I’ve been podcasting since 2021 and one show that has always stood out is the Danny Miranda Podcast. I’ve tuned into countless episodes, and am always impressed with the caliber of guests he manages to bring on.
He has managed to bag people like Gary Vee (through a viral social media post no less), Alex Hormozi, Seth Godin, Noah Kagan…the list goes on.
Danny Miranda is most famous for the level of deep research he brings to every interview. There’s an art and science to it — so much so that he has created an online course called the Art of Interviewing.
The guy knows his stuff and I had to talk to him about it.
How Danny Got Started
When Danny graduated from college in 2018 he had one thing in mind: to make a lot of money. So, he got into ecommerce and drop shipping and was making money, but didn’t feel fulfilled.
He decided to explore meditation and soon became obsessed with it. He says that now he divides his life into two seasons: one before he started meditating, and one after. The one before was all about making money no matter what. The one after is more focused on doing things he’s truly interested in — whether or not money is a part of it.
Meditation was the source of his career pivot, and, he says, the greatest decision he’s made in his life was to be consistent with it. For Danny, it was the first time he realized his thoughts didn’t define who he was. Without meditation, he wouldn’t have had the understanding and knowing that he should become a creator.
He remembers asking himself, “What did I do as a child? What did I do just for the sake of doing it?” He wrote blog posts, which turned into phone calls, which turned into tweets. He remembers having amazing phone conversations with people and eventually came to the conclusion to record those conversations and turn them into podcast episodes.
And so the Danny Miranda Show was born.
How He Landed Gary Vee
Gary Vaynerchuk is notoriously hard to book for interviews, though Danny didn’t let that stop him. The story of how he managed to land Gary Vee as a guest begins with a blog post that Danny wrote when he was just 13 years old.
The blog was about Gary and time management. In 2020 when Danny started his podcast he wrote a list of his dream guests and posted it on Twitter — Gary Vee was on the top of the list. He screenshot the blog he wrote about him all of those years before, put it out on Twitter, and Gary ended up following Danny after seeing the tweet. So, what’s a guy to do when your top podcast dream guest starts following you on Twitter? Well, you tweet about it.
Hundreds of people commented on the tweet, tagging Gary Vee and encouraging him to go on Danny’s show. He eventually agreed and was the guest on episode 39. Danny says the entire experience was transformational. He started his podcast just three months before and in one single day went from tweeting out his dream guest to hosting him on his show.
It was a foundational moment and gave him the momentum he needed to keep going. He now has more than 400 episodes.
Fluidity is the Key
As mentioned Danny is well-known for the amount of research he puts into his guests before they come on the show. In the past, he spent between five and 10 hours on research. At the time of writing, he says he’s in a phase where he barely does any research and just lets the conversation flow naturally.
He adds that one day he may go back to heavy research, and he’s not tied down to one specific approach. For Danny, it’s all about the journey — it doesn’t matter to him that he’s known as the “research guy.” The most important thing is to have fun, be present, and be curious. In fact, he notes that he’s often more present when he doesn’t have a big stack of research to refer to.
Staying fluid is a big part of the art of interviewing that Danny now teaches in his online course. It also involves doing your research, leading with curiosity, and being open to what your interviewee brings to the table.
He’s not sure what he’ll do next — how long he’ll continue to work on his podcast, or if he’ll move on and write a book, or do a combination of both. Thanks to his meditation practice, his biggest focus is on doing the things that he enjoys at the present moment. He’s confident in the idea that “nothing is a forever decision” and that he’ll figure things out as he goes.
Enjoy the process, be fluid, and take things as they come. This is Danny’s particular freedom formula and I can’t help but be inspired by it.
Photo by Maël BALLAND on Unsplash
