Blue Angel's Storytelling w/Dusty Weis's Broadcast; and The Benefits Branded Podcasts.

From the humble beginnings behind a small-town radio microphone to the thrilling heights of CBS News Network and an unforgettable flight with the Navy's Blue Angels, Dusty Weis's career is nothing short of a roller-coaster adventure. As the president and founder of PodCamp Media, he joins Host Peter Woolfolk to unpack the narrative of his ascent in the broadcasting sphere, touching on the strategic moves and the serendipitous 'yeses' that shaped his path. Dusty's tale is an ode to seizing the moment, with insights on how even late-night shifts can forge unexpected, lifelong connections, and how a piece of the Green Bay Packers came to be part of his personal story.

When it comes to branded podcasts, the secret sauce isn't in the hard sell; it's in the artful allure of storytelling that resonates with a company's core beliefs. In this episode, Dusty breaks down the vision behind his  own podcast, "Lead Balloon", explaining how it employs narrative to draw listeners into the sometimes tumultuous world of owning a public relations and marketing firm. The podcast's journey from inception to carving out its niche, along with the strategic placement of guests, highlights the doors that can swing wide open from compelling content creation—doors that lead to unexpected business opportunities and substantial brand growth.

Finally, strap in as Dusty recounts the adrenaline-fueled narrative of his flight with the Blue Angels—two years of preparation culminating in an experience that most can only dream of. The in-depth interview with their Public Affairs team is a masterclass in the power of storytelling, aligning with strategic goals and the immense satisfaction derived from helping brands and individuals craft narratives with lasting impact. It's not just a story of an exceptional flight; it's a metaphor for aiming high in life and business, and the heights you can reach with the right attitude and narrative in your toolkit. Dusty and I invite you to join us on this high-flying episode that's sure to inspire and entertain.

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Transcript

Announcer: 1:09

Welcome. This is the Public Relations Review Podcast, a program to discuss the many facets of public relations with seasoned professionals, educators, authors and others. Now here is your host, peter Wolfoak.

Peter Woolfolk: 1:31

Welcome to the Public Relations Review Podcast and to all of us in North America and around the world. Now we are right by Apple as being among the top 1% of podcasts worldwide, so I'd like to say thank you to all listeners and guests for helping us to achieve this recognition.

Peter Woolfolk: 1:49

Now here are two questions for you why do public relations firms fail? And to what are and what are the benefits of branded podcasts? My guest's first job was behind the microphone at age 17 and moving up to being and later moving up to being a reporter at News Anchor at WTDYAM in Madison, wisconsin, and later at WIODAM in Miami, florida. Later, he became a correspondent for CBS News Network. His experience and growth earned him head of public relations at Milwaukee City Hall and later to manage strategic communications for the Association of Equitimate Manufacturers. Currently, he is the president of PodCamp Media, a branded business podcast production agency for companies in Milwaukee. In addition, he is also the host of the Lead Balloon Podcast named EdWidge 2020 Marketing Podcast of the Year. Now, as icing on the cake, he will also talk about his exceptional flight experience with the Navy's famous Blue Angels Flight Team. He is also among the numerous proud owners of the 13-time World Champion Green Bay Packers Football Team. So joining me from a chilly Milwaukee, wisconsin, is Dusty White's president and founder of PodCamp Media. Welcome Lest.

Dusty Weis: 3:13

Peter, thank you so much for the invitation. It's an absolute pleasure and I understand that I am your first representative from the great state of Wisconsin. So any questions about cheese, beer or sausage, I'm happy to answer them, and I'm of course obligated to offer you a hearty go pack go.

Peter Woolfolk: 3:30

Well, thank you so, so very much. So I tell you why would you just begin talking about? You know how you went about securing that first job in broadcasting.

Dusty Weis: 3:40

Well, peter, I guess I had the superpower of being young and naive working on my side. I was really just too young and naive to know how big an ass it was at the age of 17. I was also very, very lucky. I grew up in a small town in Wisconsin called Monroe, home of the Fighting Cheesemakers Football Team and just about every stereotype that you think you know about Wisconsin life was just wonderfully true there. It's a wonderful cheese and beer town. I was also being from a small town.

