Podcasting Insights from Podfest 2025 #614

Good afternoon, everyone. I wanna welcome you to the New Media Show live. For those of you that are not familiar with the show, please go to newmediashotcom. Follow or subscribe to the podcast, and, what we, we do the show every week, Wednesday at 3 PM EST live. If you don't catch us, live, you can always watch this listen to the show later just like a regular podcast. This is an audio and video podcast, which is unique, serve the NRSS feed and on various social media

channels as well. Rob, do you want to do the introductions of the guest, and then we'll get into it? Yeah. It's great to be at, Podfest again down in Orlando 2025. So it's exciting, and it's great to get back on stage, Todd, to do do the new media show. It's been a while since we've we've done that. But, fortunately, we've been able to do it at Podfest for the last couple years. But, I've got a terrific panel with us,

Todd, on the on the show tonight. So I've got, Rocky Thomas, who is the chief strategy officer, or CSO for soundstack.com. And then, John Miles is, with us here. He's the CEO and host of Passionstruck podcast and is actually the MC of, tomorrow night's hall of fame. So, John, it's great to John, and it's great to have you guys here. Yeah. Such an honor. Thank you so much for having us. Yeah. It's awesome. It's always fun to be with you guys. I mean, we've been long friends, so it's it's kinda

like fun talking about geeks Oh, yeah. And everything else. It's good. Well, there's a lot of stuff going on in the podcasting space now that Todd and I talk about every every week, but it's always great to have a few other voices that can offer some different perspectives from Todd and I on all of the controversial

topics. So so I wanted to talk about, you know, kind of what what you guys are seeing and what's happening in the podcasting space now and where you see it going and the changes, and also what excites you about the podcasting space now as we look at 2025? So, John, did you wanna start?

Yeah. I I just came out of a session where we got to see some of the the newest details on, how many podcasts there are, which I think a a lot of people use this number of 4,700,000, but what they showed was that that on any given day right now, there's about 420,000 podcasts out of that 4,700,000 who are producing content. So so you think it's a really huge space, but those who are actually, producing and creating is actually a much smaller

number. So when I remember when I started this podcasting about 5 years ago, I was talking to Jordan Harbinger, and, this was before I launched. And I said, Jordan, what's your advice to me? And he said, my advice would be to not start a podcast.

And I remember, about 18 months later after I had started it, I came back to him, and he goes, I always use this as a litmus test because if I tell someone not to do it and they're still doing it a year later or beyond, I've I've kinda given them the prewarning, and I know that they're in it for the long haul. So I think I think the space has a tremendous amount of upside.

In fact, if you look at the statistics of the number of people who are listening to it, the the figures for 18 to 34 year olds is rising, but the figures for 34 to 54 year olds is rising even faster, especially since COVID. So to me, it is quickly replacing television, radio, and other arenas as as the the number one source. And what I love about it the most is you get a one one to one relationship with your audience, which you don't get on those other mediums. Yeah. I would totally agree.

And it's and I love you that you put those stats in there because really what excites me is we're actually becoming mainstream. Oh, I don't know if my mic is working there. Oh, it's working. So the 18 to 30, 18 to 54, which is really the key demo that we look at in media, news, and everything else, that's all taken

off. So it's no longer just, you know, the Zenzine and having my kids tell me about podcasts that they listen to, but it's really about, you know, getting to more of that older mainstream because that is really and I also think the cool thing that really excites me is podcast is really based off of storytelling. And so can I grab your mic? This one's cutting out. This one was yeah. That one's cutting out. It's based on storytelling, and really what we're starting to see is that it's becoming an

information source. Like, people are going there for news and information Yeah. Which has always been the stronghold of a lot of, I would say, mainstream media. Now I think our goal is as an industry is that, you know, we get so much consumption happening, but it's not matching the media spend that's happening for the amount of time that people are are really, you know, providing on on the on the sites and

all of the sites. That could be digital audio, but a lot of podcasting is definitely underrepresented in the media side. Yeah. I do agree. I think that the podcasting industry, and this can include some video too, is is shifting towards maybe a different type of content.

And I think that's kinda like the uber trends here that we're seeing happen as as mainstream media kind of, I don't know, declines or they've met their fate or whatever you wanna call it, that that somehow the expectations of online media are shifting, and there's maybe a little bit of influence from mainstream media come coming into play now. So I don't know, Todd, what what's your thought about that?

Well, if we go and look at the the raw numbers, like you said, the 400,000 shows that have created a podcast in the last 30 days, and I think it's, like, a 150,000 in the last 10. But what we've seen is there has been a decline in the number of active shows over the past 18 months, and part of that's the economy and things that have happened post COVID. So the thing to realize that audience that has listened to podcasts for all these years have not went anywhere.

That audience is the same. So what we're seeing at our company and looking at stats across the board for podcasters is their audiences are growing at rates that we've really never seen before largely because there's a smaller segment of shows creating podcasts, but the listeners are still there looking for the content. At the same time, I made myself some notes here. Longevity, and this is a staff that is held true from the beginning of time.

And in in Rob and I's perspective on this is 20 years. 50% of podcasts never make it to episode 7. Those that make it to 7 will likely, see another 50% of those that have made it to 7, not make it to 20, and those that remain will make it to 2 years. But the 2 year mark is always this inflection point. We seem to see that podcasters at the 2 year mark decide, okay. I've I've done this enough. I haven't grown an audience or I I'm bored or whatever it may be, so we see a drop off of of

active podcasters at the 2 year mark. Where in reality, if you look at a YouTube creator, 2 years to 3 years is oftentimes the minimum to even start growing an audience because you have to rinse, wash, repeat the content to be able to be good good at your craft, become a better storyteller. The majority of us did not start out as storytellers. We have, regular jobs. We're doing things in our communities, and we were motivated to start a podcast

because of a specific goal. So I always tell podcasters, you know, make sure you you know what the goal of your show is. So we have to remember that the audience is still there. You gotta make it to 2 years. If you make it to 2 years, that's the place to really turn the heat up and and continue to move. But at the same time, the money, which a lot of people are so focused on, that should not be the main focus for podcasters that are new in the space.

They should be focusing on building community, telling a story. But we do give podcasters the opportunity to earn money from the beginning, but that check's gonna be pretty small unless that audience unless you grow an audience. And the goal should be to grow an audience and then whatever your goals for your for your podcast is. But we've also been fed a line and fed this the thing you have to have video. Gotta have video. I've been doing video for 15 years, and

my YouTube channel has never grown. But it wasn't my goal of doing video wasn't the same as people doing video today. I'm just telling you that if you wanna do video, go for it, but you don't have to. There's plenty of people listening to podcasts. That audience is still there. The saying you look at the Edison reports, you look at Sounds Profitable reports, the people that listen to podcast has not declined.

We wanna find these audiences wherever they're residing, whether it be on a podcast app, whether it be YouTube, SoundCloud. We wanna be everywhere, but don't discount audio and also at the same time, don't discount. This is hard work. Yeah. Actually, audio is is showing in the data that it's continuing to grow actually faster than the video side. So it's, you know, video already has kinda saturation of creators and and audience already. Podcasting is still on the growth curve

as far as on the audio side. So I do think that there's more places to consume audio now. I it's always been since day 1. And that's been the real selling point of podcasting was was its convenience, and it's easy to access, and it's always available, you know, if you're out walking the dog or mowing the lawn or something like that. You can you can listen to a podcast. So, certainly, video is not that. You know, people are are consuming this content in a variety

of different ways. You know? Also, the video side is increasingly being consumed on TVs in the living room. So now you're the expectations are changing on that too. And if you look at the big trends around what's happening with, with YouTube is that the content that's really popping and doing well on YouTube are very trending topic type podcasts.

