James Bishop [00:00:05]:
Dear listeners, we are gathered here today to reflect on a podcast that is no longer with us, VoiceTech. The podcast was described as a series of conversations with voice technology experts. Haunting us today is the show's creator Carl Robinson. Launched in April 2018, 86 episodes were published in total before the show was left to perish after just 2 years. On this episode, we'll learn what caused voice tech to be yet another headstone in the podcast graveyard. We'll celebrate the highs, lament the lows, and discuss whether it should be laid to rest forever or be brought back to life. From One Fine Play, this ref his podcast
Carl Robinson [00:01:06]:
graveyard.
James Bishop [00:01:08]:
Welcome to this service. I'm your host, James Bishop, and ref I've been producing podcasts for years. What I've learned is that one of the hardest things to do is keep your podcast alive. There's nearly 4,000,000 podcasts available today, but fewer than 8% are alive and kicking. I'm curious to learn more about these lost shows. Why did they start? What led them to stop? And what can we learn from their untimely demise? Who knows? As we mourn the podcasts that were struck down before their prime, ref let us all pray we too don't suffer the same grizzly fate. A brief interruption to today's service. Ref what if I told you there was a way to cure your podcast? What if I told you there was a way to bring it back from the dead? Ref we have a secret from beyond the grave, a creation of mine in fact, podcast production from One Fine Play.
James Bishop [00:02:18]:
Imagine, dear friends, ref your podcast receiving the elixir of life itself, concept development that pierces the veil, production quality that could wake the dead, ref launches that are a scream and marketing plans that haunt listeners everywhere. Don't let your podcasting dreams grow sick and wither in the grave. Visit onefineplay.com. Let's begin proceedings. Hi, Carl. Thanks for haunting the show today.
Carl Robinson [00:02:45]:
James, absolute pleasure.
James Bishop [00:02:47]:
Ref so tell me, why did you wanna make this show?
Carl Robinson [00:02:49]:
So, I originally started The VoiceTech podcast really out of personal interest. I was doing a data science masters working in the lab on, machine learning models, with voice data. I was working on voice emotion transformation, so actually changing the, you You know, a happy voice into an angry voice or vice versa. Didn't work that well, but I I wrote a nice paper and got me my, my master's degree. But at the same time, As you can imagine, working in the lab's pretty, lonely kind of task, especially as an intern. No one talks to you. So I I started the podcast as an excuse to talk to the the smart people around me ref And, and learn more about the industry. It was at the time when Amazon Alexa and all these voice technologies were really kind of, you know, on the app as well.
Carl Robinson [00:03:28]:
So it looked like a really good place to sort of direct my career. Ref and so, yeah, I started VoiceTech with those kind of aims in mind to to help my career and to to meet the people around me.
James Bishop [00:03:37]:
What gave you the inspiration to start a podcast? How did you come up with the idea of sharing your story in that medium?
Carl Robinson [00:03:44]:
Well, I'm a podcast listener. So I've always listened to podcasts and, taking notes. You know, I'm a rabid note taker. So I was listening to podcast, pause it, write down what I learned, you know, carry on. It matched what I was doing, and I was working in voice and audio. So if I'm gonna create content, I think it should be audio. And I liked it, so I I just wanted to do it. Probably the the main reasons.
James Bishop [00:04:05]:
What other shows were your inspiration when coming up ref with this podcast.
Carl Robinson [00:04:10]:
Yeah. So, I mean, shows that I was listening to at the time, you know, I was listening to Sam Harris and some of these, like, kind of long form, discussion podcasts. But also, there was a voice, the VoiceBot podcast, voicebot dot a I, which is still going. It's the leading voice technology, ref Podcast in the space. So I really like what, Brett Kinsella was doing on on that show. He was focusing, more on the industry side, I would say. Ref You know that what what's going on in the voice technology industry, you know, the the acquisitions and and and things like that, interviewing the the leaders. And because I was doing AI, I wanted to focus more on the tech.
Carl Robinson [00:04:42]:
I thought I'd differentiate myself by focusing more on the the technology itself and interviewing designers, developers, how did you build it, and what was the traction, and all this kind of stuff. So, ref then I launched a a newsletter to accompany the podcast, which I think is a a great thing. I personally think that anyone with a podcast should have a newsletter. And, I got inspiration from, James Cridland. And when When when I saw, you know, his big list of sponsors on his, pod news newsletter, I thought I can do that for the voice industry. If I just get 20 sponsors paying me x amount a month, then, that's ref passive income, which I did do. I didn't quite make enough to, you know, to retire on the the Costa del Sol. But, yeah, I did get a few sponsors for my for my podcast, and that was that was good inspiration as well.
