A client of mine turned down 15 podcasts last quarter.
Too small. Not worth his time. He passed on them the way you'd pass on a cold LinkedIn pitch.
A year ago he would have said yes to any show with a microphone. I want to walk you through what changed, because it's one of the clearest before-and-afters I've ever been part of. Quick context if you're new here: I've spent about 10 years doing PR. 200+ features, clients on Don Lemon, in the New York Times, and in full Forbes features. And podcasts are the most underrated corner of that whole world.
The campaign
Over three months, about 50 podcasts got interested in having him on.
He recorded roughly 15. Two of those shows have over 500 ratings on Apple Podcasts, which is legitimate-show territory. And he turned down about 15 more for being too small.
Read that again. His problem became which shows to decline.
There was no magic in how we got there. We wrote one strong pitch about what he could teach, not what he was selling. We built a real list of shows in his niche. We sent at volume, followed up, and let the yeses stack.
Why podcasts beat almost everything else
A journalist can skip your story. A host with a weekly show cannot skip guests. They have a slot to fill every single week, and a pitch that shows exactly what you can talk about solves their problem, not just yours.
That's why podcast pitching converts better than almost any other outreach a founder can do. You're not asking for a favor. You're helping them fill their calendar.
And the episode itself is only half the value. Every recording leaves you with clips: you, talking about what you know, on someone else's respected stage. The clips go on your website, into your content, in front of every prospect deciding whether you're real. The episode airs once. The clips work for years.
"But I'm too early"
This is the objection I hear most, and I want to kill it here.
When Filteroff got the New York Times and the BBC, we hadn't raised money yet. The Washington Post covered my mental health community when it had about 150 members.
But here's the part people get wrong. Neither story was about how early we were, and neither pitch mentioned size. Filteroff's coverage leaned into the environment around us: COVID, and people finding a way to date safely from home. The Washington Post piece wasn't about 150 members. It was about people getting peer-to-peer mental health support online in a way nobody had seen before, an app that was helping people through their worst moments.
That's the real lesson. Whether you have 100 users, 1,000, or 1 million, the number doesn't matter unless you lean into it, and you usually shouldn't. The story is the moment you're sitting inside and the real thing you've built for the people in it. It has to be true, you can't fabricate it. But early or big has nothing to do with it.
One thing to try this week
Find five podcasts in your niche. Small is fine. Listen to part of one episode each, then write a single pitch about what you can teach their audience, and send it to all five.
If you want to do it yourself, PressPitch makes it easier. It finds the shows in your niche and writes the pitch. Free 14-day trial at presspitchai.com.
And if you want me to do this for you, finding the shows, pitching, and booking included, just reply to this email and we'll take it from there.
Best,
Zach
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