And just from my own channel, over 17 years that I've had a a YouTube channel, videos that I've had in there, I've had growth spurts, and they've had growth declines or no growth. So it comes in waves. Right? So you can create a topic in a in a piece of content and have that that content, not resonate. But then 6 months later, when that topic comes up in the news or becomes something that's important to people in their lives,

it starts growing again. I had this happen with with a bunch of my my videos that I've seen happen in there. So it's a different thing, and and it is very challenging, and and Todd and I talk about this a lot. This merger between audio and video, is is difficult, kinda like the merger between podcasting and radio has always been difficult. So I don't know. Go You know, Rocky, you've been the queen of audio for years

since since I've known you. Yeah. So, you know, you you made a comment the other day. I I don't have a face for video, but I will I would say that's probably not true. You know? You could probably do very well on video. But Right. You know, what from your perspective in working strictly in the audio space and largely in programmatic advertising, what do you see on your side in all the content that's coming in that's being monetized? What trend do you see?

You know, in the beginning, a podcast was all about direct response and really, I would say, direct advertisers, which I absolutely love. I mean, I think as a girl who used to sell personal endorsement advertising on over there radio, I know how effective it is. It's great, especially I mean, the trick I used to do, I'll tell you a little hack I used to do when I used to sell radio is that I would actually find out what the on air people were already passionate about.

Like, where they win, where they love to eat, where they love to sleep. And then I'd go to the advertisers and say, hey, listen. I have somebody who is incredibly passionate about your product and they want to do a personal endorsement. That is what really sells. Not trying to force a Casper mattress for somebody who doesn't have any idea of what that is. So so we started doing direct sales or I would say direct, you

know, response. And then we started seeing the emergence of, of what I would call podcast advertising agencies. That'd be like your Ad Result, Oxford Road, and those guys who are basically trying to have these connections to increase scale. Then in 2014, I started doing programmatic advertising and podcast. I wonder what I was talking about. Everyone hated me. And then, which and all of us in the past 4 years, we started seeing that it actually is really starting to have a lot of traction, which

is great. But now, all of a sudden podcasters wants that to be a 100% of whatever they're selling and that's bad. Programmatic will never be a 100% sell for you even if we have programmatic guarantee. Think of programmatic as like your national advertising. Really what the effort has to do is come from the direct side. So definitely work on your direct business and then also going and working with the rep firms. I would say Oxford words are great, but it's a

mixture. And well, I'll tell you what I'm really excited about is local podcasting cause I believe that if you have localness, I think that is an area that I would say over there broadcasters are having a challenge with and it's prying for disruption in the local. And what's great about local advertising is you don't need to have the huge

scales to make an advertising model work. You just have to the the local car dealership or whoever doesn't care if you have a 100,000,000,000 downloads just as long as they see a couple people come in and what their goal is to have that traction and that ROI locally. And I think that's gonna be a great opportunity for podcasters. This stupid mic, is this thing working?

Go ahead, Rob. Yeah. So I think this whole thing of local advertising in podcasting has been something that's been thought about for many, many years, and the thought was that it didn't gain traction because there just wasn't enough podcast listeners at any given local market to looks like now we're totally dead. So it it it's like it's switching channels or something, so you gotta love wireless microphone. Oh, I think Did yours yours completely die? Yeah. I think it just died. So

Alright. I wasn't listening to you. Yeah. The battery's dead. Because I was trying to get the microphone to work. So I can't I can't pick up, and I'm a bad host here. That's yeah. My battery completely died. It completely died. Alright. So 5 minutes in. So, Rob, if you remember your train of thought, continue here. Yeah. So the the growth of local podcasting is is something that will eventually get there because the growth of listeners is continuing to grow. So I think the opportunity

I think, Rocky, you're exactly right. I think that, eventually, we will get there where digital consumption of local content is gonna be something that actually comes to pass. I don't know how much longer it's gonna be, but I don't know. What what's your thought, or can you even say anything? This one died too. I tried this one. The question was for you.

Wow. Okay. Alright. Go ahead, Rocky. Okay. So I I think what we're all so I I just have to I have to laugh a little bit because it's it's notorious that always at every audio show I've been at, we always have audio problems. It's like so I'm wondering if, like, CPAs get their tax returns right at this point. Yeah. So but, oh, I I would say on on on the local level, what we're also starting to see is that there's

opportunities, not just local. I say niche. Like like very, like, focused type of, like, fly fishing. Heck, I because I started listening to, like, farm podcast. I mean, there's so many, like, very focused verticals that when an advertiser is totally focused to that target of that of that. Yeah. I mean, of course, Caterpillar wants to be in tractor. Of course, they wanna be involved in this. And it's all about the response they have. And I think scale is great for programmatic.

But scale is I mean, you don't necessarily need scale to have a thriving local business or a very niche business, whether it's sowing, fly fishing, or farming, for example. Are you are you taking questions? Yeah. Are you no. Go. You had a question? Double born again about how do I find chocolate water again? Yeah. I've been in the Eastern and I've been in the war for 3 years. What do you mean? Again, they are quite too big, but I cannot say, because I haven't been one born coming out of water.

I'm worried I want to be 1. I wish you could've been not coming to a world even with a trust. He's been on that bar. I'd be up this one. You know, that's, like, role, not a whole year. So so the question was, she's been doing hyperlocal for 6 years, and now you've kinda switched to a business focus. I I I think there's a hybrid there. You know? Why not still cover the local and talk about business?

And then if your metropolitan area is big enough, that's a good opportunity, and you have to look at your podcast host stats and see how many people in the local community are listening. Again, as Rocky said, it doesn't take a 100 people to walk into a Ford dealership. It takes 2 or 3 that comes in, buys a car, or whatever the business is that you're promoting. That's why radio, which is dying,

has been so successful in local advertising. So I think podcasters have to seek out those opportunities themselves in these early days and get these businesses on the podcast train, and then find other podcasters in community that's hopefully doing a little local. I I think there's huge opportunity in local. And I'll just tell you what I what I have done. And last year, just to give give you some background, I I did 30,000,000 downloads overall. And I never went into this

to try to to get downloads. That that wasn't the the purpose. I was trying to impact people. And so the way I've always done the podcast is I have tried to do it as if I am speaking to an individual while I'm while I'm doing it because I'm not doing the podcast for me. I'm trying to do it to serve people. But I do it in a way that

I think is universal in nature. So I I try to think because all all to me, all if I can create an episode and I impact one person and their life is better because of it, it's gonna have a ripple effect. Mhmm. So that's how I've always looked at it. And over time, on a monthly basis now, it's listened to in a 170 countries. So I still think about it locally, but I I also curate the topics so that they have universal appeal. Hopefully, that that helps.

What one of the things that comes across my desk every day is the number one question by asked by podcasters is how do I grow my show? And I used to approach the answer to that a little differently. But, really, over the last 18 months, the first question I asked back to the podcasters, what's the goal of the show? And often, I get this huge pause because the podcaster really has never thought about setting a goal for the show. My goal when I started my show in

2004 wasn't about money. Well, it became about money later because it became very expensive in those early days. But the first goal was, number 1, build authority on a tech show. Number 2, I just wanted a press pass to the Consumer Electronics Show. That's all I wanted. That was the 2 goals. Now it came a little later. The wife said, hey. This thing is costing us, you know, x number of dollars a month. You point the finger in the chest. We need to make money.

So I think, again, if you know what the goal is, and every person's goal is different, as long as you know the goal, then you can build a show to meet that goal. If you don't know what the goal is, how can you structure your show in a way that reaches the goal? And I'm not saying it's gonna be easy. None of this is easy. You know? Even 20 years in, it's still hard to grow a show no matter what. But I like what you said.

My mom and I did a podcast when we lost my dad, and our goal was to help 1 widow. That was the whole goal of the show, and we did. And, so I think it really is to think about, you know, what you what you wanna have as an effect. So, anyway, I'm sorry. And and if I can just hop in and just follow-up on that. I had an inflection point on the podcast

probably 8 or 9 months in. I like, anyone who starts a podcast, I thought first episode, I'm gonna get thousands of people on this, and and I couldn't even get my friends and family members to listen to it. And my numbers were were dismal, and then I kinda did what Todd was suggesting. I really got hyper focused on what is the problem I am trying to solve. Mhmm. And my podcast is all about how do I help people live a life that matters.

Like, how do you be intentional about the choices that you're making so it's driving you Mhmm. To have a more fulfilling life in some way. And when I really started to to target the problem I was trying to solve, everything started to hockey stick because no matter what I do on the show, I'm doing it now through a curated lens where that's what my audience wants. And so I doubled down on on it, and that's when I saw the highest results. So Yeah. We're standing.

