Bad Pitch Types to AVOID When Pitching Yourself to Podcasts

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My friends, it seems like I’ve accidentally turned this guest pitching and going on other people’s podcasts into a mini-series, because today, I am going to give you 9 Bad Pitch Archetypes that you need to avoid in your own pitches. And while I won’t name names or give actual examples, these are all based on real pitches that I’ve been getting over the last seven years. So sit back and enjoy these 9 Bad Pitch Archetypes.

Welcome to the Profitable Podcaster where I help coaches, course creators and authors launch and grow their podcasts to help them build authority, generate more leads, and sell more through actionable advice and expert tested systems. 

I’m your host, Joe Casabona, and I’ve been podcasting for over 10 years. I’ve generated millions of downloads and hundreds of thousands of dollars from my shows. I’ll teach you everything I know here on The Profitable Podcaster. 

All right. So, I’ll just say off the bat, I’ll put it in the show notes which you’ll be able to find over at [profitablepodcaster.fm/317] or in the description in your podcast player. Below that, I’m going to link to some graphics that I had commissioned for these 9 Bad Pitch Archetypes. And I’ll run through the list right now, and then we’ll dive into each of them.

1. The Bragger

2. The Shameless Self-promoter

3. The  Ignoramus

4. The Stray

5. The Copycat 

6. The Brown Noser

7. The Reciprocater

8. The Buddy

9. The Paid Promoter 

So let’s dive into these bad pitch archetypes, starting with number one, The Bragger. They wanna get on your show for one reason and one reason only. They are the greatest thing since slice spread. Their whole pitch revolves around why it would be your great honor to have them.

What makes this a bad pitch is exactly that it is all about them. And as a podcast host, I am thinking number one about my audience. I want to create good content for them. I’m not here to stroke anybody’s ego. And so if they are focusing on why they are so great, I’m gonna say No. 

What I want to hear is why are you good for my audience? What can you give my audience? What value can you add to their lives? That’s the whole reason I started my podcast. And I think this is gonna be true for most podcasters. They don’t want some self aggrandizing person who thinks that it is your honor to/they have wonderfully selected you to bestow their honor upon you. So, that is the bragger. 

Number two is the Shameless Self-promoter. They really need the free press your audience brings. So their whole pitch is about promoting their company, their product, or their event. Not only should you have them on, but you need to publish the episode by a specific date. I just, as I record this, got a pitch this week that basically said, your podcast will help us extend our reach. Great! I’m not…That’s not the game I’m in. I have sponsorships if you wanna reach my audience that way. 

I’ve also gotten pitches from people where it’s like, “Hey, I want to come on your podcast to promote my event. It needs to be published by whatever, April 5th.” Okay. That. Oh. That is also sponsorship. 

So again, this is very similar to the bragger. I am not looking to give you my platform so you can shamelessly promote yourself. I am looking to add value for my audience. I will give my guests the opportunity at the end of the show to mention where people can find them a free resource. I’ve had guests mention their books. That’s fine but they need to add the value first. If you are not leading with the value, I’m not gonna give you my platform. Or put differently, you can pay to be on my platform if I think it’s a good event or product or whatever.

Number three is The Ignoramus. Someone told them that they should go on more podcasts. Guilty. So they just picked the ones that showed up in whatever search they did. They don’t know anything about your show. They just wanna be on it and their pitch makes it clear. The reason that this is a bad pitch, right? Maybe the ignoramus is innocent as far as their intentions go, right? Maybe they have good intentions, but what they’re failing to do is the research to find the right audience and platform for them. 

So,  this happens to me pretty frequently still because I switched my main podcast,  or my other podcast. I should start saying these are both weekly shows. So, I switched my other podcast How I Built It from WordPress developers and really honestly founder stories to focusing on actionable advice for creators. And so, there are people who just find like there’s an outdated database. They find my show and they pitch a founder story. And the problem there is that they’re not doing the research to make sure that my show is still a thing to make sure I’m still talking about that stuff, right?

In the last episode in 316,  I gave you actionable advice on what you should do to make a good pitch. And one of those things is, see what the show is about. And  this shows that they didn’t really do any research to learn about your show or your audience or how they can add value. I have been that. I have been the I Ignorramus, by the way. I reached out to a podcast to do a potential podcast swap. And I misread the description. And it turns out I thought it was a show for authors, but it was by an author for children like it was a kids podcast. That’s my bad. I didn’t do the research. I was the ignoramus here. So we can all fall victim to these things. No one’s a bad, well, most people who are pitching are not bad people. But do a little research and figure out if this is even a good show for you. 