James Bishop [00:05:20]:
When starting out, what were your expectations? What did you hope to achieve?
Carl Robinson [00:05:26]:
I think that's something I did right because I didn't have very high expectations. I did it really just out of curiosity. It was more of just a, you know, a passion project at first. Like I say, I thought hopefully there'll be some side benefits of people, you know, getting to know me. I'd have something that I could show people in interviews. But I didn't ref Ever expect to make money out of it, monetize it, become famous, anything that, you know, a lot of podcasters probably think that's gonna happen after they record 3 episodes. So, yeah, I didn't have particularly high expectations, which is why I was pleasantly surprised when it did take off, and I had a lot of, you know, very interesting companies wanting to be on the show. I was like, really? Well, little old me.
Carl Robinson [00:06:02]:
Ref Okay. And, once you get a few, then it's easy to get a few more, and
James Bishop [00:06:07]:
it snowballs. So I'd love to take the opportunity to reflect a little bit on the journey of your podcast. Let's kick off with a little bit about what went into the show. So, how much time do you think ref you are putting into this thing. You made 86 episodes, so cumulatively quite a bit, but, you know, what kind of commitment were you making on that front?
Carl Robinson [00:06:28]:
Yeah. I'd like to think about the total number of hours I spent on it. Time is definitely the biggest issue when making a podcast. It is a very time consuming process. Lot of steps, ref Lot of tools, and it does add up. And even when you know what you're doing, there's no scalability. Right? Like, there is a certain linear aspect to this activity where you just have to go through Every one of these steps every single time. I I measured my time, I tracked it, and I would break it down by, you know, different activities to see which ones were worth outsourcing or optimizing.
Carl Robinson [00:06:54]:
I had a checklist of things that I would do every time, so it's it's very important to be able to do that. And I in the end, when I knew really knew what I was doing, it added up to about 10 hours of episode 10 hours of ref Work per episode. So I do typically 5 hours on Saturday, 5 hours on a Sunday, but that's like almost a full day's work on both days of your weekend, and it was completely eating up ref My weekend, you know, I was like to do so to do a weekly episode, you're dedicating your life to it. Yes, it's a lot.
James Bishop [00:07:20]:
That's the thing that catches everyone out, isn't it? They think, Oh, this will be easy. We'll just turn up on what I like to patronize only call play with the microphones, and we're done. And then as soon as you go down the rabbit hole. You realize you need to, you know, oh, just do that extra little thing, and then I'll just do that extra little thing.
Carl Robinson [00:07:36]:
Totally. Yeah. And it all adds up. Even yeah. Those those extra little things are exactly what adds up. It's all about setting up a process with a as few extra little things as possible, or even like creating a customer image For every episode, it's a nice to have. Right? And you would want that. But that's like another 15, 20 minutes, you know, just to find the photo and format it and export ref into the right formats and then put it on social and all of that kind of stuff.
Carl Robinson [00:07:59]:
Just and even though there are tools that supposedly do this stuff automatically, ref They they never work a 100%, you know.
James Bishop [00:08:05]:
You know, sometimes people in our team will spend an hour thinking about the name for the of the podcast. Yeah. What they're gonna title it. That is, After all, probably the only thing that the potential listener is seeing in order to make the decision as to whether they press play or not. But you start wondering, like, the value of all this stuff. And on that note, how much money do you think you put into this podcast overall?
Carl Robinson [00:08:27]:
Well, when I was running it, doing it all myself, ref I would say probably like €100, dollars a month or less. You know, I was paying for hosting, probably a few, you know, 2 or 3 tools. Ref Yeah. Not not a huge amount more than that. But then, you know, as the the work started building up, then you become, you know, more ambitious. And I up a website and a newsletter, and I've got social media to take care of. And the time was just snowballing that I then start to consider ref Outsourcing some of that, specifically the editing, first of all. Thought if I could get someone to edit this, there were companies like We Edit Podcasts and and many more ref That that would just do this stuff for you for around I know what it was, like, about $100 an episode or something.
Carl Robinson [00:09:10]:
But then, of course, it requires you to monetize the podcast. It's like, well, I can't just be Digging into my pocket for 4, 5, $600 a month without actually trying to make some money from the podcast. So then it it encourages you to start putting ads. Ref one of the things that that worked best for me was affiliate sales, which we can talk about. But at that point, probably at its height, when I was outsourcing as much as I possibly could and monetizing as much as I could, I was probably spending, like, 6, 7, maybe €800 a month on the podcast for 1 episode a week. Yeah.