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Apologize we don't have you on on mic, and I think Well, so so what she was saying is that she she pivoted more towards a Buddhist, philosophy. And and I think that's a hot spot right now. I I I mean, it's an area that I go into a lot of spiritual health, and I think a lot of people wanna hear about topics like mindfulness and consciousness and equanimity, and

that's really powerful. I I would probably if that's a huge part of your DNA and those are strong things for you, I'd probably double down on that as as your core and try to, then look at other areas that support the core that can enhance it. You know, I think too, a lot of times, creators get hung up on the number. I only got 300 listeners. I only got 500. I only got a 100. Well, I want you to have a different perspective on this. How many people does your boss affect or his boss affect?

Or go on Google and do an image and say, show me a picture of a 100 people if your audience is a 100. Maybe put 300 if that's the goal or 500 or 1000 or 50,000 or whatever the goal is and print that out, a football stadium full of people, 60,000, whatever the number may be. And I guarantee you, when you visualize that number of people listening to your show, whatever the number may be, you will more prepare a podcast because then it's real. It's these are the people I'm reaching.

I'm really reaching this number. So Mhmm. The way I approach my podcast often, and Robin will maybe disagree, is we know that we're gonna reach on this show around 15,000 podcasters. We don't prepare as much as we do because we talk about podcasting topics. But if you are going to go speak in front of 15,000 people at Podfest, I guarantee you're gonna put 4, 5 hours in preparing to to to talk to those people. So respect your audience.

Even if it may be small, respect the audience, and then understand you have to come and bring your a game every time. And it goes into a whole line of topics we weren't even gonna cover today. But I Mary. I think that is, you know, that's a big part of this is people are always, I wanna grow. I wanna grow my show. I only got a 100 people listening. I'm like, great. You know, you're affecting a 100 people that Mhmm. Otherwise would not have been affected. Rob?

John, so as you think about that that focus that you had on your your topic and your purpose, how did that change the actual content itself? I mean, how did you evolve what you did in your interviews? Because I know you're very focused on doing interviews. Yeah. My my show is I do 3 episodes a week. 2 of them are interviews. 1 of them is a solo.

And, the the interviews I I guess what I want people can go I I guess the best way I would explain this is I could have Gary Vaynerchuk could come on 10 different podcast, a 100 different podcasts. I want my interview with him to be different from everyone else and to serve my audience. So I probably for every episode I do, I do between 6 to 10 hours of back background preparation

Mhmm. Because I want something 1, I want Gary to know in the first 2 to 3 minutes that we're on air that he knows I have done research and that I've invested into it because I find when you do that, people open up to you more. But the other thing is is I really do it through the lens that I do the podcast, so I am trying to pull data out of them that appeals to what listeners come to the show for. So for instance, I just did an interview

today with Adam Galinski. He's got a new book coming out called Inspire, and my episode came out today, and then I heard them on NPR. 2 completely different interviews. Mhmm. So NPR focused on this one aspect where they were looking at this cruise liner that, the captain was negligent, and it caused 38 people to to lose their lives. I was focusing more on his podcast is really about how do leaders inspire people. I was focusing on it more on why are so many employees disengaged.

If you look at the the belonging bar bar bar barometer, it says 64% of employees feel excluded in their work environment. So why is that? It's probably because they don't have a leader who inspires them. So I doubled down on what what does a leader need to do based on your your you studying the psychology and science of leaders' behavior to create an environment of mattering in the workplace. And so the interviews were completely different. Mhmm. I hope that

explains Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think it is important to to drill down on what your value proposition is for your audience, and I think that's that's what, John, you you found that that formula for actually doing that. And, yeah, I know with Todd and I, with this show, we tend to go all over the place and talk about all sorts of different kinds of topics, and it's not very focused, but it's it podcasting is complex. It's a it's a difficult thing to do.

And if you're a creator and we're just a reflection of that, there's so many conflicting things going on our head. But if you're doing a podcast that's particular topic, I think it's easier to do that than it is with what Todd and I try and do as a contrast. And I think that's why you've achieved the success that you have is that you're actually solving people's real problems, things that they think

about in their head. And I think it's also what we're seeing happen on YouTube, and I think that your approach to this is similar to what's what a lot of creators are finding in success on on YouTube is getting in the weeds and really focusing it down on topics that are relevant to people's lives. Yeah. Because there there are so many podcasts that are out there that are self improvement. Right. It's it's like I could be 1 of a 1000000 that are out there. Sure.

But how do you make how do you stop giving generic advice and start giving advice that is really based on science and practical implementation? Right. So that's what I try to do is go is I I try to include both the classroom portion of it and the practical aspects of it so that people not only hear the information, but I want them to apply it in their lives. So that's what I'm trying to do is how how, through the content that I'm serving up, can people take this and

grow from it? Because if not, what's the purpose? So what's the scope of that that research that you're digging into? Is it actually going beyond, like, maybe the expectation of your guest? Or is Yeah. It's going way way beyond. So I have I have an episode coming up next week with a guest, Allison Wood Brooks. She she teaches the most popular course at Harvard Business School, and this course is how to talk Gooder in Business and Life.

Right. And so I really got into her in into a discussion with her of why does she think this course is so popular, and and it really came down to people no longer listen. Everyone is so distracted, and and when you think about having a conversation with someone, it's how you make someone feel seen or unseen.

Like, do it's like holding up a mirror to yourself because when you're talking to someone and you're really listening, all of us see a part of ourselves and another person, and we can learn from them. Yeah. So kind of once I got that sometimes you gotta adjust on the fly, and I do enough homework that I can. So once I heard her kinda put that out, I kinda drilled down on that. You know, why are we experiencing this disease of disconnection? How do people start having more fruitful conversations?

What are things that people can do today to to apply some easy steps coming out of today's discussion so that they can start listening to their partner better. They can start listening to their kids. Mhmm. They can show up differently in a work environment. And so that's what I that's kinda how I approach it.

You know, if you think about this, how many of you have been listening to a podcast and you've been at your computer, and all of a sudden there's 500 dots on the screen because you've been holding the dot button on your computer and you because you kind of paused. Right? Because someone captivated you and you you dialed in. I think we've all done that 1 or 2 times. And it goes back to what you're saying is for me, I can't listen to podcast at work.

I can't. When I'm sitting at the desk, I can't I can't do it because all of a sudden my brain is, like, engaged to what that person says. So if your content isn't at a point where you're having people lean in and engage and think while that commentary is going on, you need to improve that because you want them to lean in because you're right here. You're you're in their in their head. So and this is human talked about since

the beginning of podcasting. This is a lean in medium, and it's it's very hard to do this correctly. But, again, rinse, wash, repeat. You have to practice your trade. You have to do the interviews to get better. You have to do the research. And probably as a podcaster that we all have a problem to is listening because you probably really, really listen to your guests, don't you? Well, I mean, you have to. Oh, man.

Well, again, some peep some podcasters like me like to be heard more than like to listen. Oh, Rocky I know you always like to I know if I you know, it's the quietest I think I've ever been in, like, you know, 10 minutes on the panel. Get some and I what I love I think your advice is not just for your show. I think people should to anyone who's a podcast, you know, creator should actually really listen to what you just said because Yep. Get asked a

lot, Rocky, you like to talk. Why are you not it's not the talking, it's the listening that's really hard. Yeah. And it's actually putting together a show, having an editorial, doing the research. I mean, really working on your craft and what I I think a lot of folks they they think it's easy to do a podcast. It is not easy. It's so incredibly hard to do a really good well quality produced podcast.

I mean, everyone has great intentions with that implementation, and then they don't want to iterate on how they consistently can make it better and better and better. It's it's incredibly exhausting. It's hard. And that's why I have nothing but admiration for everybody up here because I'm an enabler in the most positive way. I enable money. I enable bandwidth. I enable all of that side because I want your support because I love consuming the the medium. That's

what I love. Yeah. If you're a solo podcaster, it probably helps to be a a powerful speaker and a and a communicator, and listening just happens in a different place, right, before you become a a solo podcaster. So, you know, that line that you're trying to walk, John, between doing solo episodes and and the conversational stuff. So how does the solo episode kinda help you with your your other conversations that you have? No. I mean, it it for for me,

they all play into each other. So for instance, that that interview I was doing with Adam Galinski, we started talking about a Southwest Airlines flight where, in in midair, the the hull burst, and the pilot successfully landed it in Philadelphia. And it took me

back. I went to the Naval Academy, and when I was there, we got to to have this crew from a United flight, you some of you probably remember it in Sioux Falls, where, they lost all hydraulics, and, they were able to bring it down just by, using the the to land the plan. About half the people still died, but it was still a major feat that when they took it into simulators, no crew could replicate.