Dusty Weis: 4:09

I was a community theater brat, which I had in my favor as well. Both of my parents were involved with the local theater guild. My mother worked backstage and in production roles for a lot of those shows, and my dad was an onstage and director kind of guy. And so I wound up hanging around the set of community theater productions a whole lot until eventually somebody told me hey, if you're just going to hang around here, why don't you learn how to use that sound board over there and those microphones and make yourself useful? And so, starting at about the age of 12 or 13, I learned how to operate a lot of the audio equipment that I would need to know how to use in order to have a career in radio, so at about the age of 17,. Then that gave me the confidence to walk into the owner of the local radio station's office. I had on the suit that I had bought for prom and asked him for a job, and he was just crazy enough to take a chance on me, peter. He gave me my first job in radio. It was certainly nothing glamorous tying balloons and giving them to kids at the county fair but like any job, that was an opportunity for me. You'd give any job everything that you've got and eventually you're going to get more opportunities.

Dusty Weis: 5:23

So I did eventually wind up getting offered my first on air work, still at the age of 17, then a senior in high school.

Dusty Weis: 5:31

It also offered me sort of the first test of moral fortitude that I was exposed to in my professional career my air shift. Of course they weren't going to put a 17-year-old kid on during the afternoon drive, and so my air shift was 11 at night until five in the morning. Now I was still in class, so that was all pre-recorded. It was on the air while I was asleep most of the time. But I do remember one particular day in seventh hour Spanish, when I was called to the front of the class by our profe Sora, who demanded to know why I was falling asleep in her class and did it have anything to do with the fact that I was up all night working at the radio station? It was in that moment that I had my moral test and had to come clean with her that no, I wasn't falling asleep because I was working all night. I was falling asleep because I was not a great student.

Peter Woolfolk: 6:25

I understand. That this job was that my very first time on the air was midnight to six and when you're the only person in the station, you or I had to stay a wake just because I had to make sure I was doing everything right for the first time being on the air.

Dusty Weis: 6:40

You know, there's something magical about working the overnight shift in radio and I did go on to after I graduated from high school. I worked that shift live in the studio, whether it's being awake when everybody else is asleep, whether it's taking phone calls from night owls or insomniacs or people who are leaving the bar at bar time. But there's something magical about working and connecting with people at a time when the rest of the world is asleep. And I talked to callers, I told stories and had people out to the radio station and you know it's brutal. It's brutal on your hairline, it's brutal on your sleep schedule. But, boy, driving home and watching the sunrise I saw some of the most beautiful sunrises in those summers when I was working the overnight shift at the radio station. But for the fact that I was only making $6.50 an hour, I might still be doing that job. It's one of the best jobs I ever had, peter.

Peter Woolfolk: 7:44

Well, honestly, there must have been some positives that came out of that, no question about it.

Dusty Weis: 7:51

Oh, absolutely, and like every job, it's a stepping stone. It paved the way to what I would go on to do, Opened up doors to me. I did go off to study journalism at the University of Wisconsin and that radio experience that I had as a 17, 18, 19, 20 year old paved the way for me to go to work at WTDY in Madison our news talker there when I was only 22 years old and there weren't a whole lot of 22 year olds in the radio newsroom back then.

Peter Woolfolk: 8:24

Well, let me say this there's certainly something to be said for gaining experience, you know, particularly when you're beginning a profession. So that, because those things certainly come in handy, and I learned a lot from being in the radio station as well and, you know, and having a TV show, so there's something to be said for that.

Dusty Weis: 8:44

Oh, absolutely, and you know I talked to a lot of classes still of 20, 21 year old kids at the journalism school and one of the most valuable pieces of advice that I give to them is when you're presented with an opportunity, don't overthink it. Just say yes. Figure out the details later, doesn't matter if it's something that you've never done before, doesn't matter if it's something that's gonna put you out of your comfort zone or take you away from home for a little while. When you're presented with an opportunity, the knee jerk reaction needs to be just say yes, because that's not it for a lot of people, and that moment of hesitation that could wind up costing you that opportunity. And certainly it's been a mantra of mine that when new opportunities have reared their heads, I've just said yes and figured the rest out later.

