Podcast Pontifications

Yes, I think you, as a working podcaster, should attend a podcast conference if you can find the budget for it. The chance to build connections among, swap ideas with, and learn from other podcasters is reason enough to go. (And if we met while I was there and the sticker I gave you was enough to entice you to check this out, welcome!)

Beyond the personal connections, podcast conferences are used by many podcasters as an immersive learning experience. There is a lot of information presented on the various stages. But frankly, there’s a lot of misinformation presented as well. The tough part is identifying what is fact and what is fiction (with or without malicious intent). And that’s an especially difficult task if you’re new or inexperienced with podcasting.

I have the utmost respect for the people who organize these conferences. Most of them -- and especially the Podfest organizers -- take their responsibilities seriously, ensuring that underrepresented and marginalized voices have a chance to be on stage. They understand that “tenure” in podcasting is ludicrous and that new ways of doing things are oftentimes more valuable and usually much more relevant than going-stale processes cobbled together a dozen years ago.

But that presents a vetting problem. Not vetting for experience. Vetting for facts and truthful information. 

Regardless of what conference you attend, some people on stage just don't have the proper facts, often regurgitating myths and falsehoods, or making assumptions and generalizations that are demonstrably false.

Unfortunately, attendees in the audience who lack the experience to sniff out the bullshit or keenly tuned into those hard-to-kill myths accept what’s being said on the stage.

How do you (and I) continue to support for the organization, the conference, the community, the comradery, and all the other great things make podcasting conferences special, yet also maintain a healthy dose of skepticism?

How do conference organizers fight this problem, preserving their own integrity which may be in jeopardy when the signal-to-noise ratio gets too small? 

Honestly, I don't know that they can. 

I don't know that they have the time or bandwidth. I know it's a lot of work to put an event on of any size. Just considering the time it would take to vet or fact-check each presentation would be massive. And likely untenable. 

That means the burden is on your shoulders. When you attend one of these conferences, you have to put on your skeptic hat. 

The barrier to entry for getting on stage at a podcasting conference is pretty low. Write up a very good description of your talk, give it an amazing title, and the selection committee is going to look upon it favorably. And given all the half-assed submissions they receive, it’s not hard to bubble to the top. 

Again, that’s not a bad thing. I don’t want it to be harder to speak at these events. But you need to understand that the person on stage isn't necessarily the expert they reported themselves to be. 

Ask your friends who also podcast about their experiences with podcast conferences or events  -- physical or online -- and the misinformation they might have encountered. Because it's everywhere and is the biggest reason I don't engage in the various Facebook forums dedicated to podcasting. There’s just too much misinformation, and it bums me out. I

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Share this with a friend: https://podcastpontifications.com/episode/balancing-skepticism-support-at-a-podcast-conference

Podcast Pontifications is published by Evo Terra four times a week and is aimed at the working podcaster. The purpose of this show is to make podcasting better, not just easier.

Follow Evo on Twitter for more podcasting insights as they come.

And if you need a professional in your podcasting corner, please visit SimplerMedia.pro to see how Simpler Media Productions can help your firm. Podcasting is our only business!

Mentioned in this episode:

Support For Abortion Rights

While Americans overwhelmingly support the right of an individual to make their own decisions about abortion, unfortunately, that right is no longer protected everywhere in the U.S. The Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade on June 24th.

This is not about politics. This is about learning lessons from the current frenzy that dominates the news here in America and abroad. Yes, I’m talking about American politics, but only so we can apply some lessons to the world of podcasting.

In order for Presidential wanna-bes to become a viable candidate, they first have to appeal to their base. The same thing holds true for podcasters. Your base is asking themselves this question: Should they help support your (or your show’s) viability?

So… is it? If so, you’ve got your base of volunteers and supporters. The people who may contribute to your show early on and maybe leave a rating and review of your show.

