Tara Sands was an imaging voice for a radio station I was programming in my radio days. It always exciting to hire new voice talent to put a fresh sound to your station. Her work extends well beyond FM, into some of the things you might hear like cartoons and commercials, but also in Anime, Audiobooks and now Podcast. If there's audio to be recorded, she is likely recording it. In this episode, you will hear about Tara's teenage years in New Jersey where she took in a few Bruce Springsteen concerts and would take trips to New York to perform in theatre. We also spoke about the joyful consequences of popularity when you are a voice of Bulbasaur in the popular cartoon Pokemon. There's a whole world of celebrity conventions and your social media changes forever. We also talked at length about the pandemic and its affects on the work that she does. Tara has not visited a studio since March 2020 and made significant upgrades to her studio in order to make it "hard wired" for internet connectivity and upgraded for speed. Voiceover talent will especially love this deep dive into her work life and career. There''s an awful lot of things that I wanted to ask after the interview was over - but that's what the episode page is for. If your radio station would like to have Tara as an imaging voice, please reach out to her via her webpage. Tara has a brand new podcast! It's a retrospective show about the 4Kids era of television as told by the people who were actually there. Hosted by voice actress Tara Sands and podcaster/artist Steve Yurko! 4Kids is the company that brought Pokémon, Yu-Gi-Oh!, One Piece and more to English speaking audiences. Congrats Tara and Steve on this vernture! Check out the trailer here and naturally hit the follow or subscribe button on your favourite podcast app. Tara also does some Streamily signings from time to time. I had to figure out what these were but it's live autographs signings. You can check out Tara's page and if there are no events posted, just sign up for for an email alert. You can check out the last one she did which was streamed on her Instagram page. There's more awesome stuff here! Like Voiceover tips! Tara mentioned that she keeps straws in her studio to practice Straw Phonation. Here is a demonstration of the technique and how it can help with singing and voicework. We also talked about love for Trader Joe's. It's a little hard for me to shop there as my closest Trader Joe's is 7 hours away. However, it is still possible for me to get some of the frozen products and make it back to Canada. I made mention of the Inside Trader Joe's Podcast which is coincidentally hosted by two other people named.... wait for it.... Matt & Tara. A brand new season is underway. Here are our Trader Joe picks! Tara is all in on the Penne Arrabbiata. There have been some other pasta offerings recently including Cacio e Pepe but this is the standalone for pasta excellence. Matt loves most of the salsas but finds this Tomatillo Yellow Chili Salsa to be exceptional. (UPDATE: This appears to be discontinued!!!!) Finally, I mentioned in the episode that podcasting has an equivalent to the Internet Movie Database called Podchaser. it's a great way to catalogue your podcast appearances. If you have a podcast, sign up for an account and credit your contributors. SHOW TRANSCRIPTION Tara Sands (VO) 00:00:01 The Sound Off podcast. The podcast about broadcast with Matt Cundill starts now. This week I'm speaking with Tara Sands. She's the voice you just heard, provided you didn't fast forward over the intro. If you did that, please restart the show in order to get the full Tara Sands experience. I was first introduced to Tara Sands through Kyle Taylor, who was at The Edge in 2013 and is now actually doing imaging at Indie 88 in Toronto. Anyhow, we were looking for a new imaging voice, and he sent me something like this. Tara Sands (VO) 00:00:37 $1,000. Take a chunk off your credit card. Go nuts on itunes, think about how much canned ham that is. Hey, it's your $1,000 spend it how you like. New alternative now, not six months from now. This is new alternative. A new Edge recipe. Smashing Pumpkins Pie. You can really taste the Billy Corrigan. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:01:03 And then I thought, that sounds cool. So we hired her. Tara Sands (VO) 00:01:07 It's one thing to see the band. It's another to meet the band. Tara Sands (VO) 00:01:12 Power 97 presents The Black Keys October 25 at MTS center. Tara Sands (VO) 00:01:18 Win tickets to the show by identifying this off-key Black Keys song. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:01:26 Tara also does voice imaging for CHR stations. Tara Sands (VO) 00:01:29 Your Snapchat story looks like you had a rough weekend hydrating you with commercial free music. It's the unofficial kickoff of summer, so Monday we are officially slacking off. 101.5 WBNQ throw back Thursday and country stations when the lights come on and the crowd roars. Be there to witness Jason Aldean live with 101.9 The Buzz. Get your hands on tickets all week. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:02:00 But radio imaging is just one part of the many ways she uses her voice. She's best known in Anglophone countries as the voice of Bulbasaur in the long running Pokemon series. And there are endless credits on the Internet Movie Database for television, anime, cartoons and so much more. She's also a voice you might hear on audiobooks. And now podcasts. Tara Sands joins me from her home studio in Los Angeles. Happy belated birthday. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:02:29 Thank you. Thank you, Matt. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:02:32 How much that is written about you on the Internet is true? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:02:35 Oh, that's a good question. I'd say most is true. They get some of the characters I've played over the years wrong because I've been doing this long enough that there was no IMDb when I started. So there's some misinformation about what characters I played. One of the shows I worked on for many years was Pokemon. I'm miscredited as playing a bunch of roles and I'm doing a comic convention next week and they put a character I didn't play on my poster. And I was like, oh, guys, I didn't play that because then sometimes what happens is someone will bring me like a picture of that character to sign and then I have to disappoint them and be like, the Internet's wrong. I didn't play that. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:03:16 Should they check IMDb for the correct information? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:03:20 It's mostly correct, but it's- IMDB is so weird because they let people add stuff without verifying it. But then getting stuff taken off is really difficult. So there were like a bunch of roles that I knew I didn't play that I tried for years to get taken off of there. I don't know how I eventually got it done, but I mean, again, it took years and some of the shows are so old that I don't remember if I worked on them. I guess I should go back and watch because sometimes I go in for like an hour and do some small characters. And again, I didn't take notes back then. I wish I did. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:03:55 How many entries are there for you up there? It's like pages and pages. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:03:59 I don't I mean, it's not insane, but you think about it compared to like an on camera actor, voice acting work for cartoons, we're not in there as much. So even if I just did one episode of something, that's another entry, whereas that same entry for an on camera job would have been a lot more work, let's say. Not that it's not hard work. But again, I can be credited for a job that took me an hour. That's not happening in the on camera world. And then there are jobs that I've done for years, and that's just one entry in there. It evens out. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:04:30 I've seen you joke before that you get paid to do what you used to get in trouble in school for. And that's talk. Did you talk a lot in school? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:04:37 Yes, I talked a lot. I don't know what I had to say that was so important. I'm sure it was nothing that crucial that I needed to get out, but I've always just- I mean, you can tell I'm rambling right now. When I was even a little kid, I talked I loved imitating commercials. So I used to get detention for talking too much. If they only knew, and now I'm paid to talk too much. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:05:05 What was life growing up like in 80s and 90s in New Jersey? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:05:09 Jersey? Well, big hair. That's the most important part. Loss of Hairspray. It was great. I mean, I lived close enough to New York that I felt really lucky to have access to great theater and things like that that I think really shaped me. And then I was able to because I was so close to New York start auditioning when I was in high school. Luckily, my parents, I begged my parents to let me. They were not pushing this on me at all. But yeah, being in New York, it was sort of the best of both. I could have like a backyard to run around in and then get to the city really easily. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:05:48 How does anybody know at that age? I want to go voice commercials. I want to be the voice of something in particular. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:05:54 Oh, no, I did not. I didn't know what a voiceover was. I was a theater kid. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:05:59 So you were going to New York for acting auditions. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:06:03 Yeah. So I was in a local singing competition. That's how I even met my first manager. And the first audition she sent me on happened to be for a voiceover. That was just in addition to whatever else I was auditioning for. But that was the first thing I auditioned for through them and booked. I had already been doing some theater in New York and some singing stuff. So I got that first job. I was like, what is this? What am I doing? And I just really liked being in the studio. When they came up, I would do them. It wasn't until many years later that I was like, I think I only want to do this job, this part of the acting world. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:06:40 What was your first job? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:06:42 It was a wart commercial. It was for wart cream. Very fancy first job. I think I said something like, EW, gross, a wart. I think it was a demo and I'm sure it probably never aired, but yeah, I was like, wait, that's it. I'm done. And it was fun. I was in the booth with someone else. Like, we got to play off of each other. I think it was like, I wish I could remember who like, to this day because we're not wearing costumes when we're voice acting. The headphones, to me, are sort of my transition. Like, okay, now I'm in work mode, now I'm whatever. Like, I'm looking at myself in the video that we have on the screen and I just want to sing We Are the World from the video where they're holding their headphones. That's still the image I have in my brain of what cool headphones are. In animation, they discourage it a lot because newer people are listening to themselves so much. I feel like you and I have worn them enough that we're sort of immune to that. It feels like part of my work costume. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:07:49 It also feels like you're flying an airplane. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:07:51 Yes. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:07:52 What kind of headphones are those? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:07:54 I don't know. Let me see. Sony MCR 7506. They're comfortable. That's all I care about. What are you wearing? Matt Cundill (Host) 00:08:04 I have DT 770 Pros from Beyer. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:08:11 I see. I like those because they're the comfortable cloth ones. The only problem there's some studios. I mean, this is pre pandemic. Those are really comfortable because they're the cloth. So if they're in your own studio, they're great. If they're in a shared studio, and they would have them in studios where I'd be right after someone who sweat all over them, they would get really smelly because of those cloth headphones. I started bringing my own headphones to Studios years ago because I'm just really smell sensitive and headphones retain smells. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:08:43 I think you and I had the conversation about studio headphones. Always bring your own because who knows what's been left behind. I mean, it could be bad as the hotel remote. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:08:53 Yeah. Disgusting. Yeah. I can't believe more actors didn't- I mean, I think hopefully now they are. But I remember when the Pandemic first started, I was one of the few, and they were like, what do you use in the studio? I'm like, I use a pair of crappy headphones that I throw around my car so that I don't worry if they break. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:09:10 When the Pandemic hit, a lot of people didn't have home studios like you do. So how lucky were you to go home and be able to do everything? And a lot of people were kind of stranded without the equipment. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:09:23 Yeah. I was super lucky that I was pretty much set up. There were still a few things that I had to tweak. The stuff I was recording from home, I was doing a lot of audiobooks and things that where there wasn't a live director on the line, so I didn't have to worry about my WiFi speed and being hardwired. And I was using a laptop. So when I started dubbing, it was taking up- Zoom takes up a lot of, I don't know, the technical terms. Bandwidth. Yes, that thing. So, yeah, I had to make some upgrades, but Luckily I had the framework in place. I mean, I remember the Focusrite Scarlett was like, back ordered for people. They couldn't get one. Mics were hard to come by. So, yeah, I mean, it's great because those companies did well at a hard time, but voice actors were scrounging to just put together their home studio. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:10:16 It took me two months to get this Sennheiser. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:10:18 Oh, that's like, I have that one, too, the 4-16 we're looking at. I'm not using it right now, but yeah. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:10:23 That's copying you, right? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:10:25 That's what it was. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:10:27 It also sounds awesome. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:10:28 I like it. I think it's probably better on your voice than it is on mine, is my guess. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:10:33 By the way, neither one of us are on that microphone right now, but it has made a huge difference for me. It sounds way better. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:10:41 Oh, it has. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:10:42 Okay, yeah. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:10:43 My intention was always to switch back and forth, but I'm using what am I using? A TLM 103. And that's what most of my clients want, so I just haven't been asked for the 416 in a long time. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:10:55 What did you take at Hofstra? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:10:56 I was a theater major. I got my BA in theater there, but I was already doing the voiceover thing and going to the city for different kinds of auditions. So I crammed my classes in and got out a little early because I was just so eager to be working. I loved taking acting classes and all that, but I just was so ready to do this full time. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:11:23 By the way, I had my son, he's now 20. I had him go through your IMDb. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:11:29 Oh, no. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:11:30 Well, he only recognized a couple of things, and that was. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:11:33 Yeah, because if you're not a hardcore anime fan, you wouldn't know a lot of it. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:11:38 That's what he said. He goes, dad, this is all anime. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:11:41 Yeah, there's some obscure stuff on there. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:11:43 But he did recognize Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:11:46 Oh, yeah. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:11:47 And your role as the waitress on Everybody Hates Chris. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:11:52 That's funny. Yeah. I mean, I'm lucky that I've been doing this long enough that there is, like, just some weird stuff on there that no one maybe will ever see. But yeah, I feel like we're in another anime boom right now. There was the one when Pokemon started. It gave access to- You probably remember the days of, like, if you wanted some weird anime stuff, you have to go to some underground video store and find a VHS of it. And the hunt is gone. Now you can just find everything. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:12:26 You've got this long list of things that I've never come into contact with, but every once in a while, there's just people. They know Pokemon and they know the characters you play as well. You play Balthaza. Bulbasaur, but yeah. Kinda close. You play Balpazar. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:12:44 No, but yeah, okay, sure, Bulba. Bulba. Saur. Bulathor. Okay, now you're being silly. Okay, yes. Who said one word. I explained that to a friend of mine. My friends have never watched the show, a lot of them. So when I explained to them that the Pokemon only say their own names, they're like, wait, what? You only said- that's- All you said was- because Luckily I played many different Pokemon, and then I played some of the human characters. So I did get to say words, but when I die, they will say, she played Bulbasaur, and I'll be known as saying one word. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:13:23 And if I were to list off some of the other very popular stuff that you're involved in, things like Fire Emblem games and Shaman King, at what point do you know that these are going to become hits? Like, you can go in and record this stuff, but when do you know that it's a hit? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:13:39 I am the worst judge of stuff, if you ask me in the studio that day. Whatever I'm working on, you're like, is this going to be big? I would never guess correctly. I thought Pokemon was the weirdest thing ever because again, we didn't know anything about it. I'm like, Wait, it only says it's own name. Who's going to watch this show? Pikachu says Pikachu. Okay, whatever. Yeah, I'm a horrible gauge of that. Even back then, it was hard to know what was a hit. Pokemon we knew pretty quickly. A lot of times, you know, just because you keep working, that's sometimes the biggest indicator that you're like, oh, I have a job again. Okay, then I guess this is doing well now because of social media. You know, much more. You pretty much can gauge right away by the fans and who's tagging you and who watched it. You can say, oh, like, no one watched that new show that just came out. I guess that's not one of the big ones and then the other ones, all of a sudden you get a bunch of new followers and you're like, okay, that's my Nielsen rating. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:14:38 I remember when I was going into voice something and I was just filling in and I said, what is this called? And they said, Super Suckers. I'm like, okay, where can I watch it? Oh, it's on in South Africa. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:14:52 Okay, sure, it's a job. That's the thing. We're going to say yes to most of this stuff, whether or not it's a success, because we're freelancers, that's what we do. So when it's a success, it's just like icing on the cake. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:15:07 If I have to explain to anybody what you do. And then I name the shows that they don't know. And then I say, oh, by the way, she can't join us for dinner this weekend. She's going to Las Vegas to a convention to meet all the people who know all this, to know the shows that you don't know right now. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:15:24 It's weird. It's a weird life. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:15:27 What are those conventions like? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:15:29 They're fascinating. Again, because at the 20 years ago, I didn't know we had fans. I liked voice acting, honestly, because of the anonymity. I don't love divulging things about my life on social media, but we're feeling obligated to post, but it's sort of part of the job now. This new culture of actors meeting the people that watch their things is kind of a new phenomenon. These conventions have exploded, and I can't believe some of the superstars that show up at them. So it's an interesting world. It used to be such a niche geeky, and I say geeky lovingly, different. They were for strictly comics, and now they're just basically big pop culture conventions, like the one I'm going to next week. There's athletes, I think there's like football players, there's wrestlers, there's artists, there's voice actors, there's on camera. It runs the gamut. They're a bit overwhelming. And I meet amazing people. I get to interact with these people who the show meant something to. And again, it's not about me. It's about what the show meant to them. But if I can be there representing that for them and give them some happiness, I'm thrilled to do it. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:16:45 It's a large radio audience who listens to this podcast, and I think everybody's had that moment where somebody comes up to them and says, oh, you don't look like you sound on the radio. You're bald. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:16:54 Right? Because they decide in their brains what you look like. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:17:00 But it must be different. You don't look like the character that I think that I'm watching on TV. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:17:07 With cartoons it's even weirder. I don't like to ruin the illusion for little kids. Sometimes a parent will come up with a four year old and be like, do the voice, tell them what you do. And I'm like, I don't want to ruin it for them. I don't want them thinking about me when they're watching. It's a weird disconnect until a certain age, unless they actually see a video of an actor in the booth with a microphone and see maybe like a live dubbing thing or something. It's very strange disconnect for a kid to understand that there's a person doing that. And I don't want to kill Santa Claus. That's sort of what that feels like to me. Sometimes I'll do the voice for a little kid and they'll go, oh, yeah, you sound just like him or her or whatever. And I'll go, well, never mind, I can't do that. I'm not a dream crusher. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:17:53 You ever been to Japan? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:17:55 No. I'd love to, though, because they don't watch the English over there. So it's not like they get to go to a convention there. They'd have the Japanese actors there. So I've gotten to go to the countries where they watch the English versions of the show. I've been to Scotland and England and New Zealand. Yeah, hopefully more when we can travel again. And I had to look and see like, oh, in certain countries, did they keep us or did they redub it with accented voices or onto another language again? I didn't know Pokemon was- I guess it just never occurred to me. Like in New Zealand, they're watching our American dub of Pokemon. It's so cool, but I never thought about it. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:18:41 Tell me a little bit about the struggle of social media. And I say struggle as if it's some sort of, like, difficult, but it is difficult because all of a sudden you had your account, you are living your life. In 2007, 2008, you had your Facebook page with your friends, your MySpace page. Yeah, it was easy. And then in come the fans, and now you've got to share social media space with fans, but also your voice acting community, and whatever you have professional, and as well as friends and family. So how do you manage it? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:19:13 Well, I resisted it for so long. I was thought, oh, I don't have to do Twitter. I have Facebook. And then we started hearing that for certain projects, like animated shows, casting people were looking at your Twitter follower number because what it is, is it's free publicity for them. So I don't know how much that's being done. But what I've heard is sometimes if it's between two people, they'll look at like, oh, this person has 1000 followers. This person has 80,000 followers. The person with 80,000 followers will get more. If they promote the show, they'll get more eyeballs on it. Even contracts now have not all of them, but some of them have, like, you're obligated to tweet a certain number of times about it or Instagram it, which is crazy to me. I think this speaks to the whole industry. Like, when I started, I was an actor. That is what I did. I came into the booth, I said my lines. I didn't know how to press record. It wasn't necessary for me to do all these other jobs. Now I'm working at home. I'm my own engineer. I'm sometimes my own director. I do my own publicity on Twitter, and other companies are maybe counting on me to do that. So I think we're all wearing a lot more hats now than we used to. And I don't know if that's good or bad. I certainly don't want to put anyone out of work. There's so many studios that closed and engineers lost work due to people having home studios. I love having a great engineer, and I would never want to put them out of work. So people who listen to this have seen the changes in this industry. Some good, some bad, yes. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:21:00 But there were people in their Studios back in the early part of the 2000's. And then I would say the pandemic probably just accelerated. We were headed there anyway. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:21:10 And now we're sort of yeah, I think listen for like, radio imaging that was all done from my home studio. The things that weren't were the reasons I live in LA. Video games, cartoons, dubbing, those are still jobs that would really like us back in the studio because they're having to do a lot more post production when everyone's recording from a different space. I've already gotten some push to come back into the studio for those things. Commercials, really not so much. Other things where it's not a ton of post production work. It's okay. But they're spending more hours because again, if we went into a voiceover session for new animation, there'd be four of us in the room recording together. Now they're recording us all separately. They're trying to change the room tones to all match. They're having to edit it. It's taking way more time, and it's really eating into their budgets. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:22:08 Yeah, I can imagine that for animation, cartoons, it would be the hardest to do remotely. And I was going to ask you, when you get in there for the first time, you're going to do the reading, the run through it, and you're starting a brand new cartoon series working with the director. They want to land on the voice. Are they landing on the voice you're offering, or do they want you to change it? What's that sort of work interaction like at the very outset of the series? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:22:36 That's a good question. So if you've auditioned, what happens is a lot of time they'll play you your audition that got you the role. So they'll say this is why we chose you. Here, listen, please listen back to this and do exactly what you did. I think that's a lot of the yeah, most of the time I'd say sometimes they say we like what you did, but we want to tweak it a little. Sometimes you've seen the artwork, sometimes you haven't. If they haven't, you're like, oh, great, because that sometimes informs the voice. So sometimes you've seen the artwork, sometimes you haven't, and that maybe changes things. Or they'll say, we drew the character and now she has buck teeth. Does that change what you want to do with it or something like that? The first day is always very experimental, I'd say. And it also depends if there's other- how much you can play based on, if it's a group recorded or if you're alone. If you're alone, you have more freedom to sort of figure it out and play. Or it's depending if time is an issue or if it's all those factors. And a lot of times I always use the Simpsons example. If you look at early Simpsons, especially even once it was a show, but especially when it was just the shorts on the Tracey Ullman show, they all sound completely different and they grew into those characters and they found them and figured them out. And I don't think anyone is annoyed that they sound different. Like, there's characters that I look at. I go, oh, that voice has evolved over time. When I learned more about her now, I didn't realize she was shy. They didn't bring that character description in until episode eight, so now maybe I'm going to make her a little quieter and that'll kind of stick with her. Luckily, I use the Charles in Charge example. I don't know who remembers the show Charles in Charge, but like, Buddy got stupider with every episode, you find characters. Sometimes they just change based on the writing that you receive. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:24:38 In just a second, Tara and I go off script. We still have to talk about audiobooks, video games, voicing opportunities for podcasts, and what it's like to bring someone's script to life. Also, we'll discuss her affinity for Trader Joe's. By the way, there's so much more I wanted to chat about with Tara, like her live Instagram autograph sessions and her role in the new Star Wars audio drama Tempest Runner. That and everything else I didn't get to with Tara is on the episode page at soundoffpodcast.com. Tara Sands (VO) 00:25:06 The Sound Off podcast with Matt Cundill. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:25:12 Tell me a little bit about video games. Are those the hardest ones to do because you have to exert yourself more? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:25:17 It depends on the game. But yeah, I mean, listen, if it's like a battle game and that's it, then you're just screaming. And the Union has been really good about limiting what we're allowed to do, what they're allowed to ask of us. And ideally all those exertions are saved for the end. And I try to book those later in the day so that I can just stop talking. But a lot of the games now are really, you know, there's a lot of, like, great scene work in some of these games, and I don't tend to book the big battle- I think that's a lot more male heavy. Anyway, that's not the majority of what I'm doing. You know, I've done some, like, really adorable games where I just get to have fun little scenes and talk like this, stuff like that. So it really depends on the game. Especially some games are based on a show or whatever, and then you're in your character doing that stuff. But yeah, so many of these, I guess they're episodic games. Is that what they're called? There's some amazing acting work going on that has nothing to do with yelling. So that's a nice change. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:26:25 Do you play video games? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:26:27 I wish I did. I'm really bad at them. I wish I had started a long time ago. I feel like now when I try to pick them up, I don't have the intuition. Are you a gamer? Matt Cundill (Host) 00:26:39 No. I mean, I play little games on my iPad. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:26:42 Yeah, me too. I play just some Angry Birds version all day long, and I'm a crossword puzzle person. That's my game. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:26:50 Sometimes I'll see one of my kids playing and I'll say, Can I play? And they're like, one person game. I'm like, Whatever. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:26:58 They're probably way better. It's intuitive to them the way it's just not to us, I guess. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:27:02 Well they're playing online with other people. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:27:05 So it's not a one person game. They're just lying to you. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:27:07 Like, back in the days in New Jersey in the 80s and 90s, where it was Bruce Springsteen, Sopranos and Bon Jovi. By the way, have you seen any of those or all of those? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:27:18 My first concert was a Bruce Springsteen concert. I've seen him a lot. I haven't. I haven't watched The Sopranos. It's on my list. I don't know how I've never seen it. It's ridiculous. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:27:28 You have to stop. You haven't seen The Sopranos? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:27:31 I know it's a long story. It has to do with, like, an ex that was, like, working near it. And I was like, I had a bad feeling about it because of an ex. And then I was like, I'm not watching that show. And now I'm like, oh, who cares? I just should watch a good show because that's the mind of a young girl who- Matt Cundill (Host) 00:27:51 Yeah, like, can we pull up The Sopranos and IMDb and look this guy up? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:27:56 No, you wouldn't be able to figure it out. But, you know, when you associate something with someone and then you just don't want to watch it, he ruined it for me. But, yeah, definitely. I loved gaming in the 80s. Like, I was in arcades. I would go to the arcade and play Pacman and Centipede all day. That was the limit of my gaming. Atari Pitfall loved Pitfall. I even went as far as Nintendo Zelda. I liked Zelda, but I think it's probably stopped around there. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:28:26 What do you do to warm up a lot of that? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:28:32 I keep straws in my boot. There's these little coffee stir straws. There are exercises. I don't use them as much as they should, but there's something called straw phonation. You can look at up exercises on YouTube. It sounds crazy, but there's these great warm ups using straws because it limits how much air is going out. I will not explain it correctly, but if you're interested in great vocal warm ups and how to recharge your voice kind of in the middle of a tough session. Straw phonation. P-H-O-N-A-T-I-O-N-I hope I spelled that right. There's some great exercises. I was a singer too, so I'm pretty good at using my voice, but I'm not as great with the warm ups and the cool downs as I should be. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:29:18 What do you do to take care of your voice in the off time? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:29:22 Cigars and whiskey? Honestly, again, I'm not a role model, but again, like water and all that stuff. But sometimes the only thing you can do is stop talking. Sometimes that is the only thing that helps is rest if I've used my voice properly. Sometimes I just did an audiobook where I didn't realize I'd be narrating the whole book in a different voice because it was the point of view of this little puppy, which is adorable, but it's a little boy puppy. So I narrated the book in his voice and I was exhausted. Again, I can do everything right and my voice will still be just tired from that. There's just a limit to how correctly you can do certain things. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:30:17 So audiobooks is a completely different pile. Again, where you'll pick up the book and then there'll be multiple characters in there. We'll be expected to adapt to multiple characters in a book? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:30:30 Yes, I like to say that it's a suggestion of the character. I'm never going to sound like a 70 year old man from Russia. I can suggest that to you. I can manipulate my voice so that you get a flavour of that guy, and I don't think the listeners are expecting you to transform. Luckily. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:30:55 Do you enjoy reading? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:30:57 Yes, because I do a lot of audiobook work. It's put a damper on my own fun reading. So I don't read as much as I should on my own, but I Luckily get to read when I do the books so that need is fulfilled sometimes. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:31:13 Do I have to enjoy reading in order to record audio books? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:31:19 No. I mean, in the way that you don't have to love donuts to work at a donut shop. It helps. It definitely helps because the cliche is these audiobooks are a marathon, not a sprint. So you have to have some appreciation for literature, I think, to really commit. It's very time consuming in some ways. And listen. I mean, I've read a lot of bad books and there's times I've been like, how did this get published? Who? What? It showed me a whole world of other stuff that I would never when I was reading, mostly when I would read for fun, I would read things people recommended so that you didn't read the crap. Now sometimes I have to read the crap. I won't say what or it's just stuff I'm not interested in. Like, I'm not a big romance reader. It's not that it's bad. It's just not my genre. Again. I can find the fun in them. I can find the fun characters and appreciate the plot twists, but it's not my favorite genre to read in my spare time. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:32:22 You just recently finished up playing the role of Joan of Arc on Godcast, which was- now this is sort of an initial podcast outing here for you. And I'm not talking about just coming on somebody's podcast to talk about voice acting or Pokemon or whatever it is that you've been on podcasts before. But this was an actual role, which was done by the people at Forever Dog. So what do you think of podcasts so far? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:32:46 I really enjoyed it. I mean, I'll explain. So Godcast is/was a podcast by David Javerbaum, who has a Twitter account called The Tweet of God. And he's tweeted as God for many, many years. He's written a Broadway show that was very successful based on this Twitter account. He's written books, so he's for many years wanted to do a podcast, and he needed a sidekick. So obviously his sidekick is Joan of Arc, because, you know, that's a job she would do in heaven. So I got to be Joan. And that was really my first foray into podcasting and working with a company who did that. They were so excited that I knew anything, that I had a home studio in the first place because that was less work for them to deal with. But I'm so used to having pristine sound, and there's so much more that, like, there's so much more leeway in a lot of this stuff that I was not used to. They'd be a dog barking, and I'd be like, we have to stop. And they're like, that's okay, we'll figure it out. But it was great. It was really fun to see it from the beginning, too. Like, I don't often get to be part of projects from day one. So this was very educational. And then hearing what amazing work the editors and sound designers, they put in a lot of great sound effects and really made it come to life more than it would have with just our voices. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:34:09 Yeah. The music and production was great on it. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:34:12 Yeah. They did a great job. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:34:13 Yes. And we say, if you find us going back and forth between was and is, it's because the project has possibly pod faded, but likely not. I mean, these things can live forever. It's not like it goes away. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:34:26 There's a lot of episodes you can listen to. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:34:28 Wait until I give you the bad news about podcasting and what they started up. They started up now the IMDb of podcasting. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:34:35 Oh, what's that? Matt Cundill (Host) 00:34:37 It's called Pod Chaser. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:34:39 Oh, okay. I should look at that. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:34:43 I'm actually working with some people on developing roles and credits, and there was a situation that came up whereby you're a voice actor on Godcast, but you're an announcer on this podcast, and I asked for them to separate the roles. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:34:59 Oh, that's interesting. Yeah. I'm glad that they're doing that, too, because I noticed there's a lot of scripted stuff going on in the podcasting world and some really good work, and you have to listen to the the end to find out who those people are. And sometimes I'm in the middle of listening and I'm like, I want to know who that is. So I like the idea of that being available. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:35:21 So if you get bombarded with emails, that's what that's about. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:35:24 It's not no, that's cool. I'm glad that. Listen, I wish that it existed during our early Pokemon days and things like that. So I really could have an accurate record of what happened and who I was. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:35:34 I thought you might be the first person I've had on this podcast who is on Cameo. You're the second. Okay, I'll take it. The first one is Lisa Guerrero from Inside Edition. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:35:48 Yeah, Cameo's- again, I would have loved that as a kid to get a message from someone I admired or a sports figure. I wasn't into sports, but there's this access that people have to celebrities and quotes that seemed unattainable to me, which is so cool. I mean, that's such a neat thing that they have access to. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:36:16 Did you always like the studio more than acting, let's say, on TV when you were doing, like, Fridays on Cartoon Network? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:36:23 I really like both, and I like that I was doing both because it kept both exciting for me and now because I'm not doing on cam- I love the camaraderie of a set. I loved being around humans because for dubbing, we're so often just by ourselves. There's a director, engineer, but we're in a room by ourselves. We're watching the screen. No, I don't think most people become an actor to sit in a room by themselves. I became an actor to interact. So that's what I did love about being on a set. Now I vary up my day, at least I'm in different areas of voiceover. So in a given day, I might do some imaging. I might do an audio book for a couple of hours if I'm working on my own, maybe some commercial and animation auditions. So the variety, I think, is what keeps me liking it so much. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:37:14 Because you're working home alone, that's going to play a role in your mental health. Everybody has felt this at one point, and we've had a lot of downs and sort of a lot of questioning about what's going to happen next. How have you managed to steer through the last 18 months of having to work at home alone? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:37:37 Yeah. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:37:37 So because I was doing a lot from home, like when I was doing audiobooks from home, which I again been doing for years. I live a block from Target. I literally would force myself to go to Target to see other humans because if I'm working on a book, there are days that I wouldn't leave home and I would have to force myself out because I knew it wasn't healthy. Again, this is pre-pandemic when we were forced to stay home. So I think just making yourself go out into the world is essential for keeping your mental health okay. Audiobook narrators specifically understand this because it's longer hours. It's a different, you know, you're self directing and engineering a lot of the time. There's a few companies that still give you a director and that will sometimes give you the option to go to a studio. But I'd say over 70% of audiobooks are done on your own, which is daunting because, again, there's no room for error. That sound has to be pristine. I mean, I've heard sometimes it's not. There are people who complain. They're like, why did I hear a door opening or a dog barking? It's so crazy to me because I'm so neurotic about sound during a book. So, yeah, the pandemic obviously is just awful because you don't just want to put yourself in an unsafe situation just to get out. So going for walks, luckily, I'm in LA. I think it's tougher for a lot of you guys in cold places where you can't just- it's not pleasant to go out for a walk sometimes. I don't know. I mean, listen, I'm a big proponent of therapy and all that stuff, just to talk it through. This is a tough time for so many people. And again, we're isolated because of this job. And the podcast was great because we'd all see each other on Zoom. Honestly, that was awesome for me to just see humans on a screen. Again, not the same. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:39:39 Have you turned down any work because they wanted you to come into a studio but you didn't feel comfortable? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:39:44 Yeah, it was like the beginning of March, middle of March. It was when stuff was pretty much shut down and it was a building I knew with an elevator that, you know, this is like pre mask mandates. And I was already kind of wearing masks because I was like, this thing is worse than people. I don't know. I had a hunch it was a weird situation. It was a game. And they said, you have to come in. And I said, I can do this from home. I have a great studio set up. And they gave me some weird- They said, you have this many lines, and if you have this many lines, you have to come to our studio. If you had three lines less, we'd let you do it from home. And I said, well, there's a pandemic happening. And if you can't be accommodating because of these three lines, then I don't think- I'm not doing this job. And it's hard, listen, we're freelancers, it's hard to turn down work. And there have been a lot of jobs that I do auditions, and it says studio or home record. And we have to put that in the subject line of the audition. And so I don't know if it's cost me work. I'm starting to feel more comfortable with the idea of going back into a studio, but I don't know if I've lost jobs. There's auditions I didn't do just because they said absolutely must come to our studio. And this was like, again at the height of craziness in a city. Okay. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:41:08 What kind of work have you seen an uptick in since that moment in March? Has there been a type of maybe it's corporate narration or maybe it's audiobooks, or maybe it was- Is there a niche of voice work that has increased because of the pandemic? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:41:28 Scripted podcasts. I'm seeing more auditions for that because production couldn't happen. I think people started adapting some of their maybe film scripts or things into podcasts. Audible does a ton, Realm. There's some great companies that are doing amazing work. I think iHeart maybe even does some of that. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:41:50 Yeah. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:41:51 Yeah. So that's increased because that is work they could get done. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:41:56 And you were mentioning with Godcast, there was a Twitter account that became a podcast, and then when March hit, there were a lot of, I guess, TV shows that were scripted, but we can't film it. So let's turn it into a podcast for now and we'll figure it out later. Yeah. I had a few people come to me and say, can you make this work? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:42:15 Yeah, we're lucky. We're part of this world where work kind of increased. I mean, hopefully it'll all level out and one day we'll be normal again. I mean, production is happening, so that's good. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:42:30 Do you think you'll be in front of a camera in the next year? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:42:35 I kind of am happy with my voiceover work. There's certain pressures of on camera that I'm just not in the mood for. I don't love the audition process of on camera work. It's changed for now because people are putting self taping auditions. I never liked the going to an audition and feeling like I was in a room full of people that looked like me. That can be avoided by self taping your audition at home for on camera work. So maybe I wouldn't mind it as much. That always psyched me out when I would walk into that audition room and I was like, oh, she looks more right than me for that. If I walked into the room, I'd be like, I would cast them instead of me. Again, when friends offer me roles, I'll do them, but I'm not really pursuing that anymore. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:43:23 Is there ever a fear that goes through you that those blue lights in back of you will catch fire? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:43:30 Yeah, sure. I'm a fire hazard waiting- No, there are these fairy lights that I have in my booth. I'm touching one of them now. There's no heat. There's no heat involved in these things. I do wonder, though, I don't know if foam is- no, because you can put these on, like Christmas trees and stuff. They've got to be okay, right? Matt Cundill (Host) 00:43:52 Yeah. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:43:55 I like that. You're pointing out my fire hazards. No, really. They don't get hot at all. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:43:59 Fun fact. You had an uncle who swore LBJ into office. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:44:05 I did not know. I don't think I ever got to meet him, unfortunately. It's my great uncle Hy. His name was Hy, not H Y Hyman. I think that's a terrible name. He was a Rabbi who wrote many books and poetry, and he was the speaker at his inauguration, which is so cool. I wish I had known him. He was a bit of a controversial figure, though. Like, I mean, I don't want to get into, like, his politics and blah, blah. So boring. But he was a bit of a controversial figure. I'll just say that. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:44:41 Did LBJ find that out before or after he was sworn in? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:44:44 I don't know when all that happened, and I think he came around. It has to do with his views on Israel. I mean, again, I'm not going to get into it all and bore you, but I don't know that it would have stopped him from doing this. I think it was just within his community that it was controversial. But I've heard very nice things about him. He is responsible for the quote. It's not having what you want, it's wanting what you have. That was something that he wrote. That a quote that was his that people really took to. And then Sheryl Crow put it in a song, pretty much. You can cut that or not. You can keep that nonsense in. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:45:25 I might add to it, actually. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:45:27 But yeah, his voice was amazing. I mean, listen, I come from a family that there were a lot of rabbis and people like that who were public speakers. My grandmother, who's, like, at 90, started doing public speaking. I think it's somewhere in me that I'm not shy about it. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:45:43 We know where you get your talking from now. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:45:45 My incessant talking too much. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:45:49 What's great to buy at Trader Joe's these days? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:45:52 We do love to talk about Trader Joe's. I'm not a vegan, but there's this new great vegan pizza. The crust is really good. You don't have Trader Joe's, though. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:46:03 We do not have Trader Joe's. I have to travel to the US to get it. In fact, during the pandemic, I had to get one of my podcast pals to send me a shipment. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:46:15 Of what? What did you put in there? What were your big choices? Matt Cundill (Host) 00:46:17 A lot of spices. Okay. The chili lime and the onion salt and the everything bagel. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:46:24 21 seasoning salute is very good. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:46:26 Got it. And I've got five smoked paprikas. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:46:30 Oh, my gosh. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:46:31 And I'm just back from the US two days ago where I emptied out the Minneapolis Trader Joe's. Wow. That's been closed because I paid them a visit. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:46:42 Wait, but do you get frozen stuff or is that too difficult? Because my favorite stuff is frozen? Matt Cundill (Host) 00:46:48 Yeah. I couldn't do the frozen stuff this time because I was flying. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:46:53 Aw, man. Because the Pane Arabiata and the Turkey meatballs. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:46:58 We buy a freezer bag and we put ice in it, and then we put all the stuff into the freezer bag. And then we have 7 hours back to Canada. And I tell everybody at Trader Joe's that I'm stocking up on my dry goods for the winter. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:47:15 Have you tried the pancake bread? No, I won't buy it because it's like too decadent. I've had it once. It's like this comes in a loaf. I think that's what it is. I think it's called pancake bread. Yeah. I love Joe. I'm a big fan of Joe. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:47:33 Do you have one near your place? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:47:34 I have like 18 near my place. They're everywhere in LA. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:47:39 Have you checked out the Inside Trader Joe's podcast? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:47:42 No. I should. See here's- I'm not a fun eater. I'm not adventurous, really. So I feel like they'd be suggesting things and they'd be like, oh, I'm too boring for that. I have to say, though, the reduced guilt potato. I just want to know what's going on because they have not had the reduced guilt potato chips in stock for months. And maybe that podcast would help me find out why. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:48:04 I think a lot of it is really about how the sausage is made at Trader Joe's. Like why they would sell one banana. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:48:11 Okay, I'm going to listen to that. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:48:13 Did you put up the picture of the cacio e pepe? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:48:16 I put that up. I have to say, I got the cacio e pepe frozen at Trader Joe's. It was not my favorite. I prefer the penne arrabiata. So, yeah, I didn't push it too hard because I feel like I feel like if you're going to be bad and eat cacio e pepe, like, get a really good, fresh version of it. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:48:37 Only Trader Joe's could get away with creating a packaged product that only needs three ingredients. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:48:44 He's so brave that Joe. He's so brave. I can't believe we're talking about this. And I love it. It makes me so happy. My dad once asked me, he said, could you be a tour guide anywhere? He just asks random questions. Sometimes he's like, Is there anywhere you feel like you know well enough that you could be a tour guide? And I said, yes, Trader Joe's. It's not like Disneyland, Trader Joe's. I could give someone a great tour of Trader Joe's. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:49:10 I have something sad to report, by the way, about my experience at Trader Joe's. So everything is in the bag. And shout out to Delta Airlines, who threw my bag. And we had a midair collision with my bag between the tomatillo salsa, which is the best. It is the best one, and spicy Italian. Sofrito. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:49:35 I'm so sorry. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:49:36 So my bag smells like Mexico and Italy, And I have no idea what the sofrito is ever going to taste like. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:49:44 Oh, I'm so sorry. Why aren't they in Canada? We have to start a petition. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:49:49 The reason why is because of the packaging. You have to have it in two languages up here, and it would cost them a lot of money, too. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:49:55 Okay, well, that actually makes a lot of sense. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:49:57 Yeah. Somebody in Vancouver, by the way, started up something called pirate Joe's Where they basically bought everything down there and resold it up here, and they had to shut that down. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:50:04 Oh, okay. Well, that's a good idea, though, but I guess you're close enough to the border that you can drive if you have to. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:50:12 7 hours. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:50:15 Yeah, that's not close. I'm so sorry. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:50:19 I mean, I'm close to the border, but you cross over into North Dakota. It's like I got another hour to go before I hit Grand Forks. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:50:26 Yeah, I bet there's not a lot of trader Joe's there. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:50:29 Not until you get to Minneapolis. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:50:31 Yeah. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:50:32 Why do I live here? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:50:34 I'm glad we're talking about the importance. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:50:37 Could I come live with you now? Tara Sands (Guest) 00:50:39 I love it. Yeah, that's not weird. Yeah. Move in just for trader Joe when you put your application in for us citizenship. So why did you want to come to this country, trader Joe's? Matt Cundill (Host) 00:50:54 Tell me a little bit about the handmade jewelry that you have. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:50:58 Oh, my gosh. I accidentally started a company. I didn't mean to. Yeah. So I started making jewelry a few years ago just for fun, and I made too much. So I was like, I'll start an Etsy shop just to get rid of it, and then it started doing pretty well. So then I was doing the comic conventions, and people were like, well, you should make stuff that applies to the work you do. So I started making some Pokemon jewelry, and then I had a friend who's on a really big, popular DND show called critical role, and he's like, you should make some dice stuff. So I started drilling dice and making dice, Julie, because I looked online, I didn't see a lot of, like, high end geeky stuff, And I thought, we geeks deserve nicer geeky jewelry again. I'm not getting rich, but it fulfills like, I love the hobby, and if I can break even, I'm thrilled. Matt Cundill (Host) 00:51:57 Tara, thanks so much for being on the podcast. The next voice, by the way, everybody is going to hear, is actually yours. The show finishes. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:52:04 Oh, right. Tara Sands (Guest) 00:52:04 I did your imaging. Thank you for that. Tara Sands (VO) 00:52:08 The sound off podcast is written and hosted by Matt Kendall. Produced by Evan sormansky. Social media by Courtney Krebsbach. Another great creation from the soundoff media company imaging courtesy Corps image Studios. There's always more@soundoffpodcast.com.