Peter Woolfolk: 9:35

You know, that's exactly how I got a television show. It was offered to me and the first thing I said was can I get back to you? Yeah, yeah, I had to ask somebody how do I produce a TV show, and we'll make a large third show. I said yes because I found somebody that will help me do it. So that's another one of the experiences. I agree with you Say yes and you figure it out.

Dusty Weis: 9:58

Oh, absolutely Well, and I'm sure, as you realized yourself, you know, with that experience and having a TV show, at the end of the day, it comes down to the same skill set. This is something that I've learned again and again throughout the course of my career here, whether I have been working at a small town newspaper, which I did for a little while working in radio, moving on to public relations, or then strategic communication and content marketing, or now being in the position to run my own agency, it's all the same skill set. It's working with people, it's building a consensus, it's working as a team and, above all, it's storytelling, and if you can learn to do those things, you can do just about anything.

Peter Woolfolk: 10:45

Well, I tell you what. Let's move on and talk about podcast media, because that is a branded business podcast, and let's talk about exactly what that is and how people can benefit from that.

Dusty Weis: 10:59

Well branded podcast is just that it's sort of turning the traditional media model on its head where you know, when you talk about buying, advertising or you talk about public relations, you're talking about a business model where somebody has an audience and you are, either through money changing hands or by convincing them that your client has an important story to tell you are vying for a piece of that audience's attention. Right, but it's still. It's somebody else's audience. In content marketing, in branded podcasting, we're saying those are great strategies, but sometimes it's a better strategy to build your own audience and then you've got their undivided attention. Then you can position that audience toward your strategic goals, whether we're talking about top of funnel awareness building and marketing, whether we're talking about thought leadership and positioning your executives as authorities in their field.

Dusty Weis: 12:06

Having an owned media channel is a really strong play. Not for everybody. It certainly doesn't work for everybody. I get on pitch meetings all the time with the potential clients and they come to me and they say we really want to do a podcast. We're super jazzed to do a podcast and it's going to be about our products and our services. That's where I throw up the stop sign and say, well, hold on a second there. A 45 minute program about your products and services is called an infomercial, and those are less popular than Congress. Let's not do that.

Dusty Weis: 12:44

What we do at PodCamp Media is, when a client has decided that they'd like to have an owned media channel and they would like it to be a podcast, we walk them through the strategic process of building out what that project could look like, how we can advance their strategic goals through a process of building an audience and serving that audience. First and foremost, we like to say this is probably the most Wisconsin thing that I could say, peter, but I'm a product of my upbringing we like to say that the branded podcast is the cheese. It's not the mousetrap. If your podcast is a 45 minute sales pitch, it's going to fail you. Instead, you want it to be the cheese, the attractive thing that brings people in, whether they want to learn from your podcast, whether it's educational or informational or whether it's entertainment, whether you're just telling them stories that vibe with them really well and using that awareness that you build, that audience that you build, to then advance your strategic objectives.

Peter Woolfolk: 13:53

So built in there, somewhere there has to be, and you tell me that, built in the podcast over a period of time or in various episodes, there is some inclusion of what that company does or stands for or represents.

Dusty Weis: 14:10

I mean, that's just it. It's not necessarily what it does. More often, the more poignant message. The thing that's more important to people is what that company stands for, and a podcast can be a great way to highlight that. Certainly, eventually, if people continue to come back to the company's podcast, they're going to start to get curious about the company. Maybe they'll Google it themselves. Certainly, throughout the course of the conversations it's going to come up what the company does. But you can't shoe a warranted in there. You can't make it feel like a sales pitch or people's red alert goes up.

Peter Woolfolk: 14:52

Now, in that process, I would imagine you can also find a way that that particular company can bring in guests to support the mission, if you will, of the podcast or that particular topic.

