We caught up with the brilliant and insightful John Orlando a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, John thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. How did you learn to do what you do? Knowing what you know now, what could you have done to speed up your learning process? What skills do you think were most essential? What obstacles stood in the way of learning more?

I learned podcasting from one, 2 hour seminar that I took at a local community college. This class gave me the basics on how to podcast. The majority of what I needed to learn was done via trial & error. To speed up the learning process, I could have researched & reached out to the podcast community that existed in Columbus, Ohio. I have found that the existing podcast community is a wealth of knowledge & they are willing to help out newcomers. The most essential skill is being authentic. Guests can tell when you’re “faking” it during a conversation. Just relax & be yourself. One obstacle for me was hyper focusing on numbers. While it is important to know who is listening, what episodes are doing well & other data, I got very, very consumed about my numbers. This made me want to quit, but I realized & began to not overanalyze that data.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

I am a podcaster located in Columbus, Ohio. I have two podcasts that I produce. The first one is The PVDcast, which highlights my interests in movies, hockey, pro wrestling & comics. I speak with guests who are in those field, highlighting their projects. The second podcast I co-produce with my partner, Jason Taylor. This podcast is called MatTalk. It is a bi-weekly series where Jason & I watch an episode of the 1980’s Andy Griffith show, Matlock. After the viewing, we analyze, discuss & poke fun at the episode. This podcast was not supposed to be a thing. It was a joke that took on a life of it’s own.

I am very proud of both of these podcasts. As I said, MatTalk was supposed to be a 1 & done “joke” podcast. The initial episode was an unexpected hit. We knew we had to keep going & even began to have actors/actresses from the show on our show. I am also proud of The PVDcast because I have produced 530 episodes & talked to many unique guests & made a ton of friends along the way.

The bottom line for my 2 podcasts is that I hope that you enjoy my shows & they bring a moment of joy to your day.

How’d you build such a strong reputation within your market?

When I started The PVDcast, I was looking for guests. I had a very good friend come on the show to talk about his newest comic book project. After the show, he took to social media & let all of the comic book creators know about The PVDcast. This snowballed, as 2 heavy hitters of the local comic book community contacted me to be on the show. After having those 3 individuals be guests & using their social currency, The PVDcast was off & running.

Any resources you can share with us that might be helpful to other creatives?

I wish I would have learned about Libsyn sooner than I did. I was producing The PVDcast using Podbean. While that software was good for just starting out, I feel like I stayed with it longer than I should have done. Switching to a larger software (like Libsyn) would have probably helped The PVDcast grow quicker.

Contact Info:

• Website: http://pvdcast.com
• Instagram: @pvdcast
• Facebook: @pvdcast
• Twitter: @PVDMVP
• Other: Threads: @pvdcast