Erin Trafford is a co-founder of Story Studio Network, a full service content branding and podcast experience for brands she co-founded with her dad Dave Trafford, who is a radio mainstay in the Greater Toronto Area, and a regular contributor on Newstalk 1010. Erin has the unique experience of growing up with a parent in broadcasting, which means you have been immersed in radio (from the inside) all your life. Erin's radio career started with an internship at CJAD in Montreal, helping to launch what is now the Moose in North Bay, working as a reporter for Global TV in Halifax, before finally co-founding her company. In this episode, you will hear Erin's pathway from broadcast to podcast, what she believes we can do to fix Canadian Media for the better, and why your business should be podcasting. We also spoke how she wanted to purse a journalism degree at Ryerson University despite their mom's objections, but letter later received a Master's degree in journalism at the University of Western Ontario. Erin also spoke of wanting to avoid being in her dad's shadow and worked in North Bay instead of Toronto to launch a station and have the most fun she ever had in their life. In the second half of the show, Matt and Erin attempt to sort out many of the self-inflicted obstacles that plague Canadian media, including Bill C-11, Bill C-18, trying to emulate America's monetization formula for podcasting and why she launched th Echo Podcast Network. In fact - give this a read for a little more insight into why she is doing it. While the Trudeau plays the fiddle while Rome burns, Erin is doing something about delivering content and news to Canadian small markets. Not surprisingly, you will see North Bay apart of it which is where Erin started her broadcast career. This episode also marks a change in the way we distribute content. We will be adding in the raw YouTube recording of our conversation instead of a simple audiogram post to YouTube. You can see it here. This is a direct result from the studies done by Coleman Insights and Amplifi Media that covered how people discover podcasts. In short, an audiogram is nice, but two people talking on microphones at one another is better. Oh and Erin has a new podcast which digs into all things media... especially podcast and broadcast. It is called the 4th Draft. TRANSCRIPTION Tara Sands (Voiceover) 0:02 The sound off podcast. The show about podcast and broadcast starts now. Matt Cundill 0:13 Erin Trafford- founder of Story Studio Network, which makes podcasts for businesses across North America- is also a former TV host, journalist, and radio talent, having worked at Global News and being a part of the launch of The Moose in North Bay, Ontario. She grew up with radio in the home, as her father is Dave Trafford, co founder of Story Studio Network and regular contributor at Newstalk 1010 in Toronto. This is me basically saying there's going to be lots of radio and podcast talk in this conversation. And we're gonna get messy with discussing everything wrong with Canadian media in 2023. I am always fascinated when speaking to second generation broadcasters, because their experience with radio is literally from the day they're born. And that's where we start. Erin Trafford joins me from the headquarters of Story Studio Network in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia. Are you a second generation radio talent? Erin Trafford 1:08 The word that has been used with me is pedigree, and I hate that, because it's like, I'm not a dog. But the story I like to tell is that the year I was born, my dad was involved in his first application to the CRTC to launch CIUT at University of Toronto. So I was quite literally simultaneously born into the business alongside him. So I have been in it since I was in diapers in Toronto. Matt Cundill 1:38 So that means for second generation radio talent- and I asked that because it is unique, because it does involve a few things. It involves a parent involved in odd hours. And it involves moving from town to town from time to time. Did that happen? Erin Trafford 1:54 It didn't. So there's- that's an oddity right there. I emphasize this because those folks in the business will understand how rare this is. The furthest my dad ever worked from Toronto was Hamilton, and he commuted. I remember it, it was like the late 80s. I don't- I'm not sure if my brother was born or not. And he had to buy a new car because he was doing this commute. It was like a really big deal. He bought a Honda. And I remember the day cuz he brought me with him. And it was like, I'm getting the Honda because I gotta drive to Hamilton. But he was only there for- I don't know, like, not very long before he was pulled back to Toronto. So he has- his entire career was- has been spent in Toronto. And for you, did you get the radio bug? Oh yeah, I got bit so hard. I used to skip school to go to the station with him. There was a moment when- one of my best friends growing up. It was her ninth birthday party. And you know, because I have kids, I can understand now, I can appreciate this. How big of a deal this was even moreso. It was the first time I was going to be allowed to go to a sleepover party. Right? Like it was a big deal. February, sleepover party, ninth birthday. And our parents were friends. So the parents kind of hung up- hung out upstairs. The kids were downstairs with sleeping bags. And the Gulf War broke out. And my dad had one of those big chunky cell phones. And something happened, he got alerted. And he came downstairs and kind of pulled me up onto the landing and said listen, you have- you have a choice. You can stay here and Mommy can pick you up in the morning. My mom was a nurse so she worked shift work also. And- or, you can leave the newsroom- or leave the party and come to the newsroom with me. And I don't know what that's going to look like. And nine year old me, bit by the news bug, bit by the radio bug, left the party to go with my dad. So yeah. It was a thing for me even back then. I was- I was probably an intense kid. Matt Cundill 3:52 Was that Newstalk 1010 or CFRB? Erin Trafford 3:54 No, it was 640 at the time. Yeah, he was at 640 until I was in high school. And that's when he made the jump over to 1010. Matt Cundill 4:03 Just thinking about that era. Was it '90 or '91, when that- Erin Trafford 4:07 Yeah, it was somewhere in there. Matt Cundill 4:09 And so I'm thinking it was post-Hog, 640 Hog, which was another adventure. Erin Trafford 4:15 So that- I mean, it's funny I mentioned the Honda Civic, because we bought the Civic so we could work in Hamilton, but then he got pulled back to come work at the Hog. And the first thing they did was paint our gray civic black and put "Maximum grunt" and a big picture of a pig on the back of our car. And our tires got slashed like five or six times, to the point where insurance was no longer gonna cover it. It was just like, you know, and here I am, this kid, and he's dropping me off at school in this, like, Hog car. It was kind of surreal. I remember it though. It was- It was wild. Matt Cundill 4:51 And so did you work in radio? Erin Trafford 4:53 I did. I did. And my mom pushed back, right, so I think of it now and I'm like, my mom kind of supported my dad's fun little hobby of radio and his creative pursuits, and all of those things. And then I started streaming in high school and in the Co-op program, and I want to be a journalist, right? Like my guidance counselor was like, You need to be a magazine editor. And I was like, I think I want to be on the radio. So I did all these co-ops. And I actually worked with James McPhee at 640. He was a mentor, and Kathleen Rankin, and all these folks. And I was like, I'm just gonna go do radio and do cool stuff. Graduate high school, and I said, Okay, I want to go to Ryerson, because this is what I want to do. And I got accepted to the program. And my mother sat me down at the kitchen table and said, No, you need to decline this, you need a real job. So I kind of did what was expected. I went and did the philosophy degree at U of T. And then was going to go to law school. And the same exact pattern happened. I did all the LSATs, I applied, I got in. And under cover of night without telling anyone, I was also applying back to Master's programs in journalism. And then I, you know, flipped the tables and said, I'm not going to law school, I did what you wanted me to do for four years, I got the fancy degree, I'm going to J school. So I went to Western and did that. And then right out of Western, I got a bunch of offers and ended up- I wanted something that felt like it was mine. So one of the struggles that I've been- I've had is that my dad is- lots of people that I talk to so refer to him as a living legend. I'm like, That's a weird thing to say to me, that makes me feel weird. But I didn't want to be in his shadow. And I also didn't want to be in his frequency, I didn't want there to be a chance for me to be on the air at the same time as him. I didn't want that. So all the jobs I was looking at were out- out of Toronto, or you know, out of his shadow, and I ended up in North Bay. And we launched a station and I was like 26. And it was the most fun thing I've probably ever done in my life. Matt Cundill 6:45 So how do you look back at Mom's advice to go and study philosophy, now that you're in the position that you're in? Erin Trafford 6:52 I love that it came full circle. So I- both of my parents were right, neither was more right than the other. Because there's some stat that says that there are more CEOs with philosophy degrees than anything else. So I do use that degree a lot. It took me a while to come around to that knowledge. But it was an I told you so moment, I was like, we didn't need to spend that money. I could have gotten here without that. So- but I do see, like, here's the thing that I see, is for someone like my mom, who also grew up in the business, because she was a very young mom, my parents are extremely young. She saw all of the pitfalls, right? You're not going to make a lot of money, you're gonna have really hard hours, it's harder on the family. And I think subconsciously, maybe she was recognizing, I'm also a woman, right? My dad is a white guy in radio. So I think it was a bit of her protection mechanism. And she never outright said it. And I don't know if she actually consciously understood it. But it was also I think her saying, like, this business is not built for you right now. Anyway, I did it anyway, which didn't surprise anyone. Matt Cundill 7:59 So were there any experiences in radio that you encountered that you said to yourself, this is not what my dad would have had to endure? Erin Trafford 8:07 Oh, god, yeah, like pretty much my entire experience, almost moreso when I was in TV. It was worse in TV, for obvious reasons, right? As I became more conscious of the machine that is the media, I realized how much more challenging it is to be a female in that environment. Yeah. For sure. Matt Cundill 8:30 And then talk about your experience in television. Erin Trafford 8:33 So I was at the Rogers cluster out here in Halifax for four or five years. And I saw the writing on the wall, they were changing formats. And I actually wasn't even sure that the brand was going to stick around out here because Atlantic Canada is a bit of a funny market. We're a bit cut off from the rest of the world. We're kind of an afterthought. But I love living here. So this would have been in- it was- it was the year I turned 30. So 2012, 2013, and Global was called Global Maritimes at the time, they were making a big push to re articulate their brand. They bought a brand new studio space right downtown Halifax, they were launching a new show. So I took it as an opportunity to make the leap from radio into television. And I had been hosting the weekend talk show on the Rogers cluster. So lots of people knew me, I had name recognition. And it was a pretty easy get in terms of the job, but man, that transition from radio to television, that was- that was something else. I just realized I'm a radio girl at heart. I can do TV. I like TV, but I love radio. Matt Cundill 9:36 Were you integrated at all with the Rogers news station on radio? Erin Trafford 9:41 No, I just left completely and went over to Global and ended up- I basically did everything, I was kinda like the kitchen sink person. I was a reporter, I did some producing. I did the morning show. I ended up on the 11 o'clock. There was a bunch of times you know, I did the six. I basically did everything, despite whatever my job said. Matt Cundill 9:59 And being in the Maritimes as you mentioned, it's a little more cut off. It's one hour ahead of everyone. You get a head start every single day on all of us, you are one hour ahead of the rest of us. Erin Trafford 10:10 Do we get a head start? Or do we just rest on our laurels and wait for everyone else to tell us what to do? Because that was a lot of the dynamic that I felt, and still do, right? Well, I run my business- my COO, Jamie, now we're both in Halifax, our sales guys here in Halifax. The rest of our team is in the Eastern, and I run our business on Eastern. The world runs on Eastern. Matt Cundill 10:33 I'm in Manitoba. I'm running on Eastern. And I understand how unique the Maritimes is and you've chosen to live there instead of Toronto. So tell me about some of those advantages. Erin Trafford 10:44 Well, as I'm speaking with you, I'm looking at the ocean. Do I need to say anything else? Matt Cundill 10:50 No, I think I'll just move to the next question. Erin Trafford 10:53 You know what, it's relatively inexpensive to live here. I have two little girls, we can walk to school. My husband has a great job. We have a wonderful life that I don't think would exist in Toronto. And I mean, I'm Toronto born and raised, like born and bred Bay and Bloor. And I just don't want to go back. Matt Cundill 11:12 What was your first podcast experience? Listening wise? Erin Trafford 11:15 Oh, listening. Matt Cundill 11:17 We all have a gateway podcast drug. Erin Trafford 11:20 Yeah, this gonna betray a little bit of my weird my weirdo-ness though. Is that okay? Like it has nothing to do with media or business or like, bro, anything. It was an astrology podcast. Matt Cundill 11:33 Really? Erin Trafford 11:34 Yes. Yes. Matt Cundill 11:37 But that makes sense. Because in the Maritimes, you can actually see the sky and the stars. Erin Trafford 11:41 I've never thought of it that way. Yeah. And I mean, my little backstory is I say- I don't say, I firmly believe- that I have a little bit of a witch sense in me, like I'm a bit- a little bit psychic, I've dreamed of things that have come true. And I was on maternity leave with my first daughter. And I was bored out of my face. And I was trying to figure out how I was going to launch my business. I knew I didn't want to go back to work. I was in that kind of weird, gooey stew. And I somebody said, you should start listening to this. And it was like a daily astrology podcast. And so I just binged it while I was playing with the baby on the floor. And that's when I realized, okay, like this, this sounds kind of like, you know, it didn't sound good. I thought, I could do this better. And then I started to lean in to podcasting and how I could use it for my business. Matt Cundill 12:25 And so what was the business? Because you were in television, and then you weren't. Erin Trafford 12:32 That's the whole story. Yeah. So I lasted two years in that environment before I decided to walk away. And it was of my own volition. And I ended up in a really cool transition job that helped me recognize what I think a lot of folks in- in broadcasting, I wish everyone could have this learning moment because it made me feel strong and confident that I could do something else. I ended up working at a tech startup. And I was in strategic partnerships. And my job was to help articulate the vision of the company to investors, which sounds boring, but was incredibly exciting. And it allowed me to figure out, like, really hone my presentation skills, persuasion skills, strategic thinking, enterprising skills, all these things that journalists have, that I think sometimes when we're let go of the industry, or the industry lets us go or whatever, it's hard for us to really reconcile what else we're good at. And so that opportunity landed in my lap. And I did it for two years, and I loved it. But while I was doing it, I also knew it wasn't my end game. It was a transition, I needed to find something else. So in the background of all of this, and part of the reason why I left the newsroom was that energetically, I was really struggling with what I see now were the pressures of the business, the image consulting, the forced haircuts. Am I allowed to swear on your show? Matt Cundill 13:59 Yes. Erin Trafford 14:00 Having to do these bullshit stories about how a bill becomes a law, like not about the bill, or about the law or the impact. I'm like, I'm not gonna go on a six o'clock news and do a story about how a bill becomes a law. But that's the kind of shit that we were doing. So I was just done. And I started building a website all by myself. And I learned how to code, and I learned how to write, and I learned how to make money doing it. And I learned how to cultivate my own audience. And all of a sudden, one day, the paycheck from that website was bigger than my paycheck from the newsroom. And at the same time, I got hauled into the manager's office, and told that my website was a threat to my job. And if I didn't take my name off of it, I was going to get in trouble with my day job. So all of this kind of swirled at the same time, which gave me the confidence to walk away. So as I transitioned, I was building the site, building the site, building the site, and eventually it became my full time job and allowed me to work with some of the largest brands in Canada. And so when you ask the question, the question you asked was, What was your podcast about? That's what the podcast was about. I launched a podcast about the burgeoning, fledgling influencer marketing industry back in 2016. And there was no tech to do a podcast back then. But we did it. And it was great visibility for my company. And to put a bow on it, I just recently sold that website business in order to fund story studio network. So it all kind of came full circle. Matt Cundill 15:26 So you're in an era when you do recognize that influencer marketing is important. Yeah, you're doing podcasting. And it's not necessarily about the websites and the Instagram, and YouTube, and where other traditional influencers are going. You're saying no, podcasting is an influencer medium, and we're going to push it in that direction. Erin Trafford 15:48 It's funny because I think I walked away from the influencer space because I didn't like the energy of it. And I actually think it's because I was always being called back to more media. So the way I look at podcasting, yeah, there's like big celebrity podcasts and like influency people, I like to think of it more as an act of values, alignment, and branding. And that's what gets me excited is that if you really nail it, with podcasting, that's more what you're doing rather than this whole, look at my fancy lipstick and buy it from my affiliate link, kind of thing. I always knew that I was going to come back to media somehow. And this was just the right time and space to do it. Matt Cundill 16:31 So in 2016, you mentioned the technology, it certainly was not what it is like today. Erin Trafford 16:36 No. Matt Cundill 16:37 I'm trying to think back because around the same time I was building my studio ongoing, started with a microphone. But I noticed right now you're using a Rodecaster Pro, that was a game changer. What were some of the other big technological things to come into your life where you said, wow, things are so much easier now. Erin Trafford 16:55 I just remember how hard they were back then. Matt Cundill 16:58 Time consuming. Erin Trafford 17:00 It was very time consuming. The speed of the advancements in podcasting is unreal. I mean, I think about it in terms of me learning WordPress, because when I started WordPress in 2011, it was the same thing. By the time I left, it was almost like anybody can have a WordPress site. But when we- when I started, it was like pulling teeth. I mean, just even like things like Riverside, SquadCast, Descript- they've changed the game. Like I can sit down and have a whole podcast done and dusted, promoted, in 90 minutes. That's crazy town. Do you use Descript to edit? Sometimes. I do on the fly, like for little clips and stuff, our team- our team uses still the Pro Tools, which I don't ever log into. That's above my paygrade now. Matt Cundill 17:50 Tell me about websites, because you've been so involved with them. WordPress going back to 2011, you saw it, and so many podcasters skip over that step. And it is a big mistake. So for any podcaster who doesn't have a website in 2023, tell them why they need a website for their podcast. And I can't believe we have to have this explanation. But it's true. Erin Trafford 18:14 Well, you need a home base. So we can talk about podcasts and get really nerdy about how it's an extremely decentralized medium. So the other thing we want to talk about is owning your audience. So if you're sending your folks to your website to listen to your podcast, versus go find me on Apple, Spotify, any of those number of things, you're increasing the value of your website, which you can get also super nerdy about, which if you get more time spent on your website that's increasing your domain authority, which is gonna help your Google rankings. Let's talk about putting the transcripts on there. I mean, yes, yes. You need a web presence for your podcast. It doesn't have to be complicated. It can be super simple. It can be also very complicated. Depends on how you feel about it. But you do need it, absolutely. Was that enough of a sales pitch? I'm like, how nerdy do you want to get right now? Matt Cundill 19:02 No, actually, I was just going for the clip. Erin Trafford 19:04 Okay. Matt Cundill 19:05 I got the clip. That will definitely be the clip. And here we are, by the way, this is actually the first time I have used SquadCast to do video. And it's going to be the first time I'm going to upload a video experience of our talk into my YouTube. Normally it's just been an audiogram. But you can feel the video monster getting closer and closer. It's now tapped me on the shoulder and just said, you don't need to do an audiogram, you really should be putting up Matt and Erin talking. People do like to watch people talk and move their hands around, such as I'm doing now. And I'm going to create an audio experience later that is going to be completely separate. Shorter, tidier cleaner, edited out my stupid comments. Is that the way to go? Erin Trafford 19:58 That's one way to go. I don't think there's any- there's any rules right now, I honest to god think everyone in podcasting is just trying to figure it out. That's what I think. I think we're still in that, just figure it out, I call it spaghetti at the wall phase. And I emphasize this to our team all the time, because we get into these conversations. And sometimes I can sense like, there's this desire to get it right all the time. It's like, well, we gotta- it's gotta be right. And I say, no, it doesn't. Done is better than perfect. And we are in a growing industry that is in an experimental phase, there is no wrong answer. There may be a better way, or a more efficient way. But you cannot screw up right now. You just can't. That's my philosophy. Matt Cundill 20:46 What's your ideal client? And who is your ideal client? Erin Trafford 20:50 Story Studio Network, can I tell you the backstory, how it started? Matt Cundill 20:53 Absolutely. Erin Trafford 20:54 I feel like that informs kind of the answer to that question. So 2021, I had just had another baby in the middle of the pandemic, which was a whole- that was a whole thing. So I didn't have anything going on. I wasn't- you know, I wasn't building my consulting business. I wasn't doing anything with two babies in a pandemic. But my dad was still at 1010. He was doing the weekend show, but he was also producing podcasts on the side for fun. He texts me one day, and he's like, Do you have a few minutes to talk? And I can just tell that when he texts me that, he's got some big idea brewing, that's either brilliant or so dumb that I'm gonna have to have a hard conversation with him. So I was like, Okay, fine. I have five minutes. 90 minutes later, we ended up unpacking this notion that he has more work than he can handle. He's getting unsolicited pitches from organizations in Canada, wanting to enter the podcast space, and just because he is who he is, he's saying, Yes, I can help you. Yes, I can help you. And then all of a sudden, he's like underwater with all this work. And he didn't know what to do. So I was like, okay, stop what you're doing. We're going to put some structure around this. And we're going to assess what the gap in the market is here, like, what are they actually coming to you for? Why are they coming to you? And here's what we discovered. And this took- this took six or eight months to really unpack. But our baseline assumptions were correct. They were coming to him because they were struggling to have their core messages, so their earned media, their PR efforts, whatever it was, actually hit mainstream media. They weren't getting picked up on TV the way they used to, they weren't getting picked up on radio the way they used to. That was a symptom of the industry shrinking, of COVID sucking up all the oxygen in the news cycle, there was a lot of forces at play. So their natural response was, well, then if we can't get on the news, we should have our own podcast. I thought it makes a lot of sense. So we went out with the assumption that Story Studio Network was going to be a newsroom in a box. That we were going to provide- yes, it's branded content, meaning the organizations that we work with drives the agenda, they own the show, they own the IP, they help us craft it in collaboration, and really make sure that their story and their message, and moreso their values, ring true through the content. And within two weeks, we'd sold our first show out, we'd proven the concept. And we just kept pushing that rock, you know, down the hill, until today, when you know, yesterday, Jamie, our COO, just started our 40th Slack project. So we've done 40 shows in however long it's been, just over two and a half years. So our ideal client is that organization, brand, which I say can be a personal brand. We do work with thought leaders, but it can also be a not for profit, that is seeking to cultivate their value through an owned asset that most of them aren't getting the time of day from mainstream media or their PR budget is being spent, but it's not effective anymore. So they're coming to us for that editorial lens, and the production value. Honestly, it's the most fun application of my skills ever. Sometimes I pinch myself, I'm like, is this real life? Do I get to do this, like, every day? I do. It's wild. Matt Cundill 24:17 Tell me about the creation of the Fourth Draft, which is your new show. Which I'm loving, by the way. Erin Trafford 24:22 Thank you, that was a gin martini or two. Matt Cundill 24:26 What bar? Erin Trafford 24:27 Chez Trafford. I have kids. I don't go to bars. My husband learned how to mix a mean drink in the pandemic. It was actually- I pulled myself off the mic for a while because I could sense a couple of things were happening with me. Number one, I could feel this swell of support behind me from mentors and folks behind the scenes really pushing me to start leading change in Canadian media. And I think it's because of all those things that we've already talked about, the fact that I have this unique lens on the business by virtue of the fact that it's in my DNA, I may not have as much- You know, I'm not a 40 year news room veteran, but I am a 40 year Canadian media product, I understand it. And embody it, is the word I use, probably more than, than any average person. And so I started getting these messages. And some of them were overt, that it's time for you, Erin, to really step out, and say what you think and say what you see, because it took me a while to really come to terms with that, because it was a confidence issue. It was a imposter syndrome thing, but folks saying Erin, you really have this knack to see around the corner, you can see around the corner. And so I sat with that for a good six or seven months. And that's what the Fourth Draft is, it's me coming out and saying, listen, like, I have had to turn the page so many freaking times in my career to get to this point. Canadian media is in turmoil. I don't care who you are, if you don't believe that that's true, like, we need to have a conversation. The industry is- it's not dying, but it is in trouble. There are some real decisions that have to be made and some positions that have to be taken. And we need to have those conversations. So this new show is my way of, to be honest, processing through that in public. It's my way of really creating space to have those conversations, because watching the industry die, especially- and I think it's still buried in my Instagram profile. When all those big cuts happened at 1010, in February of 2022, when they basically obliterated that newsroom. I went for a beach walk by myself. And I wept. Like I wept uncontrollably. And I thought, like, this means something. And it's so hard to convey what that meant to me as a person and to the industry as a whole. So that's what the Fourth Draft is. That was more emotional than I expected to get. Sorry, Matt. Matt Cundill 27:09 Well, with reason. I mean, 1010- that's home base. That's Dad, right? Erin Trafford 27:13 Yeah. Matt Cundill 27:14 And, you know, for me, CJAD in Montreal, the same thing happened there. I've worked in there, I grew up alongside that radio station, so I totally get it. Erin Trafford 27:24 I was at CJAD as part of my internship in 2006. In January. Who goes to Montreal to work in January? Me. Matt Cundill 27:34 So funny enough, I don't know how we didn't meet because I was working at CHOM in that building in January 2006. So for whatever reason, we were in the same building for that internship, and we never saw each other. Erin Trafford 27:46 Oh, weird. Maybe because I was out there in the freezing cold following politicians around with a microphone. Matt Cundill 27:51 So you worked with Mike Bendixon. Erin Trafford 27:53 I did work with Mike Bendixon. Matt Cundill 27:55 We had a Promotions person, Skip Snare, who was tour manager of the Rolling Stones from '72 through to Tattoo You. And then when Mike was hired at the age of 26 to be the program director, Skip says, I have wine at home older than that. Erin Trafford 28:12 Well, it was weird for me too, because I was also 26, right? Like Mike Bendixon and I are the same age. And I was like, Well, I'm this plucky intern, and he's like the boss's boss. I think he's brilliant. If I can be so bold as to say that, but I can see how- talk about impostor syndrome. I don't know if he had it. He must have. Matt Cundill 28:31 He did not. I can clarify. Erin Trafford 28:34 Well maybe that's- back to that whole thing about, what are the pressures for being a woman versus being a man? Maybe- I don't know. Maybe I was- I was still learning at that point. Matt Cundill 28:42 He had the stamp of approval from a number of people including Steve Couch and Gary Slate, Rob Braid. Erin Trafford 28:48 Just all those- can I say that? All those white guys? Matt Cundill 28:52 Old white guys. old white guy? Erin Trafford 28:53 Old white guys. Well they're old now. Matt Cundill 28:55 They were then. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 29:00 Transcription of the Sound Off Podcast is powered by the Podcast Super Friends, five podcast producers who get together to discuss podcasting. Sharpen your podcast and creation skills by following the show on the Sound Off Podcast's YouTube or Facebook page. The Sound Off Podcast supports podcasting 2.0, so feel free to send us a boost if you're listening on a newer podcast app. If you don't have a newer podcast app, you can get one at newpodcastapps.com. Matt Cundill 29:31 Canadian media's in trouble. I feel like there's about six fires that you and I can identify that need to be put out. I don't know which one needs to be put out first. But I'd like to start with C11 and C18. Erin Trafford 29:46 Oh, when you said that, I like, start to want to like throw up in my mouth. Matt Cundill 29:50 And you've worked in newsrooms. We've just spoken about newsrooms. What are we missing here? Why would anybody come up with this? Erin Trafford 29:57 This is such a big elephant. I'm like, I don't don't even know if there's a spoon that will help us start digging in. There's a few players in here, the most important is the audience. And I don't know if you sense this, but I sense this still, that Canadians don't understand what has happened. Like, they have no clue what is going on. And then you and I, and folks like you and I- I worry we're in an echo chamber, because we're talking at each other. And we're saying the same thing. And we're reinforcing that this is complete bullshit. But I think that the audience doesn't understand. And that's a huge problem, that even if we get back to the legislative table with the government and get somewhere with them on rewriting this or backing this, like, I can't even understand how we're going to get out of this. Like, I don't see a way out. And the worst part is that by the time we do or don't, the audience is going to be so far gone, that it won't matter. That's my fear. Matt Cundill 31:00 So I think we possibly may already be there with traditional media. But you've also sounded the alarm on podcasts and Canadian podcasts. And you had a great suggestion. I saw it somewhere on on one of your your video uploads, likely LinkedIn, when you suggested, you know, community and networking, and somehow getting together to solve the issues of Canadian podcasting. But before you dig into that, as a Canadian podcaster, what's the problem? What is the uphill battle? What is the struggle? Erin Trafford 31:30 Hey, thank you for saying I said something smart on social media. I'm like, I did? Did I actually? Matt Cundill 31:35 Well, she looks like you. Erin Trafford 31:38 It's my gin martini doppelganger. So here's the way I see it. And this is just from me having lots of conversations with lots of folks in the industry, just so that I can get this kind of read of the room. Podcasting is awesome, because it's decentralized. Podcasting is awesome, because you can grow your own audience. The phrase that's used, which I think is hyperbolic, is it's a- it's democratized. Anybody can access it, and grow the audience. Okay, fine. The challenge that we're seeing is that when a platform such as that starts to take off, it is automatically Americanized, in that the monetization strategies, the money, the way the industry adapts, is based on American core values. So what that means is Canadians are automatically compared to Americans. How big is your audience? Will the American audiences 26 times bigger. How much money are you making? Well, American brands will pay 100 times more. And the challenge is that, we in Canada have less than the population of California. So if you want to actually reinvigorate Canadian media via podcasting, you have to change the narrative, because we can't use the American playbook. The other interesting- this is a theory. I'll tell you my theory. And I don't know if you agree with it or not. I just think it's interesting. I'm sure you've spoken to folks in the UK about podcasting. Because the UK podcast scene is kind of cool. They're way ahead of us, as far as I can see. And they have a really collaborative community, eye level approach to podcasting, as far as I can tell, that matches a lot of the ethos I see with Canadian podcasters. And I wonder if it's the CBC/BBC effect, and that the Americans don't have an equivalent, that the Americans are much more money driven, market driven, capital driven, and that the UK and Canada are much more about the content first, because we have this culture of content first. Matt Cundill 33:47 Well, when I look at most of the successful podcasts in the US, they- they sound, feel, or came out of NPR. I think NPR has a lot to do with the way podcasts sound. Erin Trafford 33:59 Yes. Matt Cundill 34:00 But in terms of monetization, that's an American beast that is CPM driven. And nobody's going to be able to keep up with a $25 to $34 CPM, anywhere, because I have those conversations every day. And we have to look to our value in order to sell it. So sound wise, I see in the US, NPR. Canada, CBC. BBC in the UK, but when it comes to the money side, yeah, and we're right beside the US, so we have to come up with a different strategy. It's got to be high value. It's got to be a fair price. And you're probably going to have to work out the deal yourself. Programmatic money's going to be nice, but it's going to maybe do a car payment. And that's it. Erin Trafford 34:43 Maybe, maybe, yeah. So there is a unique Canadian challenge that we face. And if C11- I mean, who knows what C11 is going to look like after these consultations. Matt Cundill 34:53 So the government recognizes that there are challenges, but is going about it in a way that is completely unhelpful. Does that sound about right? Erin Trafford 35:03 I would say so. Yes. I mean, my fear- I have so many. This is triggering. My fear is, it's going to be C18 for podcasts, and that the big players are just gonna say, screw this, it's too small of a market to even be worth the effort, and pull right out. Matt Cundill 35:21 Yeah, I painted that scenario on your LinkedIn after- I might have traumatized you a little bit. For those who are just trying to keep up with this conversation, Bill C18 is for news. And what happened in the end is Facebook and Google decided we're not going to be participating in your news, because we don't want to pay Canada for sharing links. It's kind of a silly idea. C11 recently asked big players who make over $10 million to please register with the Canadian radio and telecommunications people. Because we would like to regulate you. They don't say what that means. In a nice kind world, it would mean, can you alter your algorithm to put Canadian podcasts at the front? And I'll say, Canadian podcasts and indigenous podcasts, because that's the way that the law is written. That seems like a very nice thing. What won't be nice is if they ask Apple and Spotify, we would like for you to pay. We'd like for you to fund our podcasts. And I can see Apple, who got into this out of the goodness of their heart years ago, because Steven Jobs liked podcasting, saying, you know what, no, we don't even make that much from podcasting. We're not going to participate. We're going to turn this off. And Spotify, who does make podcasts, could very well say, You know what, we're just not going to send podcasts to Canada. If that happens, that's 80% of the podcast distribution that's out there. So I know I have professors, and I'll throw in the localism- at Acadia University in Wolfville, Nova Scotia- who said to me, you're being very apocalyptic over the situation. But I'm not. I've already got the blueprint. And it's happening with Facebook and Google as we speak right now. Erin Trafford 37:02 Mhm. Who said that to you, that's a local Nova Scotian? Matt Cundill 37:06 Professor Ian Stewart, of Acadia University back in 1989. Erin Trafford 37:11 He said that in 1989? Matt Cundill 37:13 He wrote that on my paper. Don't you think you're being a little apocalyptic over the situation that I presented to you? It was a- it was a Canadian politics and media course. Erin Trafford 37:24 Love it. Oh, I'm obsessed with that. That just means it was- we were seeing around the corner when the academics weren't. I am fearful of that reality. I mean, there's a version of that reality that isn't as apocalyptic. But no matter what, I think we're in for a rocky road. And the podcast industry in Canada isn't strong enough right now to, I think, survive without massive change. And I've had other conversations with folks in ad sales and all that kind of stuff, who also paint this really interesting narrative. And it's just one perspective. So I'm not saying it's true or not, but like that, in particular, the Canadian radio companies- so like the Bells, the Coruses, the Rogers, all of them- are harming Canadian podcasting, just by virtue of the way that they're valuing the medium, and the way that they're attaching it to what- the other stuff they're selling. So the over the year, sponsorships and advertisements. So there are folks who really do see that this could be- I'm not gonna say a death knell, but I think a reset. Matt Cundill 38:37 Push to the bottom. Erin Trafford 38:39 Yeah. Matt Cundill 38:39 And you mentioned ad companies. There is a very low knowledge about podcasts inside ad agencies. Erin Trafford 38:48 Oh, my gosh, I know. Matt Cundill 38:49 Do you spend most of your day talking to these agencies explaining third party tracking pixels, and dynamic ad insertion, and stuff like that? Erin Trafford 38:56 I do not. Matt Cundill 38:58 Because I do. And that's- it's a- it's quite the experience. Erin Trafford 39:03 I think they're still at a, what's a podcast? Matt Cundill 39:06 Confirmed. Erin Trafford 39:09 It's like I used to say, when I was selling, like, branded content on the internet, people would be like, how- how do I internet? It's like, we're at that same point again. How do I podcast? Well, okay. Like there's just a general education that needs to happen. And we're not there yet. So if the government steps in and regulates before the education, like- there's a lot- oh, yeah. It's gonna be a fun Christmas. Matt Cundill 39:33 So you're in Halifax you're worried about this. I'm in Winnipeg. I'm worried about this. Joe McLeod does the 905er podcast, who can't put a link up on any of his channels because of Bill C18, he's worried about this. He sent me a letter and he says, Who do I go to for help on this? Because my MP is Liberal, doesn't help. The Conservative Heritage Minister will only say dog whistle things like, Trudeau censorship. The government's trying to censor you. Which is completely unhelpful. And it's not even necessarily true. Erin Trafford 40:05 Agreed. Yeah. Matt Cundill 40:07 So that's unhelpful. Jesse Brown at Canadaland has been very vocal about this. So here we're sitting, what do we do? How can we come together? Erin Trafford 40:17 Well, can I tell you a little bit what's happening at the Echo Network, because- Matt Cundill 40:20 That's where I wanted you to go. Erin Trafford 40:21 Yay, I picked up what you were putting down. So a little bit of me seeing around a corner. I started my career in North Bay, which is also a little bit why I'm a bit of a witch, because I feel like I create these beautiful patterns and cycles of renewal. I got an email, January of this year, 2023, from a guy who I met when I was launching the station in North Bay. He owned- at the time, it was a brand new marketing agency in the city. So he was buying spots for his clients on the station. And he was a former radio guy, and I always just really liked him. Like he just- you know when you meet people, and you're like, there's just a cool vibe. I always trusted him. He was just good to work with. I was 26, felt very safe with him, which, in retrospect, I can say that. At the time, I had no words to put- put around that. And anyway, so he's been following me ever since. So about 17, 18 years. And he sends me this email out of the blue in January and says, Erin, I'm watching you, I think you're brilliant. I love what you're doing. I've got this idea. But first, I want to pose a question to you. Why is it that Canadian podcast networks don't work? And I was like, challenge accepted. So hopped on a call with him. And as I'm known to do, I'm like, after 90 minutes, we decided to start this crazy project together, hadn't seen him in 18 years. I said, listen, Scott, if we can make this work, I will do this, I will go all in with you and make it work. So what we determined is in North Bay in particular, and as we've learned over the last eight or nine months, in multiple multiple markets across Canada, mainstream media has pulled right out. So when I was in North Bay, there was a massive local media diet, there was a thriving newspaper, there were multiple news reporters at each of the radio stations, there was CTV Bureau, there was Cogeco the cable channel, there was- CBC had a bureau there. And in the last 17 years, that news presence has diminished from what would have been probably 20 or 25 bodies, down to three across all media. Three people. They don't have TV, they don't have radio, they don't have a paper anymore. They don't have anything. So we put all of this into context and thought, what if we could reinvigorate these local pockets of Ontario? Just start small, with podcast networks that really help reconnect the community back into their content, but also lean into this millennial mindset of, I don't want to have to wake up at 8am just to hear 90 seconds of news on the radio. So there formed the Echo Community Podcast Network, and we hustled hard. He's got a studio built, we have a team on the ground, and launched it just- middle of September. So we're barely a month into it. And here's what I can tell you that we're seeing. We've just got our flagship show up and- up and standing up, we've got- we're into phase two. So we're going to be adding in some cool stuff about local high school sports. Like all the stuff that local news used to do, we're now rolling out in podcast form. And I would be lying if I told you we have it all figured out. We don't have it all figured out. But we're, you know, 1% growth, 10% growth every week. And we're asking new questions. We're talking to all kinds of people. But here's the cool thing that we're seeing, back to your point about how do we solve this. And I saw this in the metrics yesterday. 65% of our listens are coming from direct website traffic and our newsletter. We have zero social media strategy, and we built it this way because of C18, C18 dropped in the middle of our strategic rollout and launch planning, right, it dropped- when did it happen? July? Matt Cundill 44:04 Yes. Erin Trafford 44:05 Okay, so July, we pivoted and removed social media. And we said, what if we did this without social? What would this look like? And we're hitting our metrics anyway. So we've been able to create a groundswell of support for the content that flies in the face of what everyone believed needed to happen in order to grow a media company, which I think is super cool. You're the first to hear it. I haven't said that out loud, except for our team meeting yesterday. Matt Cundill 44:35 I think I had a four point plan for news organizations to do a pivot if they were stuck under C18. And I'm going to try to remember it, and you can just correct me. First thing was get a newsletter. Immediately. You should be building your email list and communicating in that fashion. Simply going live and using your stories and your Instagram to communicate. There's no link involved, but you're working in a one on one situation. So now you've got a little bit of a video strategy going. I know we have thoughts about Twitter, X, and Elon Musk, it's there, you can go ahead and use it, it's fine, you'll be fine. Everybody will be fine. Those were three that came to mind. You can throw some crud on the fire. Erin Trafford 45:15 Yeah, the newsletter thing. So that's part of what I learned through my digital days growing that business is, I learned very early on that the value of my company was in the ownership. So I didn't have huge social numbers, I didn't have huge conversions off of Instagram, for example. But the places where I was really large, was where I was able to use SEO, and search intent, and behaviors and drive traffic back to my website, and therefore my newsletter. And that's why I was able to very easily sell that property, because it was an easy acquisition, there was no work involved. So I learned very early on, don't build on rented land. And that's what we're talking about. But here's the problem. And I don't know if you've noticed this, is I've had a lot of conversations with smaller broadcast companies. And they're like, Well, we have a newsletter, and I'm like, great. How did you acquire those subscribers? They're like, well, we ran a contest. It's like, we did a really fun contest that was like, sign up for our newsletter, or sign up for our hot hits, blah blah blah, and you're gonna get entered to win a barbecue, or- you know what I mean? And I'm like, okay, so the intent is wrong. And this is what we need to teach the broadcasters, because I'm looking at that list thinking, that's a list of 10,000 people who are- in the business, we'd say, prize pigs. They're not your people. So there's a fundamental shift in content strategy, in intent, in branding, when it comes to- how do you create something of value that isn't a barbecue, or whatever, a booze cruise? Because that's- that's the disconnect, is Canadian media thinks that it needs to give shit away in order for folks to value it. And I don't believe that's true. I think we need to do better at explaining why we're valuable. And that's what we've done with the Echo Network. And it was hilarious, because we have these really keener designers and interns on the team. And the first thing that came out and said, they're like, let's launch with a headphone giveaway. And I was like, No fucking way. Get that off the website. We're not giving away headphones. People are going to subscribe to our newsletter, and listen to our podcast, because they want to be there. And that's what we're seeing. It's very exciting. Matt Cundill 47:38 I love that, put the value up front. And by the way, I built a newsletter at a radio station with concert promo codes. So 25,000 people on the newsletter, but most had signed up to get the concert promo code emailed to them, so they could have a pre sale. Like a special rock concert, Power 97 pre sale. It felt like a valueless audience in the end. Erin Trafford 48:04 It kind of is. Because then what are you going to do with that list? How are you going to re engage with that list? How are you going to create a behavior that creates a cycle, where they look forward to the newsletter, they open it and then somehow that leads back to a measurable KPI for the business? A download, a listen, and interaction, an engagement, something maybe over the air that can be measured using the PPMs. Like there is- there is a disconnect in the strategy fundamentally, and it will be easy to fix, but we got to talk about it. Matt Cundill 48:34 So bring this back just for the regular podcaster who doesn't have to deal with all the Canadian media drama that we've just spoken about. We should probably title the episode The Drama Queens. Erin Trafford 48:44 Where's my crown? Matt Cundill 48:49 Talk about the download for a second, and how valuable it is and how it should be read. Because there's a lot of people out there who- I mean, I go into every Facebook group, how do I get more downloads? Do I have enough downloads? I got 150 downloads, is that good? Should it be compared? Help these people out. Be their therapist and provide them with the opportunity to get out of the abyss and come back to planet earth. How should they be looking at metrics? Erin Trafford 49:15 I would love that T shirt, just like a T shirt that just has all of those dumb questions. How do I get more downloads? Am I good enough? Are you good enough? Are you really asking that question in a Facebook group? First of all. Don't ask that question in a Facebook group. Okay, so the download is a necessary metric because it is the best, most broad metric we have right now. So we can't discount it. However, you know this, it doesn't tell the full picture at all. So where we look now, especially because we work with really niche companies and really niche stuff. We're not going for massive downloads, like none of our shows is going to blow up the charts necessarily, because we're going after a really specific group of people. So the way I would look at it is- compare your downloads to your time spent listening. We're always trying to get to an apples to apples comparison, especially if, for example, you're an independent podcaster and you want to get a sponsor. I can guarantee you're gonna have a hard time articulating the value of a podcast that gets 1200 downloads a month, versus an Instagram account that gets 50 thou- has 50,000 followers, right? You need to come up with an apples to apples. So what is your time spent listening, and then back that out into how many downloads you're getting, and come up with a- we do this. This is how many minutes people have listened to my podcast. People can understand the value of a minute, but they can't understand the value of a download. And then there's a whole other thing about how like- automatic downloads by default, based on whatever player you're using. I know Apple's phasing that out, but I mean, it's just- it's not an accurate representation of health, wealth, or goodness, certainly not goodness. Matt Cundill 51:01 I find it amazing, but I really find it endearing, that you can be comfortable with metrics such as 60% browser traffic. I would just look at that and go, Well, why don't we have more Apple? Where's the Spotify listens? Where are those downloads? Erin Trafford 51:17 Well, it's- they're sitting on our website and listening through our embedded player, which I think is a behavior that's fascinating. Matt Cundill 51:25 Yeah, I mean, I've heard people say, if you have more than 4%, browser traffic, it's fraud. But clearly, it's not. Erin Trafford 51:30 No, it's absolutely not. And they may be on a lock screen, I just- it also could be like because of the conversions from the newsletter, we're linking right back to our embed player, rather than to Apple and Spotify. And the reason we're doing that is to reduce- So there's this whole thing about like, a confused mind doesn't buy, or a confused mind doesn't click. So in a market like North Bay, what we're actually trying to do is convert and educate at the same time. So we know people on the ground don't actually understand podcasting. A lot of them have never really listened to a podcast before. So if we say listen on Spreaker, listen on Amazon, listen on Apple, listen on Spotify, the confused mind won't know what to click. So our strategic choice out of the gate for the first month was just click this one link, and then hit the play button. We're just asking them to do the one thing. And they're doing it, which is wild. So you know, eventually, we probably will build out that metric. But we have a crazy conversion on our website right now. Matt Cundill 52:31 Is there anything else that is around the corner, that you see, that you haven't told us yet? Erin Trafford 52:38 Oh, my goodness, I think we need to see what this C 11 is going to be. I really do. I see a bright, bright future for branded content. Bright future, if we can get folks to really wrap their heads around it. I see- I mean, selfishly, I see a bright future for Story Studio Network. I'm so excited to build it. I don't know what the future holds. But I'm excited about it. I don't know yet, maybe we'll have to have another- like a reset conversation after C11 comes out. Matt Cundill 53:06 That's like two years away. Erin Trafford 53:08 But aren't the consultationss going to be done, like, in six weeks? Matt Cundill 53:11 They won't be able to get this together. Erin Trafford 53:12 Right, it's government. Matt Cundill 53:14 I mean, they've said it's two years away. So I'm confident that by the time they release anything, most of the things that they've suggested, will have changed, gone bankrupt or not be available anymore. Erin Trafford 53:25 I do think that the radio companies are finally going to stop looking at us as a threat. I think the smart ones will. Matt Cundill 53:33 Erin, thanks so much for doing this. I really appreciate it, and giving us a perspective, and looking around the corner into the future. Erin Trafford 53:38 Thanks for having me. So fun. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 53:40 The Sound Off Podcast is written and hosted by Matt Cundill. Produced by Evan Surminski. Edited by Chloe Emond-Lane. Social media by Aidan Glassey. Another great creation from the Soundoff Media Company. There's always more at soundoffpodcast.com.

