Hot take: Most business podcast hosts interview the same people, and say the same thing, and you rarely hear something new.
That’s why I’ve cut so many podcasts out of my rotation.
Our valuable time could be spent on so many things. There’s no reason to spend it listening to a crappy podcast.
So here are the podcasts that help me continue to develop as a business owner and learn about others’ journey in entrepreneurship.
These top business podcasts will help you continue to level up to the next level of personal and business growth.
1. The Long Game
This is clearly biased, but my podcast with my co-founders goes beyond just talking about marketing tactics but goes into the background of each marketing leader we speak with and how they think about the problems and challenges they’ve faced.
The podcast features interviews with business and marketing leaders and we get to hear the real stories of their entrepreneurial journey and thinking behind their decisions.
We talk about marketing tactics but that’s only a small piece of the story so we’re by no means a pure marketing podcast. We spend a lot of time digging into how these folks think about personal and business growth and why they do what they do.
We’re been podcasting for a short amount of time compared to other shows, but we’ve gotten awesome guests on the show. We haven’t gotten Tony Robbins or Seth Godin yet, though (;
Some of my favorite episodes:
- How to Build a High Performance Marketing Team with Andrew Davies
- Building a B2B Audience and Media Company with Dave Gerhardt
- Pursuing Excellence & Principles for Running 3 Businesses with Peep Laja
You can listen to the show on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.
2. All-In
The All-In podcast has a new episode each week and features Chamath Palihapitiya, Jason Calacanis, David Sacks, and David Friedberg who discuss topics at the intersection of venture capital, tech, macroeconomics, and politics.
Listening to these guys helps me understand how investors and economists think in a way that I wouldn’t get from a book because they’re analyzing events in real time.
They also challenge and disagree with each other, something you rarely see in the media nowadays.
They often have different opinions and discuss it in the open. Sometimes it gets tense, but you know they’re all friends afterward. They model what it looks like to have disagreements but still be good human beings too each other.
3. My First Million
Sam and Shaan bring on successful entrepreneurs to talk about their businesses, but they also have segments where they share business ideas and why they’re good ideas. They keep the conversation light and entertaining but will also jump deep into topics they feel strongly about.
They’re both marketers at heart and the businesses they focus on tend to be online businesses and tech startups. They share plenty of actionable advice you can apply to your own marketing strategy.
They look at business through the lens of financial freedom, building a business as a means of being in control of your destiny and
They’re solid hosts that do a great job sharing business and marketing topics and doing it entertainingly.
Some of my favorite episodes:
- Michael Girdley: Why Fireworks Are A Cash Cow and How to Operate a Holdco Worth $100 Million
- How to Recruit A-Players to Small Companies, Sam’s Time In Jail, and More
- #185 with Andrew Wilkinson – The Secretive Billionaire Who Acquired Burger King, Creating Better Babies & How Much Money is Enough?
- Getting Rich Quick Sucks – Andrew Wilkinson Teaches You How to Get Rich Slow
4. The Tim Ferriss Show
What differentiates Tim’s podcast from the others is the level of depth he gets into with each of his guests, while bringing the listener along with them. He gets into complex topics like whether the concept of space-time truly exists and manages to zoom out enough for people like me to be able to grasp these dense topics.
He regularly has guests that are best-selling authors, world class business leaders, and thought leaders at the cutting edge of their industry so you’re bound to learn something new.
While he doesn’t always talk about business, his guests often have a business background and it’s a masterclass in the topics they cover and in interviewing.
5. Jorgenson’s Soundbox
Hosted by Eric Jorgenson, this is one of the newer podcasts, and he regularly has great guests like Codie Sanchez and Andrew Wilkinson on the show.
His conversations are built around the idea of building leverage, which is important if you’re trying to build wealth and have an impact.
6. Business Wars
Business Wars tells the stories of various businesses that went head-to-head in the market. This includes battles like Apple vs Microsft, Netflix vs Blockbuster, and Nike vs Adidas just to name a few.
These stories are both entertaining and educational because you learn about the strategic decisions and tradeoffs the business leaders had to make as they were building.
I’d compare these to case studies you’d see in the Harvard Business Review.