By Joseph Haecker, Fractional CMO, Author of “Building Customer-Centric Brands,” and Serial Entrepreneur.

I’m going to tell you a story about a massive, expensive blind spot in modern marketing. It’s a blind spot I see at every major trade show, costing brands millions in missed opportunity and wasted ad spend. It’s about podcasting, trade shows, and a fundamental misunderstanding of how to turn a crowd into a community and customers into marketers.

But first, let me tell you what happened in Atlanta.

The Hallway Podcast: A Tale of Wasted Potential

In 2023, I was in Atlanta for a major trade show. A couple of friends of mine, who host a popular podcast, were invited by the event organizers to record live from the show floor. The deal sounded great on the surface: comped hotel rooms, a small stipend, and a prime “podcast table” right in the main hallway for maximum visibility.

During a break, they pulled me aside and asked a sincere, heartbreaking question: “We’re not profitable. How do you actually make money in podcasting?”

My answer was blunt: “The deal you made with the trade show sucks.”

Here’s why...

The trade show treated them as a novelty act—a sideshow to create ambient noise. What they should have done was partner them with the hundreds of paying exhibitors. Those brands should have been paying a premium to have my friends host live interviews directly from their booths, packing them with engaged listeners and creating powerful, evergreen marketing content.

The podcasters, so used to scraping by for recognition, saw any invitation as a win. And the trade show, with all its collective industry knowledge, completely failed to see the asset they held: a medium that could multiply the reach and impact of every single exhibitor.

I know this works because I’ve done it. When COVID hit in 2020 and physical attendance crumbled, I launched “in-booth news reporting.” We sent reporters to shows to capture the story of the products and the people behind them. Each episode averaged 178,000 viewers—compared to the show’s in-person expectation of just 7,500. We didn’t just report on the event; we became a core marketing channel for it.

The Two Big Lies of Podcasting (That Brands & Hosts Believe)

This Atlanta story exposes two pervasive myths that hold businesses back:

· Myth 1 (The Podcaster’s Lie): The value is what I, the host, have to say.
· Myth 2 (The Brand’s Lie): The value is in the download count on Spotify or Apple.

Both are dangerously wrong.

When was the last time you actually downloaded a podcast? You stream it.

Downloads are a vanity metric. And while great hosts are vital, the magic isn’t just their voice—it’s their ability to facilitate a conversation most CMOs wouldn’t dare to host themselves. The act of picking up the microphone and creating a space for dialogue is the superpower.

The real, evergreen value of podcasting in a marketing context is the live interview at the point of experience.

It’s attention-getting, authority-establishing, and creates a repurposeable asset that rewards customers and entices prospects. It’s not a sidebar activity; it should be the main event.

What Brands Really Get Wrong: The “Selling” vs. “Storytelling” Fallacy

So, what do brands get wrong about trade shows? They think it’s time to sell.

They spend six figures on booth design, swag, and staff travel, then bark features at anyone who makes eye contact.

Trade shows are not about selling. They are about awareness, connection, and storytelling. The sale happens months later, triggered by the memory of an authentic experience.

By partnering with a skilled podcaster for in-booth interviews, you transform your presence. You’re no longer a vendor; you’re a publisher. You’re not collecting business cards; you’re collecting audience attention and creating a narrative. You draw a crowd, not with cheap gimmicks, but with of a genuine conversational content. That crowd becomes part of the story, and that story lives forever, working for you long after the booth is in a warehouse.

For trade show organizers, the lesson is even starker. Giving away a podcast table is a waste. You should be selling in-booth interview packages as a premium sponsorship tier. You’re not providing a perk; you’re providing a powerful activation platform for your paying exhibitors.

This Isn’t Theory: It’s My “Customer-Centric Marketing” Philosophy in Action

You might be wondering where I get the nerve to say all this. It’s not from a marketing textbook. It’s from the trenches.

· I’ve taken companies from $9 million to $28 million in three years, and another from $30 million to $96 million in one year, not by following trends, but by rebuilding processes and empowering teams.
· My own podcast rants grew into a show with over 3.2 million views in 2018, teaching me firsthand the leverage of this medium.
· I’ve launched tech platforms that grew to over 10 million users and raised nearly $4.5 million in capital.
· I’ve written 26 books, including “Building Customer-Centric Brands,” because I believe in codifying what works.

All of this is driven by a single, non-negotiable principle: “Turn your customer into your marketer.”

This doesn’t mean referrals. It means building systems—like social platforms, content ecosystems, and event strategies—where your customers’ participation is your marketing. Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram don’t market their platforms; they’ve built systems where our use of them does the marketing. That’s the shift.

This is why the hallway podcast table fails and the in-booth interview succeeds. One is a passive spectacle. The other is an active, customer-centric marketing engine that leverages:
· ✓ The trade show’s audience
· ✓ The brand’s authority
· ✓ The podcaster’s community
· ✓ The guest’s network
· ✓ The creation of a permanent content asset

That is customer-centric marketing. It’s not about talking to customers. It’s about creating frameworks where they willingly and eagerly talk for you.

The Call to Action: Stop Marketing, Start Building

If you’re hosting an event, managing a trade show booth, or wondering why your marketing feels like shouting into a void, the answer is in front of you. It’s not another ad buy or a flashier booth.

It’s about designing a system that gathers and amplifies authentic stories. It’s about being a strategist who builds the recipe, not just a practitioner who follows the instructions on the box.

My journey—from single parent to lighting designer, to tech founder, to fractional CMO—has been about one thing: solving problems others don’t yet see.

The broken trade show model is one of those problems. The broken podcast monetization model is another. I built Open To Work Social (check out my profile here) to fix a broken hiring system by prioritizing human stories over resumes. The principle is identical.

The microphone is on. The audience is waiting. The question is: Will you keep selling, or will you start telling a story worth hearing?

Let’s talk. If you’re ready to build a marketing strategy that works because it’s human, reach out.

---

Joseph Haecker is a Fractional CMO, serial entrepreneur, and author. He helps brands grow by replacing transactional marketing with strategic, customer-centric systems that turn audiences into advocates. You can connect with him for advisory services or speaking engagements.