Once your base is engaged and is supporting your viability, it’s time to take your message to the masses. Politicians have to appeal to their own party hardliners. In podcasting, the group you want to attract is the hard-core podcast listener. And they have their own agenda: Does your show increase the viability of podcasting overall?

if you are producing the type of show that they feel exemplifies what podcasting can be, then you’ll get the benefit of their word of mouth. And some of these people, like the journalists who cover podcasting, have very loud voices indeed.

After that, the people running for office have to appeal to the people who vote. Likewise, podcasters should appeal to the people who listen to podcasts. And when doing so, they have to understand why a listener would choose to listen to them. As before, it comes down to an evaluation on their part: Does your show validate their worldview?

Yes, it really does boil down to this: what's in it for them? Yes, the 30% to 40% of the people who listen to podcasts have an appetite for new content. If it’s good enough, they may be interested in listening to the content you put out. But it has to be more than good. It has to validate their worldview.

I’ll leave you with two key takeaways from this: 

1. You don't have to make podcasts that appeal to everyone. 

Politicians don't try and appeal to everyone. They only appeal to people who are likely to vote. Podcasters should make their efforts appealing only to people who are likely to listen to podcasts. And before you go to the larger world of podcast consumers, make sure you’re appealing to those inside of the podcasting community and to your own small group of base listeners.

2. Big shows don’t have to worry about a small base or the podcasting community. 

At least not as much. So if you're taking inspiration from the uber-successful shows, keep in mind that shows with hundreds of thousands or millions of listeners play by a different set of rules. Sort of like when politicians change their focus after they get elected. If you're not at that level, you still need to tend to the care and feeding of all three groups of people.

Share this piece with your friends who also podcast. Ask them what they’re doing to make sure they stay engaged all the way up the chain. And if you think you’re doing an exceptional job in the second group, let me know, because I have a keen interest in making podcasting better. 

I’m off to Podfest Expo in Orlando tomorrow, so no piece will come out tomorrow. But I will be back Monday of next week for another Podcast Pontifications. 

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Share this with a friend: https://podcastpontifications.com/episode/the-primary-politics-of-podcasting

Podcast Pontifications is published by Evo Terra four times a week and is aimed at the working podcaster. The purpose of this show is to make podcasting better, not just easier.

Follow Evo on Twitter for more podcasting insights as they come.

And if you need a professional in your podcasting corner, please visit SimplerMedia.pro to see how Simpler Media Productions can help your firm. Podcasting is our only business!

Mentioned in this episode:

Support For Abortion Rights

While Americans overwhelmingly support the right of an individual to make their own decisions about abortion, unfortunately, that right is no longer protected everywhere in the U.S. The Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade on June 24th.

Podcast fiction is probably my favorite genre. If you're thinking today’s podcast fiction is simply a resurgence of audio drama 1930s radio, you have the wrong assumption. While podcast fiction certainly can replicate that style, today’s podcast fiction scene is much more broad and rich than that.

No matter what kind of fiction (books, TV, or movies) you like, there’s probably a podcast fiction production out there for you. I encourage you to go find it and have a listen.

But things aren’t perfect in the world of podcast fiction. The genre is oftentimes misunderstood (or underestimated) by other podcasters and those who cover podcasting alike. Journalists often pay half-effort lip service to the genre, perpetuating myths that keep people way. Inside the larger podcasting community, producers of podcast fiction constantly struggle to have their voices heard and gain acceptance. Not out of malice, but usually out of ignorance. 

There are many issues that plague podcast fiction that contributes to its ongoing ostracization. I’ll tackle a few of them head-on:

An oft-cited problem with podcast fiction has to do with issues of quality. If you randomly sample a piece of podcast fiction, there’s a non-zero chance that your encounter will be with something that’s decidedly not-great. 

But why is that surprising to you? Examine any creative endeavor, and you’ll find the same thing. Sturgeon’s Law always applies to everything.

As ad revenue continues to pour into podcasting, producers of podcast fiction are often locked out. The people who sell advertising on podcasts don't know about podcast fiction. Or if they do, they don't understand the different listening behavior of fans of podcast fiction vs those who listen to “normal” podcasts.