Dusty Weis: 15:04

Oh, absolutely and in fact it's. I think it's one of the most poignant tools that comes with a branded podcast. Certainly it surprised me. I launched a podcast you mentioned it in the introduction here called Lead Balloon. When I was first launching the podcast media agency, I figured if I was going to be pitching podcasting as a business growth strategy, I'd better have my own podcast to use as a business growth strategy for my company, or it would make me out to be a little bit of a hypocrite. Now, that little podcast, Lead Balloon, it turns out that here we are, almost five years later and that podcast probably responsible for 80% of the revenue that I've brought into this company, which is remarkable. But the way that it's brought it in is what surprised me, because it wasn't all that top of funnel lead generation. Probably that's been a component of it.

Dusty Weis: 16:00

But very often the most surprising thing about the way that Lead Balloon has brought, the way that Lead Balloon has brought new business to podcast media, has been the B2B aspect of having someone as a guest on my podcast. That's 45 minutes of somebody's time, Peter, that you spend with them. They get to know you, they get to know again what you stand for and how you do business and maybe I'm just bad at sales, but very often by the time I'm wrapping up an interview with a guest on the podcast, I'm ready to say my goodbyes and hang up the phone and they say just a minute, there, Do you just make a podcast for anybody who hires you to do that? I think we've got a job for you. That's how I acquired one of my first clients and very often that's a strategy that still pans out for me, even here today.

Peter Woolfolk: 16:57

You mentioned your podcast, the Lead Balloon. Let's talk a bit about what the main theme of that is. I thought that was very, very interesting. So talk about why you created Lead Balloon and what its main theme is and how you go about getting guests on that show.

Dusty Weis: 17:17

Well, here's the thing when I launched Lead Balloon, I knew that I was going to be frankly competing with podcasts like yours, peter, and you don't walk into the ring with Muhammad Ali and swing at him.

Dusty Weis: 17:31

I didn't want to compete with major titans in the public relations and marketing space who had already established themselves as an authority in this space.

Dusty Weis: 17:42

I wanted to do something that kind of cut against the grain and maybe approach public relations and marketing from a different angle, and so I came up with the idea of doing a narrative podcast, a storytelling podcast, where, instead of focusing on a guest, we focused on a particular story and we used multiple guests to tell that story.

Dusty Weis: 18:03

And early on, I focused on this theme of failure and disaster in the realm of public relations and marketing because, based on my experience in the field, I know that when we get together as strategic communicators at a conference, at a happy hour, at a Christmas party, we all post up around the bar or around the buffet and tell these old war stories about campaigns that we worked on, about press conferences that we've held, about times when the wheels have just came off a project and we've had to get by on our wits and our plucky good luck. I have a ton of those stories. I know people who have a ton of those stories too, and I thought it would be great to recreate that experience of bonding with strategic communicators in an audio format. And so that was what we really launched Lead Balloon to do to be this place to tell these stories of disaster and overcoming the odds and great strategic communications in a venue where everybody can come together and just sort of I don't know have a group therapy session.

Peter Woolfolk: 19:18

Now, how long have you all had the podcast?

Dusty Weis: 19:22

Lead Balloon has been on the air since January of 2020, so that's four years now. It's on a bit of a hiatus right now, but we've got 50 episodes in the bank and we've talked to everyone, from strategic communicators at the White House, the global vice president of communications at Coca-Cola to, as you mentioned earlier, the US Navy Blue Angels public affairs team.

Peter Woolfolk: 19:50

You know, that's interesting because when the suggestion came to me about having a podcast, my first question would be well, my goodness, what am I going to talk about? Because I've got to have something. So I stopped to think about that and I asked myself the question if I was listening to a public relations podcast, what would I want to hear? That's what helped me at least begin to flush out what I would be talking about and basically I came out with I'd like to hear things that I can benefit from in my daily practice, that you know, whether it's crisis communications or ESG or DEI, those kinds of things. So that's pretty much where I focused on it. And then the next question was okay, we'll find where am I going to get guests from and who's going to know I'm here. Those kinds of things all had to be worked out before I made my very first episode. So I understand, you know, having a mission for the podcast is a huge first step.

