I absolutely adore my co-hosts of “Shh, We’re Talking” a weekly livestream that I collaborate on every week with Angela Hollowell founder of Please Hustle Responsibly and Melanin MVP. And Corey Gumbs who is The Founder of The Black Podcasters Association. I’m amazed at how well this amazing collaboration has gone and I’m am so thankful to Corey and Angela for saying “yes” to working on this project. But looking back at the year, there are some things that I wish I had thought about and prepared for before we started. I thought it would be helpful to share how to successfully co-host a livestream and not go crazy if you’re thinking about starting one this year. Many of the things I’m about to share we actually ended up doing instinctively, but I think having a framework would be helpful to other people.
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Listen to the Episode
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Show Notes
Here are some things to consider and prepare for if you’re planning to co-host a livestream this year. This is shared in no particular order.
- Have a guiding framework around the goal for your livestream-What is the point of hosting it for you and your co-hosts? We focused on brand recognition and deepening community connections with us and I feel like we’ve successfully did that.
- What do you want your audience to leave with? What is the point of watching the livestream for your audience? Black BookTok is one of my favorite things to watch because those hosts are getting books into my hands. What does your audience get from watching you flap your lips? Inspired, educated, entertained, informed, connected?
- Have an editorial calendar and batch your ideas-Once it became clear that we were doing this thing, we had to spend time thinking about what we planned on discussing each week. It became stressful trying to do it each week so we started working on an editorial calendar. Having one made it easier for us to prepare for our conversations and market what we were doing .
- Plan on setting time aside to meet with one another-During the fall it became clear that we needed to begin meeting because text messaging wasn’t working as our primary source of communication. Things were slipping through the cracks.
- Focus on keywords and SEO-When you’re working on your episodes, think about what people are searching for AND episode titles that are clear vs. cute.
- Design a monetization approach that makes sense for your livestreams-Because there are three of us, we have a rotating ad system that we constantly refine. I feel like we need to spend more time working through how we plan on approaching monetization in 2026.
- Have backup guest co-hosts for those days when a host can’t show up for an episode.
- A vacation schedule and break schedule. In 2025 we didn’t take a break until December 10th with the end date of January 19th, 2026. I would like to build in a few more breaks in 2026 such as taking off the month of July.
- Goals outside of the livestream for all of the co-hosts. For us that included: Additional collaborations with other creators, growing our lists, increasing our membership communities (specific to Corey and myself)
- Discuss how everyone is going to repurpose the content-Corey is uploading the videos to YouTube and I know that Angela and I are sharing or backlinking to our previous episodes.
The Unspoken Things
- A High Level of Respect for One Another
- Self-awareness
- Deep Amount of Emotional Intelligence
- Trust
- Patience
- A sense of fun
The Anti-Grifters Social Club Virtual Summit
For the past year myself, Corey Gumbs founder of The Black Podcasters Association and Angela Hollowell founder of Please Hustle Responsibly and Melanin MVP have collaborated on a weekly livestream called “Shh, We’re Talking” We’ve decided to dip our toe in the online summit space and will be hosting our first ever Anti-Grifters Social Club Virtual Summit focused on the power of storytelling. Hang with us for for this 2-day event featuring curated talks that will get your 2026 started on the right foot! We’re giving our Substack live experience an upgrade.
This two-day free event will be from 1:00 pm MTN-5:00 pm MTN or 3-7PM EST on February 19th and 20th. Make sure to sign up at creatorsgettingpaid.com/anti today to save your spot today.