Okay. Number four, The Stray. They don’t have the time to do real research and find the contact info for the show they actually wanna pitch. So they pitched the closest sounding one. You may not be the host of that show, but it’ll get to where it needs to go, right.

Now, this one little bespoke, right? Or maybe not. I have a show that sounds very similar to an NPR show and I get a lot of pitches while I used to. I made some positive changes on my contact page to make it really clear that I’m not that podcast. But for a while I would get like, “Hey, Joe. Love your podcast. Your interview with Michael Dell was great. I’d love to come on.” All right. Well, I’m not, first of all, the name of the host is not Joe on that show. 

Second of all, I am not that show and everything about my website and my contact page makes it clear that I’m not that show. But what happens is, because that’s a bigger show, they can’t find the contact information so they just Google whatever and find the first contact form that works. 

This really goes back to not doing your research, right? So this could be and maybe it’s not a similar sounding show, but maybe it’s a show that’s now defunct, right? You reach a…you just find a show listed in Apple Podcast and you’re like, “Yeah. This is good.” And you reach out, but you don’t realize that they haven’t published a show in like three years. So, you are off course in some way. And the thing to fix that is just a little bit of research. 

All right. Number five is The Copycat. You had an episode where you talked to someone else about their area of expertise, but really you should talk to them too. So their pitch is about that episode and how they want to talk about the same exact thing.

Now, if you have a podcast where you only talk about that thing, great. Have as many guests on as you want, right? But most of the time if I have a guest on talking about, let’s say, financial planning, I’m not gonna wanna have another guest on financial planning for a long time, right? Or building your email list.  And further their pitch shouldn’t just be the pitch from the episode that they listened to or that I already covered. It should be a different spin, right? And so if somebody can say, “Hey, I saw you recently did an episode on building your mailing list (you know, whatever, through Facebook ads or whatever) I’d love to talk about how you can organically build your mailing list.” That’s a good pitch, right? Because the topic is the same, right? Or the area of expertise is similar, but the technique is different. 

So if you are going, if you hear somebody on a show or they’re talking about something that you also wanna talk about, you need to put your own unique spin and value proposition on it.

Number six is The Brown Noser. They say flattery will get you nowhere, but that’s not what this person believes. Their pitch is less a pitch and more a bunch of compliments about you. Then, assuming you’re flattered enough to invite them on. I get this a lot. “Hey, Joe. Love your show. You’re so great. Love the thing. I’d love to come on your show to talk about my business.” Okay? I get it right. Reciprocity is strong in people. You do something nice for them. They’re gonna be inclined to do something nice for you, but again, I don’t…I care less about what you think about me and more about what you can do for my audience.

So, value. You bring the value. Don’t just bring compliments. You complimenting me a lot doesn’t tell me that you’re gonna be a good guest. It just tells me that you’re a schmoozer, right? And I’m looking to do right by my guests. 

Number seven, The Reciprocater. They have a podcast, but they’d rather go on your podcast. So their pitch is disguised as an invitation onto their podcast. When you schedule, they ask if they can come on yours, like, you know, little, little quid pro quo, right? Just little quid pro quo. This happens to me more than I’d like because it makes me feel like you’re just using your podcast to get to me like to talk to me. 

And there is like another, I’ve talked about this before on a previous episode, but there are also people who will use their podcasts just to get you on a call to pitch you on their service or whatever. And that’s also duplicitous. But I’m less inclined to have you on my show just because I was on your show. Unless you’re super upfront about it, right? I’ll email people and be like, “Hey, I’d love to do a podcast swap with you. I think we have similar audiences. We can either do a promo swap or a feed drop or a guest swap, right?” I’ve done that with people. Super upfront about it though. Not, “Hey, Joe. I think you’d be a great guest.” And then get me on the show and be like, “Hey, by the way, can I come on your show?” No. No. That’s not what this was about. So,  that’s duplicitous. If you wanna get on somebody’s show, be upfront about doing a guest swap. 