And then the the, Adam brought up, well, it also reminds me of, the miracle on the Hudson, which happened 16 15, 16 years ago yesterday. Wow. So that, that got me thinking coming out of that, you know, how could Sully Sullenberger like, was it just luck? Was it just technical ability? And it really got me into thinking and doing the research on, is there something more

here? And for me, what it really came down to is ever since he went to the Air Force Academy to that incident, he practiced something called Gartner Leadership, where everywhere he went, he tried to create a culture of mattering. Meaning, he had never worked with the copilot before, but he immediately set up an environment where he knew that there was trust in the other person, which when they lost the engines, gave him the confidence to say, you go through the whole emergency checklist.

I'm gonna just focus on where we're gonna land the plan plane. It also was with how he treated the flight crew and made them feel like their actions mattered. So when this happened, they took that, and it empowered them to to deal with the incident that they did in in that way with, with the folks on the plane. And so what it then leads me to do is to then get into research on, like, what's the psychology behind this? What's the training that goes on?

And so I learn from doing it. I try to share those learnings, give tips, but then I incorporate this back in the future episodes. That's a lot of work to to pull that together and a lot of thought that goes into it. But but one one other thing I I just wanna say is you asked me during the an interview a couple years ago, Rob, that we did, do I get more downloads off the interviews I do or on the solo episodes? And I can have Gary Vaynerchuk on the show Mhmm. And I'll run a solo episode the

next day. My solo would outperform it by 3 or 4 times. And the reason Rob asked that is because our shows are the same. When it's just him and I, the numbers are always higher than when we have guests. Right. So don't discount if you're doing an interview show that they're coming for you. The guest is the is the add on. There is a lesson to be learned there

as told chemistry. Yeah. I know we got a question in the back, and if we can, we'll try to save the questions close to the end so that way we can get you on mic as well. You know, one thing that's coming up, and everyone's been inundated with this, is the is AI. And, I'll be honest with you. In the early days of podcasting, I slept about 4 hours a day because I had a regular day job. I was building a company, trying to build a podcast, and then

I would sleep. And it was you know, that was like that for many, many years. And for me, on this emerging technology with AI, it's never gonna be a replacement for a creative mind or a creator that's sharing a message, but it sure has helped me from a production standpoint. So I just wanna talk about the AI tools that are out there and some stuff that's going on right now and if you guys may be using AI. My own experience has been I got better

show notes. I got better show titles. I have better context in the content, which is basically feeding Google so that more people find the show. Are you using alright. Rocky, I know you I don't think you guys are using AI at all at at the company, but are you using AI in any of your planning? Yeah. I I use it all all the time. I I use it to to to help, with the show note production. I use it to help with I mean, if you go to Google, you're using AI.

So I use it a lot with with preparation, with oftentimes, I'll think of questions, and then I'll run I'll run it through AI just to say, can you ask this 3 or 4 different ways so I can just see tonality on how I'm how I'm gonna ask something?

Mhmm. I use it I use it for SEO a lot, so I use a whole bunch of tools to look at what keywords should I use, what, what titles of episodes should I use, what should I factor into the episode so that if this is the title I'm going for, is there stuff that I can do in the first 4 to 5 minutes of an interview that serves the audience by tying it into that title? And I use vidIQ extensively for everything I do on YouTube, so I can do a lot of, research on tags and other things.

I gotta ask since you are a creator, how do you feel about having your voice in a different language? Well well, given I just learned that, in the United States, out of out of different demographics, I guess 5th 52% of, white Americans listen to podcasts. It was 63% for Hispanic, 62%

for Asian. Yeah. So I my main person is in, Medellin, Colombia, and so we are actively looking at how do I port this over some way to pick up a a larger Hispanic audience because Mexico for me is one of my my largest list listening bases in English. So I wonder what would happen if I could figure out a way to do it

in Spanish. Would it be in your voice, or would you basically have somebody voice it totally, like so it's so it's not based I'm just curious because I find this fascinating because Lex Fridman has been doing a lot of this because he had your career in the Russian, you know, president and then he had the Argentine guy and he's very transparent

about it. It's just I think it's from a it's it I think it'd be very hard to have a translator on an interview show, especially, constantly interrupting that flow. So I'm always curious on how a content creator looks at that. Well, I'm thinking about it, and and Babbel is one of my sponsors. So I am using Babbel to try to learn Spanish so I can do it myself. But, I mean or I I could have Sebastian, do it in his voice, but it would be very different. Right? There's a, podcaster here by the name

of Robert Riggs. He'll be doing a session on Saturday, and he'll be talking about his flow. But he's one of the podcasters that has used 11 Labs, and he's producing his show in 6 or 7 different languages with with major success. So, but he be in the host's voice. It's in the host's voice. Yeah. And he says, it's good enough. You know? So that's, you know, it's good enough. So Yeah. It's just gonna get better. It's gonna get better. Because he's using the stupidest AI we've ever

used. So so when you do that, does he does how does that work? Does he put out the does he put out the podcast in English, and then he's gotta put out 6 different versions of it? Well, he basically puts it out in English, and then he goes through and make sure the transcript's right. Then make sure there's no mistakes in the transcript, and then he runs that through 11 labs, and he gets French, Spanish, whatever the languages they support. Yeah. Yeah. It

just I will take spits it out. It's pretty interesting because the way that the Lex or not to give Lex because he already doesn't need any more listeners, but it's very interesting because with the Ukraine president, they're speaking in 3 different languages. And so I heard the one that was English that they kinda put together, and it's it's pretty interesting just how much the Ukraine president sounds like himself in English.

Does that make any sense? I mean, it's kind of a mind trip, but it but what was so great, it it just allowed such a better flow because I can even imagine trying to do that through a translator. So but it is it's like, how would I feel about Rocky in Japanese? I don't know. I have to think about that, Sofia. Well, it would be entertaining. Putting, automatically through YouTube now. Yes. They do. Yeah. And I think if you're gonna be using these tools to that

extent, disclose, disclose, disclose. Total dissenter. That's the key so that no one is surprised that this is, you know, Spanish, but you don't know a lick of Spanish. You know? I think that's important. Well No, Edra. Yeah. I wanted to just raise another topic, and I think this opened the door towards us talking about AI and probably what its potential is and where it's where it's going and how it's gonna change things.

I just wonder, you know, this cloning of voices and things like that, and I wanted to talk to to John about this too and and Rocky. Where do you see that evolving to? Do we see ourselves eventually, not actually voicing our content anymore, or do we see ourselves I think the natural evolution of this is to translate it into different languages, and that's probably more acceptable. But I do wonder about just the ability to rapidly produce content through AI. Once AI see, this is the

caveat. If AI gets gets a deeper understanding of you and how you speak and you in your communicating, will it be able to really replicate you almost probably 90, 95 percent? And if we reach that point, how does that change podcasting? I don't do do you wanna take that? You know, I think we'll hit I call audio singularity

when AI can actually replicate me. So I I mean, really replicate I'm not saying just just just your tonality, but can actually think the thing is is that I think most people are in podcasting really loved, the the vocal aspect of it. I think the artist part has been going into transcripting and getting that right. Yeah. And so I think the area that I find a little bit more fascinating, which I know I always bring it back to money, but I'm going

to. I think it's really interesting about advertising. Now okay. So this is the area where I see e AI and voice because it's you know, you have a couple companies out there who are doing what's called dynamic creative where you're able to say, you know, in the olden days, it'd be like, welcome, Cleveland. And then it would, like, put the actual ad in there, like, of your location. But now what we're starting to see is, like, it sounds like a like a normal flow.