James Bishop [00:09:38]:
Wow. So it really did scale up?
Carl Robinson [00:09:41]:
Yeah. Absolutely.
James Bishop [00:09:42]:
Would you say it was a worthwhile investment?
Carl Robinson [00:09:45]:
Absolutely. Not not so much for a pure from a pure profit point of view. Like, I always I was always in the in the black. I I never went into debt on my podcast. It always paid for itself, fortunately. And the affiliate sales were the thing that really helped me the the most, these high ticket ref Affiliate sales as opposed to, like, ads or sponsorship on the on the newsletter. But it was never enough for me to just quit my job. I also thought it'd be great, you know, do something like James Cridland.
Carl Robinson [00:10:08]:
A load of sponsors. They'd be paying you. You could, you know, rock up and do a couple of hours work in the morning, and then you have the rest of the day free to do your start up, you know, dream or or whatever it is. Ref it
James Bishop [00:10:18]:
never quite worked out. I think what we just described is the standard podcaster's dream. Yeah. Took your standard newbie podcaster 2 weeks into their journey. That's what they would all describe. Yeah. It's easy. I'm just gonna record on the mic for an hour or 2, have a great chat, and that'll be my lifestyle sorted.
Carl Robinson [00:10:34]:
Ref Yeah. For sure. It it doesn't work out like that. It's a there's a lot of stuff that either you need to do or pay someone to do. But in terms of was it worth it For all the other benefits that podcasting gave me, absolutely. Like, it it transformed me in many ways. It made me a better speaker, much more confident to approach people. It expanded my network enormously.
Carl Robinson [00:10:52]:
It opened so many doors. It's now giving me a great network in the voice technology industry, and now in the podcasting industry, which is, you know, newer one for me, ref and and led to me founding Rumble Studio, which is the thing that I'm working on right now. So all in all, ref Invaluable, and I would recommend it
James Bishop [00:11:09]:
to anyone. What would you say the biggest obstacle you faced when trying to make your podcast was?
Carl Robinson [00:11:14]:
Well, it's it's it's the time. Yeah. And balancing it with with other things. You know, like, you can find the time, but then do you wanna spend that much time As opposed to doing other stuff. You know, like, if you're looking at as a means to an end or a way to support your career or start up aspirations, you need to be able to have time to do these other things. You also wanna have a life. You know, you wanna meet your partner. You wanna get fit.
Carl Robinson [00:11:34]:
You wanna and you just don't have time to do all this stuff. So ref There's always a trade off, you know? There's always that struggle. What do I sacrifice in order to make this work?
James Bishop [00:11:42]:
It's the ultimate conundrum. Right? And I think ref You highlight there really clearly what lots of people also struggle with which is do I wanna do this podcast thing or do I wanna get fit and go to the gym, or do I want to spend time with my family, or, you know And it's just that hierarchy of needs or wants, I suppose. Totally. That makes it super tricky. And I guess as well with the podcast, it's a brand build, right? So that you don't often see an instant return. Ref you often see instant enjoyment, but not that instant return because it might take 3, 4, 5, 10, 15 years to pay off.
Carl Robinson [00:12:15]:
That's a great point. Yeah. It's a slow burn thing. It's a long term commitment. You don't see the results straight away, and the and the enjoyment will trail off soon before the results Start coming in, I would say.
James Bishop [00:12:26]:
Do you have any, like, super embarrassing or cringeworthy stories from your podcast recording?
Carl Robinson [00:12:32]:
When I listen back to the the earlier episodes, they're a bit cringeworthy because they're very different from the later episodes. And, you know, no one likes to hear this their their voice on Audio recordings, you know, like, especially when you're you're starting out. But I, you know, I made a lot of mistakes at the beginning like everyone does. And I know from my very first one, I did it with with a friend. So it was I wasn't stressed about who I was talking to, but I was stressed about what the the audience would think of me, about getting letting you know the questions right. Had everything scripted in this incredibly detailed script. I was sitting really poorly on my chair. I I'd had my knees tucked up to my chest, hunched over, ref I hunched over my notes, and so my voice is really weak.
Carl Robinson [00:13:09]:
And when I listen back to it, I'm like, oh my god, I sound really nervous, really small voice. This is, it sounds just so different from the the later episodes that in a way, it's embarrassing, but, you know, you're not gonna take it down. That's where it came from. I think it's important for people to see the the journey. Ref It's slightly annoying that your worst episodes are typically your first ones, which is the ones that most people start with. If they listen to a podcast, they'll go to episode number 1 and listen to it, and you're like, That's actually not the best, but hey.