But those ad salespeople need to get over that, as they're missing a golden opportunity. What makes podcast advertising a better buy than other forms of media? The live host read. And who better to do a live host read than people who make fiction come to life! 

Like, really hard. From writing all the way down to post-production, making great podcast fiction requires a different spin on just about every facet of podcast creation. 

It's a giant amount of work at every step of the process of making great podcast fiction. I’m amazed people even try. 

So what can podcasters who do not do podcast fiction learn from the podcast fiction community? I think there's a lot we can learn about the process of and work behind making great audio, sure. But I think our biggest takeaway should be comradery. 

I maintain a list of podcast fiction productions that I really enjoy on Podchaser called Evo-licious Podcast Fiction. Rest assured that the quality of each show on my list is top-notch. And yes, you can send me your recommendations of other podcast fiction shows I should try out and consider adding to my shared list.

I shall be back tomorrow with yet another Podcast Pontifications. 

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Share this with a friend: https://podcastpontifications.com/episode/knives-out-podcast-fiction-vs-the-world

Podcast Pontifications is published by Evo Terra four times a week and is aimed at the working podcaster. The purpose of this show is to make podcasting better, not just easier.

Follow Evo on Twitter for more podcasting insights as they come.

And if you need a professional in your podcasting corner, please visit SimplerMedia.pro to see how Simpler Media Productions can help your firm. Podcasting is our only business!

Mentioned in this episode:

Support For Abortion Rights

While Americans overwhelmingly support the right of an individual to make their own decisions about abortion, unfortunately, that right is no longer protected everywhere in the U.S. The Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade on June 24th.

Podcasting has some really good benchmarking statistics. But what we (or at least I) really need to see is a distribution chart that shows clusters of podcasts by audience size.

We don't have that distribution chart in podcasting. Or if we do, I haven't seen it. Yet this is something that the podcast hosting companies could make for us. It’s something that third-party tracking services like Chartable could make for us. They're not, but I really wish they would.

So without an actual chart, I’m going to speculate that podcasting’s distribution chart would look very hollowed-out. 

If we grouped shows by the number of listeners/downloads, I speculate that we would see a really big cluster of shows at the bottom of the distribution chart. The further along the x-axis we travel, the size of the clusters of shows would drop off precipitously. How precipitously? We don’t know, because the data hasn’t been presented to us in this way. (Yet?) Continuing on, I’m betting that we’d see (or perhaps we’ll start to see) a new cluster of shows growing at the high end of the scale.

And a big gap in the middle. Hence the hollowing out of the middle of podcasting. Here’s why:

1. Big podcast creation companies are getting more money.
2.  Podcast listening apps and directories get better at presenting better content.
3. Non-podcasting big media will continue to get excited about podcasting.

1. More people listening to podcasts means more people dabbling in podcasting.
2. More services will make easier to podcast. 
3. 
   
4. Smaller shows are often happy staying small.

What do the podcasters you hang out with think about that statement? Are you sharing your numbers with one another? You should, and then you can make your own distribution curve to share with others. Tell your podcasting compatriots to listen to this episode of Podcast Pontifications and see if you can get them interested in contributing your own distribution graph. Maybe you’ll inspire others. Heck, I’ll even play along if you ask!

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Share this with a friend: https://podcastpontifications.com/episode/podcastings-hollowed-out-middle-class

Podcast Pontifications is published by Evo Terra four times a week and is aimed at the working podcaster. The purpose of this show is to make podcasting better, not just easier.

Follow Evo on Twitter for more podcasting insights as they come.

And if you need a professional in your podcasting corner, please visit SimplerMedia.pro to see how Simpler Media Productions can help your firm. Podcasting is our only business!

Mentioned in this episode:

Support For Abortion Rights

While Americans overwhelmingly support the right of an individual to make their own decisions about abortion, unfortunately, that right is no longer protected everywhere in the U.S. The Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade on June 24th.