It's not like you can tell it's being inserted with some sort of geographical type of information. Yeah. How I would say that's pretty that's fine for big brands. Like, if I'm I don't know, Big O Tires or something like that. Right. I start having a little bit of an issue when I know it's supposed to be an endorsement or a direct read or some because I just feel like it it's it's basically giving away implied trust.

Mhmm. I I I because I I think you're you're paid by the advertiser to give a live read of passion, and it's it's not supposed to be a programmatic ad. It's supposed to be, you know, creative, which that can be a whole another topic we can talk about, like, how how the guys are not rotating and they're creative enough on, on reads. It drives me crazy. But it's but it's really should be about per programmatic. I can kinda see that because people expect

it. It's not their voice anyways. But but I think at the same time, there's so much AI generated, and I wanna use a very naughty word here, on YouTube. You you've seen it. They have a series of screenshots and this monologue drowning voice, and it's got 80,000 views, and you're just like, this is this is c r a p. It's it's bad. I think what's gonna end up happening is we are going to be seeking original voices.

I think there's so much AI generated content out there that we as creators have an opportunity, and it's a golden opportunity to say, this is a podcast created by an original human being and not by an AI. I think people are gonna seek that out because we're not gonna know what to trust. The inflections are gonna get better, obviously, with the with the AI generated stuff, but I really think people are gonna seek that out.

I and I've been pushing at least in the podcasting 2 point o space, the ability to tag a podcast and say this was created by a real human. There is maybe a little bit of AI editing, but this is original content. Whereas if the French, Spanish, and German version, we can put an AI tag on that that said this was AI assisted. Because I think we have to get to a point where there's disclosure. Oh, I think there's also disclosure, but I also find that it not that's just the

hard thing about the industry. There is always exceptions for everything. Right? Yes. Because I I when I look at I would much prefer to have a very long, like, I don't know, economics, you know, like like article in audio, and that's where you're sort of seeing the spoken layer guys and, like, the GemX and then the Trinity audio where they're taking the text and they're putting into some sort of, you know, notebook, you know, l m. We're out the door. I

think that's that's nice. To me, it's convenience because it's another way that I can basically consume content because I I know at 1.5 speed, I can consume a lot more if I I know. Sorry, guys. But I I can consume a lot more. I'm a very fast reader, but that means I have to stop what I'm doing and I'm a multitasker. Right. So I am prying for a audio person and a consumption of spoken words in

my head while I'm doing something else. So that's where I see there there is a benefit and that's where you're seeing publications, not pub well, they're publishers, but publications like Fortune. All those guys really starting to understand. I am making content once, whether that's spoken word, and I've gotta figure out a way that I can monetize that or distribute

that in any way possible. I think this is also the challenge that we're running into the YouTube stuff is because, you know, for me, I I could not even phantom sitting there scrolling for hours on and then watching. I guess it's I've never been a TV viewer. So my personal consumption, I don't understand that. I do know there's people who are were always heavy TV consumers, like, a 4 or 5 hours a day, were sitting in front and watching Rogan or watching Chris Williamson on, like, in a

Modern Wisdom. That's absolutely fine for them to sit there and watch it or Daily Wire or anything else because that's how they consume content. I think it really comes down to your personal preference, how you consume. And I think as a podcast publisher and as content creators, we have to think about how we need to meet those audience depending on what our audience should be. Not everybody is looking for the same audience and that's where I go, not everyone should be

a video podcaster. I mean, if you're, if you're like a 45 plus main audience on doing hardcore investment and, you know, I don't think on on on Roth's and IRAs, I don't think probably YouTube is gonna be your best vehicle to go ahead and reach that. Rocky's one thing for sure. If you ever do a podcast, we have to listen to it at 0.75. Yeah. Pretty simple. Okay. You know, let's let's let's be real here. Otherwise, we put you on 3 speed. I'll need a Xanax or something. You know?

So I have one podcast show. I actually go below 1 o, and and you know who it is? It's Shapiro. Yeah. And Shapiro almost talks us that Ben is like a machine gun. Have to go 0.9 yeah. 0.9.8 at him. I'm like, plus he talks about economic. I'm like, woah. Woah. Woah. Woah. Woah. I gotta slow him down. So My my only input on on this is, last week, I I did an episode with Esther Dyson, probably not a household name, but she was, the angel investor for Facebook, Square, Evernote, 23andme.

I mean, the list goes on and on and on and sat on all those boards. And we were having a big discussion of what AI and and automation and everything is doing to the world. And I I love to her point that the more we keep leaning into this, the more analog it's causing us to become. And pretty soon, is that what we wanna be as humans, is analog? Right. And so I I agree.

I I can't imagine an AI trying to do the way I do it because I use my inflections, my pauses, and I go back and edit it just to make sure I get those things in in right. So that would be really scary if something I would agree. Could could do it in my voice. For the record, this show is never edited. I've edited it a couple times. Yeah. A couple times. So I do wonder a lot of the very top podcasters, and, John, I think you're you're one of them, is is increasingly becoming more analytical

about what they're doing with their podcast. Yeah. I know that there's a podcast out there called the diary of a CEO, Stephen Bartlett, who analyzes every little aspect of his his show and production to to find weaknesses. Like, he has a chief failure officer on his team that is looking for weaknesses in his in his cover art or thumbnails or his audio, the temperature in his studio, the

the brightness of the lights. I mean, they're looking for every little aspect that can affect the performance and the appeal to the audience. And I just wonder, you know, is AI gonna have a role in that too? John, do you have any thoughts on that? Well, I mean, I just learned that Steven Bartlett has a full time employee that their their entire job Yeah. Is to focus on the first 30 to 60 seconds of the video Right. To make sure that, it grabs

the attention. Yep. I I I I guess I'm nowhere near in the stratosphere of making as much money as he is to to pay for that. But, I mean, I think I think we are an attach attention grabbing society. So if you don't have something that brings someone in that right into the episodes Yeah. It's something we need to think about. But, yeah, I mean, he he analyzes everything. He takes AB testing to the next level on how his thumbnails look, what titles he should use.

I just personally don't have the bandwidth because I have a much smaller production team. Well, he's got 40 people working for does. And and I and I have, like, maybe 3. So I also think when you get started getting that large of staff, it's kind of like a startup in tech, you know, because I've done

enough of those. Yeah. You have that, you know, that scale where we're just, you know, thinking that the more people that we add, the more devs that we add, the higher production and, you know, scale we're gonna be able to produce and products and everything else. And I find that that is it's it's a little bit myopic because I think there's there's beauty and creative restraints.

I think that if you're able to really produce a product that's, like, with the minimum viable people to make that happen, I I just find that you get to the essence a little bit more. I think it's really cool what he's doing. So I'm not I just think if we start overanalyzing that, I mean, look what happened to this American life. They've never cut people. I mean, I've I've been following and known Ira forever, and it's like, all of a sudden, he's starting to see a slight downturn in the

market. And then what no one wants to get rid of people. And so I'm always I think it's cool that he's doing that, but there's also a part of me that wonders. It it's basically like a human AI almost, like, where he's overanalyzed. It's like listening to an orchestra from China. Their techno technically, they're impeccable. There's never anything that they

miss in, like, a Beethoven symphony. But I will tell you, it's not as exciting than when you hear the slight errors of a live performance like the United States, because it's really those type of, you know, moments in our life that make it beautiful. It's not the perfection in it. So that's why I I almost get a little bit freaked out. And having a chief failure officer, I don't even know what to think about this. Like, manifesting the worst thing. I don't know. I

don't know what to think about it. I don't know. Thank thank God we don't have a chief failure officer on this show. I'd have been fired years ago. Well You know, it's he would have been all over with. Rob would have been maybe fired too. Who knows? You know? Who's the chief mic officer? What's the chief mic officer? You know, but if we go back to Rob's point, you know, we've been doing a lot of thinking at Blueberry about what we can extract from the data we have. And we I mean, I've got a

I'm lucky. I've got a guy in the team that is completing his PhD in in machine learning. I was like, I I just the stars align and I got this guy, and, he was an intern. So him and I have spent many an hour talking about how we can extract data that I'm a team of 1 when I do my show. Rob and I don't have any producers. We we we do this all on our own just like everyone else. We do the social media posts. We you know, there's no team.