Jennifer-Lee Gunson is the owner of J-Pod Creations which is a Vancouver based company specializing in branded podcasting. Before Jennifer got started in radio, she was an actor. She later enrolled at BCIT, found her way to Astral owned The Bear, which has now been shifted to the Bounce cluster of Bell properties. She returned to Vancouver after a stint in Prince George and took to the air (literally) doing traffic for CKNW and later Canadian Traffic Network which is where you can hear her today. She is also the host of a few podcasts at her company, including the ever-popular HAVAN podcast "Measure Twice, Cut Once" which is a branded podcast for the Homebuilders Association of Vancouver. In this episode, you will hear how she got her start in radio, survived the pandemic, and started her company. Best of all, she shares what she learned in radio and how it applies to making great on demand audio. Transcript: Sarah Burke (Voiceover) 00:02 The Sound Off Podcast. The show about podcast and broadcast starts now. Matt Cundill 00:13 Jennifer Lee Gunson is a voice that you hear on the radio in Vancouver doing traffic for a Canadian traffic network. And she's also the owner of J-Pod Creations, which makes branded podcasts. I missed meeting her at Podcast Movement. But she did run into Jon Gay from JAG in Detroit podcasts. And it took a guy from Detroit to hook us to Canadians up for today's show. So often I spend time talking about how radio is different from podcasting. But Jen reminds me about all the great things it has in common, and the advantages that radio people have when they fully commit to podcasting. Now, not because you asked, but I'll just say that one of the things radio is good at is promoting their shows, and most podcasters who don't have a broadcast, marketing, or PR background, start out blindly down their marketing path. Jennifer joins me today from Vancouver, British Columbia. Did you always want to get into broadcasting? Jennifer Gunson 01:05 No, I was actually an actor first. I really made my parents proud. Yeah, I started as an actor, I actually started off in like biblical musicals back in the day at church. And I should have known that I had a different voice at that point, because I was always cast as the boy narrator in every biblical musical because I have this, like booming voice. So I didn't take that advice and move with it. I went on to being an actor for a while, actually ended up getting a degree in theater, which again, I don't know if my parents love my career choices, because then I went to get a diploma in radio afterwards, and my whole reason of why I went from theater to radio was the fact that was like, How do I get a paycheck every single day? And I was like, let's be a radio broadcaster. Matt Cundill 01:54 But that's not a crazy stretch, to go from being an actor into radio. Danny Bonaduce, Jay Thomas, there's oodles of them who do it. Jennifer Gunson 02:04 Yeah, but I think you think you're like, I'll make more money as a radio person. But I felt like sometimes you're maybe pretty par with an actor. Matt Cundill 02:12 I think maybe the radio gig is supposed to be what they do in between the acting gigs, so they don't have to be a waiter, waitress, whatnot. Jennifer Gunson 02:20 I was doing it wrong. Matt Cundill 02:21 What was the most exciting acting gig you did? Jennifer Gunson 02:23 I have to say, my favorite acting gig that I ever did- It was like an independent film. This sounds bad. But it's like, not like an independent, a show that one of my teachers wrote. And it was just really fun. And it was a like really weird premise where it was like, these kids create an air band. And there's a whole air band, like, underground movement. And we- basically it's that story of like, how do you raise money? And we created an air band. And then at the end- it was a lot of fun. But I have to say one of my acting gigs that I got that wasn't actually- I was just an extra. But I was on the original, the first one, the Hot Tub Time Machine as background. And it was so fun because they had to outfit you in 80s clothing. And I was there for quite a few days in the ski lodge scene. And they did this scene where John Cusack gets a fork stuck in his eye. And then he has to like run around the ski lodge. That part's cut out. But he had to run around the ski lodge screaming of a fork in his eye. And I was one of the people that were in this group, and he's supposed to push through me and another girl. And he ended up on the ground. And he like, looks up like, oh, I don't know what's going on. So we did this like a whole bunch of times. And then afterwards, it got back to the tent. And I was like, I have all this like, fake John Cusack blood on me. And I was like, Oh, this is like the best day of my life. So that's my best acting gig. Matt Cundill 03:47 And how did you get to BCIT? Jennifer Gunson 03:49 I got to BCIT after university, because I decided, what else am I going to do now with my theater degree? And I decided to apply to BCIT. And I actually originally applied to the journalism program, but I don't remember why. But sometimes I had to, for some reason, I think you had to put your voice on a CD. And the radio program was like, actually, we like your sound. And then I went for the radio interview and got into BCIT. And that's how it started. Probably not like the traditional way of how everybody else decides to go to radio school. But yes. Matt Cundill 04:25 Why do you think so many people like your voice? Jennifer Gunson 04:27 Because it's low. And I've been told that it's low and it's not irritating. I don't know if that's a good compliment. But yeah. Matt Cundill 04:36 Well, that is a thing. I mean, I know that there's been a history of female voices that say, Well, that sounds like a shrill, and people get turned off from it. And as the history goes, microphones have been made over the years for lower register voices. So there's a little bit of imbalance there. Jennifer Gunson 04:54 I think for me, I really do love the lower tone and it's taken me a long time to get here actually, because like you said, usually when we think of women, and this is like an archaic way of thinking, but we talked about it in theater school lot when we did a lot of voice work is like, women want to sound pleasant. They want to sound nice, they don't want to sound like they're nagging. So we psychologically tend to, especially women that have lower voices, tend to put it up in a higher register, even if that's not where our natural voice sits, but now I feel like more women with lower voices are getting praised for it, because it seems more like you're commanding or, or you're a leader. And it's, it's unique. And it's different. Like I've had a lot of people say to me, that it's a very unique sound. And they like it actually, the one thing that I get all the time too, which I think is so funny is like, I'll go to different restaurants and people are like, did you ever think about being on the radio? Like, maybe. I've tried. Matt Cundill 05:57 I knew during the pandemic, that there was a lion's share of voice work, especially in the first six months of the pandemic, when female voices were the voice of being more reassuring. So I know a lot of work went there. I know for cartoons, for instance, you know, higher pitched voices are gonna get more cartoon jobs. I'd like to say that it all sort of balances out in the end, but it kind of does. Jennifer Gunson 06:20 Yeah, and I don't know if this was your story when you worked in radio, but it was so interesting, because they told us at the beginning that obviously you can't be on the station that you necessarily like the music on, your voice will dictate where you get placed. And I don't know if it's so much like that now. But I remember right away my first job, which I love rock anyways, was 101.5 the Bear. And I remember I got put on a pop station years later, and it wasn't a hot AC, it was just kind of like a regular AC. And we got complaints from other women saying my voice was too low. So it's just it's such an interesting- voice. I could talk to you about this forever, because it's an area that I love is is just such an interesting thing and how people are perceived. Matt Cundill 07:04 I got a tip from somebody once, don't put your picture on your voiceover business card. Let people just hear the sound and they will imagine who you are. And then all of a sudden, there's me who looks like white bald guy. Oh, but that's not how I envisioned you. You're not really the face or voice of my product. Goodbye. Jennifer Gunson 07:20 Yeah, that's a good tip. Because that's the thing is like voice is so subjective. And I don't know if you're watching Love is Blind. It's the same thing. It's like, they can't see who the person is. And I was like- and then they're so shocked when the person does the reveal. And they're like, Okay, that's who I am. But I think it's a kind of a neat industry, radio and voiceover where it's like, you can be many different people. And it's like, you don't need to have a photo. I know that's changing, a lot more people are doing more video stuff and things like that, but. Matt Cundill 07:51 Tell me about how you got to Fort St. John. Jennifer Gunson 07:53 Oh, well, it wasn't the place that I thought I would be. I know everybody starts somewhere. But I never thought about Fort St. John. No reason why it just didn't. I was applying to a lot of places in Alberta for my first gig in other parts of Canada. And I started my internship at Sun FM in Kelowna, back in the day, and they were owned by Astral Media at the time. And again, this is why like they tell you, and I tell people now, just don't ever burn bridges and do a good job, because it can really help you. And so at the time, the bear was hiring and they found Kelowna, and they were like, Oh, we're looking for some people. And they're like, Oh, our intern was really great. You should take a look at her demo for afternoon drive. So they phoned me up and they were like, hey, we'd like to hire you for afternoon drive. And that was it. I honestly, I wish I had like a more like struggle story, like because it would sound more like cool. But I'm very fortunate that I literally got full time, and very grateful for a full time on air gig Monday through Friday with the Bear. Even though it was not the Bear that you were on in Edmonton, it was still like a really great company to work with. And really notable and then looks good on my resume. But that's how I ended up in Fort St. John. Matt Cundill 09:13 Tell me a little bit about the town. And I'm only a little bit more interested now, because I've learned that the newspaper in town, which I think is called the Alaskan Highway? Jennifer Gunson 09:24 I think it's Alaska Highway News or something. Matt Cundill 09:26 Yeah, it's just folding up shop. And I'm like wondering what that's gonna look like and sound like for that town. Jennifer Gunson 09:33 I didn't know they were closing, that's such a huge staple in Fort St. John. I think that's going to be a big effect there. Because the one thing I really liked about it is the sense of community up there, and if you ever want to feel the love for the media up there, it's definitely a place to go, because that's where they get all their information from is from their newspaper from their digital publications. Because the stories are so tailored to them. So I think If they go, it's going to be a really big hole and maybe it will give opportunities and for some of their local stations, another independent station I think is still up there, the Moose and maybe to do more stuff like that. I think they were actually very tied with foam. That newspaper may be actually. Matt Cundill 10:17 So you mean to tell me in Fort St. John, your choice of radio listening is the Moose and the Bear? Jennifer Gunson 10:22 Yes. And I don't know what they changed into it. But the pop station that was owned by Astro at the time was Sun FM, as well. But so you get sun, you get the animals. And I feel like it's very fitting. Matt Cundill 10:37 And lots of tree planters. I know that because my brother was planting trees up there at one point in his life. Jennifer Gunson 10:43 A lot of tree planters, a lot of different industries that you don't usually get exposed to in Vancouver. And it's a really fun time. Like I have to admit like, it's one of those things that you're like, Okay, I'm moving from a huge city of millions. And now I'm going to 20,000 people up north, and I'm figuring out what snow is for the very first time. But it was a lot of fun. And there's a lot of different stories. Like I said, like I accidentally- not in Fort St John but when I lived in Prince George accidentally touched a bear. Like how many people can see that? Matt Cundill 11:13 Oh, I've got time for that story. Jennifer Gunson 11:15 Yeah, that's a good one. This is why you shouldn't text and walk. You should be more alert. So I was living in Prince George doing radio. That was my next step after Fort St. John, and I was coming out of the carpark and I lived on a Greenbelt. And I was head down looking at my phone. And my friend was coming to pick me up, but they weren't there quite yet. And I'm texting them. And also, I'm wearing a skirt. And I was like, Oh, I bumped into something fuzzy. So I'm like petting something fuzzy, off my leg. And I realized I'm patting the back end of a black bear, which is- I wouldn't really recommend to everyone else. But yeah, I screamed, and I got rid of the bear. And- And luckily, I didn't know what to do in that moment. I just like screamed like I was getting murdered. And the bear just took off and didn't even look, because I scared him more probably. And then the guy living in the top of the house ran down and he said, Oh my god, are you okay? And I said, I just touched a black bear. Matt Cundill 12:13 Tell me about that move from from Fort St. John to Prince George, what precipitated it? And how much more money did you get? Jennifer Gunson 12:21 Actually, I think it was about 10,000 more, which back then you were like, oh, yeah, like, that's good. Oh, and I got benefits, because they were a Union station too. So there was a lot of perks going from Fort St. John to Prince George. And actually, it was funny, because I have to credit my boss in Fort St. John, because it was kind of at the time that I wasn't like, sure if I wanted to stick in radio or not after being in Fort St. John, like I said, loved it. But it was quite far as isolated from my family. And so he came down and he was like, they want to meet you in person, take the day off, go down to Prince George. And then they're gonna put you up in a hotel, and then- and then come back. But he's like, I'm going to urge you right now he's like, I think you should take this job. And I said, Do you think so? And he's like, yeah, he's like, we don't want to lose you. But he's like, I really think it'd be a great step. So I didn't think much about it. And then I went down there, and I met the team, and they were all great. And I decided, hey, besides the money in the fact that I was gonna get really good benefits. It was really- I have to credit my first boss being like, No, I think this is a good move. Matt Cundill 13:31 What station was that? Jennifer Gunson 13:32 I went to 101.3, the River, owned by Jim Pattison. Matt Cundill 13:36 And from there is that kind of how you got to Vancouver? After that ran its course, you found your way to Vancouver? Jennifer Gunson 13:41 Found my way back because my boss at the time, my new boss at the time, Amber was going through all of the different demos. And she phoned me up and interviewed me. And then she was like, I thought this could be a trick question. Because I was getting near like the final interviews and she said, Have you ever been in a helicopter? And I was like, I'm not gonna lie to her. And I said, No. And I was like, oh, that's probably like the end of my interview. And then she goes, Oh, nobody has. It's okay. Come on down. So that's how I ended up getting to Vancouver was getting the helicopter gig, which after being on radio, as a music DJ and then I was also- and Prince George I was the music director as well. It was really fun to go to something new that I didn't know. I knew how to speak on the air, but I didn't know traffic and specially I hadn't lived in Vancouver for like five to six years and so there were so many different things that I didn't know about like the self-raiser perimeter road, and all that so I had to learn it from scratch when I got back. But it was a really great job, but I always say, if you want to learn how to be thrown in the deep end, take the helicopter job. Matt Cundill 14:50 So the helicopter job was a traffic job at what station? Jennifer Gunson 14:55 At that time I was contracted to CKNW. Matt Cundill 14:59 And that would be The traffic station at the time. Jennifer Gunson 15:02 At the time. Yeah. So it was great. Matt Cundill 15:05 When you're thrown into the deep end you're really referring to, you've got to know all the roads, you've got to know all the alternate routes, you've got to know- I mean, that's a tight radio station. There's clocks, there's things to follow. There's- there's a helicopter involved. That's wild. I mean, that's- that's a big jump. And because I mean, the most traffic experience you have so far is the backlog at the Tim Hortons in Prince George. And the bear you run into in Prince George, and also- is there traffic and Fort St. John? Jennifer Gunson 15:37 There's no traffic and Fort St. John or Prince George. That's the thing. You hit it. It's like if there's a moose on the highway, that's a big deal. Matt Cundill 15:46 Funny enough, because I googled that earlier today, Fort St. John. And most of the stories were about a moose that had hit a vehicle. Jennifer Gunson 15:53 It's surreal, and it's actually quite terrifying. I've never hit one but like, they can destroy your car, like everyone in Fort St. John has stories about a moose destroying their vehicle. Matt Cundill 16:03 Okay, so what time did you have to be in the helicopter doing your job? Early? Jennifer Gunson 16:08 No, I lucked out. I got the afternoon gig. I feel like afternoon gigs are like my goal in radio. I have done mornings before too, for fill in and stuff. But radio, I guess I've just good in the afternoon. And that's probably the area that I like to stay in. But yeah, for the helicopter, like you said, just jumping in the deep end was hard. Because a you're trying to get used to being in a helicopter, and not knowing the roads or anything. And back then it was hard to train people because there were two people in the helicopter and a pilot. There's only three seats in this helicopter. And it's the size of a Volkswagen Beetle. So it's very teeny. And so I remember Amber took me up for like a quick test flight, and then came down and was like, Oh, you're gonna be on the air in a few minutes. And then like, she rolls up my script, and she's like, here, like, turns my mic on. And I had to do traffic for the first time. That was nerve-wracking. And I was like reading and I was so nervous. And I don't think I did a very good job at all, just because I had no clue what was going on. But I did it. And I'm lucky I had an amazing boss that was supportive. And then the best part was, she's like, this is Trish, she's gonna be your helicopter buddy. And then I went up with her and Trish was just like- I was like, Oh my God, they're putting me in the helicopter. Like I've only been at work for like two hours, it's my first day. Because I don't know if it's the same as your radio story. But usually when they bring you into a new station, even if you had some experience, they would let you like job-shadow the person for the board for the like first day. But in a helicopter, you don't have that choice. And so I get thrown in and luckily, again, Trish and Amber, I can't give them enough credit because they are awesome. And Trish helped me so much. She had to like give me the roads and everything. And then funny story which I'm okay with telling people this but, I never looked down from my paper the first time was in the helicopter because it was my first day and I was so nervous and it was kind of gray and rainy outside. And as we were landing, I drive heaved in the bag, because I was so nervous. And so it was really cute. We had this little Italian pilot that worked with us. And you know, you're just feeling terrible after your first day and you go in and you're like, sitting at your computer. You're just about to go home. You just came in from the helicopter. I'm trying to make sure I feel good before I go, Trish has gone already. This Italian pilot comes in. He's like, just so you know, when we land. It's good to look at the horizon. Like, thank you. And I felt so embarrassed. But I felt like that's a good first helicopter story. Matt Cundill 18:55 But a dry heave is just nerves. Right? You weren't really gonna throw up. It's just nerves. Jennifer Gunson 19:00 No, it was just nerves. Yeah. I'm glad like I look back on it, and it can laugh now. And I feel like now I'm able to be prepared for everything in my career. But it's just like, wow, that was that was a crazy day. And I got through it. Matt Cundill 19:13 How does a tool like Google Maps and Waze conflict, help, contrast, what work gets done in a helicopter for traffic and radio? Jennifer Gunson 19:25 Well, in traffic in general, like when we're reporting on it, Google Maps is not necessarily helpful because we do follow the red lines sometimes, but the red lines are not necessarily correct. And so like, when we go in the helicopter, someone will be like, before we report on because we want to make sure information is correct. They'll be like I see some congestion over on the Lions Gate Bridge and it's backed up to West View Drive on upper levels highway, can you go check it out. And so then we'll fly over there and then we'll be like, Oh, actually, no, it's only about midway down the cut. So then we text back to the person down on the ground in the hangar, and then they're able to put the correct information out there on all the traffic servers. But that's why it's such a team environment because like, technology's great. And like, yes, if I use Google Maps to figure out where I am in the air? 100%. But, and sometimes if you're looking for like little obscure roads and things like that, it's helpful, but you can't trust it 100%. So it's still like, you still have to have judgment, and you still have to be able to see. And so with the helicopter, and with the small airplane that we also have for News 1130, it's really great to have those aircrafts, because we're able to know and confirm the information, because sometimes too, as the average person that calls in, and that's fine. They don't need to know the roads, I didn't know until I was like, doing the traffic, they won't necessarily know exactly where they are either. So sometimes with a phone in a tap, they might get the streets a little wrong. So again, it's nice to have the helicopter to be able to be like, can you check this problem out at Highway One and Galardi? And then we'll go and be like, oh, it's actually Highway One and Willingdon. But then it's just again, it's using the technology, using us, using the callers, using everything as a team and not just being reliant on one thing. Matt Cundill 21:22 That's okay. I was giving away $1,000 once and I said, Come meet me in Stony Plain. I'm at the corner of Main and King. Turns out I was in Spruce Grove and a whole other town away. Jennifer Gunson 21:33 Did the person never win the money? Matt Cundill 21:36 I advertised myself as the local idiot. Screwed up the entire contest. Ah, well. Jennifer Gunson 21:42 it happens. I'm sure we all have radio stories where we've definitely screwed up on the air a ton of times. Matt Cundill 21:49 So did you get let go from CKNW and then you came back to work for Canadian traffic network? How did that work? Jennifer Gunson 21:55 No, I actually didn't get let go, which I don't know. Everyone says you're not a true broadcaster until you get let go. So I don't know if I'm a true broadcaster. But what happened was, I just had a feeling that something was going to happen with my position. I didn't know what it was, there was a lot of change going on, not just in Vancouver, just across Canada. And I just felt that it was time to go. So I left, and then when COVID hit my position got axed. And then a few years later, when I started my business, I have a podcast business. Amber just was like, Hey, do you want to come fill in and I said, Oh, that would be awesome. So now I fill in for many different radio stations that are under the Canadian traffic network bracket. And then I do fill in from time to time in the helicopter, which is just TV. And they do do CKNW as well, again, that was my old position. And then we also have the little airplane for Rogers as well. Matt Cundill 22:49 But you still don't have to get up in the morning, right? Jennifer Gunson 22:52 I do once in a while when I fill in for Amber or fill in for another morning position, or afternoon if I get to fill in for somebody else. But yes, I have definitely done early morning shifts. And I've done it for a stint of time, I guess when I was working in Prince George, while they were trying to find the next morning show co host, so you really got to have a taste of that, it was mid days. And then I got to fill in and I was like, Whoa, this is early. Everybody has my respect that does morning radio or television, 100%. Sarah Burke (Voiceover) 23:21 Transcription of the Sound Off Podcast is powered by the Podcast Superfriends, five podcast producers who get together to discuss podcasting. Sharpen your podcast and creation skills by following the show on the Sound Off Podcast's YouTube or Facebook page. The Sound Off Podcast supports podcasting 2.0. So feel free to send us a boost if you're listening on a newer podcast app. If you don't have a newer podcast app, you can get one at newpodcastapps.com. Matt Cundill 23:52 So you're gonna be a good person to ask this question. Because your business took off during the pandemic. I think you had a podcast related to the pandemic. And you've been able to watch traffic and people coming back since the pandemic and we're going to use Vancouver here as the example because that's what you know. So how can you sort of summarize the last two years of work from home, traffic on the streets, traffic in certain quarter hours? What are you seeing as being sort of the difference from when we started the recovery of the pandemic up to what we're seeing now? Jennifer Gunson 24:31 Actually, it's interesting you asked that because I was talking to some of the traffic girls about this. And I've noticed too when I go up in the helicopter during the week that if you go up on Thursday, it's really busy. It's like a Friday commute, especially in the afternoon like everyone's getting home and then Fridays, so quiet. So I said I wonder if it's because a lot of people are doing more hybrid and during the week they're going Monday, maybe Wednesday and a Thursday. Oh or Tuesday, whatever when they want to kind of jumble around, but Fridays are never that busy now. And Thursday afternoons are like hits like Carmageddon. Sometimes it's like, oh, everyone's coming home now. And so it's interesting too, because even when I've gone out during the day for meetings, if I meet people not virtually for my business during the day, especially if you go Monday or Tuesday, it's like Rush Hour at one o'clock. And you're like, I thought everybody was at home, like, Where is everyone like, why? Even when you're going into like coffee shops and stuff, too. They're just extremely busy. So I think with this new work with home and people choosing their own schedule, we're definitely seeing a different pattern in traffic 100%. And I'm noticing something more to like the North Shore was always hard to get on off. But I've noticed an interesting pattern because my family lives there. It's like, before COVID the weekends weren't usually that unless people were skiing weren't that bad to get off of at like four in the afternoon. But I think during COVID, too, because more people stayed at home and even now, after after COVID. A lot of people are traveling more to the US or traveling more locally. We're seeing still a lot of people enjoy all the great things the North Shore has to offer. But you can't leave now on the weekend at 4pm to get off the North Shore. Like it just it seems like people's behaviors are just a little bit more different. entitled, not entitled, they're the least they're like staying local, I guess and enjoying the amenities. But yeah, I have to admit this, I actually hate driving. Because I'm so spoiled being up in the helicopter that I just like now when I have to deal with traffic, I'm like, Why did I not check the house before I left? Why did I not do that? I don't know. I get mad when it gets stuck in something because I was like, I could have predicted this. And I didn't. Matt Cundill 26:58 And then you started a company for podcasting sometime during the pandemic. What spurred you on to start the company? Jennifer Gunson 27:05 Because I was tired of talking to recruiters is my honest answer. But maybe I shouldn't say that. But no, in all honesty, it's really difficult, especially when you have a broadcasting background. And like, again, I'm very grateful for the journey, I've had a- had a very successful broadcasting background, very grateful to all the people that I've had in my corner. But when you sit down in recruiting, I get it. This is before COVID too when they were a little bit more siloed in thinking of like, this is your position. And this is what you can do. I had a lot of them asked me like, Why would you leave broadcasting? Why would you leave the helicopter? It's so cool. And I said, I understand that. But I said our industry is going through a massive change. They said I'm just trying to figure out where I fit in there. And I said, I was still passionate about our industry, and I love it, but I've got to figure it out. So then I went home and I talked to a lot of my kind of mentors, and COVID hit and they said, You know what, why don't you showcase your skills? And I said, Okay, sure. So I created a podcast called Coping 19. And it was all about how to positively- because I was tired of all the negative, so positively pivot your business in this new world that we were living in. And I have a lot of friends that are entrepreneurs and have successful businesses. But I knew that they had a lot of wisdom on how they were pivoting their respective businesses. So I started to do that. And I started to network here through the podcast, as well is in the US. And I actually because my background is theater, I got to end up interviewing a Broadway producer. And that was really exciting for me, because I got to use my theater background talk about the Broadway closure, which was huge accent went on for a few years. And so it was just a really neat way for me to rediscover my love of broadcasting through podcasting. And not only that, just continue my networking app, which I really thoroughly enjoyed before COVID. And I think that's something that COVID really took away from a lot of people that were extroverted, was us getting out there and networking. So I was able to do it both. And then my parents owned a construction company and they've owned for a long time I do a little bit of marketing for them from time to time. And so I have a lot of friends that are in that business. And I ended up interviewing one of my friends that's an architect about, you know, kind of it was a really cool episode, like what she felt the changes were going to be to do with COVID, especially in the commercial space, like our restaurants gonna have more like booths and things like that. And so the homeowners association knew of me, heard that podcast, but also one of my friends that worked heavily in the homebuilders, or was a member of it, told them to listen to my podcasts as well. And they ended up having a meeting with me when restrictions lifted and they said can you help us create a podcast for the Home Builders Association of Vancouver? They said we have another guy that wants to work on this project with us, who's also a former radio host. And he now owns a home technology company. And they're like, We like the fact that you have a family business in construction. So help us. So that's really what started it. So I went on this journey with the homebuilders. And it's great. We're now six seasons in and we've interviewed Brian Baumler, we've just interviewed someone from the local government, about housing the housing minister. And so it really took off in a way that I didn't expect, like, and I don't mean that in a bad way, it just, it's something that I fell in love with, it fit all my skills perfectly. And I always tell people, I said, I hated that when I was trying to figure out what to do next in my career, that people were like, it's gonna come to you. Do what you love, and it will come and I was like, if I hear that one more time, I said, I'm gonna like pop because it's not that easy. And then I did this podcast, and it led me into my next passion, which is my business, and I started to gain other clients. So all those people were correct. So listen, listen to your mentors is what I'm trying to tell you. And by the way, if you're wondering what that company is called, it is called J-Pod Vreations. You're humble enough not to have plugged it. So I will plug it for you. Thank you. I am very humble. I'm not a typical radio- No I'm joking. Matt Cundill 31:03 J-Pod Creations has got, you know, some branded podcasts. And you know, your biggest one is for the Home Builders Association of Vancouver. And listen, Right Place Right Time, we talked about the timing, but the place- if you're going to talk about homes and homeownership and building, Vancouver is the place. It is tight. Vancouver has had housing problems for years, a lot of people say to me, should I have a real estate podcast? And I say, well, a lot of people are interested in certain places. So Vancouver, you can talk about it, because it's- there's always news about housing in Vancouver. Nobody's moving to Winnipeg. So you know, good luck if you have a Winnipeg podcast, you're only going to listen to it, say, when you're looking for a house. But in Vancouver, there's so many other issues that sort of come with it, because it's a tight, confined space. And it's also a very desirable place to live. And now there's also rules about AirBnB. Jennifer Gunson 32:10 Oh, I just read that. Matt Cundill 32:13 Again, like you could do an episode about that. That's something that just showed up today. And it's fresh. There's always something new to be talking about with this, as opposed to doing the Sudbury real estate podcast where it hasn't changed much, right? Jennifer Gunson 32:26 Yeah. But I still feel like there's room for those podcasts because there are information that- there is information that people need from that. But like you said, in Vancouver, it's even though it's a niche, there's a lot of things that people can take away to like, it's not just about specific things to Vancouver, like a lot of the professionals that we have on that are coveted members of Haven and have worked really hard and are great. They talk about things of like, what is the relationship between the interior designer, architect and builder? Like, how do they work together? Why do you need an integrated design process? Which is them all being on the same page at the very beginning when you start building your house? So there's a lot of things that you can take away from it, or what kind of questions you should be asking a builder before you hire them. So it doesn't limit everyone. But yes, there are certain things, like we just had the Housing Minister on and we talked about this new thing that's going on in Vancouver, which is the housing supply act. So it's it's just like, there's a little bit of things for everybody. But it is geared to obviously, Vancouver and the different steps that we are doing as a city to move forward with building homes. Matt Cundill 33:29 When you say you had the Housing Minister on, is that provincial or federal? Jennifer Gunson 33:32 Provincial. Matt Cundill 33:33 Nice. Federal one's next. Jennifer Gunson 33:35 There we go. I got the federal on. Like listen to the podcast today and actually find out if I asked- I wish we interviewed him today because the Airbnb stuff went out. But we did it a few weeks ago and I asked a question about Airbnb. And he said, Look, I could talk about Airbnb all day long. But we're going to talk about other things today. And I was like, okay, but now now I'm like, oh, I want to ask you about all these Airbnb rules. Matt Cundill 34:02 I know some people are wondering, well, what are they talking about? What is the Airbnb problem for Vancouver specifically? Tell me about a branded podcast. It seems like such a catch all phrase. There's many ways to do it. But what are some of the things that people do wrong when they come to you with an idea, that you have to correct them on and go, Okay, wait, calm down. We need to do it this way and not that way. Jennifer Gunson 34:07 So on the news a few weeks ago, they found out- and I guess they did a lot of digging- that with Airbnb that because we have such a tight rental market here for people to live here, that there are more Airbnb's out there than actual rentals for people. So their hopes in trying to do these different legislations is that more people will put their secondary homes up, or secondary properties up for regular people like myself for you to live in, and be able to rent, in opposed to doing short term rentals. It's very tough to find a rental here, so. Okay, so there's a few ones. The first one that I feel like everyone probably gets is, I heard I should be doing a podcast for my company. So I guess I'll do one. And that's like, wrong answer. Because there's still like, even though you're gonna hire me to help you with a lot of stuff, you do need to do a bit of work. And if you're not passionate about- especially, a lot of them are hosting it, they're gonna hate talking about it, if it's not their passion. The other thing is coming in and finding the right topic for their business. Because my whole thing with branded podcasts is, if you're going to put the work into them, you better be using them as your whole marketing strategy. So you're not just going to have a branded podcast for your company and just like, not put it out really on your social media, and you're gonna be like, I have a podcast. No, you want it to be working for you. So I say, once you do a subject, like I have one client that is a contractor. And he does little podcasts on again, different things that people are googling him for, like, why is it so expensive to build in Vancouver, how long do permits take to get, which is a whole contentious issue in Vancouver. And so I say we're working with stuff that's in his field and his expertise. So if he does a podcast, on permits for 10 minutes about why it's great to have a builder that can help you get permits in Vancouver and what the wait times are, then I said, Now you take that transcript, that now becomes a blog, your blog is consistent. And now you've got possible SEO potential for your website. Not only that, now, if you have a newsletter, it gives you more content to put out. And then on top of that you now have a transcript for different pieces of social media as well. So you could tailor it to your Instagram, your Twitter, and whatever. I find a lot of times when people have a podcast, especially as a business, they don't realize that it helps them in those other areas of marketing that they do all the time. And so they're thinking as a separate and an- like an extra cost. And they're like, Oh, this is a lot. But it's like, no, if you can make them all work together, this is going to help your content give more value, because you're the expert, and you're giving what you need to give for 10 minutes about a certain topic. So I feel like a lot of people have, especially when they come for branded podcasts, they have a different way of thinking. And again, like when I work with some of the educational institutes too. It's like, if you're promoting something, take that podcast and answer your question too. Like if people are wanting to know about your veterinarian program, take the veterinarian episode and tie it there and put it out. Because again, we don't want the podcast just to live there for sick of living it. We want it to work for us in all facets. Matt Cundill 37:41 I've been so hell bent on highlighting the differences between podcasting and broadcasting. I think there's more than a lot of broadcasters think you have a different way of looking at it. You look at the things that are common and work between broadcasting and podcasting. So what are some of those commonalities that I need to address and look at and take within my heart? Jennifer Gunson 38:02 For me, I really believe this. And like I said, you might not but I really think structuring your break, or structuring your podcast is very important. So I use the two and two together. Because as a radio DJ, you have to be really good at your breaks, or you're not getting the readings. And there's a lot of elements that go into that. And I always say there's a lot of elements that go into structuring a podcast episode, even if it's 45 minutes, 10 minutes, five minutes, whatever it is, you need to have that structure in there. And a lot of people don't, they don't have a beginning, middle and end. They just think that they turn the mic on and they start yakking. And so I like to take what I've learned from radio is really like, make sure you have a lead or a tease in the top part of your your intro like really make us want to come into your podcast. And that's the thing is another one that I like that a lot of people don't necessarily talk about is the one to one communication that I learned at BCIT is that one to one communication is so key for your podcast, because you're not talking to 1000s of people and you might be and that's awesome. Same thing for radio, but how do I connect with you, if you give me that one to one communication that I give you on the radio, and you give that to me in a podcast, it's going to be that more meaningful, because if I am someone selling my contractor services, or my education service or whatever, if I'm talking to you, and I'm teaching you something, it's gonna be more impactful if I'm using you and including you and making you feel special. So I do think that there's a lot of similarities between radio and podcasting, which you might not but it's okay I do like I think structure your break having one on one communication and really knowing when to stop talking. Matt Cundill 39:47 I think you're exactly right. So yeah, it's a break. Can you get into your break, can you get out of your break, know how to get in, know how to get out, and then make sure that the content is there. I used to write my breaks out in point form, which is the same way that I do these interviews, I totally love that. I totally love what you just said there. And maybe I don't recognize it, because I've been doing it for 30 some odd years now. And that's just Well, everybody knows how to do a radio break. New podcasters when they start, don't come with that knowledge that radio people do about how to build that break. So I'm glad you mentioned that, get in, get out and then have all the points ready to go in the middle. And keep it flexible. Write it out in pencil. Jennifer Gunson 40:29 Yeah, and I think that's the thing a lot of people don't realize, and you probably got over your career, too, is like, as a radio DJ, a lot of people think that we just turn the mic on. But they don't realize how much we research that day before we go on there. And like you said, I use bullet points as well. Doesn't mean I'm going to sound- this is another misconception. A lot of people are like, well, I don't want to script my podcast, because I'm gonna sound not like off the cuff and like natural. And it's like, well, yeah, I get that. But you also have to have points. Because if you don't research your topic, or have the points that you're gonna talk about, you're gonna fall off the rails really quick. And that's why I loved what you said about in and out. That's what I always remember is like, how do you get in? And how do you get out? And when you fail at a radio break so many times and you don't know to get out? You never make that mistake again. So it's really great to bring on to podcasting. Because, again, a lot of people and I don't blame them. They don't know how to do this, especially if they've never turned the mic on. It's like, how do I get into the podcast topic or even interviewing? Interviewing- I have so many skills from radio that I could take over to podcasting. A lot of people, and again, I'm not blaming anyone, do not know how to do interviews properly. And interviewing is one area that I think it's so interesting that a lot of podcasters want to start off, they don't want to start off as a solo podcast, they want to start off as an interview podcast, and interviews are so hard and there's art to them. Matt Cundill 41:47 Yeah. And most of them actually start off with one of two things: a reading of their LinkedIn bio, or the question, tell me a little bit about yourself. Tell the audience about yourself. At which point I'm done. Tell me about yourself is the worst question. Because some people are shy, and they're not going to give you anything good. But some people aren't shy, and then they talk too much. And on both occasions, it's a failed first question. Jennifer Gunson 42:15 Yeah, I've definitely used that one in the past. But that's just because like, it depends on to like, who I'm talking to, I try to gear it to. But I agree with you, like we all get in these habits, as well as listening to other podcasts. And that's something else people don't do, is listen to other people's podcasts to see how it is, like don't obviously copy them verbatim. But see what's out there in different ways. Because again, a lot of people don't necessarily want to put the work into it either, or get better or do it. They just say oh, it's so easy. I'm gonna crack the mic open and do this. Matt Cundill 42:46 With that said, I ask- pretty much the first question on this show is the same. Why did you want to get into radio, tell me why you wanted to get in broadcasting, something along those lines. Because I think it's one of the more interesting questions that everybody wants to hear from other broadcasters. And it's a great way to break the ice, and you're gonna get a different story every time. Jennifer Gunson 43:05 Well, I find it funny because I see it happen all the time, even on big news stations, especially in the States is like- and I hear on podcast all the time now is in school, they taught us, never ask the question. If say you're interviewing someone at the Olympics, never ask them what it feels like to win gold. Because they're like, of course, it feels great to win gold. Find something more interesting about that. But it's funny because you listen to a lot of different podcasts and stuff. And everyone will be like, what was it like? They're interviewing this big, like, athletic celebrity. They're like, what did it feel like to win this award? I was like- but everyone still does it. So I find it interesting. Matt Cundill 43:43 So share a couple of hacks if you will. You are hosting your podcast predominantly on Transistor. Good Canadian podcast hosting place. Correct? Shout out to Justin Jackson? Jennifer Gunson 43:54 I have some podcasts on Transistor. I have one on there. But yes. Matt Cundill 43:57 Oh, play the game. Jennifer Gunson 43:59 Oh, sorry. Okay. Yes. Yes. Love Transistor. Thank you. Matt Cundill 44:04 Where do you get your transcripts? Jennifer Gunson 44:05 I'm actually using the software Eddie right now, which is owned by Headliner. I really liked the group Headliner, I find they have excellent customer service, and they're constantly improving. I also use Descript as well, but I'm really getting into Eddie lately. Matt Cundill 44:20 Yeah, I was asked to beta test that a little bit. And can you get separate speakers with that? Jennifer Gunson 44:24 Yeah, you can. What I predominantly like using Eddie for though is that especially if I'm editing for a client, and there's multiple people on the project, that sometimes if they cut something that they wanted cut, and then they want brought back in, it's way easier you can highlight on Eddie, and then it just literally- you press the download button and it just takes that audio clip, and then I can insert it back in, so it saves me having to go through the whole audio file. But you know, a lot of these programs are still, like, very new, and so they're all coming up with their own things, and there's some pros and cons to all of them. But yeah, I was using Otter.ai first and then I went over to Eddie. Matt Cundill 45:06 So what do you do with the Headliners and the audiograms that you make? How do you use those to promote the shows? Or do you? Jennifer Gunson 45:13 Well usually have someone that else that I work with that will do like the podcast growth and strategy. So like a lot of times too, like, the audiograms are just used on their social media platforms and their channels to get them out there. And then using the transcript, we will usually take and turn it into a blog for SEO purposes. So just using the transcripts, which a lot of people are still not doing. Matt Cundill 45:35 Well, transcripts are a pain in the ass. Jennifer Gunson 45:36 And they are, yeah. And the AI doesn't know a lot of- like, it's good. But like, especially with names, you're- especially if someone says a hard name throughout it doesn't usually work. Matt Cundill 45:48 Or if it's a medical podcast, or if your guest's name is Patsy and then your transcript comes out Nazi. Jennifer Gunson 45:54 Oh, oh. Okay, not good. Not good. Matt Cundill 45:57 Did you have fun at Podcast Movement? And how come we didn't meet at Podcast Movement? Jennifer Gunson 46:01 I don't know. I feel like we should have met, because you're so fun. But I... Matt Cundill 46:06 You weren't hanging out in the Fun Zone. Jennifer Gunson 46:08 I honestly didn't meet any other Canadians, which is so funny. I met maybe one other Canadian from Victoria. Matt Cundill 46:14 But there's lots of Canadians there. They just don't put like Canadian flags on our badges. Right? Jesse Brown is there. I was there. Sarah Burke was there from Indie 88. I guess we all just fit in in the end. Jennifer Gunson 46:27 Yeah, I don't know. I don't know why I didn't meet you. I met somebody- I have to say, I always meet great people, though, through the other people of Podcast Movement. Because that happened to me the year before, too, is somebody else that I met there introduced me to somebody that lives like five minutes away from me. And now we do a lot of work together. So it was like, maybe I just need to go meet the certain people. And then they introduced me to after, you know. Matt Cundill 46:50 Was Podcast Superfriend, Jon Gay, from JAG in Detroit podcast. Also, with a radio background. It's funny. It's like the radio people all find each other in the end. Jennifer Gunson 46:58 We do, because like I was telling him, I said, I don't- he was the first one I found. And now you're the second one. So I am glad to know that there's other people who have radio backgrounds, because everyone else I meet does not have a radio background. So. Matt Cundill 47:11 Did you have a favorite session? Jennifer Gunson 47:13 Yes. Funny enough, it was the radio broadcasting one. And I really liked it because they were talking about how radio has been established for so long. And now that obviously podcasting is taking off, that- you gotta remember that podcasting is still in its first inning opposed to radio, which has been around for a long time. So that was kind of neat to hear. Because, like I said, there's still like not many people that I meet are especially doing what you and I do. And so it kind of puts it into perspective. But what I also liked was that they're trying to figure out how radio fits with this podcast. So they had Jared Edwards, he's got a station in the UK. And again, he's got a background in radio, but now he does podcast radio, and he's got a station full of podcasts and promotes different podcasts on there. So and there- they were at Podcast Movement 'cause they were opening some in the US as well. So it'll be interesting to see how that whole model takes off. And, again, I just have a soft spot for radio. So anytime you can put radio into a podcast topic, I'm there, you hooked me. Matt Cundill 48:18 What's radio doing wrong, right now? Or if you could wave your magic wand and make radio do something to really make it go? What do you think it is? Jennifer Gunson 48:27 I really feel that yes, some of them are getting podcasts now. But I really don't feel that radio is necessarily moving with the times. And I mean that in the fact that like, a lot of the cars coming out now are not going to have radio in it,or it's going to be an extra purchase that you have to have. And so that's where a lot of people access a radio. So I think, you know, like, I think a lot of their podcast shows are great. And having a podcast here is awesome. But how do you keep that- still if people want that genuine local content, how do you keep that and how do you switch it over to a podcast? I don't necessarily know the answer to that. But I think that sometimes radio is still trying to make it in radio, which is not necessarily where it's going. Like I don't think radio will die. But like I said, once it goes out of cars, I don't know what's going to happen. Matt Cundill 49:22 Jen, thanks so much for taking the time to be on this particular podcast right here. I really appreciate it. Jennifer Gunson 49:27 Oh, thank you so much. It's it's a lot of fun. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 49:29 The Sound Off Podcast is written and hosted by Matt Cundill. Produced by Evan Surminski. Edited by Chloe Emond-Lane. Social media by Aidan Glassey. Another great creation from the Soundoff Media Company. There's always more at soundoffpodcast.com.