So today I’m going to think through how COVID-19 could impact podcasting and the lives of podcasters. I’m not a doctor, so we won’t be talking prevention. Not my job.

Will people like you and me opt out of attending podcasting events? Will we cancel already-booked travel plans? How will attendance of local events be impacted?

How will interview-based podcasts change? Some enjoy doing that in-person, where the host sits face-to-face with the guest. Some prefer to capture the ambient sounds of the venue as part of the show’s flavor. How will they adapt if their guests can’t or won’t meet in person?

 Then there’s the economics. What happens to your show’s primary income stream if budgetary constraints cause advertisers to pull back? Or supporters? Or people who normally buy your products/services but are out of a job?

I worry a little bit about the global supply chain as well. I've got all of my equipment and you probably do as well. It's more disruption in the global services chain that we podcasters rely on to distribute our episodes everywhere that concerns me. 

If you've not been thinking about how COVID-19 will impact your podcast, you probably should start. Yes, on top of the worrying you’re already doing about how the virus might personally impact you, your family, and people that you care about, I need you to also think about the impact COVID-19 may have on your podcasting efforts. It's hard to prepare when we’re in the early stages and really don't know how big the possible impact might be. But thinking through the things mentioned today can only help you as you continue your podcasting efforts through this health crisis. 

Pro tip: Reach out to your fellow podcasters and find out what they're thinking or worried about. Tell them you heard this episode of Podcast Pontifications and are bringing up the conversation so everyone in your podcasting circle is as prepared as they can be.

Enjoy your Friday tomorrow (I know it’s Thursday, but don't do episodes of this show on Friday) I'll be back on Monday for a short week because of Podfest Expo (no, I didn’t cancel). With that in mind, I shall see you on Monday for yet another Podcast Pontifications. 

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Share this with a friend: https://podcastpontifications.com/episode/podcasting-through-the-covid-19-crisis

Podcast Pontifications is published by Evo Terra four times a week and is aimed at the working podcaster. The purpose of this show is to make podcasting better, not just easier.

Follow Evo on Twitter for more podcasting insights as they come.

And if you need a professional in your podcasting corner, please visit SimplerMedia.pro to see how Simpler Media Productions can help your firm. Podcasting is our only business!

Mentioned in this episode:

Support For Abortion Rights

While Americans overwhelmingly support the right of an individual to make their own decisions about abortion, unfortunately, that right is no longer protected everywhere in the U.S. The Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade on June 24th.

The decision to put content -- popular content -- behind a paywall is always an agonizing choice for any decent person. Podcasters included. 

It’s not a binary choice. Nor is it a choice that any podcaster gets to make. Successfully implementing a switch to directly charging for access is, for most podcasts, completely dependent on the size of the audience.

Here’s an easily busted myth: Every single person who currently subscribes/listens to your free podcast will continue to listen to (and therefore pay for) your content when you put it behind a paywall.

That’s categorically false. The question really becomes this; how many will, and how much can I make?

On average, you’ll be lucky to see 2% of the people who currently subscribe to your show for free switching over to the paid model. Sure, it can be higher. But it can also be lower. 2% is a good number from which you can do your projections. 

Nota bene: Subscribing to a behind-the-paywall podcast isn’t any harder than subscribing to any other podcast, with the exception that (for now) these for-fee podcasts don’t show up in podcast apps or directories. 

Let’s get back to that 2% number. If you have a thousand people listening to your episodes on a regular basis, you can expect 20 make the for-fee switch. If you're charging five bucks a month for access, that's $100.

For me, going to a fee-based model doesn’t make sense for my podcast. I have roughly 300 people who listen to me. 2% means I’d have six people paying, so a paltry sum. But if I had 10,000? Or 100,000? I’d have to consider it.