Dusty Weis: 20:52

Well and that's just it. But, as I'm sure you've learned as well, once you establish your strategy and once you establish your mission, going out and finding guests, particularly early on, before you've established a name for yourself, before you've established that library of episodes, it can feel a lot like shouting into the void sometimes, peter, and so honing your pitch to potential guests is just as important, then, as honing that mission statement and that brand for the podcast, as I'm sure you're well aware.

Peter Woolfolk: 21:25

It was interesting because that was a huge concern of mine as to where am I going to get guests. I'm here in Nashville, tennessee, and I said, well, I just don't want to sit here and talk to PR people in Nashville. Who's going to know I'm here? How am I going to grow this thing? So that's where I came up with the idea of beginning to have guests from basically representing every state, and that was a major step in getting more exposure around the country.

Dusty Weis: 21:52

Oh, absolutely. But then I would imagine it's also opened up other opportunities to you. I would imagine that you've been invited out to speak to groups, speak at conferences, that there has been new business that's come to you as a result of having this podcast and, frankly, it's really become a central pillar of your personal brand as well.

Peter Woolfolk: 22:12

Well, no question about that. I can't tell you how many colleges and universities particularly PRSA chapters that I've spoken to virtually also addressed certain PRSA chapters around the country, no question about that. So this podcast has certainly provided me those opportunities and the fact that we're heard worldwide. Let me say, 143 out of 195 countries in the world. We have a listener in there. That was just organic. I made no effort whatsoever to grow outside of the United States. That is something that happened and I'm proud of and happy about it, but I made no extra special effort to make it happen.

Dusty Weis: 22:57

Well, you caught lightning in a jar, my friend. I'll tell you that because it can be really, really challenging to grow a podcast too. But I'll say this once you get it in your blood, you'll never go back. It's funny I was just on the phone the other week with someone who was the CEO at a major trade organization that we produced a podcast for and we produced more than 40 podcast episodes with him. He's in his retirement now and no longer works for that trade organization. But we were catching up, as you do sometimes, and he turned to me, peter, and he said you know, I am scratching my head and trying to find some way that we can work together again because, darned if making that podcast wasn't the most fun that I've had as being CEO, and now that I'm retired, it's all I want to do is make more podcasts.

Peter Woolfolk: 23:52

Well, it is fun and it's also challenging to find a guest, that there's no question about that. Now, one of the things I certainly wanted to hear, and I think the audience wants to hear, is about your experience with the Blue Angels. Tell us about that and how that came about.

Dusty Weis: 24:07

Well, it kind of takes this full circle back to how I got my first job in radio and you don't know what the answer is until you ask. Right, and in this case, I set my goals once again, probably a little bit higher than I should, but I knew that I wanted to tell the most intense, the most notable stories from the world of strategic communication, and so that first season of Lead Balloon, that first year in 2020, I got about six or seven episodes in and it was picking up ahead of Steam. So I sat down with a notepad, peter, and I identified what would be the five best podcast episodes that I could ever potentially get. This wasn't an exercise in being realistic. This was an exercise in reaching for the sky, and at the top of that list was a ride in the back of a Blue Angels fighter jet. Now, I worked as a news reporter for 10 years, peter, and during that time, I saw a few colleagues that I know get invited to ride with the Blue Angels or the Air Force Thunderbirds. They very often, when they roll into town to do an air show, they will invite a local member of the media to come up with them and fly around, and then that airs on television or the pictures right in the newspaper or on the blog or something like that, and I had wanted to ride in the back of a fighter jet Well since I was probably 16 or 17 years old and even thought about going into the Navy or the Air Force at the time, and so I put that at the top of my list. And then I started my outreach, and from the time that I first reached out to the Blue Angels Public Affairs team to the time that all of my paperwork was signed, the rear admiral of the US Navy and member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff had personally signed off on my application, as he has to do. It was two years from the time that I started that process until I was invited to ride along in the back of that fighter jet.