So I think sometimes too, you see a YouTube video and, like, man, that's that was great. And I was watching a YouTube video, and I talked about it a couple of times already this, to today. It was one of the guys that interviewed president Trump or president-elect Trump. What was the guy's name from TBD or I I don't know. Anyway, he did he was one of the guys that interviewed, before the election. And I thought, wow. That's

a pretty good interview. Little did I know in the background was, like, the CNN control center for this YouTube channel. I'm like, this this guy is like like a news channel. He's not a in he's got a huge team, so some of us will see some of the stuff on YouTube. And the reality of being able to replicate that is, at our level, impossible.

So that said, I think AI going back to the AI discussion, I think AI will help those of us that don't have the time cycles to be able to do some of the stuff we wish we could do to help us do that and be a team of 3 when you're team of 1 or be a team of 5 when you're team of 1 using this stuff

responsible. So I think that's where we're going to have an advantage as individual content creators is to be able to basically clone ourselves to a certain extent and be able to use some of these tools to help us get, not necessarily the content out, but help the promotion of the show. Oh, and that's the whole, like, thought of, like, AI is workflow efficiency. Yeah. I mean, if if you wanna know like, we always say, you know, we we don't want AI to do certain things, but we want them

to, you know, do our laundry. I mean, and that's like there's I mean, really, if we can figure out ways I I I absolutely love that transcripts are more correct now. Yeah. As a person who loves transcripts and then having all of the details, you guys do great show notes. I love show notes because I love to figure out and learn more. I'm curious. I wanna click on the that guess that was coming in. That to me is like a fabulous use of AI and how that's already saved how

many hundreds of hours for you guys? I can imagine how much it needs to take you guys to do transcripts. Well, historically, let's be honest, podcasters' metadata for their shows has been I I can't even use the word here because it's, I mean, it's bad. Podcasters are notoriously horrible in putting together good show notes. I'm guilty of it sometimes too, one of those horrible content, you know, metadata.

But since the introduction of this and being able to get these good outputs from a transcript, it's it's made a world of difference. Noticed in the past couple years, I would agree, your show notes were a little bit Little thin and little thin. But now they're actually and these are having chapters and you start able and it helps it to actually divide that out. And to me, why is transcription so important is because I do believe that there's a way that we can start exposing that

better. That is a great SEO opportunity to get people back as Google was doing in the beginning for a while. Then they got rid of Google Podcasts, but it was great to be able to search, I don't know, anything. And then not only see search results, but also see podcasts along with video that I wanted to go and search. So I can choose as a consumer, my consumption way that I wanted to go ahead and get that information, and that's where I think a bid opportunity for transcripts.

Yeah. And I think that as you think about AI in this whole data driven approach, I think AI has a role to play in this. I know I'm I'm struggling with my own productions to learn about things that I need to improve on, change, and I've I'm still not finding AI to be all that helpful in that. Right? So, like, being able to do kinda like what's done kind of more in the real world where where an expert will do a review of a podcast. Right? I think we've seen a little bit of it. There's been a

couple of companies that have done that. Well, they'll the company will analyze, like, your audio quality. They'll analyze your your your, aspects of the audio that maybe are less less favorable. But to kinda go all in, kinda like what Steven Bartlett's done, but to do it in an AI. Right? To get your RSS feed, it does a deep analysis based on its knowledge of, I guess, ways of doing things that are kind of

proven to be successful. Right? I I think the future is gonna be crazy, and, I can't wait to see what's gonna happen next. And when a a a true AI agents come, I just can think of about a 100 different applications if it works, but it also is gonna change the world dramatically. It's gonna be is it gonna be full idiotic idiotic what? Idiocracy? I can't get a word. Yeah. Yeah. Like, where because you wonder, like, how how great is it gonna work? --ocracy. Yeah. Idiotrocracy.

Yes. Yes. Yeah. I can think of a day where, the AI agent does my show prep for me, and I can review it and not have to pay of course, the guy that's doing the show prep now probably doesn't wanna hear this because, you know, he's gonna be, he's gonna be unemployed, but who knows what's gonna happen going forward. Let's switch and talk a little bit about advertising. We've got about 30 minutes left here, and, Rocky,

we can dive into your expertise level. How is, you know, how is SoundStack right now helping with the content distribution and monetization? What's what's what's happened over the past 18 months with primary, I guess, programmatic and maybe even host endorsed? Yeah. It's so been a really fun past couple of years. I feel like I'm doing, like, the programmatic, like, report and updates. But, finally, buyers are coming to the table.

It's getting kind of exciting. They're finally understanding the the value, especially in the big brand, buyers like P&G. And a lot of what we like to call blue chip kind of buyers are starting to come in. I would say that's that's great. I think that's that's awesome. I would say the challenge we're starting to see though is and this is not just an advertising, but platforms you can put measurement. Distribution is between open and open web and closed right now.

And so it's and why I bring that up is that, you know, we were seeing a bifurcation starting to happen. And so, you know, what here at at SoundStack, we're we're independent. We're not owned by Iheart. We're bootstrapped, actually. We have over 80 people. And, yes, you know, carrying that many people on the HR does give me I've I've a couple of wrinkle lines called, you know,

monthly HR in my eyes right now. But it it's we we really want to build what we believe is gonna be best for the industry and not be swayed by media holdings companies to decide or or owners to what we wanna be building. What we're trying to really work on and where we see the biggest opportunity for podcasts especially is really in getting our arms around and figuring out better audience measurement Because you can't you can't manage what you don't

measure. I mean, and that's really where I think we need to be drilling down in. The biggest thing that I'm looking at from a product that I'm going pro and con, and you're gonna love this, Todd. Should I be bringing in YouTube streams into an audience an audience dashboard? And so, I'm gonna tell you my pro and con on this. My pro is that I think as me as a publisher or content creator, I would like to know where my audience is engaging. No matter if it's on audio, where it's

on video or heck, Twitter. I don't care. I mean or x. I mean, I would love to know all those. I tell you from why I have a con on that is because the way that media buyers look at audience is they wanna know the audience in which they can reach. Today, if they're doing the only way you can reach an audience on YouTube is by doing actual stitched in ads, which is fine. Podcasts, heck, we've been doing that on an offer like, you know, 15 years.

That's on my issue. But if you're if they want a simple way to buy at scale, you're gonna see a bifurcation happening. Because today, the only way you could buy a podcast that's on YouTube is going through Google's, ad manager interface. So now as an ad ops person at at the agency, I now have to use almost 3 different trafficking method is, like, you know, platforms to basically reach one audience for podcast.

So I think this is where I'm trying to figure out what's gonna be the best way for the industry to kinda move forward. And we just started getting people to understand. I'm laughing here guys because you understand 10 years ago, we've been going through this a couple of times. We just finally got all of the buyers that kinda understand what we're doing. And now I have to now explain, oh, but there's a whole another audience on

YouTube that No. I can't really help you monetize or you can't reach or you can't buy because it's on a walled garden called Google. Because just so you know, YouTube can only be bought at Google. You can't go to 3rd party platforms to buy anything on YouTube. And maybe they'll open it up in the future, but I doubt it. And so I think that's the challenge, but I think it's exciting. I love these type of problems because I look I I'm I used to be

a publisher. So I sit in the publisher chair and I think about, okay, how can we build products that are gonna help our podcast creators and our publishers become more successful? How can I give them better insights? If I and I'm like, well, I wanna know, like, my entire universe. That's one. 2nd is like, okay. I wanna know how people are consuming on the different platforms, whether it is Twitter, whether it's Facebook, whether it's my own player or Pocket Cast or

Apple or wherever else. I think the third thing that everybody likes that nobody talks about is they like to they like to compare to their to other other podcasts. They want they like a ranker. They like knowing how they are doing against which can go both ways, by the way. I think sometimes people, like publishers try to, like, oh, I gotta be number 1 in in holistic health

and, you know, Apple, you know, categories. I think it could be bad, but I also think that it's good for the industry to understand what like, if true crime is trending up or down just because it helps us, you know, talk to advertisers if they have because a lot of times they won't buy true crime because they're afraid of it. But, you know, we have to take a lot of massaging to be like, hey. The listener decided to listen to true crime.