James Bishop [00:13:36]:
I think it's the same on all creative journeys, though it's exactly the same on on YouTube. I was just cleaning up my YouTube channel the other day, and I was, oh my god, I need to hide these videos Yeah. Un publish these. That is shocking. But I think it's part of you know, it's a rite of passage, isn't it? That whole getting started tid thing.
Carl Robinson [00:13:52]:
That's it. Yeah. You should own it. You know? Feel proud that you went through it.
James Bishop [00:13:55]:
What do you think the worst piece of podcasting advice you ever got was?
Carl Robinson [00:13:59]:
Ref I was thinking you know, actually, I think it's just get started, which is simultaneously the worst and the best. Because to do a podcast, you do need to just get started, but don't just start ref Recording your episode number 1, and then release it. I think that's a terrible idea, but you only learn you learn that in, in hindsight. Now my advice to everyone is, ref First of all, make a plan as to, like, why you wanna do it, who's it for, what you know, how you're gonna make money out of it, or how you're gonna achieve the goals if it's not money. All these things have a really clear idea of what you're gonna do and why. Then, record a batch of episodes like that before you start releasing 1, so you've got a few in reserve. Because podcasting is all about consistency, pick a cadence that isn't gonna stress you out, so don't go for weekly at the beginning. I would say do 1 a month or 1 every couple of weeks At most, until you really, like, hit your stride.
Carl Robinson [00:14:44]:
And then, yeah, like recording a batch and then checking, see whether this is really the the thing that, you know, ref The thing for you before you then do the next batch because it's not for everyone.
James Bishop [00:14:54]:
And I think that piece of advice around just start is exactly what you say, best done worst. There's nothing worse than the procrastinator who just plans forever and doesn't ever get going because
Carl Robinson [00:15:04]:
there's
James Bishop [00:15:04]:
so much you can't know until you've started. But also, just starting ref isn't the best idea. Yeah. Because, you know, that's why I often think making a pilot episode is a good idea. So let's get into the nitty gritty. Ref why did your podcast die?
Carl Robinson [00:15:21]:
So, ironically, the final nail in the coffin ref Was me starting a startup to solve the problem of podcasting taking too much time. So Uh-huh. Yeah. Because I I I can see the right one wrong. Yeah. It wasn't it's a little bit ironic. It wasn't lost on me at the time, but you just I mean, podcasting is time consuming enough, but but ref Launching a startup is the most time consuming thing you'll ever do in your life. And yeah.
Carl Robinson [00:15:46]:
And I got a new baby to boot, so, all of that It was just, no. I just I just didn't have enough time. My weekends were dedicated to other things.
James Bishop [00:15:53]:
And how did you know it was the end? Was there, like, a moment when you were like, k. I have to accept this is it.
Carl Robinson [00:16:00]:
Well, actually, it's it's not the end. I'm still in denial. It's been over
James Bishop [00:16:04]:
a year. Great. Amazing. No.
Carl Robinson [00:16:06]:
I love that. It ref It is dead, but, I don't wanna admit it. But it could come back. That's the thing. I'm always I I live in hope. And, sooner or later, you may see it rise from the asset ashes in a different format. So I'm not I'm definitely not gonna go back to, you know, carefully crafting 1 on 1 interviews with people and and doing all the things I was doing before 10 hours 10 hours, per episode. Ref But if I can use Rumble Studio, for example, to record episodes in batches and scale it, then Voice Tip Podcast might come back in a in a different guise.
James Bishop [00:16:35]:
86 episodes is a lot to have recorded to just walk away from something, so I
Carl Robinson [00:16:40]:
Yeah.
James Bishop [00:16:41]:
Can see how you're still in denial.
Carl Robinson [00:16:43]:
Yeah. That's it.
James Bishop [00:16:44]:
And it it feels like, you know, you're really honest about the reason that you, you know, you walked away was the was the time thing. And I guess, I don't want to put words into your mouth but even with revenue streams and money coming in, which is lots of people's problems that they can't afford to sustain their podcast because they don't have the money or the capital to invest in outsourcing. I guess you had some of that, and it was still a drain on your time.
Carl Robinson [00:17:08]:
Ref Yeah. Because you still have to manage the outsources, and they come and go. You know, people leave, and then you've gotta train the next person up. So, you know, I work with, You know, the outsourcers in the Philippines to do some of the more routine tasks. I've worked with companies to do the editing. And, yeah, it's It's just a lot of work. And if if you if you can't even make a living out of it, then you can't do 2 full time jobs at the same time. And even if you could, That wouldn't be the most efficient use of resources.