If my thoughts have you ready to jump on the paywall bandwagon, I’d advise caution and some math before you take the plunge. There are many, many things to consider. Choose wisely. This is something you shouldn't rush into. 

My advice? Check with your podcasting friends. See if your fellow podcasters are considering this as well, weighing the size of their audience against potential revenue gains to determine viability. And discussing the potential (real, actually) outcry from current listeners if there were to make the switch. 

Send your friends this episode and blame me for your bringing up the conversation. That way they can listen to a neutral 3rd party’s opinion and not bring the judgment hammer on your head. I can take the heat! 

What do you think about this? Email me at [email protected] and tell me where you stand on the topic of putting some or all of your podcast content behind a paywall.

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Share this with a friend: https://podcastpontifications.com/episode/paywalls-podcasting-and-prejudice

Podcast Pontifications is published by Evo Terra four times a week and is aimed at the working podcaster. The purpose of this show is to make podcasting better, not just easier.

Follow Evo on Twitter for more podcasting insights as they come.

And if you need a professional in your podcasting corner, please visit SimplerMedia.pro to see how Simpler Media Productions can help your firm. Podcasting is our only business!

Mentioned in this episode:

Support For Abortion Rights

While Americans overwhelmingly support the right of an individual to make their own decisions about abortion, unfortunately, that right is no longer protected everywhere in the U.S. The Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade on June 24th.

Episodic podcasts don’t require the listener to back up to the beginning to get caught up. The most recent episode is sufficient, and even someone does take an immediate shine to your content, they might go back and pick up two or three of your prior episodes. It's not all that common where people download your entire catalog. 

Or is it?

My bigger concerns when people back and listen to everything ever produced by me are twofold.

1. Dealing with evolved best practices. 

2. Dealing with evolved cultural norms.

I am deep in the process of fixing some poor decisions I made when I started this show back in 2018. In short, I’m (finally) combining everything into a single property instead of relying on various disparate systems to present the show and episodes. The hard work is the boring part where I copy and paste content from various platforms to the new platforms. As I do it, I'm seeing some things that I'm not sure should be out there anymore. 

Can I trust a listener will know that any bad advice I gave back then has been updated? I don’t think I can. I don't mention the date during the recording. And podcast listening apps don’t go out of their way to show the date when a show was recorded. And I don’t really want them to, as I’m working hard to make evergreen content that is discovered by search engines, so I don’t want someone turned off by thinking the content is old and outdated. Except sometimes it is outdated! Agh! The angst is real.

Should a podcast be held responsible for what they said 10 years ago? Or should the responsibility fall on the listener to examine publishing date so that they take the contents with the context of time? That just sounds weasely as I type it! 

I don't know the right answer to this question. I want you to think about it. I think everybody has to come up with their own right answer. 

What are you going to do? What's your plan with all of this? Maybe you should have this conversation with another podcaster to find out what their plan is. I think these kinds of decisions are best made when we discuss them together. So talk with other podcasts at the next meetup, online chat, or when you go to Facebook or Reddit to see what the various forums have to say. Ask your fellow podcasts how are they dealing with the skeletons in their podcasting closet. 

And of course, you can tell them it was an episode of Podcast Pontifications that sparked the question. Yes, this is me asking you to tell someone to listen to this particular episode (and the whole show) because it’s helpful for any working podcaster, right? I mean, that's why you listen. 

If you want to tell me what you're doing to address your podcasting skeletons, email me at [email protected]. I shall be back tomorrow with yet another Podcast Pontifications.

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Share this with a friend: https://podcastpontifications.com/episode/dealing-with-the-skeletons-in-your-podcasting-closet

Podcast Pontifications is published by Evo Terra four times a week and is aimed at the working podcaster. The purpose of this show is to make podcasting better, not just easier.

Follow Evo on Twitter for more podcasting insights as they come.

And if you need a professional in your podcasting corner, please visit SimplerMedia.pro to see how Simpler Media Productions can help your firm. Podcasting is our only business!