If you have a Dove soap ad in there, I don't think they're gonna be mad at you. They're gonna be like, yeah. I like Dove, and I happen to listen to true crime, but that tends to be typically women. So I sorry. That was a very long litany on on the question, but I I I get really excited about measurement because I think we do it so poorly. Yeah. And I think we need to get better at it because the data is there, Todd. You know, the data is we just suck at scrubbing it and may and putting it into

a dashboard that people can understand. You know, you and I had a conversation this afternoon. I kinda had an epiphany. And, there's some stuff that we're doing in the podcasting 2 point o space that can give us some data that we've never had before. The the reason that the company I don't like to name, Spotify, is doing so well in the advertising space is they have client side data. They can see if someone actually listened, and they can really sell that. And they

can say, yes. That that listener listened to that ad, bam, pay me. Where podcasting up to this point has kind of been, well, you know, maybe they listened. And we have to back performance out into CPA and a whole bunch of other type of weird calculations that we do, but I think there might be a couple of roads ahead. Number 1, I'm I'm not those of you who don't know what attribution is, I've always been really super against attribution because it was just a methodology to remarket to

our listeners. Uh-huh. So I've worked with Dave Hamilton, and he's coming up with a new attribution method that I think will help us keep the privacy of our listeners sacred. Number 2, what we talked about today, potentially being able to get some client side data back without too much complications, at least on a handful of apps that are supporting what you and I talked about, may be possible. So it's little things we gotta get. So buyers wanna know, did they listen? Did they listen?

But at the same point, we could better be careful what we wish for because if you got a 1,000 let's say you got 10,000 downloads and only 800 people listen, you're only gonna get paid for 800. But I'm also gonna go back a little bit to the beginning. I think that the advertisers have done a really poor job of managing creatives. Because I and I'm gonna go back to, like, direct response and personal endorsements because

creative is what drives people. And I don't care if it's a brand ad that's programmatically inserted. It's it baffles me that Home Depot will spend $30,000,000 on buying digital audio and then maybe spend I'm gonna guess it probably 5, $10,000 on actual creative. When I mean, where you hear you start to listener burnout. You hear the same message

over and over. I will I wish I still had my tapes of I'll tell you this is where where radio guys 20 years ago were really good about personal endorsements. Is that every they challenge themselves every time they went on to endorse Ruth's Chris Steakhouse or a local laundry place. They challenged themselves to make a like, today, I'm gonna focus on a 35 year old female who's in the Southern Denver area, and I'm going to make an ad specifically for her. That's one

of their key demos. This next time, I'm gonna change my entire creative with the same bullet points of the message, and I'm gonna make it now a sec a secondary or tertiary demo for this person. So often I hear and I listen to I listen to more podcasts than I ever wanna admit. I almost feel like I need to start PA, you know, podcast addicts because I listen to way too much of it. But it's like, I can tell that people are constantly that on air hosts are not being challenged.

And maybe it's the brands. I don't know. Maybe it's better health. That's like, hey, I don't want you to change that. I don't know. But it because it sounds horrible with someone who listens as much as I do. Have you listened to the GoDaddy ad on gate new central 1,790 times? Well, I have. 1700. I have. But then again, I mean, I've it I think that's okay, Todd. I I know you wanna drive home that that consumption code, so I get that. But I I I just think that we should do better.

That's all. And I think that the advertisers need to be doing better because I think it hurts the podcast publisher because it sounds bad. And and to to the point I was making, and those don't know, my creative did not change for many, many years, but I had a different formula to make money with them. So it was successful, but I probably could've made a lot more money if I'd have been a little more creative. But let me ask you. Was that the focus of your show? No. Yeah. Well, there we go. Not at

the beginning, it wasn't. But, you know, again, priorities change when you're spending too much money and it's been dipping into the family finances.

So, you know, this ad targeting and listener fatigue, the thing I'm getting concerned about there's a couple of podcasts I was I don't normally listen to political shows, but I during the political season, I listened to a few, and I just wanted to just knock myself out because I was hearing ads on a ad level that was similar to radio, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 minutes of ads in a in a 60 minute worth of content, and I I quit. I I just couldn't handle it. It was too much of an

ad load. So is that adding to listener fatigue within podcast? Well, I I I'll tell you my well, I'll tell you 2 things. So 1, I my I am part of the Stitcher SiriusXM, family. So they came to me because, political ads are very, very fruitful for them from an economic standpoint, and would I run them? And I said that the only way you could run them on the show is if you're gonna do one party Mhmm. You have to do the other party. If you're not gonna run 2 on the show, then you can't run it.

And so it because I didn't wanna bend one way or the other. I have tried just to steer clear of politics as much as possible. And because I put that condition in, they didn't end up running that many political ads. So I will just So you you drove the conversation. You said you want my you want to run advertising.

This is this is my guideline. It's almost like their old radio fare access rule where basically and which is still in there, by the way, for the, you know, from the SCC that if you you have to run everybody on TV or radio that comes to you. And and which is what you're doing, which is funny that they couldn't do that or it was limited. I don't know. Or they didn't wanna do it. Yeah. Yeah. Because they had too many other choices. I I will say I take listener feedback to heart.

I I remember, this Instagram post came up and said, I listened to this wonderful solo episode you did. It had great content. It was 24 minutes long, but it had 5 ads. And, there and and the ads were too much. It was it was impacting your content. And so I went back to Stitcher, and I said, look. This I'm getting feedback that this is really unacceptable. What's the bare minimum I have to do to meet your guidelines?

And it was a trade off for me because I'm losing revenue, but I said it's better to get act to to have loyal listeners than it is to get more revenue. So I went with I backed it off from the 5 to 3 and only 1 only ran 1 mid ad. And my mid ads, I put them in the exact spot every single time. So if you're a loyal listener, you know exactly where to skip if you don't wanna listen to them. Okay. Do you find that by limiting your ad load that you're able to increase rate?

That's the problem. Well, I I, give it curious. Sometimes it does work. NPR has done a very good job at this over the years of basically limiting it. That's why I was kinda Why limit it anyhow? Because I given I have an alternative health podcast, like, Glenn Fiddick wanted to advertise on the podcast. Well, we've just seen a whole bunch of data come out putting caveats around drinking.

So should given the fact that I don't drink either, and they wanted me to do a and they wanted me to do a script for it. I didn't think it was authentic, so I said no. So I put I try to guide what is going to be on the podcast based on topics that I think or advertisers that I actually think are gonna help listeners is how I do it. Yeah. Because I was I'm always wondering that if you're worried

we call sell through rate. So if you're sitting at an 80, 90% sell through rate, my old radio local sales manager be like, we're not charging enough. We need to basically increase rate so that you have because you have a limited supply in commodity of what you do because you do it so well. And so that's all because that's always been my goal is, like, I don't want a lot of ads. I gosh. I don't I don't want podcasts to sound like, you know, like, over the air radio where you're running

5, like, 5 minute spot breaks. It's just it's horrible. It's a bad sound. I But I'll I'll tell you how Joe Rogan's doing that's about to irritate me. Have you listened to them lately? He's doing what I call brute insertion. And so brute insertion doesn't mean that I'm even running it through AI and I'm waiting for a pause point. Mid sentence, it just goes in. And I'm like, oh my gosh. I mean okay. I'll tell you the opposite side of why they're

probably doing that. Guess what? If I was subscribing to a Spotify, I wouldn't have that. Well, there's been some points recently. Those are subscribing to Rogan paying Spotify are still getting ads, so that's a whole another topic. Rob, we've got 12 minutes left. Okay. We've got some people that have some questions, so I wanna make sure they I can run. They I I can come down there. If you guys wanna they

have the question. If you wanna come to the front and take the mic, that way around the mic. So it's okay. We'll thank you, Tracy. So I know the gentleman in the back had a question. Oh, wait. Todd and I will share. Oh, where is some bowling? What do we even make this taller for you? If someone is gonna follow, what would be one more? On a simply shall we? It is really one for you. Well, we're gonna be out to make a few points. 1 chain of mob and restore, then all they'll really need to go.

