The Expanders Podcast
The Expanders Podcast
Podcast Description
We have conversations with people who expand movements, questions, companies, and themselves beyond what is thought possible.
In The Expanders Podcast, host Catherine Jelinek interviews a series of guests, some notable, some under-the-radar, and all are doing work that expands a corner of the world beyond previous limits.
We begin with our guests' stories of expansion and transformation, evolving to highlight how their individual journeys inspired and enabled the missions they stand for today. We then dive into the work they are leading now, and how it has created change and expansion.
Podcast Insights
Content Themes
The podcast explores themes of personal and professional expansion, resilience, leadership, and the challenges of navigating change. Episodes include discussions on the unseen struggles of families dealing with pediatric cancer, embracing vulnerability in leadership, and the importance of clarity when pursuing goals. The focus areas often highlight how individual narratives inspire broader societal changes.
Interviews with thought leaders that give practical strategies for emerging thought leaders ready to break through the noise, on their terms.
What if the secret to building an audience isn't holding back your best ideas but giving them all away?
In this episode, Catherine Jelinek sits down with Andy Crestodina, co-founder and CMO of Orbit Media, who's spent 25 years quietly becoming one of the most trusted voices in content marketing. With a quarter-million LinkedIn newsletter subscribers and 60,000 readers on every article, Andy breaks down exactly how he broke through the noise and why generosity, not virality, is the real strategy.
This one's a masterclass for anyone building a brand, a following, or a body of work that lasts.
What you'll learn:
- Why ”true thought leadership means making assertions people can disagree with”
- How to spark engagement by taking small, mundane stands (yes, the Oxford comma counts)
- The difference between brand marketing and performance marketing and why it matters
- How brand marketing short-circuits Google, ads, and the algorithm entirely
- Why engagement metrics are overrated, gamified, and not your real goal
- The ”leave early, go far, stay long” philosophy behind 15 years of consistency
- How to win the generosity contest and become genuinely top of mind
Chapters:00:00 — Meet Andy Crestodina00:57 — The first breakthrough: tiny live events03:40 — Why thought leadership requires disagreement05:34 — Andy's soapbox: ”PDFs are the rust of the internet”07:31 — Pre-promotion: start the conversation before you publish09:16 — Why engagement metrics are overrated12:02 — Brand marketing vs. performance marketing15:04 — How brand marketing short-circuits every digital channel16:21 — The road to 250K subscribers17:19 — ”Leave early, go far, stay long”20:13 — Generosity as a marketing strategy22:42 — Final advice for emerging thought leaders24:02 — How to connect with Andy
Connect with Andy on LinkedIn (skip the follow button and hit the three dots and connect): link in the comments.
What's the one idea you'd give away if you stopped holding back? Drop it below.
Disclaimer
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