Why Yes, I Did Rebrand Again!

Host Michele Kus shares the story behind rebranding her podcast twice in one week, revealing how a spontaneous conversation with Bill Vanderbush led to the perfect podcast name that was always waiting to happen. Welcome to Today's Kus Word!

Check out Bill Vanderbush's podcast & TV show here and Bill's discipleship group, The Table, here.

Chapters

• 0:26 Happy Friday!
• 1:11 A Fun Conversation around The Table
• 4:02 The Irony of the Name "Kus"
• 5:48 See You on Monday!

Transcript

Michele: 0:00

It's Friday, March 7th, and this is Today's Kus Word. Welcome to Today's Kus Word, your weekday blast of inspiration. Join me, Michele Kus, every Monday through Friday for some piping hot faith bombs, freedom bombs, fun bombs and Holy Spirit fire bombs. How many people can say that they rebranded their podcast twice in one week? Not many people can say that, but your girl can say that. So some of you know, if you've been following the show, that I originally released this podcast a little over a year ago and called it New Creation Meditations. And then, earlier this week, on Monday, I re-released the podcast with a brand new name and brand new artwork and called it Rise and Reign. And I was so proud of that name.

Michele: 1:09

And then, Monday night, after the very first episode dropped with the new name Rise and Reign, I was on a Zoom call with my mentorship group called the Table, and this group is run by Bill Vanderbush. And, as a side note, if you're not following Bill Vanderbush's podcast, what are you even doing with your life? This man spits revelation like a fire hose. I have completely given up trying to take notes in the actual moment while we're on the Zoom call because the revelation and the teaching and the insights and the theological bombs this man is dropping are just coming in fast and furious. So I can't keep up, so I just soak it in while he's talking and then I go back and listen to the recording later and actually take notes. But I digress. But no, seriously, go find Bill Vanderbush, follow his podcast and his socials and jump in the table because it's really fun.

Michele: 2:13

Anyway, we get on this call Monday night and he says to me Michele, do you really pronounce your last name, cuss? To which I replied yes, Bill, I really pronounce my last name, cuss. To which he replied you have to call your podcast The Kus Word. And I said it's funny you mentioned that because I just rebranded the podcast to Rise and Reign and there was someone else on the call that actually found the podcast and was holding up their phone to the screen so everyone could see the podcast artwork. And he's like no, no, no, no, it has to be The Kus Word. If your last name is Kus, your podcast can't be called anything else. You have to use your name. And he goes. And I want to be on a podcast called The Kus Word. In fact he's like now I want to change my name and all these people on the call started giving me all these really fun ideas, like you could do a series of F-bombs like freedom and fun and faith, and I don't know. He listed like 20 F-words right there on the spot and then someone else said, yeah, you could do 21 Days of Kus Words. And so Bill's like you know, you all need to come back next week with a bunch of marketing ideas for Michele's Kus Word podcast. And the funny thing is I already use the hashtag Today's Kus Word. I've used that hashtag on a lot of my posts for probably a decade now at least, so it's pretty well established.

Michele: 3:53

So I always wanted to call this podcast something with my last name, Kus, just because it's kind of irreverent and it's kind of ironic because it's obviously all about faith and our relationship with God. So it kind of kills all of the religiosity in the room, right, if you're using a play on the word cuss? And I never ended up using my name in the podcast title because I did this podcast coaching course, this was years ago and they said your podcast name needs to be. It needs to clearly convey what your show is about, and I thought, well, the only thing that that name clearly conveys is that there's swearing involved, and I didn't really want to send that message. So I never used my name in the podcast title, but I always kind of wanted to, and so after our Zoom call on Monday night, I got back on my computer and started making.

Michele: 5:03

I started toying around with some new podcast art and thinking about what if I just rebranded it to The Kus Word, or Today's Kus Word, which is the hashtag that I've been using for years already?

Michele: 5:19

So I played around with it for a while, I talked to my husband about it a little bit, I thought about it, I kind of experimented and put a sampling of the new podcast art on my Instagram story and thought what do you guys think? I put like a little poll on there, and then I thought you know what? What did I say on Monday? This is supposed to be fun and not a job, so I'm just going to do it, and if only four people listen to the show, who cares anyway? So welcome to the newly rebranded rebranded Today's Kus Word. Sometimes you just need one person to give you permission to do the thing that you wanted to do anyway, right? So this is for you, Bill. Thanks so much for the kick in the pants and thank you for joining me for story time today. I'll see you again next time on Today's Kus Word. Have a great weekend.