Carl Robinson [00:17:33]:
So
James Bishop [00:17:36]:
Quick interruption from today's service to remind you that you're listening to Podcast Graveyard from One Fine Play with me, your host, James Bishop. A quick break from today's proceedings to bring you a message from the heavens. Ref making content can sometimes feel like an epic battle against the forces of darkness, sapping you of your motivation. But I have something that can increase your vitality, a source of energy like no other. I present to you Ayla, ref the world's 1st chemical free pre workout alternative made from the power of plants for long term results and a healthier you. Ayla believes in the harmony of being active and well. With Ayla, you'll feel like you've harnessed the very sense of the night, giving you the strength to boost your workouts. Are you ready to uncover the energy that lurks deep within your solve.
James Bishop [00:18:29]:
Visit the website at meetila.com for more information. And if you dare, receive a special spine tingling offer of 20% off at checkout by using the code graveyard. That's meetailadot rufthcommetaila.com. Now back to today's service. Coming up, we get into the details of the revenue generated from the show and Karl outlines why planning might be his Achilles heel. But before that, I wanted to reflect on some of Carl's key learnings on the production process for voice tech. Let's get back to the conversation. Ref what are some of the worst decisions you think you made when making your podcast?
Carl Robinson [00:19:14]:
One of them that I personally regret, the the the decisions I've made that have made me feel, like, Dirty and disappointed in myself was saying yes to guests who either I wasn't interested in at all, Like their their product is just so mundane, or I just don't care less about it. Whereas I really kinda prided myself of only talking to people that I I could genuinely, show an interest in their product. You know, I could genuinely get excited about it because that comes through in the audio. Or people who I I initially was in interested in their product, thought this is cool, but then they came on and they were just like a 100% sales pitch. They weren't interested in having a conversation. They had their lines prescripted, and It was just totally one-sided, and I just, like, felt, you know, exploited on my own show, which, I really didn't appreciate either. So that's one of the Mistakes that sticks in my mind.
James Bishop [00:20:00]:
So do you have any tips for how you screened guests? I think this is something that isn't talked about enough ref in the industry.
Carl Robinson [00:20:07]:
Well, yeah, actually. So I never really used I I did flirt with a little bit of prescreen calls, like, you know, precalls. Ref But I found that these precalls would, you know, last like half an hour, an hour, which was like more time to the process. And then I was like, well, we could've used that as a podcast. So I tried to avoid, ref Pre calls. I did have a guest application form, so I'd I'd create a form on Google forms and get them to fill it out. Because one, it tested their commitment, as in like, are you gonna show up on the day? Because there's a lot of investment on my side to prepare for an interview, and some people just don't show up, which is incredibly disrespectful. It probably shows that They don't realize how much work goes into it, but it's just really, really annoying.
Carl Robinson [00:20:45]:
But then also it also gives them a chance to say what it is that they're interested in talking about, so that ref craft my questions, so they can demonstrate their expertise. And I I felt like that that worked for me. It's not perfect. Ref Having an audio version of a of a prescreener would be great because then you can actually hear what they're like on the mic. Sometimes you get people who ref Wrote good suggestions, but sounded terrible on the show.
James Bishop [00:21:07]:
You know, saying yes or no to the right guests was probably your worst decision. What were some of your best decisions that maybe you made too late.
Carl Robinson [00:21:15]:
Yeah. So, we can do our affiliate sales. I think that was one of the things that worked really well for me in that originally, you know, I was thinking in standard terms of I could do pre rolled ads, you know, the host spoken ads. I can put logos on my newsletter, on the blog page that I create for every episode, this kind of stuff. So I would sell Packages of that. And I initially set up a Patreon with 3 different tiers offering, you know, different levels of high spoken ads and logos. That was my kind of offer for for the industry and Had some takers on that. Made some money enough to, like, cover the costs, which is great.
James Bishop [00:21:45]:
Are we in a position to talk about how much, roughly? Like, we're talking
Carl Robinson [00:21:49]:
ref From the logos in the Patreon, at its height, maybe 1,000 a month. Yeah. At its height. Okay. So it's not too bad. Like, I was selling a package of $256 a month for ref A host spoken out on 2 episodes a month, and that came with all the logo stuff, or it was like 4 I don't know what it was, $50 a month, something like that for the just the logos, which is nothing for a company, you know. Like, you look at what the typical newsletters charge. It's way more than that.
James Bishop [00:22:12]:
And how were you marketing that?