Dusty Weis: 26:15

But I pitched them on this idea of telling the story of the people who tell the story of the Blue Angels, because when you see media coverage about the Blue Angels, it's all about the pilots, right? Those are the poster boys and poster girls of the US Navy. They're the ones who fly the planes, they're the ones who get all the glory, but there's an entire support team of 150 Navy sailors and Marine Corps members who make it possible for the Blue Angels to do what they do, including a public affairs team. That when I started to learn about what they actually do to do their jobs, it was unreal.

Dusty Weis: 27:00

These people are working crazy hours.

Dusty Weis: 27:04

They're not flying business class, they're flying lying down on the metal floor of a C-130 transport plane, flying from let me start that part over, sorry about that they're not flying commercial, they're flying while lying down, sleeping on the metal floor of a C-130 transport plane, flying from Pensacola to Hawaii, in some cases to new.

Dusty Weis: 27:31

These air shows, and the most intense, the wildest part of that job of public affairs for the US Navy Blue Angels is, of course, the photography, because to get those insane videos and photos of those F-18 fighter jets in action, they have to ride in the back of one of these fighter jets themselves with a camera, surviving these maneuvers that would make regular people pass out cold, and they have to operate a camera under those circumstances, peter, and so I pitched the Blue Angels Public Affairs Team on this idea of telling the story of the storytellers and I told them you know, it would only make sense that I should have to experience this myself, if I'm really truly gonna be able to document what it's like to do this job, and that was how I got invited to fly along with the Blue Angels down at Pensacola Air Station, pensacola.

Peter Woolfolk: 28:28

Well, I'm in the department of that itself and that really sounds exciting, and the fact that not only did it take so long, but just the preparation that you had to go through to be able to do that is. That in itself is, I think, you know, going for the gold and you know reaching for the brass ring, and those are the things you have to do if you're serious about making things happen.

Dusty Weis: 28:53

I mean, that's just it. You know, I needed doctors' notes, certainly, but I spent the summer leading up to that running an extra five miles every week just because I wanted to be in peak physical condition to do this thing. When I rolled into Pensacola, they told you, they tell you, have a big bland dinner and a small bland breakfast, because your stomach is going to be tied in knots by the end of this thing. And darn if that wasn't the case. And then, peter, we sat down and we had one of the most bizarre conversations I've ever had in my life, where they taught me one, how to flex my muscles in a way that keeps the blood from leaving my brain during high G turns, because you don't want to pass out flying in that f-18, but then, two, they taught me how to work an ejection seat, peter. Oh, my god, just in case the worst happens. Yeah, you need to know how to use the ejector seat.

Peter Woolfolk: 29:50

You're. You're emergency accident in case of emergency.

Dusty Weis: 29:55

What, what's the? What's the line from the old Disney movie in case of emergency, the exits are here, here, here, here, here, anywhere.

Peter Woolfolk: 30:05

Well, that's it. This has really been a great experience and, yeah, I'm certain that my audience will take a lot away from this, in a sort of closing remarks that you would like a listeners to know.

Dusty Weis: 30:17

Just the fact that it takes me back to something that one of my friends and mentors from very early in my career like to say Everybody has a story that they're just waiting to tell. And when I was a news reporter, and then when I was in public relations, and then when I was a content marketer and now as an agency president, at the end of the day, that's the core of what I do is, whether we're talking about a CEO, whether we're talking about a brand, helping them find that story that they need to tell to connect with their strategic Objectives, and making sure that they sound great when they tell it. We're experts at finding those stories and we love telling them. And boy, it's a lot of fun to see them come to fruition, whether that is a flight in an F18 jet or whether that is positioning Global organizations in their best light and helping them connect with their customers. It's just super rewarding to do what we do.

Peter Woolfolk: 31:17

Well, that's the thank you, so very, very much for being our guest today on the public relations review podcast. I'm certain our audience will take away a lot of information that you've imparted today, and to my listeners I'd like to say thank you for very much for joining us. We certainly would like to get a great review from you and for you to subscribe to the podcast and to tell your friends to listen to the next Edition of the public relations review podcast. Thanks, we'll see you soon.

Announcer: 31:49

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