Aiden Wolf joins me to shares tips for making it big on YouTube. Over the last few years, podcasters have been trickling onto YouTube as it has proven effective for discovery. However, this does not make podcasters, effective YouTubers. In this episode you will hear Aiden talk about his journey in radio, from morning show host to voiceover artist. But it was his microphone reviews, and unboxings that garnered him a true YouTube audience. YouTube's algorithm is based on the viewer's profile, which is created by analyzing their viewing history and interests. Content creators should focus on creating content that viewers want to watch, as the algorithm will serve their content to viewers who are interested in their niche. All this is rather benign for podcasters who will experience confusion between podcasting and YouTube, and how it affects podcasters' strategies. Aiden suggests podcasters create content for different platforms and respect their viewers' preferences to maximize reach and engagement. We also explored creating short-form content (e.g., YouTube shorts) to appeal to a broader audience and increase views, with a guarantee of 100-fold views compared to audiograms, and how to make sure that your podcast appears on YouTube Music in the near future. We recorded this episode a few weeks ago live on YouTube. Here's how that version turned out. We created a different experience for audio which is why the podcast version is shorter. You'll also note that the title is different. Our show can also be listened to on YouTube Music. However not all the episodes are present because we have not done videos for our earlier episodes. We are looking forward to when YouTube uses our RSS feed to populate the rest of our show. Here's hoping that happens. Transcription Tara Sands (Voiceover) 0:02 The Sound Off podcast. The show about podcast and broadcast, starts now. Matt Cundill 0:12 What was the biggest takeaway from Podcast Movement? It was that video is important. You need a video strategy, you need to be on YouTube, it's not just about audio. It kind of feels like deja vu all over again, because it harkens back to when every radio station needed to get into podcasting, which they did, many doing it poorly. Today we have podcasters racing into the YouTube space and a lot of it is being done poorly from a YouTubers point of view. The person I go to for all things YouTube is Aiden Wolf. He's worked in radio, voiceover and he hit it big with his Dark Corner Studio unboxings of microphones and other studio toys. I asked him to share some of his tips and tricks for making it on YouTube. What drives engagement and how we can all get rich at it. By the way, this episode originally aired on YouTube a few weeks back, it's obviously longer because I edit this for audio. Aiden Wolf joins me from Dark Corner Studios in Ottawa. You're originally a radio person, am I right? Like you've been doing radio for a number of years and then you sort of morphed into some other things. Aiden Wolf 1:18 Yeah, I got the introduction to other things the same way that most of us do by getting fired, you know, go do something different, not with our company. And yeah, it's one of these projects of becoming a content creator. That kind of happens over time as you're fired and rehired in other places and you start building that side hustle, it gets to the point that one time you get fired, you're just like, you know what, I'm done. I'm just gonna do this thing now. And that's kind of how I came to this point. Matt Cundill 1:46 Can you summarize the radio career where you went possibly how much fun or or maybe they weren't fun? Aiden Wolf 1:51 See, mine was shorter than it should have been. I've got I got disillusioned with radio pretty quick. I used to be a truck driver for much of my youth going into my 30s. I became a morning show host when I was 35, I believe. And I worked at Bob FM Brockville. I worked with Cub Carson, another gentleman by the name of Mark, we became fast friends. A lot of fun there. Then Bell did their usual restructuring. I ended up in Ottawa actually with an Indigenous station called Element FM where I was for four years. And again, Morning Show with Jay Harrington a lot of fun. I was always kind of the the guy that you didn't know if you had to have a sensor button. You didn't know if did he just say that? That was kind of the the personality. I wasn't not a shock jock per se because I never really got into that. But I there nothing was off the table for me. So. Matt Cundill 2:45 And the one time you and I met was at the conference V.O. North. Aiden Wolf 2:49 Yeah. Matt Cundill 2:49 And that was in between your time between Brockville and and Element. Aiden Wolf 2:54 That was one of my other side gigs. I was going to try to start a voiceover career. And it just never took off. The amount of hustle involved in this as a thing with all of these things, right? If you're not willing to hustle, if you're not willing to put in the grind. What are you doing? You're just wasting your time. And I think I realized that after a while. We share a common friend Mary Anne. And she's been crushing it in voice over. And it's just one of those things where you see what she's doing day to day you see the work she's putting in you're like that's why it didn't work out. Okay. I get it now. Matt Cundill 3:25 Mary Anne Ivison jumped into voiceover and podcast at the same time. She does a podcast called Let's Take This Outside. I know you're familiar with the podcast, right? Aiden Wolf 3:33 Absolutely. Matt Cundill 3:34 All right. So why you're here today is because you've done so well. You talked about how you didn't want to do the hustle in voiceover but you managed to do twice as much hustle when it comes to video and studio and just making YouTube and video work for yourself but also for for clients. And I kind of look at this in awe. And I look at also a podcast like Mary Anne's Let's Take This Outside, which doesn't to date have a YouTube presence. So I'll bring that up just a little bit later. Aiden Wolf 4:03 Yeah, that's an interesting conversation because I've chatted with her about that so. Matt Cundill 4:08 Maybe she doesn't want us want us chatting about her business on this, but we'll do it anyway. Yeah, sure. Why not? All right. Tell me, what attracted you to getting into YouTube? Aiden Wolf 4:18 Okay, so real story. My son was living in Thunder Bay, way back 2017 and he was living with his mother there. And we finally convinced him to move here and he was going to finish off grade 11 grade 12 here and go off to college. And in my way of trying, like he'd always talked about YouTube, he loves YouTube, and my way of trying to bond with him this is we're gonna be living together this is awesome. Let's start a YouTube channel together and he's like, nah, I don't want to do that. I'm not, YouTube sucks, man. You can't make any money on YouTube and I was like, well, okay, so I'm gonna start a YouTube channel to show him and show him how easy and what you can do with it and how fun it is and so I started reviewing audio units. I was buying audio gear, and I just kind of threw some reviews out, they started getting traction. And I was like, alright, just keep going. And you can see him get irritated with me, the more videos I put out, and the more relative success I was getting with it, which was still small at the time, but still. And it got to a point where he was almost not helping out or not being a part of it just out of principle. And I just continued on and I found myself really enjoying the process of learning the product, the video product, also, people started sending me gear, like, okay, I love audio gear, and it was sure I'll take your stuff, I'll do videos about it. Now, the one sidebar to this would be as as I was building up my YouTube skill set, he had always wanted a specific guitar. And I'm not gonna go into what the guitar is, but it's featured in several of my videos, he'd always wanted that guitar, it was his gold, dream. And after about a year and a half of doing videos in YouTube, I got sent on by a company to be able to use on my YouTube channel ad to this day, he still doesn't bring it up. That won't look at the guitar won't try to play it. Nothing. Still a bitter I think. Matt Cundill 6:10 Your unboxing videos, by the way are fantastic. Aiden Wolf 6:12 Oh, thank you. Thank you. One of the things I tried doing with a lot of videos is when you go online, you're looking for reviews of microphones and stuff is it's usually the same thing, this mic sound good, this is the specs, this is what mic looks like, these are the things you can use with the mics. I've been trying to expand on that and give it a little bit more of a personal edge to a lot of this stuff. So I do blind shootouts where I'm like, can you guess which mic is which and I believe the NTG three got his first treatment up against the MKH 416. Where I put them side by side and I ab'd them until the end and then I told you which one was which. And it's just kind of a twist on the usual review style what a lot of people have. Matt Cundill 6:55 Actually can do that right now because I can just go in the corner and do it with the other microphone. Aiden Wolf 7:00 Do you have the MKH 416? Do you honestly have that? Matt Cundill 7:03 Yeah, I've got it right here in the corner. Can you hear the difference? Aiden Wolf 7:07 Oh, yeah, absolutely. And you know what, it's it's funny, too, because a lot of people go back and forth with like, which one's better? There's no such thing with microphones, man. You're gonna find one that suits your voice. I like you on the Rode. Matt Cundill 7:21 This is me better one in the Dark Corner Studio of Winnipeg. And here I am back on the Rode. Aiden Wolf 7:27 Yeah, yeah. I like the Rode. Rode is good. So use the MKH 416 for your voiceover work, right. Matt Cundill 7:32 Yeah, exactly. Aiden Wolf 7:34 Detailed, very clear. picks up all the mouth noises. Matt Cundill 7:38 A lot of them. In fact, too many I just threw something out because I was may have been a little bit too close to the microphone about a half hour ago. Aiden Wolf 7:45 Oh, really? Matt Cundill 7:45 Yeah. All sorts of stuff going on. We're renovating the studio in the corner. I'll make get a camera on that a little bit later. Aiden Wolf 7:52 Nice. Matt Cundill 7:53 So tell me a little bit about why YouTube is so mysterious. It feels different. Everybody wants to be there and there's lots of talk about the algorithm. Aiden Wolf 8:04 Okay. All right so we're gonna start out with that, okay so YouTube is, is basically like any other kind of content, if you become a content creator, by the way, I hate the term podcaster, YouTuber, all that stuff. You're a content creator. If you if you sit on content creator, you'll be a lot happier in the long run. And I'll, I'll kind of explain that as we go through. YouTube itself, though, is one of the best platforms that has its own algorithm for pushing content. And the algorithm isn't technically an algorithm, your algorithm is your audience. So if you look at your YouTube homepage, if you go to youtube.com, your YouTube homepage, you'll see along the top, all these little lists are buttons for your interests and the videos you watch. And basically, YouTube grabs all this information based on every video you've ever watched, and what your most immediate interests are all the way down to your lowest most immediate interest. And it kind of amalgamates that into what people call the algorithm. That means that you are a profile to YouTube, they know that you're going to enjoy first and foremost, ice hockey, that is your number one thing that when you go to YouTube, that's one of the top things that you're really going there for. So it's your profile as a viewer. That is what the algorithm is. So when you have a person like Matt going to YouTube, if I did ice hockey content or content that was pegged as ice hockey content, Matt has a very good chance of coming across me. And likewise, if you have microphones as one of your interests or audio gear or studio recording, you're probably going to see my face. In fact, there's a lot of people that tell me oh man, I'm big into mics and I constantly see you on YouTube. And that's how the algorithm works is basically by creating profiles of the viewer, and then serving me to those viewers, so the algorithm doesn't work for or against you, as a content creator, the algorithm only works for the viewer. So if you are creating content that viewers want to watch, they will watch it. And so if you build it, they will come kind of deal. Matt Cundill 10:20 So there's a big come to Jesus moment here for many, many podcasters because so many people who listen to podcasts think they come from YouTube and that's the result of podcasters, putting their show on YouTube. Maybe they're recording it like you and I are doing, and then dropping it into Apple Spotify or into an RSS feed. Anyhow, we've kind of muddy the waters between podcasting being an RSS feed, and being something that lives on YouTube. And as a result, now there's this tremendous pressure on a lot of podcasters and I think Let's Take This Outside with Mary Anne Iveson is a great example because she originally comes from audio, and she said, I want to start a podcast, but I don't think the original intention was I have to do YouTube as well. So there's this internal pressure. So this podcast, for instance, other than today, when I thought, well, we may as well just go live, if we're going to talk about YouTube, you may as well be on YouTube. But normally, it's just a card and I put a wavy line up and it's an audiogram and it sits there and it gets about 15 to 20 views per episode. That's one strategy. There's the strategy of people who will record this, put it up raw to YouTube, and then edit for podcasting. Aiden Wolf 11:33 Yep. Matt Cundill 11:33 And maybe there's some others people who will just use shorts to create promo pieces. So which one should they be doing? And if it's all of them, shouldn't they just be getting in the video full time? Aiden Wolf 11:49 So here's, let's draw a couple parallels. So first, I'll start out with, I taught podcasting at the college level, past couple years at Algonquin College. And one of the first things that I taught podcasters, these young kids coming in is that there's no such thing as podcasts, YouTube, all that when you're a content creator, you're creating content for different platforms. And you're doing it in the way that those platforms want. So every podcaster that's coming out, that wants to create a podcast needs to have video as well. So even before you start, you should be looking at the video option. It's really hard to kind of migrate over into another form for a platform after you've already got your you've got your gallop down, right? You know, you know, you know from hitting records to the time that you publish every step, it's like, you're going you're good with it. The problem is, is when you get into the habit of doing something specifically like a podcast, and you're not looking at taking that and reforming that product for another platform, you're only thinking in one way. So for example, the YouTuber who puts their podcast on YouTube and just slaps it on there maybe throws on like a picture, or they've got that moving waveform, you know that WAV format a lot of podcast audience great into video now people are gonna love it. Well you only get 10 views because it's not a video. So it's, it's learning the platforms themselves, kind of treating the platforms with the product that the platforms want. And I'll get into that in just a second, but it's also respecting those platforms and the viewers on those platforms. Your product is only as good as you can sell it. If you're a decent podcasts with a decent listenership and you've already built up a decent following, you know, you have a decent product. Now to take that decent product and to package it up something else without putting the thought into it is just pure dumb and I'm gonna give you an example of radio. Radio did this beautifully back in the day with broadcasting is podcasts were on the up and up in about 2015. I would say 2016- 2017 radios are like, we got to get in on this. Our station needs to have a podcast and what did they do? They repurposed all of their product for podcasting and it was the biggest problem that radio stations couldn't figure out is why nobody was listening to our podcast of our morning show. Most of the time they would literally cut up their morning, show all the bits, slam it together, put it out as a podcast and go why isn't anybody listening? Then they had after shows that was that's what we're going to do. We're going to extend the morning show two hours with a two hour podcast. It'll be live, it'll be snappy. Why isn't anybody listening to that? Is because they didn't realize why people are going to podcasts why people are reaching out to that medium for something to listen to, or to be entertained by. Radio stations just figured well, we do this really well people will come- they won't. And it's the same thing when you transfer a podcast onto YouTube. You can't just do what you've been doing as a podcast because nobody goes to well, I can't say that, people don't go to YouTube generally, to sit for two hours and listen to a podcast. People don't turn YouTube on and go about and do their business. People go to YouTube for viewing. Imagine in the 1990s, a television show came out without video okay, how well would that television show you it wouldn't do well, because people don't go to TV to listen, they go to TV to watch. And a lot of people watch YouTube on their TV, how many of them are sitting down to watch a 45 minute podcast or listen to a 45 minute podcast while there's a still image up? None. So when you start to talk about migrating over, you need to come up with an action plan. And that action plan instantly needs to be able to address exactly what you're going to be able to give those people in YouTube that's going to make the work you put in have an outcome and that outcome should be income, right? That's the first thing you should be looking for in creating another platform. Matt Cundill 15:56 I just like to point out though, that, you know, I've been doing this for 371 episodes, about a handful of them have been, you know, recorded video like this. But I think the reason why I don't do it is because who's gonna want to watch us but I guess people do want to watch us and would probably prefer it over the audiograms that I'm putting up, Aiden Wolf 16:15 Hear me out. So when you look at YouTube as a platform, or any other platform for that matter, you have Instagram, you have TikTok, all of them that offer video options for you. Each of them has a slightly different need, they have a slightly different want from their content creators, TikTok, and Instagram might get 10 million views YouTube might get 100,000, that should tell you that a piece of content for TikTok works better than on YouTube. Not really, because there's some stuff on YouTube that'll get 50 million views and on tick tock, it'll get 200. So it's learning how to utilize that and the only way you get to learn that for your content is by doing it. And it is a trial and error. So when you're looking at expanding, the first thing you want to do is go on to the platform, find content that's relative to yours, which would be another podcast in YouTube, and do some research, do a SWAT. The first person you'd want to do a SWAT on is Joe Rogan. I know a lot of people are going to cringe at the very name, but let's be honest, he has done YouTube properly. He has done podcasting properly and he has created two separate businesses from a YouTube channel and a podcast empire that both work independently, but both support the other. And you'll look at how he has rolled a lot of that stuff out and you'll start to get some ideas of what might work for you. But then you need to niche it down a little bit. Because Joe Rogan doesn't work for everyone. Joe Rogan's style might not be relative to your style. So you might need to kind of differentiate how it is. So for example, a three person podcast wouldn't be able to enact how Joe Rogan does things in his interview podcast. So then you go you find a podcaster on YouTube that's successful that does things like you and the one I love to utilize is Steve Daniels' Podcast Network, but you're not a Leafs fan, Matt. Matt Cundill 18:14 No, not one bit. Aiden Wolf 18:17 I'm guessing you're a Jets fan. Matt Cundill 18:18 Habs. Aiden Wolf 18:20 That's right, I'm sorry. I'm really sorry. This is one of those podcasts that got to start as a podcast then kind of piggybacked off of the success of Steve dangle. I know wait, the YouTube came first. But it really ramped up along side of the podcast, but then they opened up and started doing video on their podcast and created the Steve dangle Podcast Network, I think SDP at first, because then they created a network out of it it's a whole big deal. But the big things they did there, and you can really see how they captured the YouTube algorithm, or the viewer as you will is they created clips of their show, they created four to 10 minute video clips from their podcast, with video of all three of them talking and it was usually something along the lines of should Matthews get 10 plus million a year. And it was that segment of their conversation. So it was more than a clip. It was an actual full on video. But that segment of their conversation from their podcast was very pointed, it was very, it had an interest in it, it had a question. It had an answer. It had everything that one long form video on YouTube should have. It wasn't a sprawling YouTube video about four different subjects that people might get bored 20 minutes into. This was a tight, compact piece of video. That answered a question. It appealed. Maybe people wanted to know what their views were on it does Matthews deserve 15 plus million a year. He signed for 13, I can't even remember what he signed for. But here's a great example of repurpose I've seen your content for YouTube and that's just one of many different ways. Tou talk about shorts as a way to promote. But why are you using a video platform to promote an audio platform? Why would you do that Matt? Matt Cundill 20:15 Well, I'm going to think of a client here. Aiden Wolf 20:16 Okay. Matt Cundill 20:17 Maybe so the client has a podcast about yoga and talking about yoga poses. There's five minutes of explanation and five minutes of going through some demonstration, we would probably use the last five minutes as demonstration, like visual. Aiden Wolf 20:31 But why does that have to promote? Why can't that YouTube channel be its own thing? Matt Cundill 20:37 Oh, it is. Aiden Wolf 20:38 Okay. But you said in order to promote you're doing, you're doing short videos to promote your podcast? Matt Cundill 20:44 Yes, we're doing both. Aiden Wolf 20:46 Well, why don't you just do them as both instead of trying to promote through them? Creating content that it's like, hey, if you want to check it out, we've got our podcast over here, we release videos every Tuesday. Every video that Joe Rogan puts out, does not have a call to action on his podcast. Because you know, what's going to happen is people are going to figure it out that his podcast as well, you can even put a little thing on, on a little lower third that says podcast, you can put details and description, you can do all those things. People will organically find you become their best friend on YouTube become content for them on YouTube, not as an afterthought, from your podcast, make YouTube your like another platform that you're excelling on, rather than something to support your other platform. Does that make sense? Matt Cundill 21:35 Yeah, I mean, we're finding a lot of podcast listeners will find it on YouTube, and then go grab it on a podcast app. Aiden Wolf 21:42 Absolutely. And that's one of the greatest things about this. But you also have a good amount of people that are never going to migrate to your podcast. Matt Cundill 21:50 Yeah and I'm also getting now especially working with various podcasts. I mentioned the yoga podcast, which will use video to supplement the poses. If you would like to see a demonstration of this, you can see it on YouTube and the YouTube will just live where you can see, you know, five minutes of the show doing the posts. But there was a kid's podcast, for instance, and a teacher came to me and said, is it on YouTube? Because I'd like to show it to the whole class. Din,g ding, that went off in my head. Aiden Wolf 22:16 There's also a lot of people that are visual learners, they don't. They don't learn through that, especially from an educational standpoint of something like something like yoga, where you have talk radio, ask style shows where it's three people sitting, talking, and you wonder, why do people watch that? I don't, but I do know a lot of people do. A lot of people love to watch. How many times did you sit and watch TSN three people sitting at a sports desk talking on TV? Matt Cundill 22:47 Never. No, never. Aiden Wolf 22:48 You never watch come on. Matt Cundill 22:50 No Bob MacAllan would always talk about the Leafs that was the end of that. Aiden Wolf 22:54 Okay, so Toronto Sports Network fair. Matt Cundill 22:56 Yeah. Aiden Wolf 22:57 We've, we've all learned how do you appreciate a video medium, right through TV. And a lot of those broadcasting kind of hooks and rules that work for broadcasting work in YouTube as well. So if you have a broadcasting background, you should be able to figure this out. It's not hard. There's no real secrets specific to this medium TV. Mr. Beast is a great example. Mr. Beast uses three big things that broadcasting use to use to make his videos over millions of views. He broke record seven videos in a row, I think something like that for the most views and 24 hours, over 55 million views in the first 24 hours. And a lot of these are the same concepts that TV used to use. He's just utilizing them with more money, and a whole lot more energy and no commercials and they're only about 30 minutes long. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 23:54 Transcription of the Sound Off Podcast is powered by the Podcast Superfriends; five podcast producers who get together to discuss podcasting. Sharpen your podcast and creation skills by following the show on the Sound Off Podcast, YouTube or Facebook page. The Sound Off Podcast supports Podcasting 2.0. So feel free to send us a boost if you're listening on a newer podcast app. If you don't have a newer podcast app, you can get one at new podcast apps.com. Matt Cundill 24:26 Okay, so you and I are just two guys riffing. Aiden Wolf 24:29 Yeah. Matt Cundill 24:29 We generally do this without the camera on and generally also don't let people hear the whole conversation because we just have a phone call or we will just have a video meeting to talk about this stuff. But the end experience for anybody who's listening to this in podcast form is going to be completely different. I'm totally going to be taking out parts of the show where we are comparing the microphones. I just want to keep it down and drill it down to YouTube and I want to keep it straight from my audience for for podcasting. Those are two wildly different experiences. So when I tell podcasters you need to have a YouTube presence, or a YouTube video strategy of any sort. I feel like I'm doubling their workload or tripling it. Aiden Wolf 25:11 You are, like 100% There's two ways to look at being a podcaster right. I've talked to Mary Anne, Mary Anne is like podcasting isn't her main source of income, she has nothing to gain by building a YouTube channel. Her main money comes from voiceover. So by putting another 20 hours a week into being a YouTuber on top of that doesn't make much sense. But and this is one of the things that you really need to come around to when you're talking about this is the bubble burst that's about or has been has been happening in podcasting, this might impact you, but know that the bubble bursting will impact everybody. Regardless, even if you're not making money in a podcast from 2020, they started pumping big money into bringing people from other mediums on to podcasting. This is how the ladies from the office got their podcast, they had a bunch of money thrown at them, hey here, do a podcast we'll talk you up, you can make as much money as you want. Or if you don't make enough money, we'll talk you up. I know a lot of YouTubers who started podcast due to the same reason to throw a bunch of money and don't worry about it. Don't worry how much you make just here's all your money do a podcast, it was kind of this follow up from Joe Rogan getting the 100 million dollar deal and instead of the way Spotify did it Spotify use Joe Rogan as a loss leader knowing they were never going to make $100 million back on Joe Rogan. However, they do know that Joe Rogan is going to bring people to their platform. And that was the loss leader. Nobody realized that was a loss leader, they just realized, oh my god, 100 million dollars, there must be a ton of money in podcasting, let's get everybody to do it. And what's happening now is a lot of those contracts are coming to an end and everybody's realized we can't make money with that model. So a lot of the money's being clawed back by the networks and I'm not allowed to name names, but I know one podcast who's going through that very thing right now. And questioning what's going to happen in the future. Because they've been they've hired crews with that money, they've, they've built their whole like standard with that money. So as a podcaster now, whether you're getting into it, or whether you're ramping up, or you're already established like Matt here, you need to understand that there's going to be a lot of money coming out of this industry over the next year and has been for the past year. That means that if you want that full time job as a podcaster, you might have to put that extra 20 hours a week into it to really, really work on this as a full time job. And I know that sucks, man. I've worked a full time job and I built up a YouTube channel, putting one video out a week. Each video when I started was 30 hours a week. That was the writing that was the shooting, that was the editing. I wasn't making any money for the first year. And I was still spending 30 hours a week while doing a morning show. I know it sucks. But if you want that if you want saturation in the market, if you want people to know your name, if you want to be successful, and you want this to be your full time job. That's what you have to do if you're not willing to do the work, tough. Matt Cundill 28:20 Is it still worth it though? For you know, a podcast like like, like Mary Anne's just to put the audiogram up? Aiden Wolf 28:27 No. I'll stop you right there. So here's, here's a good reason, I shit on this a lot. Matt Cundill 28:35 Even if I get 15 to 20 views isn't that 15 or 20 more than I had before. And maybe somebody discovers the podcast and then goes over to audio to check out the show. Aiden Wolf 28:46 Cool so here's, I'll give you a scenario. You have 20 views on this short form audiogram that you just put up, okay. Out of those 20 views one person was like, oh, I like this, that gave you point 5%. Like, that's, that's horrendous. YouTube uses algorithms to basically recommend channels. So the more people liking your stuff, the more YouTube kind of opens up to you, the more chances YouTube's going to take on handing your content over to other people, okay, that's what YouTube's willing to give to you. If you can maintain a relative number of satisfied customers, the worst thing you can do is make somebody close YouTube altogether. That's literally like the red flag YouTube will put on your channel. Now when you start putting out content that does not offer a satisfaction to the viewer. You're initially telling YouTube that people don't like your content. Don't bother serving me up. So those 15 to 20 views you got here and they're probably going to be mildly organic at first but then you're going to see a foot come down and you're going to put a piece of content out that's gonna get zero. And then the next piece of content that gets zero, maybe it'll flick up five views as YouTube tries to take a chance on you again. But eventually, what you're training YouTube to do is just ignore you. And when most people go to a platform for video, they're not going to be satisfied with an audio only experience. So here's the idea, let's talk about a way that you can create content for YouTube, that isn't going to crush your weekly schedule. Are you ready for this? Can we blow your minds? Matt Cundill 30:30 I have got my pen and my paper. Aiden Wolf 30:32 So let's say instead of repurposing some of your old content, you're going to create a new piece of content for a short. Ah, this is a great idea. So you now you're not going through and editing crap out, you're just going to create a new piece of content, and it's going to be a short, you're gonna use your cell phone, cell phones are the easiest thing to create shorts with. Okay, you can even see yourself in your cell phone, when you're shooting, it's great. You can walk around with it. I like to put my phone on an arm when I'm shooting with my my phone so it doesn't make people sick. And then you're going to have a script, you're going to read from the script, or you're going to add limit. Try to get it perfect. So you're not doing all the ums and the aws, it's why I like scripts, and then you're going to upload it. Maybe possibly you can throw in a couple other images or you can put some text over it. All and all your inputs going to be maybe an hour of work. But you're going to create the content that will be relative to your content that you're doing on a podcast. So let's say if you're doing an education podcast, your podcast is about science. There's a ton of shorts you can do on science. There's a ton of shorts, you can, you can have like fun facts, you can do anything you want and then the link down below always goes back to your podcasts. And you can literally do fun fact videos for a full year have a massive 52 video pile of shorts that might actually start making you money because people find them entertaining. Oh my god, what a concept. Your goal shouldn't just to be able to get one or two viewers, your goal should be to create an empire for your content. Every time you press play, what is it say in Valery Geller's book, every time you press play, Matt? Matt Cundill 32:24 Anything you can record you can make better. Aiden Wolf 32:26 Never be boring. Matt Cundill 32:28 It's tell the truth make it matter. Never be boring. Aiden Wolf 32:31 Okay, so I'm pretty sure out of all of that, she's probably referencing don't just slap something on another platform just to get one or two views, you could probably read between the lines on that one. So utilize these platforms by looking at ways to expand your content. You don't have to just slap a one hour product on YouTube and think well, that's it for me two guys talking for an hour, that's all it's gonna be. And screw you if you don't like it. Matt Cundill 32:59 I didn't even get to that point, I barely do this. Aiden Wolf 33:03 I'm just talking from a usual podcasters perspective. Actually, you think about what other people are doing and how you can capitalize on that. If you can create compelling content, in any platform, any platform, you create something that compels people to watch, they will find you. You don't even have to put a link. You don't even have to put any kind of call to action. If you can compel them to watch and they are entertained by you, they will hunt your ass down and watch everything you can do. You are in charge of that. Your only goal is to get people to watch people to listen and you do that by doing the best quality content you can. That's why I preface this with if you have a decent following and you've already created a community with your product. There's no reason you can't do it on YouTube. You just got to think a little bit differently. Matt Cundill 33:58 Okay, so for this podcast, I would probably just do the two people talking. You know, I just I there, I know there are people out there who are like, I just want to see the show or I just want to see live people and watch it on say YouTube. I think that's totally fine. Aiden Wolf 34:14 Okay, let's take the Joe Rogan effect here. Okay, so let's let's talk about Joe Rogan, I've gone on a couple rants. Some of those rants have been three, four minutes long, right? Okay, so let's say you created a video a four minute long video of you but don't call me a YouTube expert. But YouTube experts says quote, and you put that up how to get your podcast on YouTube and make money video up. There's so many ways you can repackage content without making it to guys talking. Because this view what you're seeing right here is my YouTube background. It's a new one, still in work I've got a guitar to hang up on this side. It's still in progress, but you could actually literally put this into a short. You can put this into just my screen onto a full video for those three to four minutes of me making a point and learn how to create thumbnails and titles that get people to click. And you literally already have a video in this video, you can clip it out. And Good God, it takes you 30 seconds to clip out a video and render it 30 seconds and you would have a video to put on YouTube. You don't want to intros, stop thinking in the podcast, one minute long, intros kind of concept. You don't need that crap YouTube a zero intros, you put content up and make sure it either educates your entertains and if it does both, you're gonna be successful. Matt Cundill 35:41 Yeah, just start the show man to start the show. Aiden Wolf 35:43 So with that in mind, do you still just want to throw up a video of two guys talking for an hour and a half? Matt Cundill 35:50 Maybe. Aiden Wolf 35:53 It's that laziness talking, though. And I'm gonna call you out on this. Because I don't necessarily think it's laziness. I think it's a stubbornness to leave what you know, for something you don't. Matt Cundill 36:05 Is my show too niche to matter on YouTube? Aiden Wolf 36:10 How many downloads a week you get there, Matt? Matt Cundill 36:12 3000 a month. Aiden Wolf 36:14 3000 a month. So let's say you got 1000 a month on YouTube, you were able to build up enough where you could get 3000 views in a month on on a podcast. You got to remember a lot of your content is geared towards broadcast professionals. So that is a niche, but I bet you any money all those broadcast professionals watch YouTube. You do bring up an interesting point about being really niche. I actually tell this story quite often. You had somebody I think he was on your podcast and he has a tailgating podcast and- Matt Cundill 36:47 Tailgate Radio. Aiden Wolf 36:48 Tailgate Radio and relatively successful out I might add, right? Matt Cundill 36:52 Yeah. Aiden Wolf 36:53 Okay, so that's a brutal niche. But that's one of the niches you can get, as I tell you, I understand in the US they do a lot of it. Matt Cundill 37:02 But it is until you realize that there's barbecues and there's charcoal and there's sandwich meat and there's bread. Aiden Wolf 37:09 It's still niche for people that want to go to a game and tailgate. Matt Cundill 37:13 It's not for advertisers who want to advertise if you want to find the people who are buying those products this is the show. Aiden Wolf 37:19 Absolutely 100%. But what about podcasters? How many podcasters are there? Do you think there's more podcasters than there are tailgaters. Matt Cundill 37:29 No. Aiden Wolf 37:30 So there's less podcasters than there are tailgaters. Matt Cundill 37:33 Well, I've just seen college football and parking lots, and there's 30. Aiden Wolf 37:37 I think a lot of those are doubles. No, there's I mean, there's 32 teams with with 16 you know, games. If you're super niche, and this is the one thing I was kind of going for is is find ways to maybe break out of your niche a little bit for YouTube. Once again, I go back to the science podcast where you could do like, you could break your niche a bit and just do cool scientific facts and did you know kind of style videos. And like, no matter what you're doing, there's always ways you can break out of that for your niche you as well, Matt, I mean, you can, you could do podcast facts, you could do broadcast facts, you can make it a content creators, YouTube, that all points back to what you're doing on Sound Off Podcast, or Sound Off Media Company. So a lot of it is you doing the work and figuring out how you can appeal to people and then go on appeal to those people, a consultant can help like, I could come in and pour over your books, pour over your content, and start to come up with an action plan for how you're going to be able to get people eyes on with your content, I can guarantee you 100% If you start putting out shorts, you're going to get 100 fold views than you would on an audiogram. I will I will put money on that. And I will bet you $100 that if you put out a shorter week for the next month, you will get 100 fold views than your audio grams. Are you willing to take that bet? Matt Cundill 39:07 Yes, I am. I'm just not willing to do the work. And I hope you don't come and look at the books of this place and be like this place is nearly broke. Aiden Wolf 39:16 How did your wife marry, you know, I get that one a lot. But what's wrong with the work if you did 4, 1 a week for a month for shorts on a YouTube channel and that's an hour a week you're unwilling to put an hour a week in to expanding possibly your base by a lot. Matt Cundill 39:38 So I'll sign up for that. Aiden Wolf 39:40 Okay. All right. I'll even help you get the shorts done, because that means I'm going to make 100 bucks. Matt Cundill 39:44 I'm going to go back to Mary Anne just for a sec with Let's take us outside all right. I almost think that her YouTube channel should be called Mary Goes Outside and it should be anything involving her outside because she does go she's active right she's in the wildnernes she's, you know, biking. Aiden Wolf 40:04 Yes, yeah, yeah. Okay. Well, okay, so what are you asking how you would utilize something like that for Mary Anne's? Matt Cundill 40:12 No, I'm just thinking outside the box here for like a lot of people get involved and think I need to have a YouTube strategy for my podcast. Aiden Wolf 40:19 Okay. Matt Cundill 40:20 And with everything that you've been saying, at least create something that would have some value that's not necessarily- Aiden Wolf 40:26 I already know what I would do for Marianne's show. Matt Cundill 40:28 Alright, well, you should probably tell her and I'll just eliminate what I what I just said. Aiden Wolf 40:32 No, no, what do you what are you going to do? Matt Cundill 40:34 I said she should be doing videos of her outside and then she should call the channel, Mary Goes Outside. Aiden Wolf 40:39 So it's just her walking, or riding a bike? Matt Cundill 40:42 Sure, being active. Aiden Wolf 40:43 What about what if she did a series of voiceover series, you can get video of a lot of these trails in the world and what if it's a video while you have some B roll of the trail, you can see some of the beautiful sights on the trails. Well, my wife and child just did the Scottish Highlands trail. They did like 60 kilometers of the West Highlands trail. You can find video of it online, and you go in you grab some that video and you do a story about the trail. All these trails have histories. The West Scottish Highland trail has a historical story behind it every trail, you go to Machu Picchu, and the trails the way they how you got up the mountain is a video, guess what you're talking about going outside and hiking. Let's give some people some some hiking porn route in that perspective. But you know what I mean, the stuff that hikers will be looking for, and you tell the story behind it, make it a 60 second video of you and this is the content she went to where did she go to base camp for to the Mount Everest, she went to base camp for Everest. There's a story in that, get some video, you can find video online for all this stuff. You can have pictures sliding through like a slideshow and you're telling the story about base camp, Mount Everest, how many people have died on Everest, you can tell stories about other places, Canada has a ton of trails. And those can all be shorts, and people will watch that crap. I'm not saying it's crap. I'm just saying like, people will watch that. Because that's what people do a well told story will always get viewership. And those people once again, what I said, if you can hold a person on any platform, they will seek you out. Matt Cundill 42:25 I want to go back to the audiograms for a second. Aiden Wolf 42:28 You're really trying to push these. Matt Cundill 42:30 Well, I'm not ready to let it go, but but one of the things that YouTube did and as I as I share the screen for our audio audience is I'm just looking at the Sound Off Media Company page here. And here are three podcasts that I have, which I have declared podcasts here and by doing this with just the audiograms, I am now a part of YouTube music as an app. Yeah and so if you want to be a part, if you want your podcast to be in YouTube, you can declare to podcast they ask that you title it. First of all, make a playlist declared a podcast, put the artwork up, but make sure that the title is the exact same as the name of your podcast. Aiden Wolf 43:12 The the title and the title and thumbnail have to be different- is that what you're saying? Make the title the same as your thumbnail? Matt Cundill 43:18 The title of the show has to be- Aiden Wolf 43:21 Yes. Matt Cundill 43:21 Yeah, the show should should be the same and now we're going to be appearing in YouTube music, at least in the app, but at the same time, they're going to be asking for RSS feeds in that sometime in the next six months. Aiden Wolf 43:34 Yeah, no, that's great. I'm really curious to see what YouTube can do with this because I have some content on a second channel that I think is going to do really well. So let's see some of those little audiograms. Bring up the sheet of all the audio grams that you've done the shorts I guess, or are they shorts? Matt Cundill 43:50 No. These are full audio grams. Aiden Wolf 43:52 Okay, but let me see one. Let me let me see. Let me see your viewers. How many views you've gotten on some of these? Matt Cundill 43:57 This one here as a as nine views. Aiden Wolf 44:00 Oh, six days? That's good. Okay. Matt Cundill 44:02 For six for six days. Aiden Wolf 44:04 Give me give me some more. Let's go down the list here. Matt Cundill 44:06 17 views for eight days. Aiden Wolf 44:08 Awesome. Matt Cundill 44:09 50 views for Jesse Brown from Canadaland. So a little bit of a name here. 5100 views. Aiden Wolf 44:15 Good for you. That's actually fantastic. That is that is exactly what you want. Now I'm going to- Matt Cundill 44:21 But he's famous. Aiden Wolf 44:23 Am I able to share my screen? Matt Cundill 44:26 I can I can probably make that happen yeah, I think you can. Aiden Wolf 44:29 Alright, so I just hit the present button is that what I do? Matt Cundill 44:32 Yeah, hit present at the bottom. Aiden Wolf 44:33 Share screen. We're gonna go with this one. We're going to share that. Okay. I have a channel called Dark Corner Media, I've only I've only uploaded I think there's 13 videos on this 20 videos so you can see it up here. 509 subscribers off 20 videos most of these by the way or have been shorts. You can see I've got these videos here. Good fun, just weird stuff like some of the world's weirdest borders will ai ai take over media. I've had some unique success with this 8200 views on the surprisingly dark history of Christmas, why you should hate Nickelback and lots of fun. So let's look at my shorts. Specifically, these are video shorts. My first one out of the four I have one was only put up a week and a half ago. That's the most censored song of all time, 600 views. 1200 views from the one I put a week before that, the week before that, for 911, 1600 views and the week before that is 2400 views. It is just me talking with some pitchers floating by each one of those. I put in about 30 minutes work. Matt Cundill 45:41 And well titled to write I think your title? Aiden Wolf 45:43 Yep. Well, that's part of the learning process. That's part of the only way you learn is by doing right like It's like learning how to go beyond radio is a morning show host. You don't learn enough in college to be a morning show host you have to get out. That's why you start in a small market and make all the mistakes and then you build up. It's the same thing with every every single platform like with your podcast, sound off podcast, your first couple episodes, do listen to them and be proud of that? Matt Cundill 46:10 The first four episodes didn't sound very good and then I said I can't do this, as well as a producer's- Aiden Wolf 46:15 Live From A Hardrive there it is. Matt Cundill 46:17 Oh, that was good. I forgot about how good that was. We are live from a hard drive. That's what we were. Why did I stop saying that? Aiden Wolf 46:26 I don't know. It's the learning process, though. You learn what works, you learn what doesn't what, because every audience is going to be specific, we go back to that little line across the top of your YouTube channel. Not every piece of ice hockey is going to be of interest to you, but ice hockey is. So it's learning what your audience particularly wants by trial and error. I know what a lot of my audience wants. That's how I'm getting almost 3000 views for a short that took me 30 minutes to do if that was tied to a podcast. And I've thought about doing that I kind of did that that would draw that would bring people from one to the other. So it's a matter of like, if you're willing to put in the time, you can have success on this. On this platform. It's whether or not you want to put in the time. Matt Cundill 47:10 I just had to remember why I stopped using that slugline live from that we were live from a hard drive. Aiden Wolf 47:16 Yeah. Matt Cundill 47:16 it was just a waste of time and we needed to get into the show and the other thing is like when people asked me okay, well, what's your show? I said, we're the show about podcasts and broadcast. Aiden Wolf 47:27 Yeah. Matt Cundill 47:27 I mean, you need to have that elevator pitch and you need to define who you are right away- Aiden Wolf 47:31 In two words. Three words. Yeah, Matt Cundill 47:33 Yeah, I had a consultant and radio say to me, well, what's a rock ride? I said, I mean, what's a rock ride. Everybody knows what I know. No, people don't know what a rock right is. Well, don't you understand that it's 30 minutes of non stop rock and those will be sure to say that. Aiden Wolf 47:48 Yeah, well, my favorite is the longest coffee break in Ottawa. Oh, God. It's some of that crap. And it's interesting how that translates over to over to media and how poorly it does in other media forms. You can't be that cheesy and other things like live from hard drive isn't as cheesy as some of the radio stuff. But you do know there's a there's an element of cheese to it. Right? It's a play on words. Matt Cundill 48:13 Yeah, we needed to get the cheese out of here right away. I think as we left radio further and further behind, we left that piece of cheese behind. Aiden Wolf 48:20 Yeah, you've you've basically burnt that bridge and killed all the soldiers on the other side. Matt Cundill 48:25 Yeah, I sometimes think I'm still Jehovah's radio guy too like, I'll still speak to how awesome it is. But I can't work with what I'm working with here. Right? Aiden Wolf 48:34 I just got offered a job yesterday with radio, turned it down. Matt Cundill 48:38 Of course, it was probably like a fraction of the revenue you're pulling in with from YouTube. Aiden Wolf 48:43 It's about the same. Matt Cundill 48:44 Okay. Aiden Wolf 48:44 The problem is I can't do YouTube at the same time. Also, I'm a I'm a podcast editor, I edit podcasts and higher end ones and I make a lot of money at it. And I would literally be shooting myself in the foot if I decided to get rid of those. I've built it up over a year, but with the YouTube thing and with the video thing, Matt, are you sold yet on why it's important? Matt Cundill 49:07 Absolutely. I know why it's important. I just trying to find a way for it not to sink my business in terms of time. Aiden Wolf 49:16 Okay. Matt Cundill 49:17 That's all. Aiden Wolf 49:17 So let's do a little bit of time management here, buddy. Matt Cundill 49:20 By the way, when you think of this, remember, there are 70 podcasts in the network. Aiden Wolf 49:26 And you do all of them. I'm sure. Matt Cundill 49:27 I mean, that's 70 different videos, strategies. Aiden Wolf 49:30 Yeah, absolutely. But you're not in charge of all of them. Because if those podcasts can't do their own video strategies, that's their problem. Right? It's I'm not coming at this from a network owner. But how many hours a week do you put into your own content? Matt Cundill 49:45 One episode of the Sound Off Podcast takes a minimum eight hours. Aiden Wolf 49:49 Okay, so eight hours. What else do you do in the week? Matt Cundill 49:52 Everyone else's podcast too. Aiden Wolf 49:53 So everything else beyond that eight hours is other people's stuff? Matt Cundill 49:58 So I look at the sound off plan. caste is being the marketing vehicle for the company. Aiden Wolf 50:04 Okay. Matt Cundill 50:05 So, think of that when I'm working on my own company. That's eight hours of marketing. Aiden Wolf 50:09 Okay, so how many hours a week do you put on everything else? Matt Cundill 50:14 The rest. Aiden Wolf 50:15 How many do you work on average? What's your what's your weekly look like? Matt Cundill 50:19 Oh, I mean, I work every day from 6am to 7pm. Aiden Wolf 50:24 Wow, you do 11 hours a day? No, that's 13 hours a day you do 13 hours a day of straight hard work. Matt Cundill 50:30 Well, I go for a swim and I have lunch. Aiden Wolf 50:35 That but the rest of the time is no videos on YouTube. You're not listening to any you are literally, nose to the grindstone for those. Let's put that at 11 hours. Matt Cundill 50:45 Yeah. There's also I mean, listen, there's also four employees here. Aiden Wolf 50:49 Okay, no, no, I'm just asking. I'm just asking. So do what are your four employees do? Matt Cundill 50:54 Edit, market, audiograms. Aiden Wolf 50:57 They're doing 11 hours a day too? Matt Cundill 50:58 No they're not working that nearly that much. Transcription- Aiden Wolf 51:02 What if you got one of them to start doing shorts for your content? Matt Cundill 51:05 Oh, very likely, yes. Aiden Wolf 51:09 Okay. All I'm saying is, is if you want something bad enough, you'll find a way to get it. Yeah, this is true for everything. You have built a podcast to the point where it's your full time income, where you will employ for people to have income from it. You've built this thing. And this is the doorstop that you're willing to go screw that too much extra hour a week I'm out. That's the point. That's the level where you're going to be like, screw it, I'm out. Matt Cundill 51:38 Yeah, well, this person gets a short and an audiogram. And then this person gets what and then this it's such a different strategy for every single person. So it's, you can see why it's paralysis by analysis. Aiden Wolf 51:53 Before I go, I'm just going to share a little bit of information with you. It's 202 I have to be out the door by 2:20 and I stink. I've got to put some deodorant on. So I need a couple extra minutes. For a channel with 100,000 subscribers, and an average view time and view schedule that goes along with 100,000 subscribers. How much do you think you can charge for a baked in ad? I'm gonna let you guess on this one because I know for a podcast, it ain't anywhere near, so what do you think that you could charge for a baked in ad on a YouTube video if you have 100,000 subs? Matt Cundill 52:30 I would ask me what the CPM is of that. Aiden Wolf 52:32 Doesn't matter. You have 100,000 people you're selling that you're you're you're not selling CPM, you are selling the amount of people that follow your channel. And there is a base number that a lot of people will tell you, you can get for a baked in ad. Matt Cundill 52:47 Can I get $5,000 for that? Aiden Wolf 52:48 No, you're getting more? Matt Cundill 52:50 Really? Aiden Wolf 52:51 Yeah, you're getting more money, you're getting quite a bit more. For one baked in video, one ad space that you are going to read yourself. You're gonna read it yourself, you're going to be this video was brought to you by Bitdefender. Something like that. 100,000 people, you can charge up to 10 grand if you have the viewership also relative. If you have nominal viewership for 100,000 person audience, that means I do know a YouTuber who's got 230,000 subs, and he does less views than me. He can't charge that. But a normal channel that has proper growth, you're doubling year over year has the same amount of views that channel with 100,000 subscribers should have should be able to get $10,000 for a 30 seconds ad read. Matt Cundill 53:38 Okay, that's $100 CPM than right. Aiden Wolf 53:41 $100 for a baked in ad. Matt Cundill 53:43 Yep. Aiden Wolf 53:44 I don't know the math on that. Matt Cundill 53:45 Don't worry. Yeah. I mean, I believe that's what it is. But also it's um, I mean, because it's host read. Definitely that raises the value up there and it's in the yeah, totally. So I think that's, that's totally a fair rate. And I think a lot of niche podcasters can command that as well. Unfortunately, they just don't have 100,000 necessarily, they got much less. Aiden Wolf 54:06 Here's the thing. YouTube grows because it has a built in algorithm. So there's somebody pushing your crap out. You can build to 100,000 very easily. I'm at 22,000 I'm doubling year over year, do the math, like it's not hard to do. So if you can learn how to push content out and you can get a channel to 100,000 That's that's your full time gig man. That's $10,000 for a single read a 32nd reads so you do that four times in the month man. You put out a video a week with four ad read this $40,000 a month just on baked in information on your video and you don't have an hour to do it a week. Matt Cundill 54:48 And before you go I need you to remind people why they should not let AI do their shorts. Aiden Wolf 54:56 AI is horrible at it right now. Matt Cundill 54:58 Yep. Aiden Wolf 54:58 And AI is getting there. There's actually a lot of people creating content with AI and doing it very well, but it's AI based. There are ways to utilize AI to make content and very few people know how, but it has no soul. And people can see through that pretty quick. I actually did a video on my channel, which was will AI take over media, and I had aI write the script for the video. And AI actually pointed out the pluses and the minuses to having AI do your job for you. And AI actually kind of encompassed it really well, it doesn't do a great job. And the video is quite dry. Because AI doesn't have personality, it doesn't have what you bring to it. It doesn't tell your jokes. Matt Cundill 55:39 Well. It's a collection of the mean, and the average. And so if you want to create an average piece of anything, just get AI to do it. Aiden Wolf 55:46 But then it also relies on people watch personality, right? I watched my favorite YouTubers, not because they do something specific that I really like it's because who they are as people. I enjoy that, that that personality, I try to bring it into everything I do you see a lot of personality in this. That's the personality that sells me. That's what people who follow my community or were on my Discord come here for. And when you do AI, you take all of you out of it and I read an AI script. There's no joke, there's no me. I make puns. I run around with a cape on saying supercardioid man,. AI doesn't do that crap. So is it worth it? I mean, if you really know how to utilize it, I do know some podcasters. And I'm going to not say who they are. But they do fill in gaps in their script with AI and they use certain phrases or commands for the AI to make it sound really good and it works really well. So can you utilize AI in certain respects like that? Yes. 100%. Can you use AI to create a super mountain of content? No, you're you're gonna fall flat on your face. It's still pretty garbage. Matt Cundill 56:58 All right. Hey, man, thanks a lot for doing this and thanks for taking the time. I feel like I feel like I got like a lesson. Am I any further along? Yes, I think I am thank you. Aiden Wolf 57:09 I'm gonna get you to send my content. So the stuff that you recorded of me doing this, I'm going to turn it into some shorts and I'm going to send it back to you. Because I have a few weeks off from podcasts and I'm going to send it back to you and I'm going to win $100 from you. Because you took the bet which was a dumb idea, by the way, but very dumb. You're gonna put it up and you're gonna be wowed. Matt Cundill 57:29 All right, I'll get my 100 bucks ready for you to take Interac. Aiden Wolf 57:34 Oh, absolutely. Matt Cundill 57:35 I will you take in Satoshis Aiden Wolf 57:39 I pay in peanuts. Yeah, thanks for having me, brother. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 57:42 The Sound Off Podcast is written and hosted by Matt Cundill. Produced by Evan Sieminski, edited by Chloe Emond-Lane, social media by Aiden Glassey. another great creation from the Sound Off Media Company. There's always more at soundoffpodcast.com Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Back in the day, (like 2017)"Cut the Bullshit" which was the name of the Facebook group Jeremy founded a number of years back. I loved it. Jeremy is a podcast marketer and sherpa who helps brands launch and grow their shows. He acknowledges brightly that every show is different and will have a unique path. The best thing you can do for yourself is register for his newsletter, Creative Wayfinding. Often when I read it, I find it is more about perspective than tips and tricks. In this episode you will hear Jeremy's insights on developing a focused approach to podcast marketing and what he learned from discovering online business opportunities through Pat Flynn and Amy Porterfield. Also why your podcast should be listenable, with no noticeable audio issues. And is Podcasting crowded? Compared to other mediums, no. Also tips on using (or not using) YouTube and making Newsletters that matter. Also given that Jeremy is in Barcelona, Matt asked about what it is like working from Europe. I actually have a Spain Food Guide that I update every year. There are also a few episodes I have done about Spain on my other show called You May Also Like. There is the episode with James Blick who is a reknowned YouTuber on the subject of Spain. And also a recent episode with Hanni Martini who does food tours in the wonderful city of Malaga. TRANSCRIPTION Tara Sands (Voiceover) 0:02 The Sound Off Podcast. The show about podcast and broadcast starts now. Matt Cundill 0:13 Jeremy Enns is a podcast marketer. He helps creators meet their goals. He sees a lot of phonies and B.S. podcast marketers come and largely go. And over the years he's developed a tangible and focused approach to podcast marketing. Don't take my word for it, you can just subscribe to his newsletter, Creative Wayfinding. I've posted a link for you to sign up at Soundoffpodcast.com, or even better, you can go to his website, Jeremyenns.com. Jeremy also heads up the Podcast Marketing Academy, Podcast Launch Academy and Podcast Audio Academy, acknowledging that some of us are good at some things, but not necessarily good at others. For instance, I'm good with launches and audio, but I've always got questions about marketing. So likely that's where I'll gravitate towards today. Jeremy Enns joins me from Barcelona, Spain. Jeremy, you got into podcasting in 2016. What did you do before podcasting? Jeremy Enns 1:07 Oh, so there's a two part answer to this. And the first part is that I went to audio engineering school and wanted to work in the music industry. So went to school and moved to Vancouver, Canada for that, from- from the prairies where I know we both are originally from, and went through school, did an internship after that at a big studio with a long storied history. We're at- places where like Metallica and Aerosmith and Guns and Roses all recorded back in the 80s and 90s. It was under different ownership when I interned there, but it's still a pretty cool experience. And so I was there for about a year. Little Mountain Sound, was then Fader Mountain Sound at the point I was there. And Garth Richardson was the kind of Head Producer there at the time I was there, he's done a lot of work with a lot of big names as well in his own right. So kind of got into audio that way. But after that realized I was doing that for a year, kind of a couple days a week, realized that everybody who's like moving up the ladder at the studio, was there seven days a week, kind of like 8am till 4am every single day. And I knew at least one guy who was like living out of his car in Vancouver there, I had a full- full time job, needed to pay the bills and everything. So I kind of realized like, I wasn't gonna get anywhere at that studio at the kind of rate I was investing in it timewise. And this was an unpaid internship as well, which I believe is still very common in the music industry, certainly was back when I was there 10 years ago. And so I kind of realized like, Okay, well, this isn't, you know, what I want to do, let me just take a step back from this and reassess. And so I'd always worked on like landscaping, worked at golf courses, kind of outdoor stuff, just like an outdoorsy type guy. So I went back to landscaping, then, for a couple years did tree planting in northern BC, kind of saved up, took a year off to go travel the world, and came back and at that time discovered podcasting as a listener. And the first thing I looked up was, you know, how do you start business online that allows you to travel, and so kind of found my way into the online business. Pat Flynn, Amy Porterfield kind of world at the time, those are some of the first shows I discovered and started kind of experimenting, and trying to find out, you know, how can I build an online business? So that was kind of the pre podcasting transition into podcasting phase of my life. Matt Cundill 3:08 Do you have a CFOX story or maybe a Rock 101 story from Vancouver, any radio story? Jeremy Enns 3:13 No stories from Vancouver when it comes to radio. I did work- one of the landscaping jobs, it was you know, an old truck that I drove. So I did spend a lot of time stuck in traffic around Vancouver listening to the radio, but I was very much a channel flipper at that point. It's kind of interesting. Like, I knew all the stations in Edmonton and Saskatoon, and I got to Vancouver. And it's just like, I didn't listen to the radio that much. So I never really knew what the stations were or what to expect. So I never really was a diehard listener of any of them. Matt Cundill 3:39 I can see you going through Edmonton and flipping between, you know, Sonic and the Bear. Jeremy Enns 3:46 Maybe a little KROC even. Matt Cundill 3:48 Of course, how could I forget KROC? The first time that I encountered you online, you had this great Facebook group called Cut the Bullshit. And I was always fascinated by Cut the Bullshit Podcasting. I just said I didn't understand- I didn't realize we had any bullshit in podcasting. Yet there was. So what were some of the things that you saw people were doing that you wanted to teach people to do properly? Jeremy Enns 4:12 Yeah, I mean, I think there's a lot, a lot of this stuff has persisted, a lot of it's gotten a lot worse now. I kind of don't really engage with it anymore or even see it come across my screen. I know there's some people who were just on a crusade against it. And I've kind of like moved away from that and kind of said, Okay, I'm gonna like occupy a higher level of the discourse here. At this point. I don't want to just stay stuck in the weeds of all this, whatever it is, people are talking about bad advice and information. That's what's going on out there. But at the time, I think coming in as an audio guy, I think there's a lot of stuff that people would- I mean, make it needlessly complicated and complex. That was one that really annoyed me. It's like, okay, this doesn't need to be that hard. Like, yeah, there's some technical stuff you need to know to start a podcast but like, this is not the thing to focus all of your time and effort and energy on, and a lot of people just like love to go in, and if you can't spend $500 on a mic, like, why are you even podcasting and you need like all this complex setup and whatever. And I think that it has kind of become- the promise of podcasting was always like this democratization of content creation in the audio format. And I think it's become moreso that's, that's become more widespread since back, you know, 2015-16 when we kind of first met, but I think that was one of the big things, I think there was a lot of like, shady marketing advice and stuff going on there. There's a lot of like, super hard selling in Facebook groups and things like that, that were- kind of annoyed a lot of people. And so I kind of wanted to create this community that was like, Okay, let's just like, have an authentic genuine space here where like, I'm not going to just be like hawking my own stuff at you 24/7. And this is going to be more, I don't know that the word, like, inclusive had the meaning that it does today, back then. But that was kind of my feeling like, I just want to create a space where people feel welcome, where they're not gonna get like shouted down by, like, elitists in the space. That was a big thing that annoyed me at the time. And so that was kind of the vision behind that. And I think, you know, when you think about, like, bullshit exists in many different formats, and I think part of that too, then as still now is like, people who didn't really have that much experience trying to capitalize on the podcasting trend. And yeah, that one, I think there's a lot more people doing that now. But there's a lot more actual experts that it's kind of like that gap has kind of grown, so you can kind of tell like, who knows what they're talking about and who doesn't. So you're an audio guy, the podcast has to sound good. I still get pushback from people who say it doesn't have to sound perfect. No, but it has to be listenable. So how can you wrap that up and tell somebody what the podcast needs to sound like for the bare minimum? Aside from getting technical. Okay, it's 16 bit, we can do 44.1. you know, what's it going to sound like in the ears in order to be listable? I mean, I think it has to be- as a listener, you have to not notice that sound is an issue. So I think it has to become just like, something that somebody would listen to it, and they wouldn't immediately think like, oh, this sounds unprofessional, or amateur in some way. And like, I will say there are niches, if you have literally zero competition on your topic, people will put up with more. And like, if you are the only place to get information on the topic, and your information is good, sure, some people are going to listen to it. But the minute you have one competitor who sounds better than you, almost everybody is going to choose that show over yours. And so I think like there is a bit of a spectrum there. And it depends on how much competition there is. But really where I would like to get people to is like, the sound is not like poor quality of the sound or whatever the quality of the sound, is not noticeable. If anything, it's like, wow, this is like amazing production. But other than that, it's like neutral. And so it's kind of just this like background flavorless, like water, so to speak, where it's like, you drink it, you don't even notice any taste. It's just like, it is what it is. It nourishes me, it hydrates me, whatever, I don't detect anything in there that's distracting me from, you know, whatever the content is. Matt Cundill 7:53 And you brought up a great point that you can sound fantastic. And it doesn't have to cost you very much. Says the person with a $700 microphone here. And a $1,500 one in the corner. No, do not spend that. I- I'm doing something different with my microphones. But what would you recommend for somebody who's sort of stuck in the world of microphones, they're gonna go to Best Buy and they're gonna get pushed a Blue Yeti. Jeremy Enns 8:16 Yeah, right now I feel like the Shure MB7 is one that's like a great- I say entry level. But like, you can do a lot with that mic. And it's designed specifically for podcasters and content creators in less than ideal environments. And so I have the, the big brother of it, the Shure SM7-B which I would push more people towards, it's actually not that much of a price difference. You can probably get this for $400. The MB7's like maybe 250 or something like that. 300. So, I mean, if the benefit of the MB seven is it has the USB capability. It's got a lot of like fancy software and stuff, but if you know what you're doing, I really like this one, the SM7-B, as does I mean, Joe Rogan, Michael Jackson, James Hetfield of Metallica. The list goes on, this is a very famous mic, and it's not actually that expensive. So for certain like vocal styles, I think this is a great mic that I would recommend for the kind of average person looking to get into audio content creation. I think that Shure MB7 is a great kind of first step into that world. Matt Cundill 9:11 And I just entered into the world of the BS because I sort of- to give a little flack towards the Blue Yeti, but the Blue Yeti is a fine microphone if you use it properly. Jeremy Enns 9:18 Well, yeah. And I have a friend who used to work for me, his name is Tom Kelly. He has a YouTube channel called Clean Cut Audio that is like super nerdy, like audio engineering stuff. And he did a mic shootout with his co host and one of them was on the Shure SM7-B, the other one of them was on the Blue Yeti, but Tom actually set up his co host with the Blue Yeti in a very like well orchestrated setup. And so the room was not like super crazy treated, but they built like a little mini DIY ISO booth for the microphone. And then he sent it around to a bunch of audio engineers and said like, which one's the Blue Yeti? And almost nobody could get it right. And so you can certainly- if you know what you're doing, like, the microphone is not going to hamper your ability to get great sounding audio. Matt Cundill 10:01 If you started the podcast in 2016, like I did, it's a noticeable advantage over others who are starting it 2021-2022. And a lot of that has to do with just the number of podcasts. So back in 2016, there were about what 60, 70,000 podcasts. But today, there's like 4 million. But that's still not a reason to not start a podcast. So how do we mentally jump that hurdle of there's 4 million podcasts, I can't start one. Jeremy Enns 10:32 Yeah I mean, it depends on I think what your goals are, like, why are you starting a podcast in the first place, and I think a lot of people start with like, because it would be fun to do. And it's like, great, do it then. Like, if it's gonna be fun, like, that's, there's your reason right there to start it. And a lot of people like start out that way. And then they want to, you know, grow an audience and monetize it, or whatever. I think if your goal is monetization, podcasting is a terrible place to do that. I think if you have a business and a product or service already, that the podcast is part of your marketing and sales kind of ecosystem. That's fantastic. But if you are looking to become a full time content creator, as a podcaster, I think that's really, really difficult. And it's not to say that nobody does it, and that it's not doable, but it is certainly not easy. And so I would just kind of start with like, what are my expectations out of this? And what am I hoping to get if it's making money, there are far easier ways to do it. That said, if you just really love the medium of podcasting, there are certainly ways you can make money in the long term, I would just say like, this is my like, five year plan here to be able to get to that point, not within six months, I want to be bringing in $1000, $10,000 a month, whatever your goal is. So that would be the first thing I would say. The second thing is like, you look at other mediums out there, whether it's YouTube or blogs, newsletters, Tik Tok, anything else like podcasting is still by far the least crowded. And so there is noise everywhere, there is competition everywhere. And if you want to create anything online or out in the world, whatever it is, if it's not an online type of artistic pursuit, or whatever it is, there is competition, there are other people doing that. And so I think that you kind of just need to get over that and say, like, wherever I choose to play, there are going to be other people doing similar things. And then the next question for you is like, how do I stand out from those people who are doing something similar to me? And so, you know, most topics, most niches have probably at least a dozen shows that are all creating content around the same topic. And I think that what most people do is they don't listen to any of the shows, they don't research any of them, they just go and say like, I'm going to create this because I think this is interesting and cool. And they create something that sounds very generic and very similar to everything else that's out there, which makes it really hard to grow. And you're not really giving anybody a compelling reason to pick your show versus any one of those other ones. So if somebody searches, you know, knitting podcast, or whatever it is, if I'm starting a knitting podcast, I'm going to go search knitting podcasts myself, and I'm going to look at like, Okay, what's the vibe I'm getting from each of these shows? I'm going to listen, maybe not through all of them, maybe maybe I would, depending on how serious I am. And I'm going to just say like, okay, what are the opportunities here for me to create a different type of knitting show than from what people already have on offer? And then that's probably the direction I'm going to go, if that's aligned with you know, the thing I actually want to create. But unfortunately, not many people, I would say the vast majority of people, don't do that kind of competitor or market research. And they end up with something that's really, really hard to market, because there's just no obvious reason for a potential listener to choose them over any of the other options. Matt Cundill 13:17 So you're going right into the crux and into the center of podcasting BS, and that is the monetization aspect. And I get into so many conversations with people who say, I don't see the ROI, how am I going to make my money back? How do I monetize this stuff? And your approach has always been, you're doing it wrong, look at this as a marketing opportunity and take from your marketing budget, and make this your marketing spend. Jeremy Enns 13:47 Yeah, and I would say like, even in that, I think one of the frustrating things as a business owner, especially when you're earlier on, is you're always looking for like the one thing that will just like, do all your marketing for you. And so I know like I've been through starting my business, now being seven or eight years in, like very many of those things like, Oh, if I just do this, like that's gonna solve all my problems, if I just have a client referral policy, and it's like, okay, that helps for a little bit. But then those referrals dry up, and you need to find a different way to market yourself. And so then it's like, well, if I start a newsletter, or if I start a podcast, whatever. And I think that the smarter way to think about it is that like all of these different platforms, they kind of supplement your larger marketing strategy. And so one of the things that like, yes, podcasting is a great part of your marketing strategy. But today, and this is different from like four or five years ago, people are likely not going to discover you through your podcast, and so today we're I'm kind of coaching people is that like, okay, the podcast is one of the best tools for you to win over superfans and like nurture the people that you have already in your ecosystem to becoming clients and customers. That's going to just happen much faster through podcasting, where people really feel like they get to know you, they can binge through your episodes, all of that, but it's going to be really hard to convert people. So say you are a consultant or you, you know, sell a course or a digital product or something like that, you probably also want to have an email presence that- and the goal is ultimately to get you know, everybody who's on your email list onto the podcast, and everyone who's- who's listening to podcasts on your email list. And that way, you're kind of using each platform for what they're best at. And so you can really like nurture people, develop a relationship with people, demonstrate your expertise through the podcast, and then send those kinds of like targeted, you know, sales emails and things like that, where they can actually just easily click a link to your sales page or to book a time to work with you or whatever. And so I think like, yes, podcasting is a great part of your larger marketing effort. But it's still limited in some ways where people aren't going to discover you through it. And so maybe that's where you're using social media or YouTube or something like that. And it's also not great at kind of getting people to convert directly from that just because of the nature of the platform. There's a lot of kind of friction getting people into it, as well as out of it. