Telling the Stories of Peoria, IL — The People of Peoria Podcast

When an idea alone connects with a community, you know it’s the right one.

Some people have told me that I get bored easily… Really, that just means I have a lot of ideas. Most of them never get spoken out, but I’m always thinking about new content ideas, how to improve, and what can be changed.

At the end of 2019, I spoke out one of these ideas.

I live in Peoria, IL, a midwest city with a long, rich, but complicated history. For a while, I had been noticing a gap in our community when it came to capturing our community’s culture. There were a few modern ways it was being done, but most of the formats where stories were being shared felt outdated and didn’t connect with me. Businesses were really left on their own to share their story with the community and people making a significant difference in the community often went under the radar.

Thus the idea: The People of Peoria Podcast, a show where we share the stories of the people and places shaping the culture of our community the most.

I asked my friend Alex if he wanted to host it with me, we recorded a couple trailers, I put up a post with the cover art that said “Coming 2020” and boosted it locally for $10.

Literally $10.

As we were scheduling interviews so we could launch on January 1, we waited to see what the response would be…

50 listens came in.

100 listens.

200 listens.

400 listens.

600 listens.

ALL BEFORE LAUNCH!

The response to the idea alone told us it was right.

Since launching, we’ve continued to have hundreds of listens each month, averaging around 400-500 per episode in the first 30 days after that episode’s release. We’ve built some crucial relationships throughout the community. And we’ve solidified ourselves as a positive voice in the community.

The People of Peoria Podcast on Instagram

The People of Peoria Podcast on Facebook

Check out the website for this show.

Content Marketing Lessons This Project Highlighted For Me:

1) You don’t need a big platform for content marketing to be effective. Content marketing is how you build an engaged community. Before starting this project, I had no platform at all locally. I wasn’t starting with a local following interested in what I was doing. The idea, and the execution of that idea, built the community.

2) Building the platform gives you the open door. This isn’t so much a “content marketing” tip as it is a business / networking tip. Just being willing to put in the work to build a platform puts you into a different tier of how the people you most want to connect with perceive you. Without a podcast, people say no to grabbing coffee so you can pick their brain. With a podcast, those same people say yes, you build a relationship, you get a high-quality episode for your audience, and get to learn from them. I’ve seen this with all three of my shows. Content marketing matters.

3) If you’re not sure if an idea is right, don’t be afraid to ask. Ask a friend. Ask another business owner. Even ask your audience. I found out my idea was right by spending $10 on Facebook. Especially online, people will often tell you what they really think.