John Lee Dumas is the host of the wildly popular podcast “Entrepreneur on Fire”. Today he shares the pain and the fears he faced with his podcast (and in particular Day #57). John has reached a level of success that most only dream of in podcasting. But he worked hard, got really clear about his “vision” to inspire millions, and realized quickly he could not do it alone. In fact, John talks in depth about the coaching he received at the beginning of his podcast and even how much he invested BEFORE the launch of his business. (Don’t worry…the ROI has been absolutely amazing!)

John’s Target Audience: John’s target audience is entrepreneurs and wantrepreneurs who want to listen to a podcast 7 days a week.

John Lee Dumas is arguably one of the most successful podcasters today. Most people in the podcasting world know his story: he saw a need for a 7 day/week podcast, something that gave entrepreneurs and wanna-be entrepreneurs a daily dose of information, inspiration and motivation. There was no one doing a show 7 days a week, and even though everyone told him it couldn’t be done, he decided to be the first. He chose to niche down to an area that was absolutely untouched.

Despite paralyzing fear, he went for it. In his first 56 days, he made iTunes New & Noteworthy and saw a spike in his audience growth. In under two months, he was receiving up to 3,000 downloads a day. If you aren’t into podcasting, just know that’s a great number!

But after he was no longer eligible for New & Noteworthy, on Day 57 to be exact, those numbers plummeted to under 600 downloads a day. Doubt crept it and John wondered if he should throw in the towel and stop the podcast. He truly considered giving up.

But his intuition told him to keep going. He knew if he stuck to his guns, there was at least the possibility his audience would grow. Nothing was certain, but the possibility was there.

That was almost a year and a half ago, and today his podcast grosses over six-figures a month. His intuition was right; he stuck to his guns and his audience grew, exponentially! Just recently he surpassed 30,000 downloads in a day, an elite number in podcasting. To get to where he is today, John had to grow his podcast, grow his business and ultimately, grow within himself.

In this episode, here’s what we’ll cover:

• The one theme around getting “out of the trenches” that keeps coming up during his podcasts and the one theme he is learning from his guests.
• The two things John did right when he launched his podcast.
• What’s been one of the most powerful takeaways he’s gotten from his guests?
• Focus – what does it mean for John?
• The two reasons entrepreneurs are terrified of niching down.
• The lesson of Tim Ferriss: from niche to broad market.
• One of the keys to success according to John.
• How much did his Entrepreneur on Fire business gross in the month of March 2014?
• How to choose what to give to a Virtual Assistant and what to do yourself.

Practical & Actionable (at 25:08):

John’s practical and actionable advice for any entrepreneurs in the trenches right now is fairly straightforward: he says to focus. He says focus stands for follow one course until success. Stay on your path, keep your eye on your goal and keep going until you reach it. And when you focus, you free yourself up to do what’s really important.

He also believes in the power of outsourcing. He utilized Chris Ducker’s wisdom from Chris’ most recent book, Virtual Freedom, and made a list of three areas. They are

1: What you have to do.
2: What you don’t have to do.
3: What you shouldn’t do.

After you make that list, find yourself a good virtual assistant who can help you with the items in the last two categories. That frees you up to focus on the items in number one. For John that’s meant more time for him to focus on his podcast as well as his products for his audience, like Podcaster’s Paradise and Webinar on Fire.