James Carbary is the bestselling author of Content-Based Networking: How to Instantly Connect with Anyone You Want to Know. He’s also the founder of Sweet Fish Media, a podcast-first media company. He’s been a contributor for the Huffington Post & Business Insider, and he also co-hosts the B2B Growth Show (a top ranked podcast according to Forbes).

Follow James on LinkedIn here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jamescarbary/

Learn more about Sweet Fish Media here: https://sweetfishmedia.com/

Did you ever do any podcasts in person at, at any point in time?
So we have, but I don't... To me, the benefit of being able to interview somebody from wherever you are in the world, without the limitation of having to be in-person, has always been so much more attractive to me. And the thing about in-person interviews, it accelerates the friendship a lot faster, and I'm big on that. Like using podcasting as a way to generate, or not generate, but like cultivate really genuine relationships with people. So when you're in person, obviously being in person, you can, you just have a different level of intimacy with the person there. But, no, I haven't done a lot of in person interviews. I think maybe a handful.
Yeah. And as someone who's done as much as many podcasts as you have, I do, because I have a second podcast called mile high Mentors, which is all local community, Colorado base, Colorado guests, everything. It really brings a different dynamic doing it in person. I just, I can't wait for the day where we can be in virtual reality and literally feel like we're in the same room, do a podcast that way. We're on the the way there, hopefully. You know what I mean?
Your local podcast idea, man... I'm convinced that there are people in real estate, people that own like... The people that own marketing agencies that focus on the local market, like there are so many industries that if they just started like the Denver Entrepreneurs Show or like whatever, like going local like that, it would position you so well to build all the right relationships.
Dude, the niche show has been so underutilized, because that was my first podcast. B2B Mentors was a little more recent. And when I first wanted it to get into podcasting. I'm like, whoa, there's a lot of podcasts out there, and you know, what do I want to do that's unique? And I know Colorado's got this big ecosystem that in 10 years from now is going to be on the global stage, which are a kind of already is. And so I decided to do it on all local niche. And it's been total trampoline, I think because of the focus that literally when you really start getting in touch with your local community and understanding all the influence that's there... We're only one degree connected from everywhere else in the world.
So I can only speak to that. It's been a blessing having that and starting it that way, just out of serendipity. Like, I wanted to do it in person. It was actually going to be a TV show when we first started.
Okay. Yeah. The other piece, you can level up your video when you're in person. You can do a video, obviously, digitally like what we're doing right now, but just having a zoom background or whatever the office of the other person that you're talking to, it's a little bit limiting. Where, when you're doing in person interviews, you can have a couple cameras set up and you can do a little bit more stuff in post that, that creates a little bit, I dunno, just a higher level of production and depending on how you're repurposing the content, it can end up going really well for you.
In the energy, there's a huge difference in energy doing that stuff in person. Just being able to read each other's social cues a little bit differently. So, it's been a little disheartening going back to zoom all the way, but it's still good. And you're still able to get good convo in everything. You just gotta be extra, extra thoughtful in how you're going about it.
Yeah. So what, what was it for you, man, that you had this local podcast. Why then start another one? Why start B2B Mentors?
Mile High Mentors, the formatting of the show is a little different and I love sales and marketing and like nerding out about sales and marketing and business development and strategy, more specifically. So, I found a lot of my podcasts- I kind of started inking a lot of these shows. They are kind of started bleeding into Mile High Mentors a bit like. I'm like, I would really like a separate show that's all focused set on leadership, business development. And I can, I can do this more on the global stage and have guests from, you know, Israel, and UK and anywhere in the world. There is a yin and yang to it. There's a yin and yang to having a local Show. I still run it.
And it still well, well worth having those separate, but that was why I kind of went in one direction over the other. So this is a good question. Now my question for you, it's not maybe not as good of a question, but why Cherry Coke? Why not Cherry Pepsi? Cherry Pepsi doesn't live up to your standard?
Bro, like I just hate Pepsi. I don't know if it tastes too water down to me, but I like, I will legitimately leave a restaurant if they're a Pepsi shop. I was going to be like, sorry, like I have to go next door. I don't know when that happened. I think it was like my late twenties when I started just developing this incredibly bad taste for Pepsi for some reason. And so our team jokes around about it all the time, like one of the questions we ask our new employees: are you Team Coke or are you Team Pepsi?And a it's, it's how I, how I know whether they're going to be on my good side from the get or not.
You won't hire them if they're Pepsi? You're just discriminating against people who are Pepsi fans.
Oh, I'll end up in, ah, in, in jail at some point for my discrimination toward Pepsi lovers.
But for now you're moving, you're shaking. You're doing business. Just for those that are listening, please brag about yourself. Give, but yeah, man, give just a background 60 second synopsis on what lead you to where you're at, in your career today and some of the major wins along the way.
Yeah. So, I won a sweepstakes back in 2008, I didn't actually it. My roommate's brother-in-law won this sweepstakes through a phone company called Alltel. And it was one of those deals where you, like, text football to 1-800-ALL-TEL. And you can win an all expense trip to a professional football game of your choice with nine of your friends. And so I was one of the friends that got to go on this trip. Took a private jet to New York city, got to go all around the city in a private, like, limo bus with a police escort. Got to watch the Giants-Cowboys game in a suite right next to Jerry Jones. It was like this is unreal experience. And there's a guy that was leading all of, kind of, the logistics for the trip.
His name was Jeff and he was waiting there for us as soon as we got off the private jet that morning. He was in the limo bus with us, coordinating with a police escort. And so he was with us the entire day and I just ended up hitting it off at this guy and didn't really think anything of it. I just thought, "Oh, he's probably some low level employee with Alltel." I didn't really think in any of it. But we talk about faith. We talked about family, business... And by the end of the day, I found out that he's actually the CEO of this global logistics company that Alltel hired. And he just really likes New York. And so he happened to be on the trip himself. And so we ended up swapping contact information. I didn't think anything is going to happen from it.
So I'm not really thinking anything at all about this interaction. And about a year and a half later, he calls me and asks me to move across the country. I was living in Oklahoma at the time. He asked me to move to Orlando to help him run the helicopter division of his logistics company. And so, prayed about it and decided to say yes, moved across the country and at helicopter logistics for NASCAR, actually, for three years. And the reason I like telling that part of my story is because it's segued really nicely into what we do now in the world of podcasting. I actually don't care much about podcasting like, I think it's cool. I think it's nice.
But what I really care about is relationships and how can you reverse engineer, genuine relationships with the exact people that you want to know? Because the relationship with Jeff that I built in 2008 was completely serendipitous. It happened by accident. There was no strategy or purpose in meeting Jeff. I just happened in to that. And I think so many of us just stumble into these life changing relationships, but what I have found with podcasting or with really any sort of content collaboration, I've built the business around podcasting because I think its the easiest form of content collaboration. But what I loved so much about it, what we helped other companies do, is try to figure out like how, how can I reverse engineer relationships with the exact people that I need to know to move my business forward?
And when you have a podcast. So for us, we work with a lot of VPs of marketing at B2B SaaS companies. So, our Show B2B growth. We literally go to VPs of marketing at B2B SaaS companies and ask them to be a guest on our show. And most of the time we don't end up doing business with them. But a lot of times we do. And through that collaborative process of creating an episode with them, we actually get to know them. We build this meaningful relationship with this human on the other end of the Zoom call, and through that collaboration, sometimes they end up referring us to people. Sometimes they end up becoming our customer, but regardless at the end of the day, we've developed a friendship with that person.

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Ep. 6: Perception and Reality (Part I)