Carl Robinson [00:22:13]:
Well, I kind of marketed it. So I I did a bit of research ref And outbound stuff. I was like, hey. You know, I've got this thing, and I landed a couple of, like, really interesting deals just by doing that. So it's it's amazing. You can pick up the phone and actually people say yes. But again, that's more work than your what you're doing, you know, like so, it was good, but and then another problem with that, you know, that, Avenue is that people quit, you know, so that they're not gonna stay forever. So you've got you you always have to be looking for new customers, so that becomes part you know, really becomes a business, and you gotta have a pipeline.
Carl Robinson [00:22:43]:
Do you really want a pipeline for something that's earning you less than, you know, 1,000 a month? It's it's just too time consuming. So
James Bishop [00:22:49]:
But then it's also organic, which I guess is really interesting.
Carl Robinson [00:22:52]:
The organic ones are good. If people just go to Patreon, sign up, great. I I I launched a premium feed for the listeners as well. So for, like, $5 a month, you could get the ref ad free version of the podcast, and bonus content. But the problem with that is that creating bonus content is, again, more time, And not everyone gets to hear it, so you're creating this content for, like, 5% of your audience or something, which is a real shame, you know. Like, when you've got a guest on the show and they say something really cool, That guest wants that to be heard, right, not just by 5% of your audience. So how much can you really gate? So so yeah. So the premium thing in Patreon, it was it was nice.
Carl Robinson [00:23:26]:
It was nice to offer an ad ref Free feed, but, you know, adding extra content to it wasn't worth. In the end, I stopped doing that. I just said, let's just add free, and then they get access to back catalog. That's something that peep I found that the People are more willing to just pay just for access to the back catalog of ad free content, the new episodes. But then the thing that worked the best was affiliate sales. Ref And, you know, I had 1 or 2, partners, one of them selling courses. And these courses are quite expensive, you know, that I don't know what they were, like 1,000 or $2,000 per course. And with the affiliate deal, I got 25%.
Carl Robinson [00:24:00]:
So you only have to make 1 sale and you got $250, Which is definitely worth it, right, for a small niche podcast that only has you know, my podcast downloads were at their ref My best episodes have got, like, I don't know, 15, 1700, listens. But on average, it was maybe around 800, 500 to 800 per episode, and they grow the back catalog grows. But within the 1st 30 days, maybe it was like 5, 600, which is not bad. It's better than a lot of podcasts, but it's not like You're never gonna make ad revenue off that. So affiliate sales are, I think, the best option for small download podcasts like that because you only have to make 1 or 2 sales per show, And it's become significant.
James Bishop [00:24:38]:
And I just want to dive in with this because I completely agree with you, and thank you for bringing up the affiliate thing, and I'm also super impressed by what you did and we should champion the fact that you had revenue coming in. Right? You weren't going out pitching to Adobe or to British Airways to give you ref 1,000 and 1,000 of pounds. You were making plans and putting in products that allowed people to make, essentially, micro payments. So, ref your listening audience, whether they were a brand who wanted to take advantage or whether it was a listener, they were able to make a small contribution and to help you to grow the show and keep it going through affiliates. It has 2 really good benefits. That's 1, is that you're making these micro revenues from your audience, but the second is that if you do run an affiliate programme and you've got 1700 lessons and you convert 3 sales and you get your commission for that. You also now have data points of how many people you can actually convert for a different ticket priced product. Mhmm.
James Bishop [00:25:39]:
So if you've got a $1,000 ticket item and you know the audience converts at 1%. You've got a data point from that and no one took the risk to paying you for that ad. Ref you might have a low ticket item that converts at 10%, and now you've got data points that you can take to a potential sponsor or advertiser who will then pay ref An upfront for that opportunity. But if you haven't got the data points for that upfront, why would they take the risk on you? Ref So, you've basically got a no stress, no commitment way of proving or trialing how an advert is going to work ref through affiliate marketing. Now, once you've got it, you take the that data, and then you take it to a sponsor, and then you get them to pay for the upfront because you've got ref some kind of reference point for them to work from.
Carl Robinson [00:26:26]:
Yes. Yeah.
James Bishop [00:26:27]:
And that's how you unlock bigger deals, in my opinion.
Carl Robinson [00:26:30]:
It's a really great strategy. Yeah. We should try that sooner as well.
James Bishop [00:26:33]:
Ref what aspect of your podcast do you wish you'd put more energy into?