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 15:52 Transcription of the Sound Off Podcast is powered by the Podcast Super Friends, five podcast producers who get together to discuss podcasting. Sharpen your podcast and creation skills by following the show on the Sound Off Podcast's YouTube or Facebook page. The Sound Off Podcast supports Podcasting 2.0, so feel free to send us a boost if you're listening on a newer podcast app. If you don't have a newer podcast app, you can get one at newpodcastapps.com. Matt Cundill 16:24 So you brought up newsletters, having one hand wash the other. And for those who have dynamic audio insertion, instead of getting a Verizon ad or Tim Hortons ad, why not use that spot to promote your newsletter or some of your other social assets? Jeremy Enns 16:40 Yeah, and the person who does this, I think better than almost anyone, is Ramit Sethi. So his brand is I Will Teach You To Be Rich, just like kind of a scammy name almost, that he acknowledges a lot. He's actually been doing- creating content, I think like 20 plus years, I think he started the brand in his college dorm room or something like that. But I've been binging through, he's kind of reinvented as podcasts in the past couple of years, which he's been doing probably a decade in some form or another. He has a really interesting new format. But he- at the start of every episode, he does a call out to this upcoming week's newsletter. And so it gets inserted across his whole back catalogue of episodes. And he says, Hey, have you ever wondered about you know, this topic? Well, this Saturday, you know, Saturday, September, whatever it is, I'm going to be sending out a newsletter talking about this, you can't get it anywhere else. It's going out just to newsletter subscribers. So sign up at you know, Iwillteachyoutoberich.com/podcastnewsletter, and you can get it there. Now let's get into the episode. And it's such a like, there's urgency built into it because- Matt Cundill 17:36 Excitement. Jeremy Enns 17:37 Yeah, and this is the only time and place it's like targeted the date. You're like, oh, that's this Saturday, I can get this thing. And he's already writing the newsletter. And so he's just writing this 30 second ad, inserting it into his whole back catalogue of podcast episodes. And I imagine, I don't know his numbers. But I would imagine he gets a ton of email signups through that, you know, he has a big show. And he has been very successful and put 20 years into to building this brand. But still, I think a lot of people are doing both these things but aren't doing a good job cross pollinating. And there's a huge opportunity there for, I think, a lot of people who have these things kind of already created. Matt Cundill 18:09 You know, that's something that radio has done well for so many years, and that's promoting whatever it's doing. And here we are in podcasting. And I just got excited for a newsletter. But it's almost like the truck and tractor pull. This weekend, a newsletter like you've never read before. It's coming to your inbox on Saturday, Saturday. Jeremy Enns 18:29 I love that. I'm going to wait to hear that- that ad on your show. Matt Cundill 18:32 Well I'll be the voice of it. I'd love to be the voiceover of this big newsletter that's coming to everybody's inbox on Saturday. Talk a little bit about competition, because you mentioned competition. And one of the things that I found in podcasting is that we're not competing against each other. You're not competing against the other 4 million podcasts that are out there. We're really competing for people's time. And a lot of people look at the Apple Podcast catalogue and go, Well, I can't get into that niche. I can't get into that territory. And it's it's not it's not really the right thinking before you head in. Right? Jeremy Enns 19:06 Yeah, I mean, I think you you hit the nail on the head there with like, and this is true of any type of content, like really, my email inbox is filled up with newsletters that I want to read. Hundreds of newsletters probably at this point. Maybe not hundreds of individual newsletters, but there are certainly like 1000s of issues that I would like probably like to read at some point. There's tons of articles in there, my podcast feed is backlogged, I've got a huge list of YouTube watch later, I've got how many shows on Netflix and Disney plus and like Apple TV, all of these, like there is so much content that all of us are drowning in that like this is really what we're competing with, is for somebody to pick, you know, out of all the stuff that's available to them, essentially for free. Because let's let's even talk about like Netflix, sure there's a monthly payment, but I think most of us treat it as like, well, I'm already subscribed. I'm not like choosing to pay each and every month it just automatically comes out, I can open it up, I have access to it. So like, all of this content is essentially free to us as consumers, and you look at some of what we're competing with. And you think like, okay, every movie that's on Netflix or any of these streaming platforms, like what are the budgets that go in here, these are like, the top storytellers and cinematographers in the world, creating content, all of the best podcasts in the world on a different topic from ours, just you know, any podcast available any YouTube channel available, like all of this is just at our fingertips, and is just as easy to get into as a podcast. And so like, this is what we as content creators and marketers are competing with. And so I think that's the big question is like, what is going to get somebody to click play on your show over all of that other stuff? And I think that where a lot of people get frustrated is they think that they need to be better than any of that other stuff. And I don't think that's the way to think about it at all. I think it's really about being more relevant to the person in a specific moment than anything else. And so there are things, especially if you're a business owner, you're probably more in the education space, and you're trying to help people solve problems, you're trying to teach them something, along those lines. And so I think that that's where we can be more specific and say, Okay, there's this very specific person out there, maybe there's only like, 10,000 people them in the world, they're struggling with this problem. And I know that I can help them solve that problem. And that is more valuable to them than binge watching through three hours of a super highly produced Netflix show. Like, it- because they have that problem, that Netflix show is almost a distraction, and they know it, but if they want to make progress towards this goal they have, like, where are they going to go? Well, they're not going to listen to, you know, the latest true crime show, they're not going to open up Netflix, maybe they're looking at YouTube, maybe they're reading newsletters, things like that. But then we started thinking about like, oh, okay, maybe they are a podcast listener as well. And they are, you know, they have their commute every day where they can't do that other stuff. And that's where our show slots in. And so I think it's really about thinking, like, who can I be more relevant to than the competition? Not like, How can I be better than all of this other content that's available, essentially, for free? Matt Cundill 21:49 Do you know what Netflix's biggest competition is? Jeremy Enns 21:52 Sleep, I believe. Matt Cundill 21:53 That is correct. It's such a great question. Jeremy Enns 21:57 Yeah, and I think this is from- I don't know if it was their CEO, or founder, or somebody like that, who has essentially said, like, yeah, we're not worried about Disney Plus, or Apple TV. Like, we're worried about people turning off Netflix to go to sleep. And that's what we're competing against. Matt Cundill 22:09 It's just a great way to get people to stop thinking about on demand content as competition against one another. Jeremy Enns 22:16 Yep. Matt Cundill 22:17 So I always use that- I always use that trivia question to get people out of that mindset. Convince me I need to do a newsletter. Jeremy Enns 22:25 I think it depends a lot on what your goals are. I think there's two benefits to newsletters, for podcasting in particular. And the one is actually not really for podcasting, it's for the business as a whole. But kind of like I mentioned before, when it comes to getting people to take action, podcasts are just so difficult, because they're often doing something with their hands, they're driving, they're walking, they are not in an environment where they are likely to click through to a sales page, and then read the sales page. And then you know, purchase the product or whatever it is, or even click through to leave a review and whatever. We all know how hard that is. And so there is less friction in newsletters. There's another piece to that, that is also what's known as platform psychology. And so essentially, people behave in different ways, depending on the platform they're using. And so when you're listening to a podcast, you're probably not in buying mode. Whereas when you're in your inbox, I think we all buy things from our emails, like, not every day, but like on a monthly basis, there's something that we're like, oh, that looks interesting, I'm gonna check that out. And maybe I'm gonna go, you know, buy that. And that's why there are so many marketing newsletters from every kind of department store we've ever shopped at, and all this stuff. And so that is a place where people are, we're approaching them with an offer and a request where they're in a mindset that they are likely or at least they're open to taking it. So sales would be the first reason that I think newsletters are valuable. And part of that, of course, you can just get people on your email list and send sales emails when you want, that's probably not going to do as well as if you are regularly sending just useful informational content of some kind, entertaining, whatever it is. And so that's where the kind of like regular newsletter, that's not just pure sales would come in. The other piece is for engaging podcast listeners, existing podcast listeners. And so I think of like a- of a podcast audience, there are people who, you know, literally wait for the episode to drop each and every week, and they like plan their week by it. Every Tuesday is like, you know, whatever show is their favorite show day, and they like get up. And that's part of their routine. They listen to it. But I would say that that's a pretty small percentage of any show's subscriber base or listener base. And so I think where email can really come in handy is just giving that nudge that touch point, to get those people who- maybe they don't listen to every single episode, but they listen to the episodes that feel particularly relevant to them. And so if you're able to meet them in the inbox, maybe they haven't checked their podcast app in a few days, maybe they don't listen to that many shows. Or maybe yours has just got kind of drowned in the feed of of shows they do listen to, and you're able to say, hey, we're this week on the podcast, we're talking about this topic, and if they're like, oh, wow, that's exactly like what I've been thinking about recently. I need to listen to that. You've now kind of like re-engaged that person who might not have have listened to the show otherwise. And so you think about at scale if you have you know You're dealing with 1000s or tens of 1000s of listeners or anything like that, that is going to really boost your overall download numbers. If you're able to reengage people who have like already said, like, Yeah, I'm interested in the show, and especially enough to subscribe to your email list. They've checked it out before, they've listened, they've subscribed to the email list. And so I think like winning those people over each and every week is an important part of marketing and growth that I think a lot of times people think about, like just getting people to listen once, which is the hardest part of podcast marketing, but there's this other part of it, that's like, Okay, once they've listened once, like, how do we get them to keep coming back? And so I think that's where email and newsletters can play a really vital role as well. Matt Cundill 25:35 I'm just gonna say- same question, now with YouTube. But I want to- I want to change this a little bit. And I need you to be my therapist for a second, when it comes to- when it comes to video. And that's, I know I need to post my podcasts on YouTube in a full version, because Google Podcasts is going away, and YouTube Music is now going to become the app for that. Unless, of course, they're gonna let me attach an RSS feed. But then I'm convinced by so many people that I need to do Shorts, and create shorter clips and content for more views. I never got into this to do video. What do I do? Jeremy Enns 26:13 I take issue with that, like, you need to be on YouTube, you need to be on video. I think that that's a tool that's available, if you want to use it. And I think it can be a powerful tool, I think it can also be an entirely overwhelming feeling that we'd like need to do this thing. And at least personally, like, I tend to resist now, actively resist anything that I feel that kind of like onerous, like somebody else is saying I need to do this, that's, uh, I know, for myself that like, if I feel that it's not going to work for me, like, because I know I'm not gonna be able to consistent- be consistent with it. And there are other things, like there are so many tactics that we can use to grow our shows that we don't need to do any- we can ignore any single one of those and find something else that works for us. And so that's something that I think there's a lot of opportunity for video, but I think you really need to go all in on video and you need to like- when you get into video, then you start need to- you look at all these people who have like fancy YouTube, you know, sets and backgrounds and things like that. I think those people who take video that seriously are going to get the most out of video versus people who are just like, Okay, well, I've got my standard office, it doesn't look that interesting. It's not visually engaging, and it's just, you know, an unedited, like, version of my podcast up on YouTube. I don't think that's going to get much benefit for anyone. And so usually where I'm counseling people is like, okay, YouTube, there's some opportunity there, but you like, really need to learn YouTube, like you need to think about like, Okay, I am essentially now becoming a YouTuber as well. And I need to learn what are the rules that govern YouTube and its algorithm so that I can play by those and give myself the best chance of success? And you start to look at like, Okay, well, how much time is that going to take? And then there's also, you know, video takes much longer to edit and produce than podcasting does and like, is that something I am both like, have the bandwidth for and am also excited to learn about? I mean, you can outsource it if you have a really big budget, but at some point, I think like us as creators still need to learn the basics, the fundamentals, so that we can kind of dictate the strategy. And I think that that's not for everyone. And that's totally fine. I don't think like audio only podcasts are going away or going anywhere. And so I think that you can still like commit to doing an audio only show and just change your strategy- or not change your strategy up in this case, by not adopting YouTube, and just saying like, Okay, I'm going to tailor my strategy around the fact that people are not going to discover me through YouTube. So where are they going to discover me through? Maybe that's guesting on other shows, maybe that's social media, whatever it is, maybe I only do YouTube shorts, but they I'm not repurposing them from my show. I'm just creating them as one offs. And that's, you know, an entry point into my ecosystem. But there's lots of ways that you can you can think about YouTube, I think, you know, any show that's- that's grown at this point has- likely YouTube has not been a big part of it until the past few years. And I think that's still going to be viable in the future. Matt Cundill 28:51 So FOMO is really the root of most podcast marketing BS. Jeremy Enns 28:56 I would say so. Matt Cundill 28:58 Yeah, but we had a lot of it at Podcast Movement this year, there was a lot of video talk between the Coleman Insights presentation and YouTube making their announcements. Felt like I needed to become a YouTuber at the end of it, and it's just not true. Jeremy Enns 29:10 No, I would not say so at all. And I mean, I think there's other people saying that too. And I mean audio- Every medium has its purists. Audio certainly has a lot of purists as well, and I don't think there's a lot of people in that camp who are not buying into that you need to be on YouTube camp. So I think there's there's still lots of room for audio only shows, and there's lots of things that like- some of the best podcasts out there, and I think about audio dramas and things like that, like there's no way for those to become interesting like video first shows, and like part of the magic is that it's audio, and I think there's- I have a lot of friends who do YouTube and podcasting both very well. And they've kind of come to the conclusion that like you produce these things differently. Like what makes a great podcast is- does not often do well on YouTube, like YouTube rewards fast paced, like shorter timespan, like a lot of like value in a short amount of time. And I think that's great in terms of like, communicating information in a concise way. But I think like, a lot of the things that make my favorite shows my favorite is that they're not just like, I'm not listening to them to get- to download a bunch of information into my brain. Like there- I know there are faster ways to do that. I'm more listening for an experience. And I think that that's something that podcasting is great for, is hearing a more unstructured conversation, is getting into the weeds and like really digging into in a nuanced way, a topic rather than just like, here's the five things you need to know in 12 minutes or less, and being able to actually explore topics in more depth. And I think that that's something that if you're thinking like what- how do I create a great audio only podcast, it's like, well, you know, use it for what podcasting can do that is unique to podcasting. Unlike other mediums, and I think if you don't want to do that, like maybe there is a better place for creating, you know, YouTube first content or things like that. That's kind of my opinion on on audio only podcast is like, if you want to win in that kind of realm, like lean into the strengths of audio only, and don't try to like compromise and kind of do everything with one platform. Matt Cundill 31:06 So at the end of 2022, I thought to myself, podcast marketing is really changing a lot. I know we need to discover new ways to do it. I know what we did in the past is not applicable to what we're doing today. I've seen a lot of people in podcasting pivot, what has triggered all this when it comes to marketing? What has come into the marketing space that has made us go, we need to do it differently? And I can point the finger a little bit at AI, I can point the finger a little bit at automation, and tech, technological advancements. But there's some other exterior stuff going on. Maybe it's video. What caused you to pivot? Jeremy Enns 31:48 I mean, to be honest, I don't think I have pivoted that much in my approach to marketing. I think that like one of the things I've observed is that I love podcasting, and I'm a longtime podcaster and in my career is in podcasting. But I think like podcasting, as an industry is just kind of dumb in terms of marketing, where it's like really immature, where we didn't need to market until the past three or four years. And so there's just like, not a lot of nuanced thought around how marketing actually works as a industry and among podcasters. And like that's, you know, not a slight against anybody in the podcasting industry. There's some super smart people in marketing as well now, but I don't think that was a necessity in the past. And so a lot of the people who had a lot of success as podcasters, were marketers because they had businesses somewhere else. And so they brought a lot of that knowledge into podcasting. But as a industry, there wasn't a high level of kind of like dialogue around like, what are marketing best practices? What even is marketing? How does it factor into what we do here? And I think that there's some pieces like- there were people in public radio, who had a very deep sense idea around marketing, especially from like a show development, and like differentiation kind of side of things, concept development, which I think is actually one of the podcast industry strengths. Not that the average indie podcaster thinks about that as much. But I think like show development and concept development is becoming more kind of mainstream topic, which I'm really excited about, because that's really kind of getting into this conversation about differentiating yourself from the other, you know, countless interview shows on any given topic under the sun. But I think like, most of my marketing knowledge is not anything new. It's like stuff that's been around, that would have worked for hundreds of years. And so like, at the end of the day, marketing is about like finding people, getting in front of them, like the people who your show is a good fit for, or whatever your product is that you sell, and, you know, kind of convincing them that like, Hey, I've got this thing that you would benefit from, do you want to check it out? And like, it really can be as simple as that. And I think when you start to like simplify it away from all this, like, all these data and stats, and like Facebook advertising all these tools and everything, it's like, no, what we need to do is like, who are the people we're trying to get in front of? How do we get in front of them? And how do we present our show in a way that gets them excited about it? And it's like, if we can do that we're gonna grow our shows. And we can use tech and we can use tools and you know, data can provide some insights as to whether what we're doing is effective or not, but like, it's really a simple process. And I think that that's never gonna go away with marketing of any kind. It's just like the tools we use to do that maybe become more efficient, or allow us to reach more people or allow us to spend money in different ways to get in front of them, or whatever that might be. Matt Cundill 34:19 You might have answered this question. And it was gonna be a two word question. Paid social. Yes, no? Jeremy Enns 34:28 I have not seen any compelling data to support advertising the show directly. I would say that- so from what I've seen, this was in Katy Lauer's Pod the North newsletter, she had an interview with somebody, I can't remember his name, from an agency. He'd done a ton of experimenting, spent a lot of money on social advertising for I think, as well as like Google and display advertising, stuff like that. And I think the average was like a $20 cost per new subscriber. And when I compared that- I've done a lot of experimenting with newsletter advertising, and usually I'm at like a two to $3. So it's basically 10 times as expensive to get a podcast subscriber as a newsletter subscriber. So what that says to me is like, if I have an advertising budget, I'm 100%, spending all of it on getting people onto the newsletter. And once I get them on the newsletter, then I can, every single week, can put the show in front of them, I can craft an onboarding sequence that gets, you know, some potential like best kind of entry level, or entry point episodes in front of that person. And I'm going to then get them into the podcast on the back end, where I have way more opportunities to do so. So that would be- I think there's plenty of opportunity in social advertising, but I wouldn't point people directly to the podcast in most cases. Matt Cundill 35:38 So a couple shout outs, we'll give one to Katie for Pod the North, great newsletter. Your newsletter, by the way, everybody can connect to those newsletters inside the show notes of this episode. Also, the Podcast Academy, you're a noted resource, you've done some mentorship programs. And as well, you've spent some time walking us through some marketing for those who are part of the Podcast Academy. Thank you. I love that. Do you work with them often? Jeremy Enns 36:02 We do probably a few kind of collaborations a year. I'm doing another one- we're recording this end of September. And I think it's actually in two weeks from now, I'm doing an AMA in their Slack community. And so we've- I think we've done like three or four collaborations so far. So I'm sure there will be many more in the future as well. Matt Cundill 36:17 Excellent, I'm gonna look for that. I'm part of that Slack community. So we'll look for you there, that's gonna be a lot of fun. Want to ask you, because today, I was surprised to find out that you're in Barcelona. So how do you find the time difference between Europe and North America? Or does it matter? Jeremy Enns 36:31 I love it. I always say, this is like a little bit of a privileged comment. But I always say, like, the best productivity hack is just move to Europe, because you have like, until 2-3pm, your you've just got like the whole morning and early afternoon, just like focus on whatever your, like, deep work projects are without worrying about email or anything else. I always feel like I'm just in like reactive mode whenever I'm back in North America. My partner and I, we've been traveling full time for the past seven years at this point now, five of which together. We have spent most- we got locked down in Europe during COVID. She's American, I'm Canadian. So we- I couldn't get into the states during COVID. She couldn't get into Canada, so we kind of had to stay somewhere other than either of those countries. So we ended up in Europe and kind of spent the better part of two years or maybe even two and a half years on the continent. And we'd already- always loved it already. But after that we were like, you know, what are the- we were thinking about moving back to either Canada or the US. And then we started thinking about like, well, like, what if we started looking at- what are the other options? Could we move to Europe somewhere? And it's been a few years of kind of like waiting through immigration stuff and visas. And now we're in the process of actually settling in Spain. So the plan is to be here permanently. And yeah, in terms of time zones, I think it depends a little bit. When I've had more client heavy work and things like that, it's been more of a pain. But now where it's a little bit more async with my schedule, I absolutely love it. Matt Cundill 37:46 Okay, thanks. Because he answered a bunch of questions on why I feel very uncomfortable in the early morning hours in Europe. And that's really the time I should be writing newsletters and communicating and doing my own personal writing. But I find by three in the afternoon after I've had a you know, a vermouth and lunch, which is generally the time we have lunch in Europe, that, you know, I start to get slammed with a lot of client requests and the alcohol begins to wear off and I get a little bit irritable. Jeremy Enns 38:10 Yeah, I front load all that stuff. And then- there's- we're going to need to find a balance, because it is so easy here to then feel like you need to stay online till 9-10pm. At which point it's still only, I mean, Pacific Time, like, mid afternoon. So that's something that- that I definitely need to work on as we kind of get permanently settled here. But yeah, I do love the mornings for sure. Matt Cundill 38:30 Excellent. Jeremy, thanks so much for being on the podcast. It's great to connect with you finally and talk a lot about podcast marketing. Jeremy Enns 38:37 Yeah. Matt Cundill 38:37 Thank you. Jeremy Enns 38:38 Yeah, thank you so much for having me on, Matt. This has been, I mean, a long time coming I would say, since back in 2016 or whenever we first connected in the Facebook group, and it's been good to keep in touch with you at Podcast Movement when we run into each other and- and online. And this has been a lot of fun. Matt Cundill 38:51 And shortly in Barcelona. Jeremy Enns 38:53 Shortly in Barcelona. That's right. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 38:54 The Sound Off Podcast is written and hosted by Matt Cundill. Produced by Evan Surminski. Edited by Chloe Emond-Lane. Social media by Aidan Glassey. Another great creation from the Soundoff Media Company. There's always more at soundoffpodcast.com.

Fatima Zaidi is the Founder and CEO at Quill Inc., an award-winning production agency specializing in corporate audio, and CoHost, a podcast growth and analytics tool. In this episode you'll hear Fatima talk about what goes into creating successful and listenable podcasts, how she fell into the tech industry, and the opportunity that presented itself in podcasting. We also discussed why her company created Co-Host which is a podcast analytics and audience insights platform built for brands, and why attribution is a good thing. We also spoke about which metrics are important and share some tips about podcast promotion. Also why podcast ratings and reviews help, (it's not the algorithm) and why Zoom is a horrible place to record your podcast. Finally, who pulled the fire alarm at Podcast Movement? TRANSCRIPTION Tara Sands (Voiceover) 0:02 The Sound Off Podcast. The show about podcast and broadcast starts now. Matt Cundill 0:13 Let me tell you the story of Quill. The company was founded by Fatima Zaidi, and they make branded podcasts. I can tell you that making a branded podcast is hard. The goal is to create compelling pieces of audio content that subtly and nearly self like, promote a brand. In fact, you could be listening to one right now. What I love about Fatima is how she knows what matters in a podcast. Which metrics should you pay attention to? The quality of the show, the sound of the show, the content that will make people come back for the next episode. Many of the things I'm going to speak about with Fatima were covered at a number of sessions sponsored by Quill at Podcast Movement last month. And we'll talk about what happened to Podcast Movement too. Now Fatima Zaidi joins me from Toronto. Tell me why you started in tech. Fatimi Zaidi 1:08 I didn't start in tech intentionally. I think I sort of fell into this world. I used to lead marketing sales for a tech PR agency and just became really familiar with a lot of the startups that were popping up and some of the really great innovative work that was taking place in the US and Canada and ultimately saw a gap in the market and decided to productize our services. That was how Quill was born. Matt Cundill 1:35 What did you see or hear in podcasting that energized you to start Quill? Fatimi Zaidi 1:40 Well, actually, interestingly enough, I was trying to hire a production agency to help us create a branded podcast and this was, you know, back in 2016, when there weren't as many agencies as there are today. It wasn't really a saturated market and there was, you know, a couple of really premium high end agencies, the Pacific Contents of the world that do amazing work, but maybe the price tag wouldn't necessarily match some of the tech startup clients that we were working with. And so I had to hodgepodge a team of freelancers together, a producer and editor, a sound engineer, some writers, some creative folks and I thought just wouldn't it be easy if he could work with an agency that could be at an affordable experimental price point, but also do it all for you a one stop shop, and especially the marketing component because it was the wild wild west back then and nobody really knew anything about podcasting data or audience growth. And so I thought, I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna go out there and build a production agency that focuses exclusively on branded podcasts, but also audience growth, podcasting. And then a few years later, came our product co host, which was born out of necessity due to the pain points we were feeling on the agency side. Matt Cundill 2:59 And you're so right, 2016, there was a lot of people who could make you a podcast, but could they make you a good branded podcast and Pacific Content was there with the vision at the front with with Steve and Dan. But you're right. Like, there was a lot of people who say, oh, yeah, I can make you a podcast, but could they really make you a good branded podcast? So what makes a good branded podcast? What were you looking for when you wanted to put together your own branded podcast? Fatimi Zaidi 3:27 It was a combination of things. I think editorially really leveling up first, not creating another podcast that A, nobody really wanted to listen to with dry content, but thinking about is this going to be something that podcast consumers are going to tune into and be engaged all the way to the end of the season? I think a lot of brands sort of fall into this pitstop of wanting to promote their services, and products and initiatives and thinking that the existence of their business is news, which is far from the truth, and so the content piece was huge. I mean, I think folks like Pacific Content are really the masters of it, Steve and Dan, knew how to put out really great content that could essentially, you know, entertain, inspire, provide companionship. Podcast listening is transactional. We're asking for your most valuable resources, which is time and attention. I think the second component for me, that's arguably become even more important today is understanding the ROI of the show. Taking 50% of our time, investing in marketing, and then being able to prove back ROI, whether it's reaching the right audiences, whether it's lead generation, whether it's brand awareness, but you know, having some sort of a tangible metric to point to like the cost per minute of human attention. And back then I think the biggest challenge was nobody knew how to measure podcasting success or any form of metrics and, and so, we've come a really long way as an industry in terms of the ROI component. I would say that you know, our company that's what we've been laser focused on is how do we take the data and analytics makes sure that we're targeting the right people and making sure that we're targeting them the right way. What's the education piece like with clients when they first engage with you? Because I think a lot of clients come in knowing yeah, I want it to be and look and sound like this and at which point, my experience, and I'll bet you yours is as well, you immediately have to become a therapist, to explain what they need to do and what metrics they need to look at. So what's that chasm, like, what do you do to bridge that? Well, first and foremost, we run far, far away from the vanity projects. So as soon as somebody tells us that they're looking to become an influencer, a thought leader, for their CEO, or one of their C suite executives, we just know that this isn't really going to be a project that we want to align ourselves with. The vanity projects never really work. Interestingly enough, the second really big education piece for us these days is marketing. A lot of brands just don't understand the importance of allocating budget towards ad spend and taking as much time as you do to procreate your show, and actually marketing it through paid and organic tactics. And it was sort of the education piece I had back in the day when I was running the PR agency, which is the existence of your business is not news. And so simply creating a show and expecting people to find you isn't going to work in a market that has what I think the number I was reading in Podnews recently, the 4 or 5 million podcasts, and I believe 18% of them are active, which is, you know, a lot of content to be perusing through the iTunes app. And so the education piece right now for us is yes, creating a show is important. But we have to spend as much time getting it into the right ears and drawing in your qualified audience. Matt Cundill 6:42 So for the last couple of years, there's been a lot of people from the social media side who will try to provide you with magic bullets to make your podcast go. All sorts of marketing wizardry and witchcraft that's out there, but in the last two years, I think the most common sense I've heard are from the people who have PR experience. We had Lauren Passell, and I go, these are just PR basics, but it just makes sense to, you know, to be able to move the needle when it comes to a podcast. So what is inside the PR playbook that works for podcasters? Fatimi Zaidi 7:20 It's about creating content that's relevant to your show all year round, like having a 360. 12 month content strategy and making sure that you're creating content that's newsworthy, timely, and topical. You know, this month is the perfect month, September 30 is International Podcast Day and so of course, you should be doing something to improve your discoverability get the word out about your show, whether it's a cheeky PR campaign around your show concept or you know, talking or piggybacking off of another news trend. For example, when Adnen Syed got acquitted last year, or actually wasn't even that long ago, six months ago, he got acquitted, I was emailing every single journalist in the US and Canada ask him to share my point of view about what we thought of the of the verdict as well as what Serial has done for the podcasting world. And because it was super timely and topical, we had a lot of journalists interested in hearing our perspective as a production agency and thought leaders in this space and similarly, constantly finding ways to monopolize on trends, whether it's, you know, reaching out to James Cridland at Podnews and asking him to feature your show with I believe they have 20 or 30,000 subscribers at this point and that's not nothing. You know, when newsletters coming out Monday to Friday, there's the Podcast Journal, there's Inside Podcasting, there's red news, there's BNN Bloomberg covers a lot of content around podcasting. So there's, there's a lot of content being put out there and they are looking for thought leaders are looking for features. They're looking to highlight and profile stories. So it's about creating opportunities for yourself by being proactive with your pitching. Matt Cundill 8:55 So without giving away too much of the secret sauce, what is the launch process like before any audio is recorded on a branded podcast? And really, it sort of dovetails into any podcast that gets made. Fatimi Zaidi 9:09 For us the first process or first step of the stage, and to be honest, this is the part that takes us the longest is the podcast positioning as we like to call it. We're trying to figure out how are you, how is your show going going to be the first the best or different? And if it doesn't fall into one of those three categories, then we know that it's not a show that we want to create. Looking at your competitive matrix what's already out there, the idealists or profile, who are we creating this show for? And once you've really nailed down the strategy of your show, then you can think about concepts themes, the structure, the format, it really becomes your playbook or podcast bible, and anytime you know you're creating long form episodes or even short form and you look back and you look at your playbook making sure that you're in you know, creating content for who you originally intended to create it for. It's always better to be something for someone rather than everything to everyone and so that's why the strategy playbook is so important to us before we actually get into the magic of, of creating the actual show. And then of course, creating news around your show. Once it's ready to launch, making sure you're putting out a press release, pitching to all the right places about your show, launch a trailer audiograms. The standard playbook for promotion. Matt Cundill 10:21 I'll just share one right now, just because I think I'm so smart. And that's if you do and you should have a transcription for your show, anybody who's a writer, point them to the transcription that way they can go and help themselves to a quote, and then voila, you're published. Fatimi Zaidi 10:36 Yeah and if you are thinking of it from a marketing perspective, take it one step further and convert your transcripts into SEO formatted blogs, which are really great for both accessibility and also discoverability. Another really great tip for promotional sort of hacks is applying for Apple's placement forum for new and noteworthy, there's about a 25% chance you'll get picked up if you fill out the form properly, which isn't necessarily high. But if you do get picked up, it's really great promotion to be on the front end of the Apple Podcasts app and to get pushed within the various verticals that you operate in. Matt Cundill 11:09 So I always think that's a good idea, but a lot of people are so keen to launch they don't really consider what you need to do for Apple, which is, make sure you include Apple Podcasts in all of your promo material, show them what you're going to do. Make sure their logo is front and center on all your external marketing, things like that. They like that, you'll improve your chances. Fatimi Zaidi 11:31 And actually, usually you have better luck. It's second season, third season launches to get picked up because one caveat or criteria that they look at is how many Apple Podcast reviews do you have. So spend your first season running promotional giveaways and contests and leading people to the Apple Podcast app to leave your review because the more reviews you have, the more likely they are to pick up your show. Matt Cundill 11:55 So you're telling me ratings and reviews matter? Fatimi Zaidi 11:58 Of course they do. I mean, it's great feedback for you as well. I mean, that's one of the first call to actions that we have is please leave us a review whether it's good or bad. It's a touch point and engagement point with your listeners and that type of feedback is absolutely invaluable. Matt Cundill 12:14 Okay. I have a pile here of ratings and reviews don't matter. But I guess they don't actually trigger the algorithm in any particular way, but you're talking about the social value of it and it's a lot bigger than I think people lead on about. Fatimi Zaidi 12:27 Unless you're actually conducting surveys or brand insights studies. How else are you going to know how your listeners are responding to the content? Matt Cundill 12:35 Tell me how you looked at attribution when you first started making podcasts. And I mean, we only had two pieces, we had an IP address, we had a user agent, I guess it wasn't enough and then you went looking for more I gather? Fatimi Zaidi 12:47 Oh, my goodness, this was such a huge hurdle for us because back when we started really the only tool out there was Charitable, or Podsites, which you know, arguably both for very clunky at the time and probably still continue to be. Charitable's campaign attribution data was pretty limited and because Charitable wasn't a hosting provider, I think the accuracy of the data was also a little bit questionable. We could see, we know we utilized tracking links to see where our listeners were coming in from. But the data was pretty limited in terms of what we could see. I think the challenge is when you're working with clients like PWC, Microsoft, Expedia, you can't get away with just simply giving them number of downloads and listeners and calling it a day, that doesn't justify the creation of new production budgets. So we knew that we had to provide much more detailed like Google Analytics level data. And so that's why we built Cohost. It was really just internally for us to address our pain points so that we could show you things like age, gender, household income, occupation of your listeners, social media, habits, hobbies, lifestyles, what companies are listening to your podcast, and most importantly, where are the drop offs happening in terms of average consumption rate? And are your listeners loyal and engaged? Are they listening all the way through to the end of your season? Are they dropping off earlier? And where are they coming from? Which marketing channels are working, which marketing channels aren't working? This is the kind of data that we needed to take our shows to the next level. So we built our own hosting platform, really, it was just for us and for our clients. And then about a couple of years after building it, or I think it was about exactly 12 months after our competitors on the production side started reaching out to us. And we have a really great relationship with all of our competitive production agencies and they said, hey, we heard you have this product that can measure XYZ, any chance we could get on it and we thought why not? Better to collaborate with your competitors and do competitive gaps together and, and work together. And that's one thing I love about this industry. We're all super collaborative and it's healthy competition. We support each other we send business each each other's way and, and so now they're on our product and our customer and agencies are a prime bread and butter. Anyone who works with branded branded shows. Matt Cundill 15:04 And that's why I left radio for podcasting because everyone finds a way to help one another. A lot of people share their toys, and you built a toy and decided to find a way to connect it to other people. So two things at Podcast Movement, you mentioned third party analytics when we were talking about attribution and how to do the counting and then I had a question, but the person beside me asked the question I wanted, which is, what is that third party analytics and its co-hosting and so you basically went out and built your own? Fatimi Zaidi 15:36 Yes, we went out and we built our own. In September, we're actually launching a prefix, so if anyone doesn't want to migrate to us, so with the hosting, we had offered free migrations and we would carry your data over, but a lot of folks don't want to change their hosting providers and I get it. It's unfamiliar territory, the migrations can be a pain, no one wants to carry over their data, and you're comfortable with who you're comfortable with. And so we are in September, at the end of this month launching, it's already September, how where's the time gone? At the end of this month, we're launching a prefix. So anybody can use this, like a third party prefix, similar to the way that Charitable was used to be able to access all of this data. We do use certain third party providers like Clearbit to enrich some of our data to be able to provide you with like, you know, companies that are listening, what industries are they in the revenue size, how many employees, but you know, at the end of the day, it's something that we built from the ground up, because we really felt that there was a need for it. Matt Cundill 16:31 Absolutely. And you also said that people will come to you and say we want x, y, and z. What is the X, Y and Z that they are looking for? What sort of attribution do they really want? Fatimi Zaidi 16:44 I think if you're interested in A, either monetization of your podcast or B customers for your business, if you're a branded show, then the company B2B analytics to company level data is really important, because what we're seeing is our customers are exporting these company lists and either giving it to their sales teams, or personally doing outreach to all of these companies that are listening to their show, either asking them to be an advertiser, or sponsor of their podcast, or trying to build a relationship with them for their brand. And so it's creating it and lead sort of lead funnel for them and that's never been done in podcasting. It's the way Zoom Info or Lead Feeder converts your website traffic into sales leads, we're trying to do that for Podcasting. We're actually hoping that like the next feature for B2B analytics, were able to give you very direct contact information of your listeners so that you can do some more targeted outreach. And so ultimately, I would say that is really a feature if you're interested in the monetization play. And if you're more so concerned with brand awareness, and making sure that you're becoming a thought leader, and reaching the right audiences, then I would say it's the demographic data. So things like age, gender, household income, what is the title of these folks. What competitive shows are they listening to? Simply because I think that that gives you a sense of whether or not you're reaching the right audiences and if you're not, then you can use that data to take change up your content, or change up your marketing strategy. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 18:36 The Sound Off Podcast supports Podcasting 2.0, so feel free to send us a boost if you're listening on a newer podcast app. If you don't have a newer podcast app, you can get one at newpodcastapps.com. Matt Cundill 18:50 Do we make too much of a big deal about the lack of attribution in podcasting? Do we've over focus on the download? Fatimi Zaidi 18:56 Absolutely. Downloads are a metric, I don't think that they should be ignored. They're one data point of many and I think the challenge is there's so many other metrics that we're often overlooking. So one big one being the cost per minute of human attention. Podcasting is in a really unique position where you can use listening time as an engagement metric to calculate your ROI. And nobody really uses listening time as a metric. I mean, I don't think it's talked about it at all in our industry and so that is really surprising to me, because I realized the importance and value of metrics like engagement, listening time, loyal listeners, the average consumption rate, we're the only hosting provider that provides you with average consumption rate on your hosting platform. So we actually show you how much of your show are folks consuming. And as of Q1, we're going to be launching a new feature, which is your consumption rate per episode. So you can actually see where the drop offs are happening per episode and you can see what your listeners are telling you in terms of like the data. We focus so much on downloads and nobody really talks about the fact that if someone drops off in the first five minutes of your show, that's a download, but it's not a very successful download. And the average consumption metric is something that nobody pays attention to. So if your downloads are like a million, but your average consumption rate is 20%, are bots listening to your show? Or do people just really hate your content? Those are all, you know, the questions I think we need to be asking beyond just downloads and there are a lot of metrics that I think are arguably much more important. And I think as an industry, we have gotten better, we have gotten better in terms of focusing on the right metrics, but I think there's still a lot of whitespaces today. Matt Cundill 20:38 So for the radio portion of our audience, consumption is really the same as time spent listening. So when you're aggregating that data for consumption, are you grabbing the Apple and the Spotify or is it all of it? Fatimi Zaidi 20:53 We're currently just doing Apple. Unfortunately, Spotify doesn't allow you to access that. But the version two of this feature that we're launching is going to be across all of your platforms. That's the heavy lifting is we're aggregating it, we're hosting providers. So we do have access to the data and we're aggregating it across all your channels, because right now, Apple provides it on the back end of their dashboard, but Spotify does not. Matt Cundill 21:16 So little hack, if you've got your own podcast, and you submitted it to Apple Podcast yourself, you can go in and grab that number for consumption per episode and you're going to tell us what is the number that you would be satisfied with for consumption. What percentage of the show, you know, if you're a podcaster, I have 60% 7080 90% 100%, what to you would make you happy and smile? What's the number? Do you have a magic number? Fatimi Zaidi 21:41 I do. And actually, I've done a lot of research on this because I think that everyone sort of has their own opinion and I've read tons of articles that, you know, the industry has put out focus on specific content. Dan Meisner, and I've had a lot of chats about this and then I've also looked at the average consumption, we involve our clients, we produce what 30 shows a quarter and so we're typically looking at the average of all of our clients, the ones that are, you know, winning awards and doing really successful and then like the smaller shows as well, that maybe don't have enough, as much budget to put towards the show, I would say the consensus I've come to is anything above 60% is good. Anything above 75% is excellent. So if you're in the 70th percentile, you are doing really well. Of course, you know, if you're backed by a really big production agency, for Quill, our expectations are you should be in the 85% or higher average consumption rate. And that's because you know, we have a lot of ad spend to play with, we have a whole team dedicated to content and we're collecting premium analytics in terms of your show, doing, you know, daily brand inside studies on your show, and using that data to level up editorially. So in a situation like that, when it's like really sophisticated marketing, you should be at a higher rate. But if you're you know, creating a show is a lifestyle, and maybe not spending as much time on marketing, or the data analytics component than if you have anything in the 70th percentile, you should be over the moon. Matt Cundill 23:07 I just get over the 70%. Fatimi Zaidi 23:09 That's great. Matt Cundill 23:10 Yeah, well, I'm happy with it at 70, 75%. I did open up a couple other podcasts the other day and you know, they're they're seasoned veterans and with loyal audiences, and I cite some 80s and 90s. And when you come in with a very loyal fan base, and you've been broadcasting a while, I think broadcasters do have an edge because they're aware of the clock now. Fatimi Zaidi 23:30 Yeah and generally speaking, the more niche your audience, the higher your loyalty slash average consumption rate. That's generally the rule of thumb, because you've formed a natural community around your show. And when we look at our shows, the one with the niche audiences and niche content are generally the ones that very easily, you know, skyrocket in terms of completion and average consumption rate. It also makes sense to me why your show is doing so well from that perspective, because it's like a very specific topic and you're interviewing very specific folks and I imagine that your listeners are very engaged and loyal to this, like broadcasting community. Matt Cundill 24:07 I opened up the numbers on a true crime podcast that we have in our group and I'm like, you're getting 90s. And then somebody sort of said to me, yeah, listen, they want to hear the story to the end and find out what happened. So that's the benefit when you have a great story, people want to hear it to the end. Fatimi Zaidi 24:23 Of course. I think that's a really great point, Matt. When you have a true crime show, it's much easier to get your average consumption right to the end, then if it's like a branded podcast, or B2B show, very, very different pros and cons to both types of shows. But I would say if you're in the true crime category, these numbers and metrics don't apply to you. Matt Cundill 24:41 So you work with branded podcasts so you don't spend a lot of time dealing, I'm guessing with dynamic ad insertion, however, you're all about maybe the dynamic audio insertion. So how do you use dynamic audio insertion for your shows? Fatimi Zaidi 24:56 So we're all about the pre roll, post roll ad insertion. What we use them for is generally product placements for brands, if they want to promote a product or service at their company initiative, anything related to their brand, most of our clients, we work with primarily Fortune 500 to Fortune 1000 brands, so they're not interested in monetizing on their shows, they don't care about bringing in advertisers or sponsors, their prime concern is just, you know, putting out really great content becoming thought leaders, and then of course, promoting the initiatives that they have internally. So that's generally we do it co host have the pre roll post roll, ad insertions, you can also dynamically insert them, but it's generally used in a different way than how most podcasts use them and it's for product placements. Matt Cundill 25:45 Yeah, actually, one technique that I heard on a branded podcast is that they use dynamic audio insertion to promote their webinars to catch people to come and see what they're up to every year, or at least every quarter and find out what's new with the business. Fatimi Zaidi 26:01 Exactly things like webinars, other marketing initiatives that are happening, conferences that they're hosting. One of our travel companies, they always like to promote their product, their their travel deals that are happening, any any discounts or promotions, any sales of any deals that will be dropping, just you know, any new features that might be launching, those are the type of, you know, sort of variances that are utilized in terms of the ad insertions. But yeah, not so much about promoting other shows or ad roles. Matt Cundill 26:32 So if we were teenagers, and it were September, I'd be asking you this question, but it still applies today and that's, how was summer camp? Fatimi Zaidi 26:41 Summer camp was so much fun. It's probably one of the most exhausting events I go to every year, but also one of the funnest. Were you around for the 4am fire alarm pull and did you were you one of the people who left or did you sleep through it? Matt Cundill 26:55 No, we had an announcement in our room. I was in the tower that did not have the alarm go off, but received all the announcements. Fatimi Zaidi 27:02 So somebody pulled the fire alarm and we still don't know who it is. We're on a mission. Heather from Acast and I are on a mission to find out who it was. But we were essentially up all night because we were you know, in lessons or sessions all day, I was on stage for about nine hours speaking. So I almost lost my voice and we were out at the industry, dinners, parties, events. We finally get to bed, we're in the middle of our REM cycle and someone decides to pull the fire alarm at 4am. Now, most people, the smart ones, decide to sleep through it or stay in bed and not leave their rooms. I was one of the plebs that decided to actually evacuate the building with our entire floors. So all in all, I would say summer camp was a blast, super exhausting. I somehow managed to avoid COVID this time. But so great to see industry friends really helpful from a collaboration perspective and every time I come back, I'm reminded as to why I want to stay a part of this industry. Matt Cundill 28:02 So I'll put the email address. It's Heather Gordon, who's had Acast who is taking I guess, anonymous submissions for who may have pulled the fire alarm. Podcast Movement. Fatimi Zaidi 28:12 Yeah, Heather Gordon, and I, we have our suspicions. We were deliberating the next day at breakfast, but our suspicions were put to rest. And so we're still on the hunt for whoever it was to pull the alarm. Matt Cundill 28:24 You mentioned, I don't know if you want this in the show or not so we may clip this, but you've been the Podcast Movement in the past, you've done the booth thing. And this year, you went with the sponsored stage and you had an all star cast that came out for the event. How would you weigh both of those experiences? Fatimi Zaidi 28:40 So I'm actually totally happy for this to air because I think that it's important feedback for anyone who's debating putting their sponsorship dollars into Podcast Movement. The last five Podcast Movements we've done, we have sponsored stages. And we're also we just signed a contract for the DC event as well and we're also similarly doing something similar for Evolutions in LA. Now, I will say if you are a product company, so if you have a microphone or you know, if you're yellow tech or Rhodes microphone or have a physical product that you're looking to promote, then I would say the booth makes a lot of sense because it's a demonstratable product. I would say that in terms of the foot traffic of these boosts up and down depending on the year. I remember Nashville was super quiet. There wasn't a lot of foot traffic. I think the Dallas was definitely a lot better in terms of foot traffic, but it really is very inconsistent in terms of the type of traction you're gonna get at a booth. I will say if you are a production agency producer or in the service space, then you're probably better off going going with some sort of a sponsorship that allows you to provide value and collect value from like a knowledge Generation standpoint. And so for us that definitely in the sessions that we're creating in the conversations that were happening, because we get to choose to have the conversations that we think are important and relevant and so our entire stage or it's called the Ghost Talk was about the challenges the opportunities in podcast analytics and marketing and growth. And I think that because we were sponsoring it, we could manipulate the content that we wanted to share and that was really helpful for us. Matt Cundill 30:29 So you mean, the track that you sponsored had a lot in common with a branded podcast as opposed to a booth? Fatimi Zaidi 30:35 Exactly, exactly that's exactly it, we, we our entire stage was about like how to promote branded shows. And that's a category that's really growing now in the podcasting space, but for years isn't really been looked at as a serious contender. Because we were such a small space and I think people are starting to realize that it's growing, More and more companies and brands are interested in creating audio format shows and I think the analytics and data piece was really important for us to discuss this time around. Matt Cundill 31:06 What was your big takeaway from Podcast Movement? Fatimi Zaidi 31:08 My biggest takeaway was they really can step it up in terms of conference locations. It was a, it was a huge step up from Dallas, I would say, where the Locusts were all over the lobby and in people's bedrooms, so the Gala was absolutely beautiful in Denver. If you haven't been I highly recommend it and then in terms of the content, I would say, I thought it was really interesting to see the amount of folks who came out that were interested in the campaign attribution data this year, that was probably one of the biggest takeaways from our stages. In the previous stages. It was always the question was around, how do we you know, increase our downloads? Or how do we improve discoverability? Or how do we reach more listeners and this year, people are a lot more focused on the quality of listeners, which was very heartwarming to see. Matt Cundill 31:57 So a lot of people talking about video and video podcasting, YouTube with their announcements, Coleman Insights and Amplify Media up on stage telling us all about how listeners will grab onto a podcast or YouTube. So from where you sit, how do you look at video? And how would you incorporate that into branded podcasts? Fatimi Zaidi 32:19 I think it really depends on the KPI as to why you are looking to produce a video show. I think that the reason 94% of people who listen to podcast and listening to the entire episode, whereas 30 minute video only has a 12% completion rate. We get asked all the time, why is there such a disparity in stats? Well, it's because you can be driving to work and listen to a podcast but you can't be watching the Netflix show you can be walking your dog and listening to a podcast, we can't be reading an article at the same time. It's one of the few mediums or being actively engaged in another activity. And being able to do another activity, especially the mundane monotonous tasks and chores increases the engagement. Now when you add a screen that takes away from that flexibility, and so generally speaking, I would say we have seen a direct correlation with video being added. And the average consumption rate decreasing completion rates decreasing. If we look at least for our shows, if we put them on YouTube as a YouTube series, which we often do as well, because we record on Riverside, and we capture both audio and video. And then we'll sometimes put the video on on YouTube as a as a video series and we find that the engagement rates and the completion rates and numbers are much higher on the audio only listing platforms like Spotify and Apple versus video which they'll get some views. Typically a younger demographic audience is what we're finding but but not nearly the same completion rates that we're getting on audio format shows that tells me that folks are interested in just the audio formats. That's why they're seeking out podcasts. Matt Cundill 33:57 Thank you, you've confirmed exactly what I thought and that's people use YouTube for search, search and more search to discover once they've discovered it, they'll move on if they really like what they see on YouTube. They're going to move over to Spotify app or whatever their favorite app is to go and listen to the show. Fatimi Zaidi 34:15 Totally. I mean, look, that's not to say that I don't love utilizing video content for bite sized social content. If you're capturing video like you are right now, Matt on Squadcast, take some of this video content and convert it into bite sized content with tick tock or LinkedIn. When it's done in like sort of micro portions. Video generally has higher engagement than audio, but there's a time and a place for it. You know 32nd promotional clip on Tik Tok or LinkedIn, great. A 30 minute long form conversation, probably best in the form of audio. Matt Cundill 34:49 Okay, so this is where I have to make a confession. I'm actually not using this for any video. I'm still an audio holdout. Fatimi Zaidi 34:55 No, it's great because sometimes you just use the video to be able to see someone and have a voter come conversation and that's great too. Matt Cundill 35:02 Yeah, actually convert this into a audiogram which will appear with a bouncy little line on YouTube. Fatimi Zaidi 35:08 Amazing. Are you using Headliner? Matt Cundill 35:10 Yes. Fatimi Zaidi 35:11 I love headliner. I love that team. I love the team. I love their founders, their exact team is awesome. The audiogram, trailergram promotions that they do work really well so if you're ever looking to invest in ad dollars, like check out headliners promotional feature I would say that they're they're really great company doing really great work. I love the way they automated audio grabs for everyone. Matt Cundill 35:35 And I want to thank Headliner and Kristen for the purple shirt that I received at Podcast Movement. Thank you. You mentioned you use Riverside. My ears really, really perked up in Toronto when you were at Radio Days and you said never use Zoom to record a podcast. Tell people why they should never use Zoom to record their podcast. Fatimi Zaidi 35:56 So we actually use both Riverside and Squadcast. We have two enterprise accounts and we and we interchange between both. Both have their pros and cons and we love the team at Squadcast. So highly recommend using Squadcast if you're looking for an audio platform, and they've come a really long way in terms of functionality as well, they've done a really great job. And will they are going to continue to do better after the acquisition of Descript. Riverside has also really great alternative very clean audio, they record separate tracks. So even if you talk over somebody, it's not captured in the editing process. If you're listening to this, if you could just take one tip from this conversation is please don't use Zoom to record your episode. It is not an audio optimized platform. It is a conference line. So when you export the audio from zoom, it actually distorts the sound and content and it actually really significantly lowers the audio quality. When I listen to a podcast on Spotify, I know I can tell right away when it's recorded on Zoom and that will be the end. I will be that person dropping off in the first five minutes of your show. Doesn't matter how many you know high tech microphones and headphones and equipment and pop filters you have setup. I would say the most important thing you can do for your show is use a software that is optimized for audio quality like Squadcast, Riverside, Cleanfeed, there's a bunch of them. Matt Cundill 37:22 Fatima thank you so much for taking the time to be on the Sound Off Podcast and share some of those branded podcast secrets. Fatimi Zaidi 37:29 Of course, happy to be here. Thank you so much for having Matt. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 37:32 The Sound Off Podcast is written and hosted by Matt Cundill produced by Evan Surminski, edited by Chloe Emond-Lane, social media by Aidan Glassey. Another great creation from the Sound Off Media Company. There's always more at soundoffpodcast.com.