Mentioned in this episode:

Support For Abortion Rights

While Americans overwhelmingly support the right of an individual to make their own decisions about abortion, unfortunately, that right is no longer protected everywhere in the U.S. The Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade on June 24th.

Hang around with enough podcasters who've been at it for a while and you’ll eventually hear many of them ask the same question: “I don't know if my podcast is as big as it should be.” Or perhaps, in rare cases, “I don't know if the quality of the content I'm putting out is as good as it should be.” 

The best way to break the complacency trap is by understanding where you could be. You might have aspirations, but quite often they aren’t written down or codified in any way so that you or your podcast team can measure the effectiveness of your efforts. 

When you're not really sure what success looks like, you just keep going about the motions. You become complacent. Complacency breeds familiarity. Familiarity becomes habit. And habits develop into ruts. You do the same thing day after day, week after week, or month after month, without any growth or change. 

Once you’ve identified where you want to go, you're going to have to work harder. You have to dig in deeper, roll up your sleeves, and spend more time making great content. Can you do that? Can you afford that? Is that really what you want? Are you willing to completely overhaul your show? Are you ready to look at the consumption numbers provided by Apple Podcasts and Spotify to see exactly how much (or little) of your content is being consumed by listeners? Are you willing to make drastic changes when you face evidence that what you are doing right now is not resonating with your audience?

I know that’s a heavy set of questions to dump on you on a Monday morning, podcaster. But at some point, if you really do want to move closer to viability, you’re going to have to face the reality those questions present. Because complacency is the biggest mistake that mid-level podcasters are making today.

Raise this question with the other podcasters you interface with. Ask them if they’re complacent with where their show is today. Ask if they are happy or if there are things they want to do differently. Just by having this conversation with other podcasters, it’ll help you get over the hump and understand your own ideas around complacency and your podcasting efforts.

And while you’re having this conversation, be sure to tell them what sparked the idea. Maybe they're not yet listening to Podcast Pontifications. Maybe they need the regular kick-start I try to provide here on the program. I don't sell ads and I’m not even selling this type of advice, so please tell a friend about PodcastPontifications.com. [email protected] reaches me, and I’m always happy to answer any questions from listeners. Fire away!

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Share this with a friend: http://podcastpontifications.libsyn.com/mid-level-podcasters-biggest-mistake-complacency

Podcast Pontifications is published by Evo Terra four times a week and is aimed at the working podcaster. The purpose of this show is to make podcasting better, not just easier.

Follow Evo on Twitter for more podcasting insights as they come.

And if you need a professional in your podcasting corner, please visit SimplerMedia.pro to see how Simpler Media Productions can help your firm. Podcasting is our only business!

Mentioned in this episode:

Support For Abortion Rights

While Americans overwhelmingly support the right of an individual to make their own decisions about abortion, unfortunately, that right is no longer protected everywhere in the U.S. The Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade on June 24th.

The promise most low-cost podcast media hosting providers make with you is for “unmetered” bandwidth. It doesn't matter how big your show gets, they say. They’ve got the bandwidth taken care of, and your monthly bill won’t increase. 

Well... what if I told you that wasn't always true? 

What I’m about to say should not cause the vast majority of podcasters to take drastic action. For the overwhelming majority of podcasts, you’ll always keep paying whatever you're paying right now for podcast hosting. 

If you’re successful at growing your podcast into a commercially viable enterprise, to the point you’re getting tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of downloads on your episodes, your podcast hosting company will be forced to make a business decision, because you’re costing them thousands of dollars each month. They’d like that back, and even to turn a profit so they can stay in business.

Look at the contract you probably didn’t read that spells out the terms of service with your hosting company. Chances are, you’ll find a clause that states something along the lines of, “If your show gets too big, we're going to reach out to you and find ways to help us recoup our real costs.” 

If you really do have designs on growing your show (and a plan to do so) to the point where it's commercially viable, then you need to prepare for this eventuality. Because it will come up. You need to be eyes wide open that someone will have to pay the bandwidth cost eventually. 