Carl Robinson [00:26:36]:
I think maybe the maybe the planning right at the beginning. I didn't really plan it. And so now, you know, as I was saying before, my my advice reflect plan, and I didn't plan it. You know, I just thought that would be a cool thing to do and just started doing it. And one of the things that I could have planned ref Better, perhaps, is the niche itself because I I feel like that the potential audience size is one of the biggest limiting factors ref of any kind of venture, really, whether it's a startup or a podcast. And voice technology, although it was really super cool, and ref Having a, you know, having a podcast targeting a small, highly connected audience is a great way to grow quickly within that small audience. You quickly hit a limit, And that that audience can only support so many podcasts, and there are already some some people doing it, you know, better and earlier than me. So there's, ref You know, I I realized after about a year or so, I can't grow it much bigger than this because there's just aren't that many people to listen to it.
Carl Robinson [00:27:29]:
And that limits the amount of ad revenue and affiliate sales and everything else you can get from it. So If I'd thought about it or if I'd known then what I know now, I think I would have picked something that would easily evolve into something, you know, a a wider audience. Like, just go for more marketing in general or the things that, you know, that everybody wants, like wealth, power, status, all of these kinds of stuff. Ref Even though that's not at all what the the show that I wanted to build, it would have been, like, you know, successful in inverted commas more easily.
James Bishop [00:27:56]:
I don't want to play devil's advocate, but I actually hear totally what you're saying, and with time I think you can mushroom, but I would punt that your success, and I mean success in terms of download numbers and, you know, the relationships you built and the revenues you generated ref all down to the fact that you niched so hard. Yeah.
Carl Robinson [00:28:15]:
It's true. Yeah.
James Bishop [00:28:16]:
Because as soon as you go generalist, it all goes wrong.
Carl Robinson [00:28:18]:
No. You're right. And I don't really know what the the best route is to transform a a niche a show like that into something that could be more generous?
James Bishop [00:28:25]:
You gotta keep on keeping on. This whole show, did you mourn its passing? Or were you relieved to see it go?
Carl Robinson [00:28:32]:
Like like I said, I haven't completely let it go, so I still think it will rise again at some point. I haven't haven't reached the the morning phase, But it it does disappoint me, and it has been, like, you know, hanging over me for for the last year and that it's a fantastic resource. And to just let it, you know, fade away, ref It it feels like a loss. So, yeah, I I I do I do wanna kind of make use of it. And I I still on my LinkedIn profile. You know, I still use it ref As as credibility for what I'm doing now at Rumble Studio, it is my it's part of my story.
James Bishop [00:29:00]:
How many people are listening to it now? I guess you still get a bit of outreach, and there must still be a community around it.
Carl Robinson [00:29:05]:
Oh, yeah. It's weird, yeah. I still get more than a 100 listens a week.
James Bishop [00:29:08]:
So, from everything you've learned, what is the 1 piece of advice that you would give to a podcaster just about to make that journey of making their 1st episode.
Carl Robinson [00:29:20]:
Well, I think I the 1 piece of advice, I think I've already said it, which is to make a plan. Ref So I really sit down and think about what it is you wanna do and why you wanna do it. But it kind of, you know, contradicts the next bit of advice that I would give, which is What worked for me at least, which is don't start with any, goal in mind. Don't have, like, high expectations, and do it for the love of it first, because I felt like that really worked for me. And they kind of con contradict each other because if you're doing it for the love of it, then it's then your your heart and soul will be in it. And I feel like that's a real important part of podcasting is, You know, you're putting your personality into it, your own interest. But if you only do that, then it will burn out.
James Bishop [00:30:00]:
If your podcast had a headstone, what would you put on it?
Carl Robinson [00:30:03]:
This podcast died so that yours didn't have to. Head over to rumble.studio today and start creating podcasts asynchronously.
James Bishop [00:30:11]:
I love that. That is a cheeky plug, but I absolutely love it. I like the honesty that you have that it was about time, and that whole irony of your podcast died because you were trying to build a thing that helped other people make more of theirs. Is great and I guess I can relate to that because I've moved from production to education. It's a case of taking what I've learned and helping others to to succeed and and tell stories.
Carl Robinson [00:30:34]:
So
James Bishop [00:30:34]:
so I appreciate that and I think that would be a great thing to put on your headstone.
Carl Robinson [00:30:37]:
Thank you.
James Bishop [00:30:38]:
As We move to the closing act of this podcast, where we talk about whether this podcast should be resurrected. For me, I feel like, if I'm honest, with everything that I've heard you share, you had some real successes and I'm so proud of you for some of the stuff that you did. The whole affiliate peace and the growth of the show from not really knowing anything about being a creator. You come from a developer background, not from a, you know, a creative background. So, I would say in its purest sense I get that developers are also creatives and, you know, but you know what I mean? You don't come from being a videographer or ref a designer. I think you've done phenomenally. I think that the podcast served you and it's opened up an incredible opportunity in what you're doing over at Rumble studio I am a big fan of and I would love to see succeed because I think it opens up all kinds of new opportunities for people to create and share and tell. I think what I would say is it should come back, but it should come back in an evolution whereby it's now putting you at the front.