For natives of Kelowna, B.C., Stephen Keppler requires no introduction. But on the off chance you're not from around there, Stephen is the morning drive host at Move 101.5 in Kelowna, one of the largest radio shows in B.C. Morning show hosts nowadays have a bit of a reputation for making easy content- lots of audience text and phone lines, asking questions like "What's your worst concert experience? Call in and let us know," so on and so forth. This summer, though, things haven't been quite so easy for Stephen. If you've been watching the news, you'll have heard of the disastrous forest fires wrecking the West Coast for the last few months. It just so happens that keeping people informed about, and safe from, those fires has become a huge part of Stephen's job. Stephen talks to us about his humble origins as a radio-loving kid in Edmonton, his roles on morning shows at a huge number of large radio stations in Western Canada, and of course, what it was like helping people avoid those raging fires. For more of Stephen, listen in to Move 101.5 in the morning if you're in the Kelowna area. If not, you can listen online here! You can also connect with Stephen on LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook and Twitter. If you do, you should also follow the Instagram page for his segment called Some Good News, which (as the name implies) focuses on bringing you news stories that might actually make your day a little better. What radio does best is communicate in a time of emergency. While the main radio station Instagram and Facebook accounts were being suppressed by Meta due to poor Bill C-18 Canadian legislation, Stephen took to his own account to communicate information. Radio station social media accounts are not the "be all and end all". In fact - many are currently the "end all" as they don't work. Let your personalities post equally on their social media accounts and the stations' accounts. One hand washes the other. Transcript: Tara Sands (Voiceover) 00:02 The Sound Off Podcast. The show about podcast and broadcast starts now. Matt Cundill 00:13 Steven Keppler is the morning show host at Move 101.5 in Kelowna. If you're a regular listener of this show, you'll know that I think Kelowna is one of the best markets in Canada to spend some time doing radio. There were some serious forest fires over there this summer, and radio played a significant role in keeping people informed and safe. And they did it in the face of Facebook's depressing news. I'll just cut right to the lesson. Live radio is better than Facebook. Stephen is going to tell us about his career, and even his early years in Edmonton, where he grew up listening to radio in one of the most competitive markets in Canada. Now, Stephen Keppler joins me from his vacation home in Whistler, British Columbia, where I'm examining and scrutinizing his microphone's setup. What would you do with an iRig on remote? How does that work? Stephen Keppler 01:01 So we can actually take this on remote easily if you have the software, just the app and I for- the record it live app. And all you would do- I mean in Edmonton, where other stations you just upload via FTP, but actually with a record it live, you can upload, or you can connect directly into the board. And then an off will record you. Matt Cundill 01:24 Where'd you go to high school? Was it in Edmonton? Stephen Keppler 01:26 Yeah, Jasper Place High School. Not far from where you worked at The Bear. So I went there to high school from 2000 to 2003. I think you were at The Bear, I want to say late 90s. Early 2000s. Right? Matt Cundill 01:38 Yeah. Stephen Keppler 01:39 Yeah. So we drove by that station all the time. All the time in my '91- What was it called? Shoot. Plymouth Sundance? No, Sunbird? No, that was my brother's car. Yeah, just our- our piece of crap cars. Matt Cundill 01:56 Yeah. And I'm reminded, I know exactly where that high school is. I don't know why. I know. It's off 163 Street. Stephen Keppler 02:02 Yep! Right next to Saint FX. So there was two high schools on that giant city block there. And our lives were at the mall. So we'd, we- I lived in Lewis Estates at the time. And we had moved there from British Columbia. And so it was my first- Edmonton was my first taste of taking the city bus and a big city for me at the time. And boy did I cut my teeth there as a- as a young, young football player. And it was a good high school to go to. What's really strange though, is my niece just started grade 10 there last week, and so it's just bringing back all the memories. Matt Cundill 02:40 I remember Lewis Estates for its very cool golf course. I also- and my buddy Gordon Giles, who I played soccer with, had a place down there. I doubt he still lives there. Maybe he still does. But that was my only ventures into Lewis Estates. Actually, there were a few soccer players that I played with who had houses in there. It was- it was all new back then. It's not new anymore. Stephen Keppler 03:01 Yeah, it was brand new then, now there's the River Cree. And there's about five other surrounding neighborhoods, but the Hamptons, like my wife and I, we moved back to Edmonton when I got a job there working for Corus. And we bought in a neighborhood that was Winterburn. I think it was right next to Winterburn school. But it was a- it was a farmland when I was in high school, and then moving back, it's just like this urban sprawl. Matt Cundill 03:25 And you really were a mall kid, because you had an early gig working the Boston Pizza at the mall. Stephen Keppler 03:31 How'd you know that? Matt Cundill 03:33 I do my research, my friend. That is funny. Was Hooters still in the mall? Is Hooters still in the mall? Stephen Keppler 03:35 Actually, my brother started working there when he was 16. He was a busser. And I was in between gigs as an actor. And I got a job working there because we knew the management. Like I know the owner, Troy Houseworth, one of the nicest guys you'll ever hang out with, and he owns a couple of BPs now. That was such a fun, fun gig because you met so many different people and interesting people from across the world, like people from the Netherlands trying to order a barbecue chicken pizza, when they kept saying pork or like- and you just have to learn how to be a communicator and it was- it was a cool job. Yeah. Hooters is gone, but it was when I was there. But now it's called First Round, it's like a bar. Or it's like a sports pub. So they have a lot more TVs now and it's less scandalous I guess. I don't know, Hooters- We went there in high school. We we'd order like the cheapest stuff on the menu and be just gross. Matt Cundill 04:41 You're not- You're not the first Edmonton actor to appear on this show. Because Christian Zyp, who's a long time CJSR guy, and you're nodding your head. Do you know of this individual? Stephen Keppler 04:52 I know of Christian Zyp. I don't- I don't think we've ever met. Which is crazy because we've been in that commu- We were both in that like the theatre community, and a little bit of the film community as well. So it's like crazy how- it's crazy how many actors will be- will get into broadcasting, because I think it just comes natural- like being natural comes natural to us. Matt Cundill 05:14 CJSR is his radio gig. He's had it for 25 years. But his claim to fame with me is is how we met. And I'll just tell people to roll back in the episodes and go listen to that 90 minute episode of the story- of his story, which is a rather incredible Edmonton story of how he got meningitis, and he lost his limbs, etc, etc. So, and I mentioned that because we also played soccer together as well. Wow. Yeah, that's- again, he's never worked for radio station. We count CJSR though, right? Because it's a- it's a good- Stephen Keppler 05:45 I count CJSR because there's so many people who talk about like, it's got like this cult following in Edmonton. And if you're- if you live in Edmonton, and you don't know what CJSR is, then I guess you haven't lived in Edmonton long enough. There's- you know what, Derek Scott, he's guy I met in Kelowna, and he's back in Edmonton. And he wants to get this old radio show he had with his buddy, Pharaoh. And it was called Evil Petting Zoo. And they played all sorts of like, just like rap, like, indie rap and really unique stuff. And that's why I like CJSR, because they- they play whatever they want. Like you could almost say they had- they were one of the last station staff disc jockeys, right? Like where they play whatever they wanted, and what they were feeling at the time. Matt Cundill 06:33 My first weekend in Edmonton in 1994, I took a look to see what was going on. It was the Fringe Festival. And that's a big deal for anybody who's an actor in Edmonton. It's- it's the Superbowl of Fringe Festivals for- Oh, yeah. It's big. It's good. Stephen Keppler 06:51 It's the second largest Fringe Festival in the world, next to the Edinburgh Fringe. And it's a- it's a riot. Like, if you're not performing in the Fringe, what you do is you go down to the beer tent, you hang out and you meet some artists, you hang out with some friends. And then you just go to shows. And doesn't really matter what show you see, because everything is unique and different. Like I performed in the Fringe and a children's show. And I remember a mob of friends coming to see it just because they were- you know, they were bored in the afternoon. And they came and it was like you're performing- like, you felt like a rock star. And then other times you go to the Fringe at like 10 o'clock at night and you think everything's winding up? Well no, there's a 12:30 showing of Bat Boy the Musical at La Citee Francophone and you're like, Yeah, let's go. Let's check it out. And you're blown away at this unique musical that you've never even heard of before, only knew through tabloids, right. Matt Cundill 07:42 Do you have a story from the Black Dog Free house you want to share? Stephen Keppler 07:47 I don't think so. I don't even- I don't think I have been to the Black Dogs since I saw Mostly Water Theater perform there. Unless you dug up some random story about me being there? Matt Cundill 08:01 No, I just wanted to know if it still was what it was and is what it is, because that was my- that's where I hung out. Stephen Keppler 08:07 I think the Black Dog is- I don't know, like I went to the Black Dog when I was fresh 18 to go listen to live music. That's all I really remember from it. And you'd go to- I think it was Squires? I think Squires was around then. And a couple of those other pubs who, I think they're all like gone. Which is, you know, that's- that's the nature of white half. Matt Cundill 08:31 So your acting. Fringe. Jasper High School. And then your first experience with radio, I want to say, is Astral up on Stony Plain road. Stephen Keppler 08:42 No. So I toured through Western Canada as an actor. So I did Jubilations Dinner Theater in West End mall there. And we went to Winnipeg, and we did shows at Celebrations Dinner Theater, and we'd go to Calgary and do shows there. And then I was doing film and television for a while. Actually, I have a pretty cool story about how I kind of started to get interested in radio. I was doing a indie project. And it was a Star Wars fan film. I don't want to get into who was the director because I think that's a long, long story. But I met Fearless Fred, he and I did a scene together. And we just kind of shot the shit. And what I loved about Fred was just how natural he was. And I was like, Dude, you're really killing this. He's like, cool, I've never acted before, yada yada, you know? And we had like two or three lines. It was very basic, but it was a Star Wars fan film. And if you know Fred, you'd be like that, that is on point. And he was working for The Bear at the time. And I was a starving actor. Like I was what some would say successful because I did be- I was in two Oscar-nominated films. But that doesn't mean you're an amazing actor. And it just means you you saw a little bit of success. So I remember seeing Fred leave with like a decent car, and I said, Dude, what do you do for a living? He's like, I'm in radio. And then we started chatting. And then I started listening to his show. I'd call in the odd time, but then you know, life happened. And my girlfriend at the time, my now wife, we moved to Vancouver. And that's when I started doing real film auditions, like for bigger movies. And I was like, trying to make it. Like this was 100 pounds ago, I was basically like, hauled into these cattle calls to be like, the next Edward from Twilight, and I looked around the room and I went, I'm not as good as these guys, but I'm really good at being myself. And then that's when I, just overnight, enrolled to be in Columbia Academy in Vancouver. And so AJ Junip and Dave Smith kind of guided me along the path of what it's like to be a radio announcer across Canada. And then out of nowhere I started working for- so my first radio experience per se was actually for Astral- so you were right there- in Richmond, which was Virgin Radio at the time, Shore 104. And I already forget what the AM station was. But that station was ran by Ronnie Stanton. And Taylor Jukes. Like they're so successful now. And then I just kind of would do whatever it needed- whatever anyone needed. I was the promo team, street team. But I did more than that. I went in, I said, I would go in on days where I wasn't doing anything and said, Do you guys need anything done? And I would just go out and do it. And yeah, it was pretty cool to learn from like Nat and Drew and Scooter, Aaron Davis, Crosby McWilliam, like so many really cool people working in that- in that building. Matt Cundill 11:42 Tell me the difference between acting and being on the radio, I've always said that if you could be on the radio, you need to be yourself. But if you're acting, you have to play the role of something completely different. Is that fair? Did I get that right? Stephen Keppler 11:55 It just depends on what kind of an actor you are. Like, every role I play is an extension of myself. So while you're right, I think it's- it's not as cut and dry as that, like, I tackled a role last year. So I still act. I don't do it professionally, per se, but I still get paid for it. But last year, we did SpongeBob the Musical. And I had to tap into my inner Patrick Star. And so just trying to like find my way around that role. I was like, Okay, well, what part of me is that kind of person in a vegetative- not not a vegetative state, but like, somebody who is just kind of mindless. And so I kind of tapped into a piece of myself where I'm able to shut my brain off. And it's kind of funny I say, that because you're always paying attention on stage. But there's certain roles you play where you need- your eyes need to say that you're- there glazed over. And so I was definitely Patrick Star. You know, my closest friends wil be like, Oh, Kep, you were so Keppler at this moment in your life, and they point out those things, which is really cool. So, while you're right, I mean, I don't think there's a wrong answer to that- that statement either. Like there's nothing wrong about it. So, yeah, yeah I guess. Matt Cundill 13:08 You've also done a number of roles in radio, you mentioned marketing, but you've also sold. Stephen Keppler 13:13 Yes, that was my first job. Matt Cundill 13:16 Tell me about the sales experience. Stephen Keppler 13:21 So when I was in Vancouver, I was faced with an opportunity. So it was to stay with Astral, which would- which had been purchased by Bell. And Ronnie had offered me overnights at Virgin Radio Vancouver, and so did Taylor. They kind of pulled me into their office, and it was pretty exciting. And I was actually going to fill in as a producer for Scooter when he was away. So I was definitely making my way up the ranks. But I believe you need to go cut your teeth, I believe you need to go somewhere and fail. I believe you need to learn as many jobs as you possibly can in this industry, to make yourself a Swiss Army knife. So a job that popped up for Astral/Bell in Golden, B.C. And it was sales and on air mornings. And I went okay, that's a morning show. We need that. Can I do sales? And I thought, well, I'm passionate about the product. I need to learn. What better way for me to go to a market size of 3000 people and just go in and kind of fail every day, and learn every day, and become something greater? Because I think- and it was great, like, Golden was the hardest job I ever worked in radio. You know, you wake up, you do your morning show, and then after, you're out there hoofing it, going to mom and pop shops. This isn't like going to a business where they have all the money to spend on their advertising. No, you're going to mom and pop shops, and you're selling ads for two bucks a spot, so that they'll buy enough that they'll spend $95 a week for a month. Right? So look at that. $400 a month is actually a lot for a guy who owns his own shoe- shoe store. Or Doug Barrault who owns Barrault Furnishings, or the Sears outlet store. I mean, we had a Sears- Like there's just- there's something about it. But also, working there taught me- because I was out there in the community so much, it kind of just ingrained in me that you- to sell ads, you need to be out there and you need to be with people. You can't just be sitting in your studio, wasting your time there. You need to be out there connecting with people. And so I was never the greatest radio host out of Golden, ever. Chris Cameron, in my opinion is and was. He was the guy who was there before me. And he was awesome. But I think you're- I'm never going to be the best radio host, but what I'm going to be is your best friend, I'm gonna hang out with you, and we're going to- you're going to remember me, and I think that's that's like a big key- key takeaway that I had from Golden and we had some major successes there. One day, they got nominated for one of those Kraft $100,000 contests from TSN where if they got enough votes, they would get a new rink or $100,000- Matt Cundill 16:07 Oh, the Hockeyville. Stephen Keppler 16:08 Yes, thank you. Hockeyville was a different one. This was a- but they're all relatively the same. So I rallied the town for two weeks straight. I was out there handing out flyers saying hey, vote, vote, vote. I sold a remote to the grocery store. And it was my first remote ever, and I was there in front of the pop. All this, like, all the pop it in front of me, and I was just saying vote, vote, vote. They ended up winning, and it was really cool to see this town, like, come together. This tiny little town of 3000 people beat Revelstoke, and beat Salmon Arm, and beat Vernon a little bit. It was just really cool to see. So, and again, that was like my first taste of, okay, radio is powerful. You just need to be out there working with people. You can't just sit back and hope they come to you, right? Matt Cundill 16:56 And then after Golden, did you go to New Cap? Stephen Keppler 16:58 Yes, I went to Brooks, Alberta to be a music director and morning host and, and that was a fun station because I got to program the music the way I saw fit. Jeff Murray, man, that guy. He was so awesome to me. And same with John Petris, the station manager. But Jeff Murray, just he- he let me just go. He was like, yeah, just do what you think is right. Go- Go fail, go- Go have fun. And he really made radio fun for me. Matt Cundill 17:24 And how long after it was- was it before like, you know, the Broosk station began to get amalgamated into, you know, other New Cap properties? And was that during your stint? Stephen Keppler 17:34 No, I was only in Brooks for nine months. And then Abby White pulled me up to work at KG Country to take over for- Greg Shannon had already left and Tara Lee was still there. And Tara Lee just decided she was kind of- she needed a break from radio. And so they kind of they gave me the chair, basically. And I wasn't there too long. It was a pretty short stint, because Corus came calling after about three months in Red Deer. Edmonton was always on my list of radio- radio markets to work in. And not because it was home, but because Edmonton is the most competitive radio market in North America, I believe. And I could be totally wrong. And you could argue with me, but in my eyes at the time, I was like, I need to go somewhere and start competing and start learning- learning that side of the business. So I wasn't in Red Deer for very long before Corus came calling. Ronnie and Greg Johnson came calling and they said hey, we got an afternoon drive position open at 92.5 Fresh Radio. Why don't you come up and work for us? And I was like, Power 92, let's go. Matt Cundill 18:45 Isn't it amazing? Like so many people would still call it Power 92 after all these years, and they probably even called up and gave the phrase that pays as well. Stephen Keppler 18:52 Oh, absolutely. Like Power 92 plays today's best music, now show me my money. Like that was on people's answering machines. It was everywhere when I was in, you know, Junior High, High School in Edmonton. So to work at that station was like, Okay, this is awesome. And- and the cluster there. It was really cool, because he had KISN Country. And 630 CHED there as well. So it was- what a neat building to work at. Matt Cundill 19:16 Yeah, I'm trying to remember exa- the exact address of the building. I think it's something like 63 Avenue and 90- anyway- Stephen Keppler 19:24 Roper road. Matt Cundill 19:25 Thank you, Roper road. Stephen Keppler 19:26 Yeah, just this old- it's this giant warehouse of a of a radio station. It's awesome. Matt Cundill 19:31 Yeah. And lots of talent having passed through that building over- over so many years. And you're at a heritage frequency at 92.5. And trucking along nicely. Did you get to do music there as well? Stephen Keppler 19:43 I was an assistant music director, because I kind of said I'd like to continue to learn Musicmaster, but when I got there, we were using RDS selector so I had to learn how to use that, and I don't even- I don't think any other station uses RDS selector now, but I know how to use it which is great. I don't know if that's going to be helpful in 20 years, but learning as many programs as you can always helps. So, yeah, Paul O'Neill was the music director when I was there. And Paul O'Neill is a radio encyclopedia, like that guy knows about every station, about every frequency, who worked there, when they worked there, when they flipped formats. Like, he's a knowledgeable radio guy, just- and he, he really showed me that there's so many more passionate people about the business. And I love that. Paul was just so fun to work with. Matt Cundill 20:30 And what's it like working back in your hometown? Stephen Keppler 20:32 It was cool. Because you had old friends from high school who text the radio station and say, Is this Keppler? I say yes. And they say, like, Keppler, Keppler? The guy who ran down to the high school hallways in his full football gear and like, tried to fake tackle people? And like, yeah, that's me, that's me and- And it's just one of those things where your brothers are proud of you. Your family's proud of you, and you feel- you feel something about being in your hometown, you know the town. So when you get on the air, the first time you crack the mic, you already know what's going on in town, you already know what's going on in people's minds as they're driving home from work. So it's like you have this head start almost, because when you start in a new town, you got to learn like little things like who the mayor is, or, or what's the most frustrating traffic- traffic spot. And in Edmonton, I had already known that the rat hole was gone. But I already knew about the rat hole. And I think that's- that's a piece- that's a small piece of how you understand your market is like what's frustrating for them every single day. And now it's the white mud, in the hand day in the yellow head. And, you know, it's it's a different market now than it was four y- I left four years ago. But when I got there, I knew that Oilers are always a huge top- a top of mind conversation, and it was cool. So you could you could reference things that had happened 20 years earlier on the first day you're cracking the mic. And I think that's so powerful. Matt Cundill 22:03 Within the first four days of me working in Edmonton, somebody called in to say that there was a problem at the rat hole and I said, What's the rat hole? He goes, you're not from here? No. And then he told me to fuck off and go home. Bear listeners, man. Stephen Keppler 22:16 That was the Bear. Bear listeners, man, like they're- they're rough. Let me tell you, they- but I'd love to- That's a station I'd love to work on just so I could see all the- I think I would get attacked pretty easily on the Bear. I think the- I'm an- I'm an easy target for bullies. So like, I think I'd use that to my advantage. Matt Cundill 22:34 Did the rat hole connect Fort road? Is that what it was? Stephen Keppler 22:37 Yeah, it was just- it was a way to connect downtown. So it's been so long because the construction down there. I think you're right. I think it was Fort road. But it has been so long, since the rathole even existed, that I can't even- I couldn't tell you to be honest with you. I'd have to like Google it. Matt Cundill 22:57 I'll do it after the show. Just for my own edification, just to go down memory lane here. Stephen Keppler 23:03 Now, when you were in Edmonton, did they start building the hand day? Matt Cundill 23:07 Yes. Stephen Keppler 23:08 Because I remember when the hand day was one quarter mile stretch between the white mud and Lazard road and we would take our '91 Sunfires and our- like high- in high school. We'd take our our beat up cars and we'd race them down that one stretch because nobody was on it. Matt Cundill 23:25 Yes, that's all it was. And it was a fast strip of land where the police would hang out at some point they figured it out. Stephen Keppler 23:34 Yes. Absolutely. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 23:54 The Sound Off Podcast supports podcasting 2.0, so feel free to send us a boost if you're listening on a newer podcast app. If you don't have a newer podcast app, you can get one at newpodcastapps.com. Matt Cundill 24:08 Did you do what everybody else in Edmonton does? And that's when they get an opportunity, you leave Edmonton to go to Kelowna. Stephen Keppler 24:18 Yeah, well, it's kind of funny. I- we had spent five years, almost five years in Edmonton, and they had flipped formats. And it was a tough time for me because I think I was successful at the new format because they wanted us to be content creators. And they wanted us to be not just jocks, and I think that was actually really good for me because I'm a bit of a Swiss army knife, like I can do just about anything. I'm a performer, but I was getting up too early every morning to not do a morning show, and I thought- it was just- I don't know if it was for me, and I thought, maybe I do need a change. Maybe this would be good for me, and Kelowna had a position available, and I thought, I think it's time for me to do- to go somewhere else. I really liked Edmonton. I liked what we were doing there at 92.5 The Chuck. But I wouldn't say that it wasn't for me, because I was- I was successful there, but I wanted to go somewhere different. And I think Kelowna was just an awesome change of pace for me. I mean, I work harder here than I probably ever did anywhere else. But just the chance to move to a beautiful place and be there for a few years was a great opportunity. And my wife is from Kelowna. So it was all just, yeah, it was it was kind of an easy choice to go there. Even though I was, I was, uh, I was on the up with Corus. But, you know, I didn't burn any bridges. I was happy there. But I thought let's do something for my wife now. And we went to Kelowna. And and it's been, it's been awesome. Matt Cundill 25:47 What was the job in Kelowna that you took? Stephen Keppler 25:49 They had a position available at 101.5 Easy Rock, and I was already familiar with the format because I had done the format in Golden, and I'd already worked for the cluster. So I had an in there with Janine Carr, and Ken Kilcolin, he's the one who interviewed me, and obviously Boyd Leeder was going to be the PD at the time, also known as Rhubarb Jones. Matt Cundill 26:12 Or Rutabaga, if Graham Hicks mispronounces it, or miswrites in the Edmonton Sun like he did one day, which led to endless jokes. Yeah. Stephen Keppler 26:20 I heard that story. I heard that story, man. I can't wait. I hope Boyd listens to this. Matt Cundill 26:26 Oh, he listens. Stephen Keppler 26:28 Oh, yeah, he does. Matt Cundill 26:29 Oh, yeah. I mean, the one day he makes the paper and they call him Rutabaga. Stephen Keppler 26:34 I've been called worse. I've been called Stefan Keppler. So I can't really make it- like rutabaga is still pretty good, though. That's, that's it anyways, so I got an afternoon job in Kelowna, working with, you know, Rhubarb was my PD. And he kind of just like, he's like, he threw the reins off me. He's like, go, go, do whatever. And I loved that. Because I felt like I could just, again, go back out there and fail, fail fail. So I kind of hit a reset button on my career that way. Not saying I didn't learn anything. And, and I learned so much in Edmonton, like I learned about ppm markets about about having a niche and having, I have so many tools in my bag, going to Kelowna that. I took all of those tools. And I again, kind of just threw them to the ground and just started playing with this empty canvas. And so Boyd was amazing for me there in that way. And then obviously, nine months into my tenure there COVID hit. And so it was a tough time, they're going into a studio when the roads are completely empty. But again, you know, you got to look at every experience is as a learning experience. And I learned that, you know, what I picked up and gold and about being part of the community, I need to do that here. I just need to do it differently. And that's when more came about was my career. But to start, I thought, you know, Kelowna was a great change of scenery, great, change your pace, and I learned again learned and that's I think, if you learn every day, you're going to be so successful in this business. If there's any young broadcaster who says, What does it take to be successful, I say learn every day, go in and be willing to fail. Keith Johnstone, he said, he's recently passed. But he's, he's one of the greatest improvisers and the godfather of improvisation. He would tell his students every day say out loud, we suck, and we love to fail. Let me ask you about rebranding, because I know you had to sit through one when you went from Fresh to Chuck. And I want the perspective of somebody who's a little bit younger in radio to let me know what a rebrand is. So these decisions get made by older people who are likely 50 plus, who have a lot of radio experience, and they believe that you can come out and one book a whole thing or rebuild it. And in you know, within a year we can hit this particular level. But I can't remember a rebrand in the last, you know, five years that has had that sort of success or projected success. So what is it about rebranding a radio station? That doesn't work anymore? I don't know. I think rebranding is an interesting choice. Because I feel like people are scanning the dial so much, that they forget what brand they're even listening to. I think rebranding is great in the sense that you can refresh, you can put a fresh coat of paint on whatever it is you're doing. And you can take a dye tired brand, and you can give it a fresh coat of paint, right? But if you're not going to change the music, and if you're going after the same demographic, what are you doing? You're kind of wasting your time. I think you're just wasting money. So I've been a part of a few rebrands now and the main takeaway I have is that it's it galvanizes your station. Everyone gets excited about a rebrand listeners get excited. You can do so many cool things when you rebrand. Let's look at Sonic in Vancouver. That was probably one of the coolest stunts I've ever seen. And and 92, five, when we rebranded with the chuck, we did heritage days, and we were down there, exposing the brand to new people. And you can be successful if you have a great launch. You need to be solid though, right after that launch, you can't just hit the gas and do the quarter mile, you need to hit the gas and do the LeMans. You need to be going, going, going, going going. And then you need to keep doing that. I think I think radio is all about keeping your foot on the pedal. I don't know if I answered your question there, though. Matt Cundill 30:35 You did quite well, actually very well. Stephen Keppler 30:39 I think rebranding is the toughest thing. I've been a part of a couple. I'm so fortunate that when rebrands happen, I've been always a part of the conversation. Because I've been on so many formats, I understand different demographics. I guess you could call me a yes, man. But I believe that you can make content for everyone, you just need to understand who it is you're talking to, and build your material out for your global audience. And that means for everyone, so your company might say that you're doing your show for 2550 For females, while I look at it, like okay, we're gonna put it through the lens of a mother of two. But also I have a man. So we're gonna find ways to inject all of these things. And that's kind of the cool part about radio is that you know, you want to be able to talk to anyone in the car. You should be right next to anyone. Matt Cundill 31:31 And you touched on COVID. What do you think radio's legacy is coming out of COVID. As you look back at like the two really bizarre years, and it doesn't, you don't want to speak for the whole radio industry. I just want to know your experience and how COVID Landed for you. You're in Kelowna, to medium sized market. It's a high touch market. What do you think radios legacy is, going through that? From your experience. Stephen Keppler 31:56 as such a tough one because COVID was really, really hard. Every radio host I talked to, they struggled. I mean, we all struggled as a community. Everyone had their own separate struggles as well. I think there were some radio hosts who went I can do my show from home. This is great. But it's it's lonely. You know, and you don't realize how lonely it can get to combat the loneliness. I spent a lot of time on social media. And I took my social media presence, and I put it on the air. And I created a community of have good news. Good news in the Okanagan, just sharing all the good stuff. And I actually got the idea from Fred Kennedy. Fearless, Fred, because Fred had done shut down shout outs. And I was like, That is a great idea. Let's go positive. Let's do that. That was great for the first year. But as we got into the political turmoil, and the convoy ship show, yes, like, it just got so tough. And now you're like you're jumping on the air, people are driving around, people are listening to you. And you have to be very careful with your words. You have to be very careful about what you're saying. Not just to offend people, but not to incite panic, not to incite, you know, outrage, but you're there to be their friend. It was tough, because there were so many people calling us on the air and getting mad at us. You know, calling us cowards, for not talking about the convoy, calling us cowards, for not telling people to get a vaccine didn't matter what stance you took, you weren't going to win. And that was the difficult part about radio there. Like what had happened was I we had flipped formats in January of 2021. And they moved me to the morning show. And I had taken over for a heritage morning show. And let me tell you, I was not a light guy. I liked person for the first three months, in my favorite comment about the morning show was juvenile trash. And what I liked about it, though, is I went, I'm on the right path. I'm trying to get the 30 I'm trying to go after people my age to talk about what things that things that mean, more to us. But I wasn't well liked. So there was a lonely three to six months, especially bringing in all of that other stuff. You know, I remember saying on the air, I got vaccinated, I'm pretty happy about it. Oh, I shouldn't have done that. Matt Cundill 34:26 And I think maybe you got that blowback during that period, because radio is so powerful. And there are people who want to be acknowledged for what they're going through, you know, two years of going through the convoy- listen. Two years of going through COVID, I'm no fan of any of that stuff. But I get it. I get it. I think when somebody calls you up like that, they're just asking to be heard. That's all. Stephen Keppler 34:52 Yeah, I've done- Sid Smith from Corus in Edmonton did a great job of like helping me. And I only had maybe a dozen or two good conversations with Sid. So it's not like he was my dad. But like he was really good at, you know, listening to people. You know, when I saw angry hosts come into his office and I don't think Sid would say a word. He'd let them say their piece. And then they would go about what to do next. And that I kind of took that approach with listeners calling up the radio show. So if you were upset, and they told me what they hated about me about whatever's going on, I said, first off, thanks for calling. You know, thank them for taking the time to tell you how they feel, whether you agree or not, they have passion and they want to call you. That's great. Let's, let's use that. And then you know, if you disagree, gently, gently talk about why you disagree. But also ask them questions. Ask them what's life like right now for you? Because maybe something's not great at home for them. And maybe they just lost their job. Maybe they're not necessarily upset. We're not talking about the convoy. They're upset because they're not sure if they're gonna have a meal tonight, dinner tonight, you know, like, you know what I'm saying? Like, there's a lot that's going on in people's lives that we forget. Because we're always thinking about ourselves. We're always thinking about what's going on in our heads, but we're not thinking about them. You have to ask yourself, what took them the courage to call into a radio show, knowing they can be recorded and put on the air right away? That takes courage. Matt Cundill 36:19 Yeah, they have a story to tell and they want to tell it, or at least have acknowledged. Which kind of dovetails into the more recent events that you've been going through in Kelowna, which has been on fire for the better part of a little while, where West Kelowna, you know, fire jumped over the river, and you're facing yet again, a forest fire disaster. I think it was 10 years ago, that a number of homes were burned down in Kelowna. Stephen Keppler 36:46 The big- the bigger one was about 20 years ago. Yeah, it was the- Yeah. Matt Cundill 36:51 I do remember that one. I guess I don't remember how long ago it was, but... Stephen Keppler 36:54 Feels like 10 years ago, Matt. It does. Matt Cundill 36:57 Yeah. I'm thinking- I'm thinking of my buddy, Bruce Davis, who was- who did sales at The Bear whose house was decimated in the whole thing. And yeah, you're right, it was 20 years ago, it was 2003. Oh, my goodness. Stephen Keppler 37:07 And it was almost 20 years ago to the day when the set- the next fire had happened. And this one was big. Matt Cundill 37:13 And here you are on the radio. And here you are in the face of Facebook, that is not going to be sharing any of your links and news. And it prompted me to sort of say, hey, Facebook, maybe you should just let this one go? And make it happen for people, you might save a life in the process. But radio in a time of emergency, I've- there's moments where I downplay it, and I say radio is not there. But I think Kelowna was there for it. Stephen Keppler 37:38 Oh, absolutely. Radio was there for everyone. So I was on vacation when the fire happened. And when I saw it had jumped the lake, I told my wife, we gotta go. We're gone. We're going back to Kelowna. As I'm packing the car, my program director, Amy Gilbert. Amy was like te- she texts me. She goes, where are you? Can you come in and I said, I'm packing the car. I'll be in Kelowna in six hours, you put me where you need me. Because of the news on Facebook being cut. Because of all that, they're going to come to us, because we are real time and we have warmth and inflection and we can guide you through what is going on. So I get to the station and Amy throws me on 99.9 Virgin Radio and she goes, you're gonna do afternoons. I've never done Virgin. Okay, whatever. I go on there. And I do an afternoon show. And I don't think anything of it. What I do is I report on the fires, I report on what's going on. And I keep it pretty somber but, but safe tone. I don't want people panicking. What was really neat was when I hopped off the air that night, things kind of had calmed down. I was going to be on AM 1150 That night on the talk radio station. But I wasn't. But I'll never forget being at the grocery store, running into a P one on my station move 1015. And she said, when I heard you were on Virgin radio scanning the stations. She heard me, she left it on because she goes I didn't want my kids to be scared in the car. But I wanted to know what was going on because I was driving around that whole afternoon. And that is why people listen to the radio. That is why we need to be there for them for moments like that. If you wanted the up to date information you could have been on an 1150 But you know she wasn't in trouble. It was her friends that were in trouble and she was worried for them. It was a scary time though. From downtown Kelowna, we can see West Kelowna and West Bank and I saw houses just blow up across the lake. And I don't think I'll ever get that out of my head. You know, that was that was a very scary moment for me because I thought these embers can jump the lake because they did two nights ago. You know these houses are just they would go it was another learning experience. Because I need to be I need to be there for whoever's listening who whoever's there to hang out, and I need to be there next to them in the car to explain the situation. And then the next day, I was on an 1150, board opping never board opt in my life for our station General Manager, Ken Kilcullen. And I learned a lot listening to can interview people throughout the day talking about the fires and how he had he had such cadence and tact. And I don't think I would have had that. So I mean, I learned a lot from him. But I was, you know, it was hopping on with him every now and then to say a few words. But then, you know, you run into listeners, and they're like, Hey, I heard you on this station, I heard you on that station. And you gotta thank you from them. And the last thing I was wanting was a thank you for reporting on fires. But we got it. And it was, it was pretty neat. But, you know, we've had friends lose their homes. And it's been hard watching them go through the grieving process, because you're seeing them go through it in real time. And so this is just another another one of those events. That brings me closer to everyone in Kelowna, because we've we have a shared experience. And not saying that COVID wasn't a shared experience it was, but this is natural disasters are scary, because you don't know what's going to happen within five minutes. I mean, the fires are still burning right now. And it's, it's still scary, you can see the whole mountain smoldering, but there's a lot of people who are back in their homes. And that's good, but it's gonna be a long road to recovery. Matt Cundill 41:29 Yeah, and I've been very skeptical about radio's role in an emergency. So if we were looking at what happened in Hawaii, there was no radio role. It happened very quickly. The officials did not call the radio stations to make any announcements- full disclosure, I'm a station voice at a radio station in Maui. And they haven't really touched their Facebook page in two years. And the station is fully automated with my voice. So I don't know how you have any- build a rapport when you're running a station like that. And if they hear this, I'm probably fired from that particular job. But whatever. That's just the way I think of it. It sort of speaks to the people of Kelowna, and the relationship that they have with trust in radio, why they're calling you to vent about a convoy protest. And when there's a disaster, they're going straight to the radio to find it. And fuck Facebook. First of all, Facebook is not a real time social media platform. X is. I don't think you need it as much as you think. Stephen Keppler 42:31 No, you don't. Matt Cundill 42:32 If you're gonna do radio right, you don't need much of a Facebook presence. Stephen Keppler 42:37 Facebook's been frustrating in the radio industry for people who want to post their bits to convert listeners, because I think social media is meant to convert. It's been difficult for anyone running station promotions to get the word out there, I guess. No, I don't think Facebook has any bearing on this whatsoever. I think it's been tough. And there's a lot of companies that have been hurt. And that's awful. It sucks. But when the fires, I'm going to bring up the fires when the fires were happening. You'd be scrolling through Facebook, and you'd see posts from three days ago, four days ago. And then all of a sudden, we had a ton of misinformation being thrown around on Facebook, because somebody goes well, I heard the fire jumped the lake. Well, that was actually five days ago. That's irrelevant now. Or somebody would say I heard the bridge was closed. And the actual information was it was closed at one in the morning for a couple of hours for maintenance for them to prepare, if the fire comes down near the bridge, because the bridge needs to stay open. That's the bridge that connects Kelowna and West Kelowna. And that's a very big artery for the Okanagan. Facebook was a to me it was there was a lot of disinformation or misinformation being thrown out there. Because Facebook's algorithm, you know, is always thinking about you. They're not thinking about real time. Twitter's great for real time. You're absolutely right. But radio is the only medium where it's all in real time. You can't just sit there in your in your on your dashboard and hit rewind or fast forward. No, it's right there. Right up to the moment. So when you're getting news on the radio, it's up to the moment as best as it can. And that's why we get time checks. I think we should we might need to go back to giving time checks. I think we should do time checks on Facebook, maybe. Maybe that would help. Matt Cundill 44:17 Somebody told you to stop doing time checks? Stephen Keppler 44:19 No, I just- I'm indifferent about time checks, because I don't know if it's super necessary or not. Because there's a clock right there on their radio. Matt Cundill 44:27 But it flashes 12. Stephen Keppler 44:29 Yeah. Matt Cundill 44:31 Some of them do. Stephen Keppler 44:32 It's a good point. Matt Cundill 44:33 I guess if somebody from Facebook were here, they would say we don't really do news anyway. We're just delivering what other people are saying. And so I would probably say we should get rid of this piece of legislation because it's misguided and a whole bunch of other things anyway, just my take. That's not a question. You don't have to answer that. Stephen Keppler 44:50 It's a fair opinion, though. Matt Cundill 44:52 From what you experienced. Through the Kelowna fires. What do you think your station, or the stations in Kelowna, can do better to keep people engaged with radio? Stephen Keppler 45:04 We as hosts need to be ready to be to hop on the air at anytime. I don't mean be on call 24/7 Because you need to live your life and you need to go on vacations. You need to look after yourself. But I think companies need to be ready to to go into safe mode or, or whatever it is to be there for the listener when things happen. Radio is such an intimate medium, and it always will be as his podcasting. But you know, when there's a flood, people aren't going to go click on their favorite podcasts or they're not going to go to Facebook, they're probably going to go look outside. And then they're probably going to drive away from the flood. Who's going to be there? It's radio. It will always be radio, they will be the first thing people check into. Matt Cundill 45:51 Stephen, thanks so much for doing this and sharing the recent experience to the wildfires and as well your entire career. I appreciate it. Stephen Keppler 45:58 Oh, thank you. And I appreciate you as well. There's a promo you guys did at the Bear. I believe you were there. Where you guys invited people to drive their- their Junker cars up to the lot, and you were gonna give somebody a new car. Can you tell me about that? Because I want to hear- I want to hear your side of it. Matt Cundill 46:17 I think if it was a piece of shit car, we were gonna give you a new car. I think that was played off the Adam Sandler piece of shit car. Yeah. And then we would get we were gonna give somebody a brand new car. Turn- get rid of your piece of shit car. That was it. Stephen Keppler 46:34 That's how radio is powerful, it was like 23 years ago, and I remember it from when I was in high school. You know, I remember when Sonic launched in Edmonton, and they played nirvana. And I said, Oh my gosh, this is my music. You know? You don't forget moments like that. So, I hope one day I create a moment like that for somebody, and they decide to get into the business, whether it be radio, whether it be television, film, whether it be- whether it be stage acting, anything. Anything in performing, I hope- That's my hope in life. Matt Cundill 47:04 Thanks, man. Appreciate it. Stephen Keppler 47:06 Thank you. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 47:07 The Sound Off Podcast is written and hosted by Matt Cundill. Produced by Evan Surminski. Edited by Chloe Emond-Lane. Social media by Aidan Glassey. Another great creation from the Soundoff Media Company. There's always more at soundoffpodcast.com.