Number eight is The Buddy. This person knows you personally and that’s all they’ll need to get on your show, right? Instead of a pitch, you get, I should come on your podcast. What will they talk about? Who knows? But your friends, and that’s all that matters. 

This one stings a little bit because you have to say no to maybe somebody that you’re friends with or, you know, personally. I usually get this in my DMs like, “Hey, I should come on your podcast.” I’m like, No. You shouldn’t. You know, I usually say like, “I’m not booking guests right now or the thing that you wanna talk about is not exactly in the area of what I want to talk about anymore.” I’ve had somebody say like, “Hey, I should come on your podcast to talk about this plugin I built or whatever” and I say, “Oh. I’m not really covering that anymore.” And I’m like, then why is it called How I Built It? And I’m like, Well, don’t get like mean and offended, right? Like, it’s still about building a business. It’s just not I don’t wanna talk to you about it.

So, yeah. I mean, I invite my friends on the show a lot, but it needs to be a good fit again, right? Just knowing you personally is not a good enough reason to come on the show. This, and this would happened to me all the time when I was in web development. People would be like,

”Hey Joe, like, can you make me a website?

And I’m like, “Oh yeah. I charged like $5,000 for that.”

And they’re like, “You can’t do it for free.” 

And I’m like, “No.”

“I thought we were friends.”

“Well, if you are my friend, then you are willing to pay me what I’m worth, right?

So that’s really like the buddy angle, right? It’s like, “Hey, buddy. Let me come on your show. What are you gonna talk about? Do you know anything about my audience? Do you know anything about the show I’m currently doing?

All right. And lastly, The Paid Promoter. Relationships, relationships. It’s really hard to say out loud. Relationships, relationships. It’s all a numbers game, right? So they cast a wide net pitching all of their clients to you and hoping something sticks. The worst part of the paid promoter is that they can be an amalgamation of all nine of these. Like I’ve gotten really bad pitches from paid promoters who think I’m the NPR podcast and send me pitches just talking about how great their clients are. if somebody filled out my form multiple times like that and I said, “Hey, man. I’m not How I Built This by NPR. And it’s worse for the paid promoter cuz they are getting paid to do this. I’m not saying all paid promoters are bad. 

My friend Brittany Lynn, really good paid promoter. She’s basically, she has an…if she recommends a guest to me, It’s almost automatic because she knows my audience and she only pitches people who she thinks are a good fit, right? And so that’s really where the relationships part comes in. A good paid promoter will form a relationship with the podcasters they work with. Maybe not all of them, right? But their pitches should be better. It shouldn’t just be a numbers game, right? 

Somebody reached out to me and they’re like,

“I can get you on five podcasts a month.”

And I said, “That is more than one per week. How do you do that? Do you have…how, like do you have relationships with current podcasters to be able to guarantee that you’ll get me on five podcasts a month?” 

And they said, “No. We just have a database of podcasts.”

And I’m like, “I don’t…You shouldn’t make that guarantee then” right?

I mean unless people are just always saying yes, and I don’t really want to go on those podcasts either, right? I want to go on podcasts where I know the audience is gonna be a good fit for me. 

So if you’re a paid promoter or if you hire a paid promoter, these are the things that I would look for”

What the pitch process like for you?

Do you have relationships with current podcasters?

What podcasters do you think I’m gonna be on?

Tell me a little bit about your overall process.

Right? Because if they’re like, “Oh, well there’s like 4 million pods (like as if they just say like) oh, well there’s a huge number of podcasts” Instant no. Like, great! So we’re playing a numbers game. I don’t wanna play a numbers game. I want targeted pitches, right?

And so that’s why the paid promoter gets the number nine slot here. 

So there you go. The 9 Bad Pitch Archetypes: The Bragger, The Shameless Self-promoter, The Ignoramus, The Stray, The Copycat, The Brown Noser, The Reciprocate, The Buddy and The Paid Promoter. 

You can download these graphics or just see the graphics I had created in the show notes, which you can find over at [profitablepodcaster.fm/317]. And the big takeaway here my friends, the big takeaway is if you are going to pitch a podcast or a podcast host, put the audience first. “Hey, you do a show about X. I can talk about Y. Here’s why I think it will help your audience.” Then you talk about why you are credentialed to talk about that. That is the anatomy of a good pitch. 

That’s it for this episode.

Thanks so much for listening. And until next time. I can’t wait to see what you make.