James Bishop [00:31:41]:
So it feels like your show is very much about the guests. It was very much about what can be learned in the ref Industry, and I think that I'm a massive believer that the host is the most important part of the show. It's the only constant In your podcast there are only 2 stakeholders, you and the listeners. And they're coming back, and you're coming back, and the guests are changing, so it's about evolving the show into the Karl Robinson Show, you know? What are you learning ref And what's your journey? And what's the journey that you've been on? And I think resurrection of the show is easy for you. It's about recapturing that audience by telling some maybe honest, first person monologue type episodes that get it moving, and then it's all about an exploration of where Rumble's studio is going and the things that you're spending your time focused on as you've evolved in the voice base. So, for me, I absolutely don't think it should stay dead, I think it should come back to life, and I think that ref it just needs to evolve and have you at its heart, really.
Carl Robinson [00:32:49]:
I appreciate that. Thanks very much, James. It definitely definitely sounds good, and I would love to be able to use the tool that we're creating at Rumble to be able to resurrect my podcast, which is where it all started, and, and take some of your advice, actually, and, and share a few more of my own ideas.
James Bishop [00:33:03]:
Has this ref experience of revisiting the podcast lit a fire inside you again?
Carl Robinson [00:33:09]:
Yeah, I think it has. It's been therapeutic and, motivating.
James Bishop [00:33:12]:
I love that, and that is what we're here to do. Thank you so much for your time, I really appreciate it. Just before we go, could you tell this beautiful listening audience where they can find more about you, what you're working on at the moment.
Carl Robinson [00:33:24]:
Absolutely. Yeah. So, to find out anything about our company, you can go to rumble.studio, rumble.studio/newsletter, rumble.studio/podcast. We have some fantastic, webinars and, and workshops there, which are free to download. It will tell you all about The asynchronous process, if you're interested in starting a podcast, there's some free templates that you can use. But, talking about it specifically from an asynchronous reflect a view, like how how you would plan, those podcasts. And then we have a a webinar to take you through the the the process from from a to zed as well, produced by my, my colleague Letitia. So, re Yeah.
Carl Robinson [00:33:56]:
Rumble dot studio. That's the place.
James Bishop [00:33:58]:
Thank you. Really appreciate your time. Rest in peace, VoiceTech podcast. Ref I think you'll agree its memory has been a treasure to discuss today. Before we go let's take a moment to explore the lessons from this service. Number 1, the importance of managing expectations. It's unlikely you'll be an overnight sensation. Life will simply get in the way especially in a world with so many distractions but if you draw attention to the commitment, pace yourself and manage your expectations from the start you're much less likely to get disenfranchised and burnout.
James Bishop [00:34:37]:
The 2nd lesson connects really well to the 1st and it's about time management. Making content is time consuming and challenging. There's plenty of talented creators out there but very few are able to manage their time to meet their own demands. That's why outlining a structured realistic plan is so important. Our final lesson today is about evolution. Karl made the right move in making content for a niche at the start but in order to grow, you eventually have to reach out to neighboring audiences and expand expand your reach. Like Darwin taught us, if you want to survive you need to evolve, it's the same for your content otherwise It's really difficult to grow. At The Last Service, we were haunted by Ryan Sullivan, host of the show Podcast Principles.
James Bishop [00:35:26]:
Ref Ryan explained why he originally wanted to make the podcast, spoke frankly about the prospect of bringing it back and we discussed the challenges of being your full authentic self when making content. I'd highly recommend paying your respects and giving it a listen. As we bring this service to a close. We ask you to please pay your respects by recommending this episode to someone you think will find it valuable. And if you or someone you know has a podcast cast. It's been laid to rest and would like to give it a proper send off. We'd love to have you on. Please email us at podcast graveyard at onefineplay.com.
James Bishop [00:36:05]:
A quick thank you to those who have helped make today's service possible. Kasar Faroozia was the producer and editor. Conor Foley was our assistant producer and Selena Christofides put together the visuals. Special thanks go to Andrew Davey for the inspiration. In parting, let us not dwell on the darkness of this moment but instead let us focus on the light that voice tech brought into our lives. Its memory will forever be a guiding star leading us through the night. I'm James Bishop and this
Carl Robinson [00:36:46]:
ref