Because TANSTAAFL. 

Do you have a friend in podcasting who needs to know about this? Do me a favor and send them this particular episode. Word of mouth works really well to grow a podcast. There are almost 900,000 podcasts available, but I’m nowhere near having 900,000 people listening to my program, so I’m not facing the reality I just laid out. So don’t worry: You can send me as many listeners as you like! 

And if you have questions for me on this topic or anything related to making podcasting better, reach out to me at [email protected]. 

Enjoy the rest of your Thursday and your Friday tomorrow, as I don’t produce this show on Friday. Instead, I'll be back on Monday with yet another Podcast Pontifications.

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Share this with a friend: http://podcastpontifications.libsyn.com/hitting-the-limits-of-low-cost-podcast-hosting

Podcast Pontifications is published by Evo Terra four times a week and is aimed at the working podcaster. The purpose of this show is to make podcasting better, not just easier.

Follow Evo on Twitter for more podcasting insights as they come.

And if you need a professional in your podcasting corner, please visit SimplerMedia.pro to see how Simpler Media Productions can help your firm. Podcasting is our only business!

Mentioned in this episode:

Support For Abortion Rights

While Americans overwhelmingly support the right of an individual to make their own decisions about abortion, unfortunately, that right is no longer protected everywhere in the U.S. The Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade on June 24th.

Last week at Podcast Movement Evolutions 2020, I paid a lot of attention to the conversations regarding podcast advertising as a business model. Mostly because of the new moves in podcast ad tech (something I’ll dig into in future episodes) that are increasingly interesting to my ex-ad-exec brain. But also to better understand where the threshold is today for having a show with an audience size big enough to be attractive to advertisers.

So what’s big enough to be worthy of consideration? For many years, the threshold tossed around the community has been 5,000. No, not 5,000 total downloads over the life of your show. 5,000 downloads of a single episode of your show after it’s been live for 30 days.

But according to the people I spoke with and saw on stage last week, that 5,000 download number is woefully out of date. The new threshold floated around was double that. Or quadruple that. Or in the case of one big direct response advertiser who talked about the success his company is having with podcast advertising, it’s 10x that. His team won’t even consider booking ads with shows that have less 50,000 downloads per episode after 30 days.

So how much money is that? In the episode, I do a basic formula to show that each download of your show can be worth a dime. So if you have 5,000 downloads, that’s $500. And it’s hard to run a commercially viable business with a revenue stream of $500. $5000 is better… but you still need extra revenue sources to make that a going concern.

So here’s a radical thought. Assuming your show is not yet at that level (most aren’t), and further assuming that you aren’t financially ruined if you eschew the $50 or $100 a month of ad revenue you might get from some of the self-service podcast ad providers… 

What if you focused on growing your show through word of mouth? 

 No appeals to donate. No appeals to rate or review. Only a single call-to-action, repeated in every single episode for a year, that sincerely asks the listener to tell one friend about the show each and every time they listen.

So let’s try it. If you got this far, you're either a working podcaster or you know working podcasters. Would you find one of them -- just one -- today and tell them about my show, Podcast Pontifications? Shoot them a text, an email, or send them a DM right now and tell them to listen. Thanks in advance!

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Share this with a friend: https://podcastpontifications.com/episode/is-selling-ads-on-your-podcast-worth-a-dime

Podcast Pontifications is published by Evo Terra four times a week and is aimed at the working podcaster. The purpose of this show is to make podcasting better, not just easier.

Follow Evo on Twitter for more podcasting insights as they come.

And if you need a professional in your podcasting corner, please visit SimplerMedia.pro to see how Simpler Media Productions can help your firm. Podcasting is our only business!

Mentioned in this episode:

Support For Abortion Rights

While Americans overwhelmingly support the right of an individual to make their own decisions about abortion, unfortunately, that right is no longer protected everywhere in the U.S. The Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade on June 24th.