference, and since then, we've reconnected on PodFest, EPC2, and almost every week through the Empowered Podcasting live stream, so welcome to Hacks and Hobbies, so awesome to have you.

**Jason Cercon** (2:16)
So glad to be here, Junaid. I feel like this is long overdue.

**Junaid Ahmed** (2:20)
I totally agree.
It has been long overdue, and it's my fault. I haven't been recording a whole lot of episodes, so it's my fault that I have...

**Jason Cercon** (2:29)
Yeah, I know you've been toiling away the hours. You told me before we started. Just doing nothing at all. No projects in the hopper at all, nothing.

**Junaid Ahmed** (2:37)
No, Jason, take us back to the first Empowered Podcasting Conference. Man, that's a lot of words.

**Jason Cercon** (2:45)
A lot of words. A lot of syllables.

**Junaid Ahmed** (2:48)
Yeah, that's what it is, right? So what did you hope that gathering would become for you? And what surprised you once people were actually in the room?

**Jason Cercon** (2:58)
Well, going back to the first conference, I really wasn't involved from a planning standpoint with that event. I was an MC and I was on a panel.
And I went just like any event that I go to, whether it's something small and in my neighborhood or if it's a bigger event like the podcast movements or the podfests that I've attended in the past. I go with an agenda. And typically leading my agenda is getting to meet fellow creators, fellow professionals, and learning if there's any synergy to where there's a number of potential opportunities that could happen. So with Empowered Podcasting 1, what I discovered immediately was this event has potential. Because of the podcast events that I had been to, it was the smallest in regards to audience size. And what I learned was that was by design.

**Junaid Ahmed** (3:57)
They're not trying.

**Jason Cercon** (3:58)
And now that I'm fully invested in this brand and in this conference, it's not the mission to try to be as big as a podfest or a podcast movement. There is a lot of value in the smaller settings because of the networking opportunities, the ability to connect.
You don't have to go in feeling intimidated. So when I look back on that first year, I know going into it for me, I wanted to make some connections. I wanted to see how the event unfolded. And I've known Mark for many years. And when we were standing there, but it had been before the end of the event or at some point during the weekend, I said, I think there's something here. I'd like to be more involved if you're looking for someone to help with the cause. And as we moved into year two, he said, yeah, I'd love to have you on the team. And that was really where things began. And I took a bigger hand in building out EPC2 and now full hand. And that was one third hand with Mark and Rich and the rest of our team.