That is for real and. So this is the one of making you more about checking and. You need to think about, believe in your audiences. We we hear the artists who make work the entire film to their favorite taste. It will not only work, but for the age of. The voice of someone I've worked on a solo clip a little bit. No clue. Well, thank you. And and I I'm just gonna comment on that. 2 of my favorite episodes I've done recently, one is published, one isn't, is I I I like to

mix it up. And for me, with the type of people I like to bring on the show are what I call everyday heroes, and and they're people who I think are trying to do their thing and influence people in a way that people, the audience can resonate with. So going back to what you were just saying, I had heard Glenn Phillips, who is the lead singer for toad The Wet Sprocket, speak on another podcast. And I I just really loved how genuine he was

and how authentic he was. And so I reached out, and I got to interview him behind stage in in Clearwater when they were performing there with The Barenaked Ladies. And I I have just found you have to meet your guests where they are. So I had done a whole bunch of of research on Glenn, and I went into this question that could've shut the whole episode down, but

it it kinda opened it up. And Todd the wet Sprocket was the largest when he was, like, 19 to 22 years old, and I said to him, you know, Glenn, how does it feel to have reached your professional peak when you're in your 20 your early twenties? And he looked at me, like, with anger for a second, and then he said, you know, what you're saying is true, but I might have hit my my so called commercial professional peak, but I feel that I haven't hit my creative peak.

And he then went into this we got into a whole discussion about creativity and that whole aspect, which brought out just a completely different dimension with them. And then yesterday, I interviewed Randy Blythe well, Randy Bly, who's the lead singer of, Lamb of God. And, I I his whole latest book is about his struggles

with drinking and alcohol abuse. And so, again, I could have made it a very sterile interview, but I made it a very emotional one by bringing myself into it and my own struggles with it, which allowed him to open up even more, which the whole purpose is, you know, if someone's out there struggling with alcohol or drug abuse, like, what are ways that we can make them feel that it's okay to to not have to to do that, to to feel they're good with their life. So Yeah. That's how I kind of approach

it. And I think you put these people on pedestals, and they're no different than the rest of us. They all have their own struggles, and it's how can you bring those struggles to light. Yeah. Hello. Credit and bills. Michelle Huberty. So those for those could be detail. How do you what is hunger level? I would define hyper local as it can be a metro. I'll call a metro like

Atlanta. But, actually, in my years of doing this, some of my best markets of, like, selling digital has actually been in, like, mid and small market. And so I'm talking, like, market 50 and smaller. So let's see. Merkle. What's a market 50? I'm trying to think of Nashville used to be, but that was years ago. I'm trying to think would probably be, like, around 50 now. Maybe like a,

Jacksonville, Florida. Chattanooga. Chattanooga. I'm trying to go I'm trying to but like, that's actually a sweet spot because I found that when my I and I've done this in TV and radio and stuff. I found that when you had the bigger markets, you're competing with so much other stuff. And I found that actually some of the smaller size actually is more community support.

You also have buyers that buy differently, and they're and people and the people who are listening are being more, I guess, loyal to what you're doing for the community. So especially in Farm Report. Heck, Farm Report is like, Nebraska rural radio has a whole entire in

Nebraska. Okay? So they have their they they have, like, an entire network of not just their own stations, but other stations that do commodities, corn, and with stuff that would kinda like make your eyes bleed, but they've done really well at, you know, targeting to Nebraska and Iowa for those type of people. Yeah. I I think so, but I also think it's really listening to every community is different. It it's crazy. I I had, I had

sellers in LA and New York. You wanna know the one who did the best in digital? Indianapolis. And I'll tell you because they they're incredibly hard workers in the Midwest, but also it's I think it's because you didn't have so much. Everybody wanted to meet New York and LA, and I'm like, you have so much distraction with everything else in those big markets. That's why I don't think they're really great sweet spots. I'd put DC in there as well.

I think I think really trying to find out what your community is looking for because every community is different. You know, everyone thinks it's gonna be like northern exposure, you know, with Chris and stuff. I'm dating myself totally, but I absolutely love that program. But I think it's really but you found that there was actually community engagement. And I'll tell you, a community in Iowa is gonna be very different than even a community in Northern California.

I think it's just gonna really depend on what the communities, like, needs. There's communities and communities. Yes. And then you're right. There's communities and communities as well. So it seems like, what you're saying is kind of underserved city markets that maybe have less media that's available in those markets? Yeah. And I think what's been happening is that, you know, Facebook has kind of, like, put in there, like, I live in I live in rural

Colorado. And every time we have a snowstorm, Facebook blows up because their semis get out, left and right and stuff like that. It'd be really nice if there's an audio option and actually there is a gentleman who's trying to do that. It's and believe me, sometimes it's it probably just be reading some of the reports are in Facebook or d o or a DOT, but it's just distracted driving. I really dislike distracted driving in an ice storm in the mountains, to be honest with

you. I would be okay just keeping that on and listening and having the updates of traffic. I think that's really what we're missing is that type that's that's unique to where I live in Colorado. I think I'm sure you can find a a pain point or knee point, I like to say, a knee point in every community depending on where they're at. I'll tell you, and in Texas, North Texas, it's gonna be high school football. I mean, it it just depends where you're

at and what people are passionate about. People up here are like where I live are passionate about getting home in 1 piece. I mean, that's what they're passionate about. We we've got a few minutes left, and I wanna take this opportunity to thank our guests. And I wanna give them the opportunity to you tell the the audience where they can reach you. Oh. And, so if you wanna engage with them, those of you that are listening and those of you here as well. So, John, you wanna start first?

Yeah. I well, I I just wanna make one comment on this Sure. To us. This super low bull thing is there are a number of people in at play in Tampa Bay where I live who are trying to do this. One of them is this company called St. Pete Catalyst that, you could probably look it up, Catalyst. And what's happened is the Tampa Bay Times used to be a huge Mhmm. Huge newspaper. Now they've cut about half to 3 quarters of their staff. And at the same time, the business journal has cut way back.

So these intricate stories of human lives in the community aren't being told. And so where he is, Joe, who who leads this, where he's trying to focus is how do you do storytelling about people in the community? And I think I mean, he covers, like, events, like a business is coming here as well. But I think when I talk to him, his content does best when he's trying to bring forth stories from the local community and highlight acts that people are doing in the local

community. Mhmm. And he does that in articles, but he also does it in in local podcasts. And I think what he has done that's smart is he's brought, he's complemented the podcast with a whole another platform to to amplify it. But that would be a good taste, case study if you wanna look at it.

I am trying to experiment with it by putting my podcast on Radio St. Pete, which is a non a nonprofit, just to see what it's what it's doing, and I am finding that my episodes that have local guests in the local community do better than than my ones that don't. So there's something there. For my show, it's not a focus, but I I it's a missing ingredient, across America right now. We are I hate to interrupt you. We are really tight on time. Okay. So, Johnny,

go ahead. Reach me. Personal perspective, johnrmiles.com, and the the Passionstruck podcast or my book, you can go to passionstruck.com. Rocky? You can find me at at soundstack.com. That's sound stack.com and or just put in Rocky Thomas with an I e, like the mountains. And I'm the only one around usually. Lee's the only one that's probably a girl, so there you go. Rob. Yeah. I can be found on x at, Rob Greenlee, on YouTube under my name as well at Rob Greenlee, and LinkedIn and Yeah.

All the social platforms. I have my website at robgreenlee.com. Would love to have you check out some of the variety of podcasts that I do on podcasting and other topics. So thanks so much. It was great to have, this deep conversation. You know, I I used AI to create an outline for us, and I will say that I don't think we use much of any of it. So what does that tell you about AI? Right? Great. So and thank you, John and and Rocky, for being here. Thank you very much, Rob

and Todd. Thank you. And I'm, [email protected], and, of course, at geek news on x@[email protected]. We wanna encourage you to be get your own PhD in podcasting by listening to the new media show. Again, we produce this show every week, Wednesday at 3 o'clock live. You catch it anywhere you consume your podcast, of course. So go over there and follow, subscribe. And I want to thank our live audience today

for their participation. And for those of you who've been listening at home, you're missing a good time here at Podfest. Thank you so much. We'll see you next week on the New Media Show. Bye.