Sean Ross is back to talk about radio and records. He answers my burning question: What happened to the hits? We also talked about the lost factor, whether "Join the Conversation" radio has run its course, and those songs of summer. We also talked about Radio Days North America, the lack of programming related radio conferences, and why Taylor Swift is as big as the Beatles. Please follow Sean on X Also sign up for his free Newsletter to give yourself a heads up on some really fun columns like this which discussed what was better... 1983 or 1984? And this.... which discusses some of the specialty programming radio is doing this Labour Day Weekend. We spoke about the Lost Factor and Sean has a Spotify playlist. TRANSCRIPTION Tara Sands (Voiceover) 0:02 The Sound Off Podcast. The show about podcast and broadcast starts now. Matt Cundill 0:12 This week, it's the return of Ross on radio. Now forgive the not so subtle Star Wars reference here. It's been just over three years since Sean was on the show, about the same amount of time George Lucas would allocate to space out his Star Wars films. Sean is the author of the Ross On Radio newsletter. He's been working in consulting with radio stations across North America, and he works with edits and research on various station projects. You can find him on the social media platform, formerly known as Twitter, where he comments on music trends and identifies those moments of music scheduling bliss. Sean is one of the more popular guests. And by that, I mean, whenever we ask people who should be on the show, Sean is one of the more common asks. And now Sean Ross joins me from Maplewood, New Jersey. How have you been Sean? Sean Ross 1:00 I'm okay. Matt Cundill 1:01 I missed seeing you at Radio Days North America. Sean Ross 1:04 I was there. Matt Cundill 1:06 I was there too. Sean Ross 1:07 You should have come to jukebox jury, you're probably in the PPM session. Matt Cundill 1:13 You know, I find that there's a lot of choice. And there's a lot of FOMO with these things now. And bad decisions get made. Sean Ross 1:21 Well did better than the alternatives, which has nothing to go to. But yeah, it's you know, more than a lot of other conventions. Matt Cundill 1:32 And you and I were at the former Canadian Music Week, which was still coming out of the pandemic, but then the next year, it became Radio Days North America. And I know you've been to a lot of these things. So how did it compare? How did it perform? And how much did you like it? Sean Ross 1:45 I was so happy to see people in the halls again. I think Ross did a great job. I think Ross they think the radio is people do a great job. It is certainly a cut above any recent CMW radioactive. I'm glad they're trying to draw an international audience. I actually think it needs to be more Canadian. I am more excited by seeing Canadian programmers centerstage than I am seeing European or US consultants who aren't necessarily draw downs. But I enjoyed it. I think it's headed in the right direction. I am certainly doing everything I can to help them get the word out to American programmers. This is a good successor to the the radio show, which I miss. Matt Cundill 2:51 And I'm glad you raised that because there's very few programming conferences or sessions left, we had the disappearance of the worldwide radio Summit and now the All Access audio summit that's obviously not going to be taking place in the future. Conclave has gone away. It feels like there's not a lot of places for programmers to get together and have great conversations. Sean Ross 3:17 It's sad, watching legendary stations shut down. It's sad watching legendary broadcasters retire or pass away and it's sad that they're less infrastructure for the industry and All Access is a part of that. All Access, you know has a lot to do with keeping the record and radio relationship in play. And I worry about what's going to happen without it. Right we are already at this point where labels don't seem to want to promote records to radio. They want Tik Tok to be the decider and that will come to Radio One some with some. And I'm not seeing that as a good situation for anybody, including artists, including the labels themselves. We have half the hits we had three years ago and that was the pandemic year when we were talking about how nobody was releasing on your records. Now we have half of those I'm not sure how to better but yes, I miss all access. I never gotten to go to a worldwide radio summit in person. Certainly as a website, I am hoping that radio winds were my columns appear will be a resource to even people now and help facilitate that belong to be the place where people will see right. Matt Cundill 5:01 So I always thought this podcast would be a great place for record companies to spend money to play a new song and get the song into the ears of programmers. I've had maybe one or two little nibbles of some indie promoters who would make that podcast advertising purchase. But as I found out at Radio Days North America and I spoke to record reps, yeah, we're not doing that anymore. And then comes a note from Joel Denver, about the prevailing headwinds and that money kind of kind of drying up. So what are the record companies doing? Are they really going to double down on Tik Tok and that's it. Sean Ross 5:40 I think there's some disappointment with Tik Tok, but I don't know what's replacing it. There are articles in Billboard including today about how labels don't find Tik Tok to be promotable and how Tik Tok is playing less music and feeding people. Music, but I don't see it, you think replacing it. And every now and that it helps with a record. The radio can play anyway. Like Noah Kahan - That Old Drunk. This week, there is a record called Lil Boo Thang by Paul Russell, which samples Best Of My Love by the Emotions and that song is being upside it, speech reinforced by Tik Tok and that's a pretty good radio record, but yeah, every night with that, just as often you get a sign with a title, I can't even repeat it here and radio doesn't know what to do with it. Matt Cundill 6:49 What happened to all the hits? Sean Ross 6:51 People have busy lives, they can't do radio, just job and the record companies and break them all. Okay, usually they can find something and you share with friends, occasionally something can become phenomenal, and so on occasionally something that has the help five years of TV commercials like mckeeva, but he got up to about this summer. Occasionally a record like that can come back and it's usually not organic anyway, it's usually TV or movies, or some sort of calculated effort and the result is we have half the hits we still have we have half the hips we had even three years ago. The consultant Guy Zapoleon keeps a list of how many powers there were at top 40 every year. And in 2020, which was certainly a slow year there were 30. This year, they're going to be about 20 if we're lucky, maybe 18. Matt Cundill 8:07 So I always thought that for a song to be a hit it just had to get above 40 in the charts. At least that's what the CRTC was telling me for many years on how to score you know what a hit is. So how does somebody like Guy determine what a hit is? Sean Ross 8:22 I think from everything I've learned doing the column called Lost Factor and also working in radio, I think something really has to empower, which means Top 10, Top Five. These days top three to be a record everybody knows and verybody remembers. And the old hit-non-hit, 40 is certainly not the dividing line anymore so it can go top 15. You can't be sure everybody will have heard it, but even that is hit hit. There were some fun loopholes. Here Comes The Sun, never a simple nine hit the Beatles and Tony Sheridan doing My Bonnie Lies Over The Ocean, got up to 20 something I think maybe 32 at the height of Beatlemania That's a hit. Somebody would be damned if they went to 50.1% Platinum and silver. And yeah, most people don't even know it exists unless you lived through Beatlemania. Matt Cundill 9:45 Hit non hit , maybe the last time we talked about it on this podcast and may it rest in peace, Sean Ross 9:51 You know, it kept things interesting and maybe not in a good way. And you talk about the endurance of record, there were toward the end, plenty of good non hits. 'What I Like About You', I Melt With You Things that peaked at 42. And then there is things like 'The Edge of Heaven' by Wham! , which nobody would even remember if it weren't even on here. So it just shows how sometimes don't enter equally. Matt Cundill 10:26 Or unless of course you've seen the Wham! documentary, which is phenomenal. Sean Ross 10:31 Well the documentary was phenomenal, but for all the great songs on the right, it's mostly 'Careless Whisperer' and 'Wake Me Up'. And for the phenomenal album that George Michael had it's mostly 'Faith' and 'Father Figure'. Matt Cundill 10:50 I think one thing about that documentary that amazed me was just how short the radio window was with Wham! where it's kind of starts with 'Wake Me Up (Before You Go Go)' and it's done just a little bit after 'Freedom' in 1985 and also, it's surrounded by some of the best music ever created for radio. It's a short wild ride. Sean Ross 11:13 Well, and it was an embarrassment of riches. If you know, George wanted to make a different corner or later play for time, something that was a fun radio record. Radio would find their fun radio record. They didn't have to deal with it. It's you know, it's interesting now, in this year, Jake Goldenhour, our Steven Sanchez and Billy Eilish, and so many records that our atmosphic and ethereal and fun and up tempo. It's interesting to think that some of George Michaels more experimental songs could have been bigger hits. Matt Cundill 12:01 Yeah, and I too, am thinking about that 1989 album or the 1990 album as well, which listen I without prejudice, which we all did. Sean Ross 12:10 Yeah, well, you know, people tried to like that record and radio tried to like it and for a couple of years, he didn't want to be a rock star. And for a couple of years, Alannis didn't want to be a rock star. And you know that's how he got supposed for. Eventually they all came back, I can want them to be rock stars, in that record had other choices. Matt Cundill 12:38 So we're talking about the lack of hits this summer, but I look back and I read your columns all the time, and I'm thinking that it was 1984 was really peak hits. You know, the most punch the most superstardom. Am I right to say that was the one that was the year where every song was really can't miss? Sean Ross 12:59 Yeah, I've just written a column about whether 83' or 84' was better. And there are partisan disfigured for both. Certainly 83' has a pretty clear winner for saw the summer. 'Every Breath You Take' 84' Is it 'When Doves Cry?' Is it 'Dancing in the Dark?' Is it 'Ghostbusters'? Could be round and round by round? There are so many choices and so many fun up tempo records. No wasn't the worry. No, there were so many things and all of them sound like they would be much bigger than a lot of what's out now, Matt Cundill 13:45 As we record this as late August and I think back to 1984 and the song that really sort of captured a couple weeks, right around now is Tina Turner and 'What's Love Got To Do With It'. I can pretty much parcel and segment. Each one of those songs that you mentioned by week throughout, you know, June, July and August. The correct answer, by the way is 1984. I enjoyed 1983 As much as anyone else. Somebody on Twitter responded 1985 which was a big mistake. Sean Ross 14:15 Yeah. Matt Cundill 14:15 Although you know, some Power Of Love from Huey Lewis And The News was a great summer song from from 1985 1985 Sean Ross 14:23 loses points for broken wait. I know some people love that song, but that to me is the beginning of the descent back into Yap. Matt Cundill 14:36 Something else about 1985 when I go over it, I look at the charts and especially AOR charts and it's really the number of epic bands. Fleetwood Mac, Eagles, Paul Rodgers is releasing record. Everybody who was successful in the 70s is now releasing solo records into 1985. And it's just a factory of music coming at us from multiple formats. Sean Ross 15:01 And they've all listened to each other. It's like 1967 with beige is Motown, Dylan, Beatles stop playing off each other. In 1984, Before Springsteen gets remixed by Arthur Baker and all of the music sort of meets in this you know, this place that isn't rock, isn't pop, isn't r&b. It's all of the above. Matt Cundill 15:34 Do you have one song that you will look at throughout the history of all summers and say that is the quintessential summer song? So when you go to look at this year in 2023, you'll compare it against another song from another era. Sean Ross 15:48 1976 Thin Lizzy, 'Boys Are Back In Town'. Up, fun, propulsive, little bit G about summer. Matt Cundill 16:01 How would you put Cruel Summer from Bananarama? Sean Ross 16:03 Cruel Summer 1983 in the K 1984 in North America. Cruel Summer is certainly up there until this summer, I would have different points for the title, but it's not the starboard this year, obviously. It feels like a lonely song as well. This summer, it's Taylor Swift Cruel Summer, because Taylor was pretty much the only shared experience that everybody had. And yeah, it could have been Karma it could have Cruel Summer, I went for the song with summer in the title and I went in for the one that's a hit now as opposed to six weeks ago. But also says something about Taylor she's the only person who had two hits this summer, saw it hang around forever. Matt Cundill 16:59 That's come up a couple of times that the lack of hits is really the result of fewer shared experiences. Sean Ross 17:06 And vice versa, fewer chances for people to unite around the record. Matt Cundill 17:12 How's the music industry going to solve that? Or are they just going to carry on? Sean Ross 17:17 I think first they have to recognize it as a problem. I think music industry has found a model was streaming that makes money, but it doesn't necessarily make stalkers. And there's still layoffs in the industry. And there are still artists, you know, on Twitter complaining about getting $27 royalty checks. So it's not like this is working so outrageously well for everybody that we don't need radio in the equation. Matt Cundill 17:54 Why Taylor Swift? Is it timing? Because of when she started it in the genres that she touched way back before 2010 and now it's evolved in this direction. What is it that has made her as big as the Beatles? Sean Ross 18:08 She did make her superstardom with radio at a time when radio had clearly had the yank. She happens to be the last brand name artist of that magnitude. And I think the fact that she was kind of off the radio for a couple of years, people thought she was gonna have a traditional Celine Dion and Thai baht, or didn't reach the point where she just never became cool again, and didn't have yet again and I couldn't be happier for her that that turned out not to be the case. And I think it's a good message to write do not to be too snobby about any artist and also, as far as fans, whatever frustrations that you're trying to get tickets, Taylor has been all about goodwill to the fans and good vibes when other things aren't. Matt Cundill 19:19 I also think back to a moment in the documentary that she was in, where she wanted to take a stand against I think it was a Republican candidate who was running. The issue eludes me at this time, but she was going to take a political stand and there are people around her saying this is not a good idea. This is going to sort of rupture your fan base and it seemed to have done the opposite and galvanized, fans even closer. And I'm not sure who exactly, I'm not even sure which one of her fans would even depart because I don't think that she was alienating anybody really she was galvanizing them. Sean Ross 19:55 It's certainly something we barely even remember now. As you know, it was not a national action about which she made the point. It was a Tennessee State election or a Tennessee senatorial election. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 20:32 The Sound Off Podcast supports Podcasting 2.0. So feel free to send us a boost. If you're listening on a newer podcast app. If you don't have a newer podcast app, you can get one at newpodcastapps.com. Matt Cundill 20:45 So one of the things that you do all the time is scheduled music and I think one of the questions I always love to ask is tell me about how music scheduling has evolved in the last 10 years. But I'm not going to make you do that because it's changed so much in the last three years or two years. So what are some of the new techniques for music scheduling, when we're dealing with less hits when we're dealing with Tik Tok when we're, you know, getting our music from different places. How would I schedule music on a radio station these days? Sean Ross 21:17 I am still dealing mostly with gold base stations so I don't have to worry about three Justin Bieber's or I still believe that program director is have thrown up their hands and some of the things that still do matter to the audience. When Post Malone had three hits at once, I was working at my Edison ressearch office and their were three interns all of them listeners, women in their 20s. They were working adjacent desks, and I listened to an hour of a Top 40 station that played three Post Malone songs and then I switch to their competition and I heard three more Post Malone songs and I said, 'How did you feel about the Post Malone? I mean, he's hot right? You probably enjoyed hearing him six times'. And they said no, it was too much. Program directors who don't want to fight that battle anymore and you certainly position it as a get off my lawn issue. If you object to any artist every 20 minutes, it's your problem, not the audiences. But I think the audience wants variety. I think the audience wants a variety of textures. I think the audience doesn't want to hear songs to sound the same and I don't think the audience wants to hear Harry Syles "As It Was" in power rotation for two years. I don't think people want to hear Calm Down on as much as they love it in power rotation for a year. People aren't saying when you look at the call out and nothing replaces Calm Down, I don't interpret that as I cannot get enough of this song and I want to hear it every 65 minutes for two years. I interpreted as I have not learned about other songs, in part because you don't plan your songs and it's not that I'm not sick of this song. I'm just sick of other things less. Matt Cundill 23:52 I know you threw the disclaimer in this says oh, I just do the classic hits stuff, but you're not bullet proof from outside sources, changing things on you. I've got two examples that have come to mind. One of them is Kate Bush 'Running Up That Hill', which doesn't even get played on in a lot of classic hits stations and then all of a sudden it's going up Top 40 so classic hits has to react to that as well. Sean Ross 24:16 Classic hits could do well to look at what's around it. Not everything is gonna stick. It's looking like Kate Bush might not stick and it probably doesn't help seven times a day, the radio when songs would come back into the public consciousness it would be something like 'Unchained Melody' that you hadn't heard for years and it would come on as current for four months. And then be a gold again and certainly 'Unchained Melody' didn't stay relevant for, many years, I don't know that every song that comes back from a TV series is going to have sustained relevance. I also think there are signs that are bigger than people realize is Jolene by Dolly Parton song every 25 year old knows. They probably don't know what it's from. They probably don't think of it as classic country because they don't listen to classic country for the most part. That's a song that could be a lot more classical stations and it's interesting that some of the stations I work with, it sounds so weird to even suggest it. I have one client where I know, hearing them grow avery time I bring it up. It's practically like a drinking game that some Sean will at some point in the conference call bring up Jolene. Matt Cundill 26:07 Yeah, I think we had a rock cousin to that Johnny Cash, 'Hurt'. That's another one that rock stations even found their way playing at one point. Sean Ross 26:15 Yeah, and you know, I don't know if the classic hit station should play that, but it would still test for any alternative station that tested. Matt Cundill 26:25 Yeah, and another song that did find its way back and again, these TV shows are on demand, they are not shared experiences. They're not mass shared experiences, say the way the sopranos was, which had journey don't stop believing, you know, at the end of it, or like Glee, which had Journey, 'Don't Stop Believing', you know, as as a part of the the repertoire, but something as simple as Linda Ronstadt in The Last of Us doing 'Long, Long Time'. I didn't even watch the show, but the song was on and somebody in the room was watching and I began to sort of touch and feel it again, didn't have a giant resurgence, but it certainly got a couple weeks of interest. Sean Ross 27:04 Yeah, and I haven't had the opportunity yet to see if they saw and took in radio research. And you know, it's a good example, because there's going to be one of those every few weeks and which ones are gonna stick with people and, by the way, if I had tested logging in six months ago, or a year ago, it was a great song, then great side now, but nine months ago, people wouldn't have remembered it, it wouldn't have been top of mind. For them, it would have been a programmers self indulgence to even consider playing it on the radio again. As somebody who works with classic hit stations, I do like to surprise and delight. But there are 15,000 hits that don't generally get airplane out and which ones do you start with some outside help. Matt Cundill 28:17 Aomething that I've been interested in and tracking and that's the launch of a couple of radio stations that have not performed as well as I thought and you know, the first one in was in Edmonton, it was now at 102.3, I was really surprised it wasn't copied more across the country in you know, the 2010s. But you know, some budgetary restrictions as it was, but eventually a couple stations did come around and relaunched one in Winnipeg at 94.3 and I believe one in Toronto at 93.5 and you know, it's today FM now radio join the conversation, and they haven't taken off the way I thought they would have. What do you think and why is that? Sean Ross 28:58 Edmonton and Calgary they have a 15 year headstart and attend headstart. Edmonton certainly had one of the best and best financed launches of all time, which stays with us to stay. And again, if they're not the answer, it is certainly hard to build a full service radio station from scratch in Vancouver, in Winnipeg, certainly in Toronto. It's hard to get noticed now when you're not dealing with as many potential listeners to begin with and it's hard to get notice now unless you're spending right we'll go to that listen five money. All of them said, one. I hear the influence of that station. Practically everywhere in Canadian radio, anytime somebody does a topic, I hear that influence. But the other thing that's interesting, I still hear, compared to America, I hear a lot more topical magazine type item topics. Survey is now FM type topics and I think some of that in Canada is the lingering effect of the enrichment regulations that went away 25 years ago, or people had come up with topical bits like that. I feel that some of that lives on in stations like now FM, especially when they do what's your favorite cookie? Or should should ham be a pizza topping. Matt Cundill 30:53 I think I took a podcast episode to really bang out a lot of stations where everybody was sort of doing it and meeting in the middle and it would be a meme. And it would be something you would create on Canva and posted on your Facebook page and this is what we're talking about and do raisins belong and cookies and I criticized a lot of stations for doing it. You did message me and say, you know, the join the conversation format is very valid, it does very well. And I would expect to hear that sort of conversation on that station. I don't expect to hear it on 10 different radio stations. Sean Ross 31:29 Yeah, I think people want to be engaged and the engagement is different one to 10 Bruce in the UK. Everybody else on radio two did pineapple on pizza, except for the topical political show admit it is. But mostly, he talks about music and it's refreshing to hear people talk about music and it's interesting, if you listen to C 97.7 in Calgary, there's obviously a certain amount problems, you know, because there are co-owned with the join the conversation stations, there is certainly some of that in their DNA. But when you hear Graham camp, do his breaks. The structure is familiar, but the topic is music. Graham did yesterday where he said, I suppose you're wondering what the best Britney Spears song is, and then called into you drive me crazy. I thought that was a great break. Because it got people's attention about the topic that anybody who'd be listening to that station had an opinion. Matt Cundill 32:47 If I had more time in my life, I would probably figure out a way to run the data and find out what the last classics were, but you've done all the work for us all so thank you very much. First off, what is a lost classic and how do you sort of determine what they are? Sean Ross 33:02 Back in the 80s, aa DJ in Boston came up with a show called Lost 45s. What he was playing at that point, what Citizens In The Sun, Heartbeat is love are records that people profess to be ashamed of. So a guy named Barry Scott came up with the last concept, what I do is called the loss factor and what I do is I take how big a song was when it was hit based on how well it did on your charge. And I divided by the number of spit it gets. And I did that for about three years starting 2020 until I worked up to about 2009. And that's where I've stopped it for the time being and what you find of course signs do not hinder equally the famous example is that doesn't stop belief and and upon Glee ends up the suppression of this and becomes a song for our time. And 'Physical' by Olivia Newton John with 10 weeks on at number one when 'Don't Stop Beliving' was a hit stop it's not in the same way. If you look at classic hits radio, Olivia Newton shot and it was pretty much represented by one song from Greece, which is the help of everyone watching it when are 10. So if you're interested, I've looked at literally every hit from 1960 to 2000. In how much you hear them or don't hear them on the radio now. Just Google radio insight, Loss Factor and then Sean, S-E-A-N and you should find those articles and for the people who liked it it's a definite rabbit hole. So do it when you've gotten some time this weekend. Matt Cundill 35:10 I mean, I've lost complete days down there and I think so often about again 84' and 85' when I did a lot of radio listening and you know the song I think it was Olivia Newton John, 'Twist of Faith'. A big one from 1984, very lost but you know, big video with John Travolta from a movie, the formula is there. It's a very simple ad and just it I mean, it's certainly going to get lost and in amongst everything else in 84', and so many songs by Hall and Oats in in the years afterwards also became lost. Sean Ross 35:41 Yeah, there was there was a definite bias and I think Jack and Bob had something to do with this. The Jack and Bob FM stations toward things that were their wave, toward things that were rock and away from things that were pop. 'Twist Of Faith' seemed like his big hit the time is anything else and so did 'Far From Over' by Frank Stallone, it's you know, if you want to get into the weeds, why did maybe by Michelson Bell, last and Far From Over' practically the same song. Matt Cundill 36:21 I guess it would probably horrify you to let you know that I've watched Flashdance for the very first time about six weeks ago on a VHS tape. Sean Ross 36:30 You can also by going to Ross On Radio on Spotify, you can find my 1983 playlist and there are four songs from Flashdance. They're not just the samples. Matt Cundill 36:46 That came up when I was watching the show. Oh, I forgot about that. Oh, I forgot about that. That was also a hit. Sean Ross 36:52 Yeah, you know, guys are a joke. 'Man Hunt' by Karen Kamon is probably a song we've all heard 100 times, but never on the radio. Matt Cundill 37:04 Sean, thanks so much for doing this and being on the podcast yet again. Sean Ross 37:07 Always great to be here. Matt Cundill 37:09 I always get so much reaction to this episode and so nice many people listen to it twice. So thanks very much for being on again. Sean Ross 37:16 Thank you and yeah, thanks to everybody who's a fan of the column who's kept us going into the 12th or 13th year over us. So I apprecaite it. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 37:29 The Sound Off Podcast is written and hosted by Matt Cundill. Produced by Evan Surminski, edited by Chloe Emond-Lane, social media by Aidan Glassey. Another great creation from the Sound Off Media Company, there's always more at soundoffpodcast.com

Sam Sethi is setting out on his biggest adventure yet. The host of Podnews Weekly Review and former programmer at Windows and Netscape, is launching Podfans; part of a new wave of podcast apps you can find here on the Podnews website. Over the last few years, podcast shows like Podnews, Pocasting 2.0 with Adam Curry and Dave Jones, and shortly after The New Media Show with Rob Greenlee and Todd Cochrane, began to talk about ways to improve the technology involved with podcast delivery. Think of things like sending money straight to the host or evenly amongst hosts, being able to follow along with captions, listening live when the show goes live, listening to podcasts created in your neighbourhood, and chapter markers so you don't have to scan every 15 or seconds for the part of the show you are looking for. During the Episode - Sam sent me some Sats... and also streamed some as well. He summarizes the activity in this LinkedIn post. TRANSCRIPTION Sam Sethi 0:00 Sorry. Sorry, my wife. Yeah. Yeah, I've got the car keys in my pocket. Sorry ma'am, my wife's, my wife's looking at me. Where's the car keys? Sorry. So going back. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 0:19 The Sound Off Podcast. The show about podcast and broadcast starts now. Matt Cundill 0:30 One of the things I love about podcasting is all the possibilities. For those who are regular listeners to a podcast from the Sound Off Podcast Network, you may have heard this before. Mary Anne Ivison (Voiceover) 0:42 This podcast supports podcasting 2.0. If you like this show or getting value from it, hit the boost button now. If you don't have a boost button, you can get one now at new podcastapps.com. Matt Cundill 0:55 Today I'm going to be speaking with Sam Sethi, who co hosts the podcast weekly review along with James Cridland. He's also the creator of one of those new podcast apps called Podfans. Now, most of you listen to this show on Apple podcasts or Spotify. I know because I see the data, but have you checked out what's available at new podcast apps.com? There are apps available to show you things like when a show is live. They let you see transcriptions or captioning or you can even send some funding in the form of satoshis or boosts. Sam is in the process of launching Podfans, a new podcast app which is going to support those aforementioned things and more. Now speaking of SATs and Satoshis. I want to thank Dave Jackson, who has a great show called Ask The Podcast coach. He's using one of those newer podcast apps called Castamatic and he has the app set to stream some satoshis in my direction for every minute he listens to the Sound Off podcast. Thanks so much, Dave, and thanks for the 5000 SATs. Now, Sam Sethi joins me from Cookham, England. Long before you involve yourself in in radio. you worked in tech. Sam Sethi 2:02 Yep. Matt Cundill 2:03 And you go right back to the early 90s. And Microsoft and Windows 2.1. What was windows 2.1 C yeah, I can even remember the C bulk of it. What attracted you to tech and computers? Sam Sethi 2:16 The only stones was I left the army as an officer and typical English army officer not knowing what to do next I had to skills, kill people or shout not really of, often asked for. So they all send you into the city to be a stockbroker and sat at a desk watching screens go red or blue didn't appeal to me at all and so they sort of stuck me in a corner with this sort of massive, great big computer and said, go and create a trading system on that. So somehow, I enjoyed doing that and that was the beginning of it, yeah. Matt Cundill 2:49 It was funny how it all comes full circle, because as we get into talking about podcasting, 2.0 that's pretty much where we're going to be headed. Sam Sethi 2:57 Yeah. I mean, I'm very, very bullish on where I think this is all going. And I think he's just waiting for people. I've been here before, and we'll talk about it in the podcast when I was at Netscape, you know, I remember sitting down, its called a browser, it starts with http. Yes. That's the URL. No, there's no search engine. People looked at me like I was talking Swahili and now when I say it's a micro payment is called a Satoshi you need a digital wallet and people look at me go, what's he talking about? I have no idea. And yet I can see the natural hockey stick of growth because it's a solution to a problem we actually all have, and it works. And when you've got those two parts, a solution that's actually fixing a problem and that actually does what it says on the tin, then I think you've got gold, and it's just a timeframe then Matt Cundill 3:47 My gateway to the internet, the first time I got on it was Netscape. You may have a few tales to tell about, working with Netscape and when you go to tell somebody yes, http colon, backslash, backslash. There's always a contingent of people who are like, okay, well, how do I make money from this? What were those monetization questions? And did you even have any answers? Or did you just say this is really a gateway to marketing and a bigger world? Sam Sethi 4:12 I don't think anyone knew we were all blind leading the blind whether it was there was a brilliant guy called Mike Homer, who was the marketing director for Netscape. Sadly, he died very young, but Mike Homer was the guy who could foresee RSS. He was the guy who worked with the tech team guys to come up with RSS. I know everyone says it's Dave Winer. It wasn't Dave Winer. Dave Winer took what Netscape and enhanced it, give him that credit. At the same time, Mike was the first one to create a portal. So he worked out for Netscape that there was going to be a portal that we could put news into and you could start to put basic products into right. And that was his vision that was beginning to evolve and I think that the monetization, of course Microsoft ran with that idea and created MSN. And then of course, we saw all the other people suddenly Ting Ting Ting, ah, there's money in this hill, right? Let's get some e commerce, we have pets harass me had everyone else in the world and obviously, that's how I think it evolved, but yeah, genuinely I don't think anyone really understood how you're going to monetize this. Matt Cundill 5:22 So I'm having a Netscape flashback. I believe beside the bookmarks, there was an opportunity to subscribe to the RSS feed exact and anytime somebody updated their website, it would show up in I think, maybe a sidebar. Sam Sethi 5:37 Like little push notification, actually, yeah. Matt Cundill 5:39 Yeah and I was supposed to be really, really excited that the website had been updated, and that I could go and consume the new content that was put on there. Sam Sethi 5:47 Yeah, and I think that was the original concept of it, it was going to be a data transport layer, which RSS is and you remember, the Google screen reader for RSS, which everybody in the day had, right and it was brilliant, because you could consume loads and loads of different websites through a sort of very flat file, in effect, like a spreadsheet, and then dip into it by clicking through it. And again, when that die, you know, I think a lot of people will very unhappy. And that's when I think RSS itself fundamentally first time round died as well. Matt Cundill 6:20 And I hear you talk about this on your show quite often with James Cridland and that's something like Internet Explorer that comes along podcast apps, but things like Netscape go away, a search engine, like Alta Vista goes away, and then it gets taken over by Google. And then once they're gone, a lot of the smaller little components that made it great also disappear along with it too and we miss those things. Sam Sethi 6:47 We miss comfort because we learn how to do things on the web in the way that we want to do them. So whether it's the best way of doing it, it's the way that we train our mind. And when we we don't like change, humans don't like change particularly. It puts us out of our comfort zone, it makes us have to think through our frontal cortex rather than the relaxed. Oh, no press one press 2,3 oh that's the job done. So yeah, again, strangely, after Netscape I was the marketing director for a company called CMGI out of Boston, CMGI owns 60 of the first original startups, AltaVista was one. Now vo to Rome, the list goes on. And their goal was to create a synergistic platform. So the sum of the parts would make it greater than the whole. And CMCI was the first billion dollar valuation on the internet and that was because it was just buying up all these companies is a combination of a VC and an incubator, and it sort of had this sort of sausage factory idea of will buy in a startup will, will enhance it through the services that we offered, and then chuck it out the front door for for extra value. So again, early days of the web. Matt Cundill 8:01 We could really use an Alta Vista right now in Canada. We've got this problem with Google in the news. Sam Sethi 8:06 Well, I don't think it's Google in the news. I actually think it's Canada and its politicians, but that's where I think the problem lies. Matt Cundill 8:13 And I heard you discuss that on your show and you're both exactly right. And you've seen this before, by the way, you've seen it happen in Spain, you've seen it happen in in Australia, where the government has this overreach and thinks they can just send the bill to Facebook and Google but leave Twitter out of it for whatever reason, and sort of stick these companies with the bill and that's not really how the internet works. Sam Sethi 8:32 And I think you have to ask Mr. Murdoch, why he's probably instigating this through lobbyists. Really, that's where I think the actual pressure is coming from because he sat there going, I once had advertising and I had billboards and job boards and classified ads, and I had all this revenue coming in and was worldly and I had millions of people reading my rubbish, and then suddenly, no one's reading my rubbish and at the same time, I'm not making any money from it. So who's making all my money? Oh, that's those guys over there called Google right? I want some of their money. And, you know, fundamentally, either it's dumb politicians or good lobbyists. I don't know which way you go. You're convincing people that yeah, it's the fault of Google. Matt Cundill 9:13 So my first introduction to you was pod land, which is now the podcast weekly review. When did you first meet JamesCridland? And why'd you start the show? Sam Sethi 9:22 Very interestingly, I met James because pre COVID. I decided stupidly, that I Why wouldn't we put on a podcast festival? Why don't we invite Kara Swisher, James Cridland and a whole bunch of really leading edge podcasters coming to an event? Nobody knew who I was, but guess what they all said yes, thank god. So we put on this online event which I'd never done. We used a platform called Hoppin, which went through COVID from zero to 7.7 billion and only this week, we heard that hoppin CEO has stepped down and the value of the company has gone but during COVID it was getting VC money. In daily, basically and his valuation went through the roof. Anyway I did that platform, James kindly said he'd come on and do it. And then afterwards, I looked at Pod News Daily and I said, James, do you want to sort of extend that from three minutes to maybe an hour? And I think it was 30 minutes. I promised him in the beginning, but it's gone a little longer these days and strangely, he said, yeah, I'd love to. And I thought oh, great, okay. And I promise you, if you go back to Episode 123, or four of pod land, it is car crash radio, or car crash podcasting, we didn't know what we were doing in terms of was he going to be the expert was only going to ask the question, which way was the I've taken the role of the dumb questionnaire. And I've let James to be the goat expert, podcaster and it seems to work for us. Matt Cundill 10:47 I like the fact that you can still put in these long form interviews, and you're both, I think, interviewing to your passions. So, for instance, you reached out to Rebecca Senalis and had this wonderful conversation about podcasting is path in the last 10 years that you were clearly passionate from the article you read. And at the same time, James had an interview recently with Christopher Lydon, who was one of the original podcasters, who started 20 some odd years ago, that's up for debate, we can have that debate forever. But I love how the show's evolved in that direction. Sam Sethi 11:23 Yeah, I mean, we've got a structure to it. We think it works. I mean, I think is one of those that I've said to James, we should go back and always review it. and I think we will, just to make sure that you know, we haven't become comfortable and stuck in our ways, and that there's a better way of doing it. But yeah, we are reaching out, we think to whoever we think in the news that week is making the news. That's the goal of it. Yes, obviously, James has gone back in time today, Wiener and as you said, other people. But generally, if you listen to the ones that I'm trying to do, or we are looking at who's in the news, so next week, we've got somebody from Descript coming on, because Descript got a brand new version coming out, that's going to be amazing, according to them for podcasters. We'll wait and see whether it's amazing. But again, we booked that person on, because they're going to be in the news for certain in a couple of weeks. Matt Cundill 12:17 I know that because I got three emails this morning, inviting me to the new version of the script. I don't even I don't even use Descript . I used it once and I decided I much preferred to edit the sound rather than the words. Sam Sethi 12:28 Yep, on the reverse, but I'll give you a thing. Hey, Matt, I'm not very good at editing. I'm basically good enough, but not good in either better, better people at doing that than me. Matt Cundill 12:40 So I'm not very good at production and mixing. So I have somebody on staff who does that because again, like you mentioned about your first few episodes, they're not always the best. And my first four episodes are a complete car wreck as well. Sam Sethi 12:53 But that's the way you learn, right? I think that's a brilliant way I've got an expression, which is go ugly early and that used to be my nightclub tactic can find the ugliest girl and then go early. But reality aside from that, go ugly early for me really means, you know, just get on with it. You can procrastinate all day and wait for that perfect moment where you can go out there in the world and be you know, told by other people what worked and what didn't know, I firmly believe that. Matt Cundill 13:21 Why is everybody unhappy with their podcast app? Sam Sethi 13:24 I don't think people are I think what it is, is people don't know what they don't know. That's the problem. So in a world of podcasting, if all you ever use is Spotify, and Apple, well, it works, right? You go on there, they're all their updates, you click in it is ready to download, it's ready to stream happy days. What you don't know is that finding podcast discoveries hold on those platforms. But you don't know that it's hard because you don't know there's a better option. You don't know that interactivity is a problem. I want to give feedback to the creator, but I can't do that on those two platforms. I can't leave a comment. I can't zap more or like something I can't put a rating when he can on Spotify by any chance. So discovery, interactivity, and being able to give back a small micro payment instead of a heart or like or a thumbs up. But if you don't know that that's available elsewhere, then you're not unhappy. You're just in the dark, really about what's available for you as a broadcaster. Matt Cundill 14:28 Maybe the question was oddly phrased in that I'm assuming that everybody's going around going by man, this podcast app sucks. I'm working off three podcasts app. So when I'm in the car, I like to use Apple, except for if I want to listen to a show that is live like the new media show with Todd Cochran and Rob Greenlee. Now, I want to use the fountain app so I can access it live. But inside my home, I use Spotify because I want it to connect to my smart speakers. I'm running three apps. I'm downloading shows all over the place my phone's getting a little bit full I'm not here to say that I'm unhappy with these apps because they're doing what I want them to do. But why can't I just have it on one app? Sam Sethi 15:06 Well, the answer is you can't have it on one app and and you know, strangely, that's something that I'm working on. But again, look, fountains a brilliant app, Oscar's a mate of mine, we have a lot in common in the way that we think about the future podcasting. I think what he's doing and implementing for fountains great. And he's putting all these new features like the live item tag, which is the one you just used to do listen to live shows. He supports this thing called micro payments. Satoshis. And, you know, he's got some great ways for discovery and interactivity, like creating little clips or leaving comments called boost. No, Oscar is doing a great job. He's even got car pay working as well. So there is a lot of good out there, fountains leading the charge from the new podcast apps, and good on Oscar for doing that. But there may be other people who do it, I sort of like him myself a little bit, you know, we had MySpace and Friendster before Facebook, I like to think that I'm the one coming from behind in the tortoise and the hare race. And, you know, I might be the tour toys with my app, you know, developing it and getting it right. But I hope that in the long run, it's the one that you will choose, or other people choose because it offers all the fixes to what you just described. Matt Cundill 16:21 So here you go, you're going to be jumping into the podcast app space with Podfans, I'm very excited for it. I'm so excited, I went and I'm registered, and I'm on a waitlist. And you've also got this thing where your slug and by the way, like a lot like blue sky does it. There's lots of apps that sort of slowly release, and you've worked in this space for so long, and you've been a part of the tech funding of it all. How do I expedite my myself to get my hands on this app? Sam Sethi 16:53 Basically, I'll be doing it straight off. It's not it's not a problem. In fact, probably all of that was my fault, Matt, we probably open the doors, a fraction too quick for people, we had a load of people come onto the waitlist. And when they came on, we realize that we've made mistakes in the admin, so we deleted a few people. So I'm gonna check, we may have just deleted your waitlist entry and I'm just being honest and if that's the case, I'll ping you back and say, just hit the whitelist entry and I'll push it straight through. It's weird building software in an I believe in building it in public. So I put out a lot of what we're doing very, very early. And sometimes when that happens, you go, Oh, we have to roll this back or something's not quite right. And that's what happened. We, we went a little bit too quick on getting people onto the waitlist, and then realized that there was a couple of issues. So we rolled it back and in the process, we had to delete some of the list and then restart it. So apologies if you're one of those, but I will check. Matt Cundill 17:57 I actually just registered just before this. Sam Sethi 17:59 Okay. I will make sure then you're in in a second. Matt Cundill 18:03 And I'm happy to report that I do have a get Alby wallet. Sam Sethi 18:06 Excellent. Let me explain a couple of things. This is this is one of the hardest things for me to do, which is pod foundry. I think we talked earlier about me being at Netscape, getting people onto the web and explaining the terminology, we're in that same boat. It's a micropayments. Satoshi wallet. The reason we're letting people on who have an old B wallet first is because it's half the battle has been done. If you already know what the Alby wallet is, and you know what a SAT is, and carry on to the platform and then trying to understand how value for value works, and how zaps and boost work is a second part of that vocabulary learning curve. But you don't then have to learn both of those sides. Whereas if you come on and you don't know what a wallet is, nobody would have sat it oh, my God, and now gonna learn about value, no far too long a learning curve. So we're being selective on our waitlist, about who comes in and who doesn't and that was part of having a waitlist. Now, why bother if if all you're going to do is let everybody in and that was a reason. Matt Cundill 19:04 I can totally understand why you're doing it. I'll look at an example of squad cast, which we're recording on right now. They put out their 5.0 version and it came out with a couple of bugs. But when it gets to people's computers or their phones, you just don't really know how it's going to react and the next thing you know, you've got, you're gonna spend the next year and a half trying to clean up all the little things that are involved with the program. Sam Sethi 19:29 So one of the things we've learned in the process so, again, stepping back we've built it to be a progressive web app. We don't want to be an iOS app or an Android app, why there is a potential problem. I'm not saying there is a problem, there's a potential problem that Apple is going to wake up to the idea of micro payments, and then suddenly realize that you've got a monetary system in your app, and they're not going to allow you in they've already booted out one app called Damas. Most of the podcast apps who are iOS with them Micro payment, or keeping their heads very, very, very low at the moment, but I didn't want to risk the 30% tax that Apple imply for every app if there's any micro payments and so we're a progressive web app, that just means we work on the desktop. And then when you shrink it down to whatever screen size, we shrink down to an iPad, or an iPhone or an Android. And with that capability, we also looked at how can we make this easier for people to use, we realized that again, we had stepped back a little bit to go forward. So we've created this week, a feedback app, which is both a bug report and a suggest new ideas feedback app. But what we've done to make it slightly different, is we actually give you SATs micro payments, for every time you report a bug or every time you suggest an idea, we have an opinion that your time and attention is valuable. And therefore we're going to value it by giving you back sets for what you give us. And I just literally released before this show an hour before the first ever blog that enables you to write a comment called a boost. So a comment with a payment or as app. It's the first ever one that's using the new micro payment system. But we're using your standard Alby wallet, the one you just described, because it all works in the system. So yeah, we're building features around the desktop and feedback loop. And then I think next week or the week after we released the mobile and then after that we've got a whole bunch of beta features that we want to release. Matt Cundill 21:35 So I guess I'm really excited about this app, because you've taught me through your time on what was Podland and now the Podnews Weekly Review, teaching me little things like I get Alby and it can sit as a Chrome browser extension and here's the fountain app and look. So I walk myself through the steps of sending people and I've sent you guys a couple times. micropayments. I sent you guys 5150, I think a few months ago, and I'm sorry that neither one of you got the Van Halen reference, I had to explain it to you. Sam Sethi 22:05 Sorry can I point out on the soul boy, no idea what was going on there. Matt Cundill 22:11 And that was really my first step to, you know, the form of micropayments. As we've walked through this monetization, how do we monetize our podcast, we've got the ads, we've got programmatic ads, but people sometimes skip through them. And then we've got subscription, you could have a subscription and apple, but there's 30%. And I think largely, not everybody wants to subscribe to a podcast and pay. I don't want to make a conclusion here, but it feels like a bit of a bust. Sam Sethi 22:39 But it's like paying for your gym membership. You know, you pay in advance, then do you go everyday? Do you use it twice a day? Or do you use it at all, right? The subscription is pay in advance the Chinese buffet model, eat all you like or eat nothing and I think we're all a bit tired of subscriptions. You know, I've got a Netflix, I've got a Paramount. I've got an Apple, I've got Spotify. I mean, how many more subscriptions do I want? Matt Cundill 23:02 Why are micro payments complicated? Sam Sethi 23:05 Let's take a step back again, when we were at Netscape, one of the things that Marc Andreessen has written about, is that he wished he'd created a micropayment system, a way of paying small amounts to creators as a way of rewarding them and he didn't. So in the absence in web 2 data, we created hearts, likes, thumbs up, claps, right? Go to the bank with a million likes, doesn't really do much for you, you're not going to get a mortgage, we're not going to get a car loan. So what did creators do? They put advertising around their content. We had blogs with ads, if you remember, and your blog roles and all these sorts of things and then Mark Zuckerberg said, no, no, no, we'll give you a platform for free, don't pay for it. You put up your content for free, we'll give you a platform for free and we're going to take all the money from your content, and we'll get rich ergo go Twitter, Facebook, etc. Well, fast forward to today and what you have or whoever he she it or they was Satoshi Nakamoto, the inventor of Bitcoin. So we no one knows who they are. But 100,000,000th of a Bitcoin is a SAT. That's the micro level of it. So this is great. You know, somebody might be listening to this podcast and going, Matt, I am loving what you're talking about and I want to give you 1000 SATs. Now, initially, well, when you did your first 5151 I am sure that there was a well, we've seen it so often people going sending one sat with the word. Did you get it? Did you get it? Because they just don't know it's going to work? It's the same as when when people started doing Zoom called, are you there? Can you hear me? Are you there? And it's that sort of affirmation. It worked. I can't believe this is working. It worked. And so now we're beginning to see people putting larger amounts. But what micropayment allows you to do is a peer to peer direct between you and the creator. So there's no third party in the middle, it's real time it just happened. So if I want to give you one SAT, I do if I want to give you a million SATs I do. And it's instant from my wallet to your wallet. And there's nobody in between. And the value for value model, which is what Adam Curry promotes, is fundamentally a bit like going into a shop to buy the shirt you're wearing. It's got a price tag on it, you take it off the hanger, you go to the counter, and you choose to pay either the price on the tag or you barter. Well, we're all too posh to barter. So we wait for the sale, or we don't bother at all. But digitally in a value for value world, you can barter you can say, you can say this podcast is worth 100 SATs per minute, it's an hour long. So that's 6000 SATs, which is probably $1 and a half Canadian dollars, not much if I want to give you value, but I'm not going to listen to the whole show. So why do I pay in advance for the whole show? No. So what we've done and what others have done is created a per minute payment model, which means that you can set a value per minute of 100 SATs per minute and if I consume 10 minutes or 20 minutes, I just pay for what I consume and that's the new model. So the new model is a value for value model where the creator sets a price, the listener agrees or changes that price. And it's paid per minute on what you can see. And that works. Not just for podcast, but it works for music, as we've seen. Audiobooks, video, in fact, anything digital. Matt Cundill 26:29 Now I know you might be thinking, is there any radio talk in the show? And the answer is yes. Yes, there is. Tell me about River Radio. Sam Sethi 26:38 Okay, so one of the things I am is naturally curious. That is that is just mind leaning in life and probably about eight years ago, somebody came to me and said, look, you used to be Microsoft's professional presenter used to stand up on stage and release products and do the old hello, good morning, and welcome to my and all that was great. And they said, do you fancy doing a radio show with us? Never done one of those. Great, I'll do an 80s radio show and it's cheesy and it's funny, and you played Shalimar and you played Michael Jackson. But I promise you after 10 times playing it, it gets a little bit repetitive, but the entrepreneur in me suddenly decided that I didn't want to play music, I wanted to interview great guests. Those great guests weren't all living in my village or near where I live, they happen to be across the pond, they happen to be in another part of the country. So I managed to go into the radio station and actually hook up a Zoom call when no one was doing zoom. This is pre everyone knowing about Zoom. And I can live link a Zoom into the studio now. Everyone was like, how you doing that? That's amazing, right. And that led to me starting sound talks technology, which was one of my own podcasts. But the entrepreneur in me wanted to do more, I wanted to be on a bigger broadcasting network called DAB I wanted to do different ideas with the radio station. And the owners of the one I was on didn't want to do it so I left and started my own radio station. I had never built a radio station, I didn't even know how to do it. So I sat down and I basically worked it out. And I built a radio station with 40 presenters. But what was unique was we created every radio show to be one hour long. And that was because we wanted them to be podcast first. I always call it podcast first radio. So the idea is that it's an hour long show about wine about parenting about local events, and it was hyperlocal content. So you weren't going to be talking about Canada and, and maybe talking about Guatemala, you were talking about the villages around where we broadcast what was going on. So we wanted local people to listen to the radio. But we also wanted the content to reflect that. And so I managed to work with a company down in Australia called Whisker, who Spotify bought. And we managed to take the live feed and the minute the show finished, they converted that through a series of processes into a podcast and we got cover art and titles and off it went and it was brilliant. So we have this amazing way of basically doing what we're doing now Matt, but physically actually broadcasting it live to cars and kitchens and Alexa's and web and mobiles and whatever. But the goal was really to convert that into a podcast and have that available and what was missing, this is going back a couple of years was micropayments and Alby and again, even if it was available a couple of years ago, as I said, I think the learning curve right now was a little early. So imagine trying to go on the radio and go hey, thanks for listening to the show. Now if you really liked what you just heard, why didn't you boost that and give us, no no one would have done it. So it was too pressing too early in the cycle but I will go back and take the pop bands platform and all of the mechanisms and convert that back into river radios platform when I think Mark is ready to understand that model. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 30:05 Transcription of the Sound Off Podcast is powered by the Podcast Super Friends, five podcast producers who get together to discuss podcasting. Sharpen your podcast and creation skills by following the show on theSound Off Podcast, YouTube or Facebook page. The Sound Off Podcast supports podcasting 2.0. So feel free to send us a boost if you're listening on a newer podcast app. If you don't have a newer podcast app, you can get one at new podcastapps.com. Matt Cundill 30:37 How about podcast hosts? I see some are knee deep into it and others are sort of just dipping their toe in the water. If I were to ask Megaphone, for instance, their involvement probably get a very standard response that we're looking at it. But then we look at like rss.com, Captivate and Blueberry who were diving straight in. Which ones are going to be the ones who are going to get involved with this? Sam Sethi 31:02 Well, I think there is a good smattering of hosts that are doing it. You've mentioned three, I mean, there are others. And the thing about it is what you'll see is that the features or functionality of this new Podcasting 2.0 , commenting interactivity, search engines, micro payments will become the competitive advantage over the others. Right now, as I said, we're crawling along the bottom, we're just beginning to see our heads rise and suddenly people will get this message. When they do they'll look around for which host provides most support for the features and functions and it'll be you know, James talks about it a lot. You know, we're seeing anchors, numbers dropped, we're seeing Megaphone still going up. But we are seeing a lot of people jumping around from house to house, finding them once they weren't. You know, this week was a milestone for three reasons, actually. So the first one was rss.com, who you mentioned, suddenly, they provide all of their users, their podcast creators with a micro payment Alby wallet and one of their podcasts is suddenly there's something called a split. So a split is basically a programmatic way of saying I've received 1000 SATs from a listener, but actually, there's two hosts on this show. So we get it 5050, right. And it's just automatically done programmatically in the admin. Well, they were the other 50% of this podcast and wow, they were like, we can see now how we can get in the money flow. So that was one thing. So hosts begin to see that actually giving their users wallets and maybe having 1% or 2% of the money that that podcaster receives might be an extra revenue stream. Secondly, rss.com is one of the biggest providers of something called IPFS. Again, I apologize for the terminology, but it stands for the Interplanetary File System. In English that is a distributed file system. Think of the original web Napster, Limewire Skype, it was all a peer to peer distributed file system before web two centralized everything and what we're seeing is this distribution again, going back threads as a distributed platform. Mastodon is a distributed platform, so we are beginning to distribute back out again. Anyway, this week, Adam Curry's new podcast called Boostagram Ball and James's Podnews Daily, put themselves on the IPFS. Net and that meant 20 or 30, people were hosting segments of their podcast. But when you were I listened to it, it magically brought it together as one stream. And what happened was each of these little nodes that were hosting a little part of each of those podcasts was getting a micro payment. So okay, so let's think hosts are now got an alternative way of getting paid with micro payments. People storing content have Adam played Boostagram Ball, this podcast where he had for the first time real time music coming into his podcast, and listeners were paying the artists directly, not the way that Spotify does it where you put music up and then it goes to the licensee and then it gets its distributor and then it goes to Sony and EMI and then eventually the artist gets nothing of nothing of nothing left. This was direct to the artist from the listener as the program played. So one of the artists Ainsley Colette said I made $144 in that show, and from one song played, I made $26 from 60 streaming platforms in the traditional way. So music artists, again, that story will reverberate more people will started to understand that there's better ways of monetizing your content and so we're beginning to see slowly great story of how micro payments actually direct between the creators and listeners is actually much more lucrative for the creator than the current models that exist today. Matt Cundill 34:54 I'm really excited about that because for the last 20 years, you haven't been able to play a song on a podcast and I think a lot of people have noted that, it's one of the things that holds podcasting back as people think a podcast, it's just going to be a lot of talk, well, now we can put some music in it and now we've just solved the problem with micro payments of reimbursing artists. The old model was really simple. If you play a song, we're gonna send you a letter for $10,000. Sam Sethi 35:23 Exactly. Yes. And I have a radio station and we have a PRS license. We have a Ofcom license in this country in the UK. And so I can legally play it in the car, and I can legally play it in shops and whatever and I can broadcast. But we took the shows, turn those into podcasts with music, stain them stuck them up onto Facebook, and they were down in 30 seconds because Facebook went, sorry, no that's a copyrighted piece of music and I go what, no, no, no, there's the license. I've got a license to do this. Yeah, but only in the UK. Okay, well can geo fence me? No, we can't do that. So literally, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, boom, and you're straight back down again. So you can't do it. Matt Cundill 36:04 When it comes to Podcasting. 2.0. I hear lots of great ideas. We can have a transcription tag, geo local. What about going live? And it's like this giant laundry list and I've heard you and James on your show talk about you like things more than James does, and vice versa. But I think with POD fans, you're trying to take the initiative to include it all. I mean, that's a lot. Sam Sethi 36:26 Yeah, we've included 25 of the latest or the newest features. In fact, that's all of them. When I said about creating Podfans, I wanted it to be a great podcasting app 101. You have to consume the right RSS. Allow the user quickly to find what they want and play it that is the end of. Forget about the micro payments, forget about everything else. The core one I want object to visit plays podcast. But the meta data around it is what is going to help people discover more and more podcasts. So the first thing that I really love is you would have seen it in Apple, you know, the the avatar of the host and the guest in the podcast, but that's proprietary to Apple. So the person tagging this open ecosystem within the podcast namespace meant that I could see your face map, I could hear your voice in the podcast, but maybe I've never met you. And so suddenly, now I can put in a face to a name. And maybe you've got three podcasts. So now I can click on your face and suddenly, oh, yeah, there's Matt's three podcast, discovery, I didn't know how the other team out amazing I'll give those a go because I love the one you're on. So the person tag is a really sent political, the transcript target brilliant because transferring the audio into a written word, A is good for accessibility, but B, for others who want to just look up very quickly into a search in the transcription. But again, we're building things like keyword search. And let's say Matt, your name comes up on someone else's podcast that you didn't even know about. You can have an alert that Sunday, hey, my name came up in that what's what's going on, go to the podcast, listen to the audio, bang, you know, like a Google Alert. You might want to take a transcript and create a tag cloud, you might want to take a transcript and do other things with it. So these are not enhancing the podcast. They are wrapping functionality around the podcast to make the podcast more valuable. Matt Cundill 38:26 There was a web function by the way that did that with transcription many, many years ago, but it was just solely web based and of course, it's going to be so nice to have it in an app like yours. I put my name and I found out that Dave Jackson was saying things about me. Sam Sethi 38:39 Hopefully nice things. Matt Cundill 38:41 It was my introduction to him. It was the if it was not nice things. Sam Sethi 38:45 Oh, really? Matt Cundill 38:46 But he was right. So I'll give him that. Sam Sethi 38:49 He's such a nice man. I'm amazed. Matt Cundill 38:51 Yeah, yeah, it was great. For anyone who's not going to be interested in micro payments or starting a wallet and get Alby. What's going to be in Pod fans that they are going to love. Sam Sethi 39:02 If they don't want any of that, then the discovery engine the search engine itself on its own. So most search engines are just title based. Now I can search for the person tags, I can find you I can search by country, I can search by keyword or category. So there's that's one thing. The other thing is you want to create playlists. Great, we've created a really simple way to create a playlist, you just have a button, I want that episode that episode that episode, create a playlist, save it, bang, it's done. Share that with friend, whatever. Again, while you're looking at the transcription, it'll highlight the words as the audio is playing. So again, if you just want to follow along, you can. Those are the sorts of non micro payment, things that we're adding that we think you know, again, just value add services, they don't enhance the podcast, particularly in the sense of we're not making the audio sound better or we're not making the hosts and the guests sound better. That's their job, but we're building things around it. The other thing that I think's really interesting is, you know, we allow you to create clips in real time. So let's say somebody just heard what you and I were talking about, and then want to create a two minute clip and share that on to Twitter, or x as we should call it, or onto Noster onto another platform like LinkedIn, you can do that. It's just there as a tool in front of you. So they're all non monetization, value added tools that are available in pod funds, if you just don't want to pay micropayments. Matt Cundill 40:30 And one of the great things about getting involved with with an app like this is the feedback. I think, for years podcasters have sat at home, and what do you get for feedback? Well, a rating and review on Apple, and maybe somebody will send you an email or tweet at you or something. But there's a whole world inside that app of people who can be liking or talking to you. Sam Sethi 40:50 Yeah, one thing with rating that we've done is you can't rate a podcast unless you've listened to a certain amount of time of it, we find it really weird that you can go into app or not listen to the actual podcast and still rate it. You can go on to Spotify and listen to 10 seconds of the podcast and then rate it. Well, there's no way you can write anything with that little interaction with it. So we've set a bar which says you have to least listen to, I think 10 minutes is the current limit and then after that the rating buttons turn on. But before that you can't rate anything. Matt Cundill 41:24 It's terrible to put pressure on you by asking this question, but when do you think the whole thing will be rolled out? And you can go good, we're done. It's all rolled out, or when you're doing something like this, is it just something that is a continuum. Sam Sethi 41:36 There is a continuum element to it. Again, I was talking to Dave and Adam last night about this brand new technology called value time splits, which is how this music works. So as you're listening to a podcast, something comes in like think of it as like a URL on a website, something comes in on the audio stream, and then suddenly the payments go off, then they come back when the music's finished and it goes back. That's quite complex. But there's many other things you can do with that. So in terms of features, they will always be a continuum in terms of opening the door and not having a waitlist, I think that's more likely the the right answer. I think what you're hinting at is when when will the waitlist be gone? When will we be ready to just have people use the platform, right. And that's really when we have the mobile element ready. And what I love about it is I'm not trying to rush this out the front door. So I think we've got a rock solid platform now for podcasting, but it's desktop only. I think the feedback platform we built is going to be critical for getting people to give us some rock solid suggestions and bug reports. Because you said earlier, every platform, every laptop, every phone is going to be different. So we don't know what other software is there, what breaks is what doesn't. Matt Cundill 42:49 And I'm not putting pressure on you. I'm just trying to get in the mind of- Sam Sethi 42:56 He broke me people. Matt Cundill 42:59 I'm trying to get in the mind of an entrepreneur and somebody who's who's got this idea and wondering, okay, well, what does the runway look like? I wanted to say, I'm very excited for this you've taught me a lot just by talking about this every week on your show about micropayments. And about, you know, Satoshis I didn't really know what they were. So between you and the New Media Show, I've began to come around on this stuff and, and learning and hit a few bumps along the way, which is how I guess we all learn. Sam Sethi 43:26 Yeah and I've got a 93 year old father in law, when COVID hit. We thought how we can actually see this guy, how are we going to make sure that we stay in touch. You know what he learned Zoom, he learned how to turn it on and click and hit the right buttons and make it work and it became second nature. I think people as I go back to my earlier answer, you know, people aren't thinking as a problem. They just in the dark of what the next stage of the web is. And god help us if we can get rid of advertising and we can get rid of all of these things and we can make real money from our fan base. Look, Kevin Kelley was the guy that really inspired me and I don't know if you've read his 1000 true fans blog, but if you haven't, I highly recommend looking it up and reading it. And he simply said if you can get 100 pounds per month paying you 10 pounds a month, there's 100,000 pound business right? If you're Joe Rogan, great, you've got a massive audience sticking out very happy days and guess what Spotify is paying you anyway, a massive amount of money. But most people are on that long tail of podcasting. $25 CPM rates mean you have to have 1000 people. No one's getting that on the longtail but you're still passionate about your podcast, you still would like to make a little bit of money because that pays the hosting costs or whatever. So now if you just say to the, you know, we say on Podfans, look guys, you know, if you realize what we're doing, give us a little bit of money. It's small. So if I said 5151 That's probably 30 cents, right? 40 cents maybe. And that's great and we love it. That's not the point. The point is, it's a gesture of value that you decide to give us because you appreciate what we're doing. And if we roll that up into everybody who listens to the show, then we'll make more than that $25 CPM rate with a smaller audience, but a more engaged audience. Matt Cundill 45:17 So you'd be able to answer this question. If right now I decide that for anybody who sends a boost on this particular episode, how can I split that with you? Sam Sethi 45:27 So very simply, you create me in the splits as a guest. So when you go into your splits, so Okay, let's take a step back in the RSS feed that you have, there is a block called the value tag, block. And inside that you set, if you've set it up, you've set yourself up as the host and the current split may be 100%. So everything goes to you are on this episode, not at the what we call the channel level, the podcast level, but at the episode level, you can go in and put an additional split just for this podcast that says, I want to give Sam 5% or Timpson whatever number you want. And so on the boost that comes in for this episode, what it will do is it look at the rule in effect that's in your RSS for this episode into hey, Matt says 90% goes to him 10% goes to Sam, job done. And I've got both of your wallet addresses the lightning address. And this is this the other thing Matt, that I think again two years ago when I first tried to get my head around this, by the way, I didn't get it when it first started, right. It wasn't a you know, instant Eureka I've got this, this is easy. Now I'm scratching my head houses were what what was this thing? How do you do it? Look, a boy said to you now Matt, what's your email address? You would just reel off Matt at something right? And I'd go great. And I'd go into my email app and I just type out matter whatever. Click a button. I don't go Matt, tell me what your IMAP for addresses. Tell me how you route it. What's your exchange server look like? How do you none of that matters, I just need an address and then magic happens through the capability of technology and routing. Well, now with wallets, my wallet addresses Sam, a get alby.com Yours might be Matt at Alby. I don't know, he may well be something else. But it's something along those lines. What is yours by the way? Matt Cundill 47:21 Is it a shame that I can't tell it to you right now. But it's sitting in the description of this podcast. Sam Sethi 47:25 So it'll become second nature for you to know that though. So you'll say hey, look, if you want to send me some SATs, just send it to Matt and get alby.com people will go to the Chrome plugin, or they'll go to Podfound or go to a Fountain or pod verse or cast automatic or whoever they'll type in your lightning address. That's what it's called not an email address. It's called a lightning address and I just simply say, that's the address, that's the amount I want to send, hit send it and it's gone. I don't need to know your public key and your private key and your node address and all these things. But in the beginning, year or two years ago, that's exactly what I mean. It's no and so we're hiding that complexity. Matt Cundill 48:06 The answer is Mattcundill@getalby.com Sam Sethi 48:10 There you go. I literally could. Well, okay, I'm gonna do that. Okay, just to prove it. Only you will know this, Matt. Matt Cundill 48:17 I've never accepted payment from a guest to be on the show. Sam Sethi 48:20 Right, so my Matt Cun- h double l? Matt Cundill 48:22 C,U,N,D,I,L,L.. Sam Sethi 48:24 I,L,L, @ getalby.com and if I hit continue, and I'm saying I'm gonna give you 1000 SATs it confirmed that has now gone to Matt Cundill@getalby.com and you will see it in your wallet right now. Matt Cundill 48:41 Outstanding. What a world. Sam Sethi 48:43 Yeah nd I think that's what when people see it and the penny drops, people go, oh, my God, did you just do did you just did that and it worked. And I didn't need to know that complexity of everything that happened. But that complexity now is gone. It's hidden. It's under the floorboards. You don't need to understand that. Matt Cundill 49:02 Are you going to Podcast Movement? Sam Sethi 49:03 Sadly, I'm not I'm in Catalonia next week with my family and the Brits tend to take August away. So we tend to go abroad or do something but I will be in LA for Podcasts Evolutions, and I look forward to seeing you there if you're going to be there, Matt. Matt Cundill 49:19 Sam, good luck with Podfans. I'm looking forward to it and happy to give you feedback in exchange for a few Satoshis Sam Sethi 49:25 Thank you very much, Matt. And thank you everyone who's listening try it just go to www.podfans.fm, get on the waitlist. We have people coming on board and yeah, we'd love to find out what people think we may be totally wrong man. Maybe actually barking up the wrong tree you know know. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 49:43 The Sound Off podcast is written and hosted by Matt Cundill, produced by Evan Surminski, edited by Chloe Emond-Lane, social media by Aidan Glassey. Another great creation from the Sound Off Media Company. There's always more at soundoffpodcast.com.

Sue Haas is an experienced media executive, having worked on a wide variety of teams and projects. She was at Blue Ant Media for over 12 years, managing sales operations as a director and digital media as VP and later SVP. This experience has made her a good fit for her new position as President and COO at NLogic, a company providing audience and commercial analysis tools for the TV and radio broadcast industry, media agencies and more. In this episode, Sue talks about the strategies behind multi-platform content distribution, which content should go on which platform and why and the new technologies that are being introduced in the creative world. These things may seem technical and only interesting for the technology ‘geeks’, but this data is important because it's all for you. This information helps the media makers make the media you all want and enjoy! ProTip: Register for NLogic's newsletter to received information on upcoming webinars. _____________________________________________________________________________ Transcription Tara Sands (Voiceover) 0:02 The Sound Off Podcast. The show about podcast and broadcast starts now. Matt Cundill 0:13 One of our longtime supporters on this show is NLogic a relationship that goes back to 2016. They're into TV and radio data, consumer behavior, ad tracking and if you've listened to those host read ads that I've done over the years, you can actually sort of track and hear the evolution of the company. There's an awful lot of data out there and in the end, all we really want to know is what does it mean? Where are we going with this? Did the marketing work? What's the ROY on this? So late last year, David Phillips, who was a regular on this show left NLogic and Sue Haas took over in April. She's been there a short time and I wanted to take a moment today to get to know her thoughts on media today, especially because she spent the last 13 years at Blue Ant working on a number of projects that don't often wind up on traditional television or radio and I thought, hey, let's just make this an episode. So here we go. An uninterrupted conversation, as we get to know Sue Haas, the new CEO of NLogic and we started with her time at Blue Ant. Sue Haas 1:13 So Blue Ant Media I have been there for almost 13 years and I love the company, I love the culture. We are one of the smaller media companies in Canada, traditionally, a broadcaster, but really, over the years been very multi-platform and a big chunk of the business is actually in production, television production and the channel operator part of the business drives significant amount of revenue for the company in Canada and really finances a lot of the original production efforts. It's it's a great company, because there's so many creative people working on different types of projects. As I said, you know, there's television production, but I ran the digital group. So we were creating a short form series for YouTube and Snapchat, we ran several Tik Tok channels, some of them, you know, close to the million follower range. And just speaking of myself, I also oversaw the digital publishing business so our news based websites, sort of companion sites to our print magazine, business and website companion channels to our television networks. And then increasingly, over the years, Blue Ant has been very focused on fast so free advertised streaming television, which was a huge growth area for the company. And I was increasingly part of that more on the how do we get the advertising side of that business to work. If you're not familiar with fast, a lot of the you actually don't need a direct sales team, and the platform's do all the selling, although there are partners that are starting to ask for it in some cases, and insist on you selling X percentage of the inventory yourself. So that was a learning area for blue ant and something that I was involved in, over the last few years. But yeah, I love Blue Ant, Michael McMillon I've worked with back at Alliance Atlantis, actually, in the early 2000s, when he owned that company, and happy to work with him again for so many years. Matt Cundill 3:11 Yeah, I remember that sale of Alliance Atlantis, that was I think, late to close to 2010 in there when that when that sale went through that was made some news I'm based in I'm based in Winnipeg, so that would make news around here with where that company went. Sue Haas 3:27 Yeah and it's forward thinking company, as I said, great staff great culture, and I think pretty well regarded in Canada and internationally. Matt Cundill 3:35 You said multi-platform, and we're probably going to say it like mean if we had a drinking game, that would be our drink. Sue Haas 3:41 Yes. Multi-platform, yes and I have heard a term as I started NLogic multimodal, which is used a lot, which is not a term that I would have used like historically, but multi-platform for me and how we used it at Blue Ant would be traditional linear TV, connected TV, and all its forms including fast and SVOD and BVOD, etc. Website publishing, so running really like an ad based model there, so running ads across websites that are producing large volumes of content as social channels. We also ran as I said, print magazines. We also had, you know, experiential event business. I don't know if you're familiar with the Cottage Life, consumer show in Winnipeg, so we don't go to Winnipeg, but it's huge in Ontario, but 30,000 people come over the weekend to see that in person show. So experiential is also a part of multi-platform at Blue Ant. Matt Cundill 4:36 So when I think of multi-platform, especially with many of the things that you're talking about, it sounds like a lot of work and it sounds like each one of those platforms is going to deliver a little bit of money back on on the advertising. And so how do you put it all together to bundle it up to make it profitable to make it so that we can collect all these what they call the digital dice, but turn those into like some very thick dollars because, oh, we're gonna put this on Tiktok and oh, look, we're gonna stream over here. Oh, look over here another streaming possibility and let's check out the social channels. How do you get all that together and it without, you know having having someone's head blow clean off? Sue Haas 5:15 Yeah, it's great question I would say we don't we don't put it all together in every instance. So not every platform is going to work for every campaign or every show, what I really oversaw was the revenue driving part of the social digital channels and platforms. So especially TV bait, first companies would use social as a marketing tool primarily. So if you were picking a huge show like Game of Thrones, and you're releasing that on linear and then you're putting it on streaming you might use you would use for sure, Tiktok and YouTube etc, to help promote back to those to those earrings. For me, we were creating standalone shows and series on the social channels that earn their own money and we also were marketing arm for the traditional legacy part of the media business, the TV, primarily network channels. But I would to answer your question, we would never, we rarely would use a full 360 cross platform strategy for everything. Occasionally we would do that for really big in the case of a huge release for a really marquee, tentpole show, or if we had a really strong on the ad side, which I also oversaw a really big RFP or or campaign that we were trying to pitch on. And we would put every platform in there just to try to you know, get maximum dollar for that by or maximum like ROI for the client. But definitely every platform is not going to fit the objective for a campaign or show launch in every sense absolutely not. Other the demo is off across those things, or the content just does not resonate in a format. Sometimes taking a 12 episode TV show and cutting it into 15 seconds to promote on Tiktok is just not going to, to work in every instance, especially if the demo and TV is 45 plus. Matt Cundill 6:56 What is NLogic? Sue Haas 6:57 So when I started also disclosure, when I started the job I had I had never heard of NLogic, I'm just going to be honest there. I had certainly heard of Numeris and Numeris was a client of Blue Ant in fact. NLogic was a client of we were client event NLogic to I just the name had never kind of gone across the office. I would think of it if you asked me a few months ago, I've been in the job by the way, less than three months as a software company evolving into a data company, a data first company that's providing data solutions to clients primarily in Canada. And that is something that NLogic will be focusing on moving forward. And I know David, who you know, well my predecessor looked at too, but how can we bring in new forms of data even outside of Numeris, which is our parent company, and provide solutions to the market outside of just the software. Matt Cundill 7:46 So last night, I'm watching the Women's World Cup, aside from being just a little disappointed with the result was a tie, I get the feeling that Nigeria wins 00 was was kind of how I felt. But this is a great time of year for no tools that you have where you can get some actual real time data, I was gonna say, well, I can't wait for you to provide the data a month from now. But a lot of the stuff is really, you're able to deliver it in real time. How important is real time data for your clients? Sue Haas 8:17 I'm still out in market discussing a needs assessment with the clients and getting their feedback on what they're looking for. Specifically, of course, from NLogic as it comes to data and data analysis. I haven't heard a lot about real time data yet. To be honest, what I'm hearing a lot about is campaign tracking, commercial ratings. Matt Cundill 8:59 That puts a lot of pressure on you, you know, for for advertisers, because advertisers really want to know what's working. And so is that something that sort of keeps you up at night to think okay, well, how are we going to be able to provide this and really sort of show proof that the ad worked? Sue Haas 9:14 Yeah, attribution on advertising is a huge issue in the industry overall. And I would say we are looking at a lot of solutions for that. Does it keep me up at night? Not yet. I'm I'm pretty optimistic. I haven't had any sleepless nights yet. Ask me again in a couple of months, I guess. NLogic is a part of the solution and I think a lot of these bigger picture issues in the media industry, which are global not just in Canada really need the buy side and the sales side and the associations like think TV and radio connects and the jack like Numeris and us to work together. I don't know if NLogic can solve these big problems on our own, but I'm definitely out talking to our clients and partners and getting their feedback and and it's early for me to say like, where's the biggest concern right now. And I don't want to say that yet, because I just haven't had a chance to really hear from everyone and really evaluate the market problem. But that is there. I think evaluating campaign performance in real time is clearly one of the concerns I'm hearing. But it's one of several. Matt Cundill 10:18 You're taking this incredible new role and usually the advice that I give to anybody who's starting something new, but I think I think you're in this phase, you have your first 100 days where you really started taking stock of everything, but then there's also what I call the one year that the lap around the track. So here you are, you're taking your lap around the track, you've come around the first bend, and we're going through summer, we're gonna move into fall. I've already called this sort of like the summer of discontent. It could be, you know, Bill C 18. It could be the actor strike, it could be all these things that are really hampering down on media and I know you've worked in all facets. Even earlier on you mentioned, you talked about newspaper websites. Sue Haas 10:18 Magazine websites, but similar. Matt Cundill 10:19 Are we going to be okay, in media? Sue Haas 10:20 I am optimistic. I am generally very engaged in the media industry. Yes, that we're going to be okay to answer your question. For me, there's always been an uphill battle, even if just on the TV side, I think for the last 10 years, and I've worked digital first, for pretty much my entire career, it has been my entire career, and have always heard like, you're going to be the replacement of cable TV and build up your revenue plan and build up the growth strategy. And you know, it never really it still hasn't come to that I think TV advertising is still I don't know this for a fact. But I don't know this like, exactly. But 60 to 70% of the industry still in Canada is is hugely, I mean, on the ad side is still in cable television. And so I think that, it's still going to be a slow move away from that into connected TV and other platforms. I mean, I worry about Bill C, C 18 and the writer strikes as well, but there's always something and I feel like we get through it. People at the end of the day, I feel people want to consume media, we're creating entertainment that people enjoy on their free time. And when I talk to the team, and NLogic, sometimes I try to distill it down to that very basic need. We are a part of an industry that creates TV shows and radio content, and articles and things that people like to watch and listen to, to learn and to laugh and to relax. And that is not going away. So how people consume it and find it and pay for it will always change. But they'll always be media in Canada and will always to always be a need for it. Matt Cundill 12:46 You know, who else is creating all that stuff, is AI. And so I had this question down and how do you look at AI from from where you sit? Sue Haas 12:56 It is growing at a phenomenal pace, I will definitely give AI that. And I'm sort of glad I'm not managing a group of 20 journalists who work on online websites right now, because it is a bit scary of of how efficient and how well AI can create articles online, for example, or radio scripts or whatever it may be. But again, being optimistic with there always being advances in technology, there was an analogy that someone gave to me that I thought was helpful to to get comfortable with AI, where you know, when the dishwasher was invented, it saved everyone a lot of time and created the efficiency in the household. But you still need someone to open it and put the dishes in and take the dishes out. It's not you still need that human interaction with the dishwasher and I like to think of AI in the same way where it can really help us be efficient and focus on more important things. But we're still required to make it to make it work. Matt Cundill 13:56 I love that analogy. And I did two things today on LinkedIn. One of them was I asked for a connection request with you and thank you, by the way for accepting my connection requests. Sue Haas 14:05 Yes. Matt Cundill 14:05 The second thing was I went to create a post for a podcast episode and the first thing that shows up is would you like AI to do this for you? Sue Haas 14:14 Did you? Matt Cundill 14:16 No I didn't. I don't think there's enough AI information to talk about Bryan Goldmark from the Locked On Podcast Network. Sue Haas 14:22 You should give it a try because I had to do it. What did I have to do the other day? I was short on time and I had to provide a bio for a conference that I was attending. I actually just came back from the Cantar World Summit in Buenos Aires, Argentina, which was really amazing experience. First time I've been there. First time I've been at a Cantar Summit and first time I've been to Argentina and actually the first time I've been south of the equator I realized. It gets dark at 4:30 and it's dark at eight when you wake up which is very disorienting coming from somewhere here. But it was amazing and I had to provide a bio and I was course late on it and I did go and use Chat GPT and it was a really nice start. I did go in and I fix it like the dishwasher analogy, of course, but it did save me a lot of time and it was a good, a good starting place. So I do recommend that you at least give it a try. Matt Cundill 15:08 I might try for this episode. Sue Haas 15:10 You're still required in your job it just, it allows you to cut out time for things and focus on more important tasks and projects in your day. Matt Cundill 15:18 What is multi-platform for radio, so there's some streaming, and then there's some podcast and then maybe there's some social, maybe if you put the show on on Facebook, there's this there's a stream there as well. So when we think about, you know, audio, and you know, I'm thinking about inside the radio station, does that really constitute because I think for radio, they've had a lot of trouble over the years trying to monetize the digital numbers they have, they've got very good Facebook pages and great websites and a whole bunch of stuff. But I feel like it's been a bit of a leap, to get them to not give it away for free. And to get the right numbers in order to you know, come up with a multi-platform number to, you know, to sell across a number of things. How do you look at now you've come from the TV side. So but coming over from TV, and visual and video and video streaming? How would you look at the audio side of that? Sue Haas 16:08 How I've always approached multi-platform, I hope I'm not contradicting what I said earlier, is you have to create a voice and a presence on that platform that fits that demo and what that demo is expecting. So what I would never do is take a radio show, and then go and cut it from its format and just chuck it on Tiktok, for example, that's not going to work. If you want to have a presence on Tiktok, that maybe long term grows to let's say, half a million followers, and it starts to drive awareness for your brand or your show. What I would always recommend is a unique standalone approach for that platform that works and resonates with that audience. That takes more time. Of course, it takes more money so you really have to think is it worth it. But it probably will not work. If you just cut down and throw up on the other platform. It does in some cases, like I know some some tick talkers that have taken their content verbatim and put it up on Snapchat, and they grow a pretty strong audience and they're able to make significant revenue on Snapchat just from dropping it on exactly how it is. They don't even change the aspect ratio, it's just go straight up. But in general, the rule of thumb is to not do that it probably won't succeed. And for radio, I would say what is your intent for going multi like cross platform? Multi- platform is why do you want to be on Tiktok or or Facebook or Instagram or YouTube? Is it to promote the over the air listening? Is it to promote online streaming? Like what is your goal? Is it to create revenue standalone revenue on those platforms? If that's the case, and you need to grow high subscriber follower numbers, you need to have a separate strategy, content strategy and plan for each platform. Unfortunately, it's not always efficient. Like I've done it for so many years for so many different shows like YouTube shows that we've tried to just take exactly how they were and put on Snap and put on Tiktok and put on Facebook. Sometimes it does work like I found first natural history shows like nature, sometimes you can do that. But oftentimes, you have to customize for each platform and for radio would be no different, really. There's been some success, I think you would know more than me would taking you know posting on YouTube, for example, I listen to some podcasts on YouTube. That would be an exception, I suppose. Yeah, I don't know. I would say like if you want to use the social channels as a marketing tool, still you have to you have to have a strategy that's that fits that demo and what that demo is looking for. Matt Cundill 18:40 So I find it curious. You say you listen to some podcasts on YouTube, or do you just watch them? Sue Haas 18:45 I listened to them. I don't really watch them. I'll have them on in the background like really some, to be fair, some podcasts that my team created at Blue Ant we owned, I oversaw a brand called Mobile Syrup. I don't know if you are familiar with it. Matt Cundill 18:57 Absolutely. Yeah. Sue Haas 18:58 So that that was a really amazing team that Blue Ant acquired in the fall of 2020 and that fell under under me and they are tech news in Canada, one of the only independents in the country, they're going to really have some issues with with Bill CI8, that does sort of keep me up at night on their behalf. I don't even oversee them anymore it's pretty scary. But we would post all the podcasts on YouTube and I would listen to them. Not watch them the watching to your point like the taping in the studio, I think you have to be a pretty diehard fan to enjoy that. Again, you probably know this better than than me but the stats on just the audio listening of podcasts on YouTube are pretty high. Matt Cundill 19:37 That's amazing. By the way, by the way, when we talk multi-platform and just you know diving into the podcast side, I was gonna I will talk about attribution in just a sec, but a lot of podcasters come and they're like, ah, should I be on YouTube? Should I put it up on YouTube? And I'm like, yes, but maybe only for the reason that it becomes marketing for people discover your show and then they'll go to the odd the audio side of things, and it doesn't really matter where they access to you anyway, the answer is no. So go right ahead, right. Sue Haas 20:05 Yeah. Yeah. Yes, for the marketing, but again, my, in my experience, a lot of people do listen to their podcasts on YouTube. It is one of the top ways to, to hear hear show. Matt Cundill 20:17 We've, we've had this discussion many times on this show before, Signal Hill Insights will obviously come out with a study and they will say 24% of podcasts are discovered on YouTube and the original OG podcasters will go sideways and say, but they're not podcasts because it's just a show or a streaming piece of audio. It doesn't originate from an RSS feed. So but I mean, listen, you're in you're NLogic, and you're, you do the data. And the data says, people have consumed the show here and that it doesn't lie. Sue Haas 20:49 Yeah and you'll find like, fans live and breathe on YouTube and there's many people like that. Those are ones that are going to consume any media on on YouTube. Really, YouTube is just such a huge platform. Matt Cundill 21:10 My father in law is watching TV on YouTube. Sue Haas 21:12 I mean, I watch TV on YouTube, too. I'm a huge YouTube fan, but anyhow, I do love podcasts. The other thing too, I think when you get you get like platform loyalty and then it's hard to break out into these other distribution outlets, or you just don't want to be bothered, you're already on YouTube. So you don't want to jump off and and go to like your Apple Podcast or Spotify or whatever. Matt Cundill 21:35 That is fascinating about platform loyalty. I don't know that there's necessarily been a study about that, but I know, most people will go in to try to give some promotion to maybe their radio show, whatever it is, and you want to get them on Instagram, come over and listen to my podcast over here. Is it easy to get people to leave one place to go to another? Sue Haas 21:56 I'd say no, it is extremely difficult and for talking about the social network, some of them are much better equipped for click through and link off and others Instagram is not good for that. Generally, you want to keep people within that environment. And Facebook's better, YouTube's okay, Tiktok's terrible, you can't even click off Tiktok, really. So yeah, I would say it's very hard to get some people to move from one to the other. That's why back to my previous comment, if you're trying to build a fan base and a loyalty and engagement on a network, the strategy to have that be a link off somewhere else is probably not, it's not going to work for you long term. In most cases, the exception on Instagram would be ecommerce, probably, but it's pretty strong on shopping, Matt Cundill 22:44 I have one hack on Instagram and that's if you share the episode through Spotify, and then send it to your stories, you can get to Spotify in one click, which I think is a great way just to drive your Spotify listening, or just connect them to the show that it's just a nice hack that that Spotify put in. So yeah, if you want to send people to your website, you're probably gonna have a very hard time doing it, but it's so nice when it's just one click. Sue Haas 23:06 Have you checked the stats on it, like are people clicking? Matt Cundill 23:09 Yes. Generally, when I recommend this hack to people, Spotify listening will start to increase and what's the comfortable number for Spotify in podcasting? Well, it's anything over 11% you're punching above the podcast average. So like, again, it doesn't really matter where you listen to the show, we're just happy that you do it. One little podcast question- has it come up yet about the about the lack of attribution. Because whenever I talk to anybody who wants to deal with advertising and podcasts, well, you only have an IP address and you only have a user agent, and I'm not really sure what else we can do with that. So seeing from where you are and what you know about media, is that an obstacle or is it good or bad? Sue Haas 23:51 In my role at NLogic that has not come up to be honest yet. It hasn't been brought up to me directly. The the main issues that I've been facing as I'm having very are not issues I'm facing but then I'm hearing that in my very early conversations are frustration over the the measurement methodology and PPM and diary in the fluctuations and how significantly impact someone's business. That's one of the big things, the difficulty in getting ads up onto radio has come up, especially when it's compared to say running a Facebook ad or a YouTube ad. What else has come up with radio- definitely the the measurement side has been brought up just lower budgets, generally for the industry and being able to quite frankly afford our software. I mean, that comes up quite a bit for me too like I have two kids 13 and 10 year old and have been, you know, pay more attention to to the media that they're consuming and they do not consume. They would consume some radio in the car possibly, but not really and if they were to consume radio at home that we don't really have hardware for them to do it. And so that that's sort of something I've been thinking about, especially if you wanted to bring in younger demos is how are they actually going to listen to it? And I know a lot of conversation is around streaming off the phone. I don't see anyone doing that. So how you actually get access to radio comes up. But attribution? No, I for podcasting, I haven't. I haven't really heard that. At Blue Ant where we did run advertising on podcasting and we would have podcasts together by advertising for our own business, or we would have clients by ads against the podcast that we created and ran, the major issue was on just reach and having a wider audience, which was always really, really hard to get to get a big enough volume to get enough of ad buy around it, because we just couldn't get it high enough downloads and get a high enough audience. And as I was in charge of launching new digital content projects, so it might be video format, or it might be on video format and social like Tiktok show or YouTube show or snapshot like reminding staff shows and podcasts as well. It was podcasts were tough, because the revenue plan around podcast was a lot more challenging than, say, a Snapchat Discover show. It's much easier to make money quickly where a podcast is, as a content owner, pretty challenging. I would say, to be honest, I don't have I have all the podcasts we launched at Blue Ant, which wasn't a ton, but challenging to make money on them. Matt Cundill 26:25 You mentioned that a lot of people are concerned about the speed and the time it takes to get a radio ad from the copy to the airwaves and this came up I think over a year ago at the radioactive conference in Toronto, and somebody mentioned on stage and I went, 'really?' Does it really take that, what happened radio used to be the one that could get this out the fastest and now it's really being challenged by it takes a while to get the spot on the air. What that I miss? Have I been locked away for 10 years? What happened? Sue Haas 26:56 I don't know either yet, Matt to be honest, but I have heard that. So it's something that's sort of on my list, my list of things to look into and investigate back with and logic team. But I don't know, I don't know. But it is it is an issue that the industry is facing. Matt Cundill 27:10 I've heard it a few times and I'm very surprised to hear it. Maybe I'm showing my age. I mean, maybe I might be aging out of this. Sue Haas 27:17 So switching topics altogether. One of the things I've been in a few radio competence, like radio days, I was at the spring, which was part of Canadian Music Week, which was great. One of the things I'm most interested in with radio is some of the the innovation in the car and with some of the smart cars coming out and the interactive dashboards that are coming out and ways that they can have some art and lyrics and search for for your radio channels, which is a lot more sophisticated than what is in the car dashboard. today. I'm just thinking of how do people actually discover an access radio. And I do think that the that that is limited, especially as you go down and age, as I already said, because even if my own kids and their friends, even if there was a show that really resonated with them, I don't really don't know how they would watch it. Eventually they'll get a license and drive a car, I assume maybe not in Toronto, but that is definitely a way to consume radio. I've never worked on radio before it's radio and newspapers are the two media forms I've really never had the opportunity to work on. So I'm very excited to to learn more about the industry. But I feel like the accessibility for radio is a problem. I don't know if you find that. Matt Cundill 28:27 I think it's okay for me because I can find it on my ALEXA. I've got three of them. I can ask for at any time. You're right. I will never listen to a radio station on a phone, but I will plug it into my car play and listen to largely iheart radio stations off their app so I can listen to WKTU. I can listen to stations from Los Angeles as I drive and go places I don't need to listen to my local station. I can just choose any one of the ones out there radio player Canada's also available to me, um, through the app. So yes, I mean, I think it's as accessible as it used to be, but it has to go up in competition with the podcast that I'm really more interested in listening to right now. Or perhaps another piece of audio. I actually will often ask on my on my smart speaker just to play 107.1 The Peak, which is a station on a White Plains, New York. I just happen to enjoy the music and I still think there's joy for having music curated for you. Sue Haas 29:26 Yeah, no, me too. I'm just thinking of as generations that don't grow up with radio playing in the house or being aware of what stations are on the dial, and to stream all their music and search all their music on demand, how they're coming to the appreciation of that. I'm just not sure. Matt Cundill 29:45 By the way, shout out to Fred Jacobs, who gave that presentation at Radio Days North America on the car dash and talking about some of the importance of at all you'd have to refresh my memory in that session. He talks a little bit about advertising but maybe not putting the advert icing on the on the dashboard that there was some pushback with people who had tried to use you know, put a Burger King as part of their their dash display. Sue Haas 30:10 Yeah, I don't know if it was that session, I was looking at the Xperio one. That was the one and his name is escaping me now, but he did the same presentation at VCAB in Vancouver a few weeks previous, that was the one I was referring to and actually, we're sort of discussing with him any opportunities to work with and logic, they collect a lot of proprietary data from the car OEMs, the car manufacturers and so so we're having, you know, early days discussions with them, but that was the presentation I was referring to. Matt Cundill 30:40 which was the one I missed. How did I miss seeing you at this event? Sue Haas 30:43 I don't know. I mean, I probably saw you and didn't recognize you. Because I'm still meeting so many people. I was there I was definitely there. I was in most of the sessions are some of them were at the same time. But I did try to hit all of them. Matt Cundill 30:55 Yeah, I've got some regret too. Because I mean, there was a couple of sessions I missed. I was like, oh, there's video afterwards. Now there's no video so darn. The next time we do this, do you want to do this on YouTube? Sue Haas 31:07 I mean, sure, we could post it on YouTube and I'm happy to do that. I would love to meet again later on. Once I've, you know, had a few more months and really have, you know, thought through some of these market problems more with with clients and been discussing with the team or the team, by the way, and logic is amazing. That's one of the real highlights of the job for me so far. We had a little social event on Wednesday up at Sunnybrook Park, which is a big park in Toronto on the north end and several new employees were there. So meeting them for the first time. We have a fairly big engineering team so over half the staff are engineers. I think people don't realize that about NLogic. We do build software and proprietary software. Yeah, they're a great team and I'm learning a ton every day but them and the clients and our partners so I'd love to meet again when I'm a little bit further into the job down the road. Matt Cundill 31:57 Thanks for taking the time to do this today. I know it's you're a few months in on this and still doing that first lap around the track but hope you're enjoying it. Sue Haas 32:04 Yeah, thanks, Matt. This has been great. Tara Sands (Voiceover) 32:06 The Sound Off Podcast is written and hosted by Matt Cundill, Produced by Evan Surminski, edited by Chloe Emond-Lane, social media by Aidan Glassey. Another great creation from the Sound Off Media Company. There's always more at soundoffpodcast.com Transcribed by https://otter.ai