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Tom Fairey
The Back Yourself Show
CEO and founder of start-up Stakester, Tom Fairey, raised over £3 million of investment off the back of this podcast.
Background & First Steps
Tom Fairey is an entrepreneur and “Averagely average” human by his own admission. He is also the founder of Stakester - an app that connects players who want to test their skills, by playing their favourite video games for money and prizes. He initially approached us in 2019, having been a neighbour of ours at our studio space in London. He wanted to make an entertaining podcast with great production value. He also wanted the podcast to help his business win work and get investment. And so begins ‘The Back Yourself Show’.
Obstacles
- Multi-tasking: The Back Yourself show was about giving would-be founders the insight they need to take the plunge into the start-up world. It was about inspiring them to ‘Back themselves’. So naturally the guests would be other successful founders and entrepreneurs. This became a vehicle for Tom to overcome a funding obstacle he had in his business. On our guidance, Tom used the show to invite on guests that would serve a twin function: adding value to the audience, but also being a potential future investor for Tom. Both boxes were ticked. So in making the podcast Tom maned to kill two birds with one stone: build an audience off the back of his podcast as well as secure millions of pounds of funding for his own business. We often say at OneFinePlay, treat your podcast like a party - invite your friends, meet new people, have fun and make long lasting connections.
- Humour: A lot of people make the mistake in believing podcasts need to be rigid. And so they end up making boring content. After getting to know Tom, we realised entertainment and humour needed to be a fundamental part of the podcast. Tom had done comedy before and we felt adding this element would make the show stronger. We produced calls and prompted Tom to bring more humour out during recordings. By the end of our collaboration, Tom had become a well-rounded host - balancing when to ask an insightful and injecting humour at the perfect moments.
- Different Formats: After a while Tom’s ambition for the show took on a life of it’s own and one podcast was no longer enough for him. So we experimented with a couple of different formats, one of which is among the best podcasting work we’ve done as a company. It was a show called Raising the Stakes, where Tom would discuss similar themes to the Back Yourself Show, but we would bring the idea to life even further by having them play a video game whilst having the conversation. This made for awesome video podcast content as we used split screen to display the gameplay in real time, providing multiple levels of entertainment value. We also bagged some awesome talent for the show including a celebrated UFC fighter and a film technician fresh off of working with Steven Spielberg on Ready Player One.
- Branching Out: Tom wanted the project to be bigger than a podcast. We felt the show offered value not just in terms of entertainment but also in terms of insight. We advised Tom to explore the idea of turning The Back Yourself Show into book. Tom would go on to secure a book deal from a publisher, based on the podcast. This netted him another source of revenue plus it became an Amazon bestseller.
Impact & Achievements
- We provided a rich source of content for the audience who credited the podcast with giving them the courage to start their first start-up amongst other things.
- The podcast secured millions of pounds in investment for Tom and created life long connections for him.
- Book deal secured from UK publisher.
- The Back Yourself Show would fulfil Tom’s ambition of an entertaining show that stood out, won money for his business and built his personal brand by becoming a thought leader and author.
- Now, Tom is a well known speaker in his space and his podcast has produced over 100 episodes.
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