Shownotes
In this episode of the School of Podcasting (episode 949), we get some great insights from media research expert Tom Webster. With a focus on optimizing podcast content and strategy, Tom and Dave explore common pitfalls that podcasters face, particularly the importance of engaging content from the outset. They discuss practical tips on improving podcast narrative and editing, handling advertiser concerns, and leveraging audience feedback to refine your podcast. Whether you're a seasoned podcaster or just starting, this episode provides valuable lessons on creating captivating content that resonates with listeners and satisfies advertisers. Don't miss the unique strategies and actionable advice that could transform your podcast into a must-listen show.
About Tom Webster
Tom Webster is a partner at Sounds Profitable, dedicated to setting the course for the future of audio. He has thirty years of experience in streaming, podcasting, audiobooks, terrestrial radio, and everything else that we stick in our earballs. In his previous work, with Edison Research, Webster was the co-author of the annual Infinite Dial® study, the longest-running study of consumer media habits since 1998, as well as the Share of Ear® and Edison Podcast Metrics studies. With Sounds Profitable, his body of work includes dozens of the most influential reports in podcasting, and he is one of the most widely cited audio researchers in the world.
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Mentioned In This Episode
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The Audience Is Listening: A Little Guide to Building a Big Podcast Book
Tom's Webster's Website for the Book
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Transcripts
Today on episode number 949 of The School of
Speaker:Podcasting, I've been dying to do this interview. The one and
Speaker:only Tom Webster talking about his book, The
Speaker:Audience is Listening, a little guide to building a
Speaker:big podcast. And I also ask him a little bit about
Speaker:brand safety. Let's start the show. The School of
Speaker:Podcasting with Dave Jackson.
Speaker:Podcasting Sense 2,005. I am your
Speaker:award winning hall of fame podcast coach, Dave Jackson, thanking
Speaker:you so much for tuning in. If you're new to the show,
Speaker:this is where we help you plan, launch, and grow your
Speaker:podcast. Wanna monetize it? Yeah. We can do that too.
Speaker:Everything is out at our website, school of podcasting.com.
Speaker:Use the coupon code listener when you sign up for either a
Speaker:monthly or yearly subscription. And, of course, that comes with
Speaker:a 30 day money back guarantee.
Speaker:There is a new service online that I'll be
Speaker:telling you about a little later. A lot of people think, I don't
Speaker:know, it's the bee's knees. And I'm here to say, you gotta
Speaker:be careful with it. But right now, here's my talk with Tom
Speaker:Webster. I've said the audience is
Speaker:listening about, I don't know, 10, 12 times on my show. It really is
Speaker:required reading. If you're a member of the school of podcasting, it's it's one of
Speaker:those books that's like, go ahead and read it. If you don't like it, I
Speaker:will buy it back because I will give it to somebody else. It's really that
Speaker:good of a book. And so, I'm very happy to have the one and
Speaker:only from Sounds Profitable and many other things in podcasting. The one
Speaker:and only Tom Webster. Tom, thanks for coming on the show. Dave, you're you're so
Speaker:kind, and you've been so kind to mention the book as as much as you
Speaker:have, really. That's, maybe maybe more than you should excessively. So
Speaker:thank you for that. Writing a book is a lot of
Speaker:work. I know I've got my book. I'm working on the audio version.
Speaker:So what inspired Tom to write this book? Because
Speaker:it's really, really good book. I'm so grateful for that,
Speaker:David. You know, I wrote this book because I have all this weird experience,
Speaker:and I didn't want it to you know, when I eventually retire to podcast
Speaker:island or on the on whatever, you
Speaker:know, floating device that podcasting has enabled me to buy, I didn't want
Speaker:this knowledge to kind of disappear. And and it really it comes from a
Speaker:a, you know, background in in media research, a background in radio, a background
Speaker:in entertainment, and all these other things. And, you know, I've had
Speaker:the privilege in a 30 year career of being able to
Speaker:work, you know, sort of behind the scenes on audience development for some pretty
Speaker:pretty big shows, both in podcasting but also in radio. I've done
Speaker:research on The Howard Stern Show. I've done research for, you know, Elvis Duran, who's
Speaker:a very big syndicated morning show host across America, and
Speaker:and what struck me was how much of the,
Speaker:you know, literature material, helpful advice that's out there for
Speaker:podcasting about the mechanics of doing a
Speaker:podcast, right, the equipment and
Speaker:formats and things like that, but not enough about how to understand
Speaker:an audience. And I wanted to do the best I could to kind of
Speaker:correct that balance because I can guarantee you, you know, when Elvis
Speaker:Duran steps into the studio or or Ira Glass steps into his
Speaker:closet to record with a blanket over his head or whatever, He's not
Speaker:thinking about the equipment, you know, or what
Speaker:platform he's going to they're gonna record on. That's not what they're thinking about. They're
Speaker:thinking about their audience, and I wanted to put the focus squarely on that. So
Speaker:for the brand new podcaster, what would be your advice? For
Speaker:the brand new person, I would get very, very clear on
Speaker:who you're for. Right? And it's not I want to talk about
Speaker:this. You don't get the benefit of that unless you're already John
Speaker:Grisham, and you're writing your 68th book. I wanna write a book
Speaker:about Christmas. Okay. We're gonna give you a pass because of the
Speaker:Pelican Brief or whatever. You don't you don't get that pass necessarily. So before
Speaker:you get to, I have an idea and I want to write about this, the
Speaker:thing you want to do is not necessarily the thing people want to hear. And
Speaker:that's not to discourage you from making your art. But I do think you
Speaker:need to be very clear on, alright, if I'm going to do this, who is
Speaker:it for? And the answer is not men 25 to
Speaker:54 because men 25 to 54 have very little in
Speaker:common with each other. You have to get a lot more specific than that. Can
Speaker:you imagine the exact human name, rank,
Speaker:serial number, maybe somebody in your life that you're making this show for,
Speaker:and then make that show. Right? Make a show for that
Speaker:human, that individual single human. Make 6 or 7 of
Speaker:them, put them under your bed, and think about it for a while. And I
Speaker:think, you you know, this culture with the this sort of cult of
Speaker:entrepreneurialism and and things like that and the, you know, all the things that we
Speaker:tell ourselves about you know, the Jeff Bezos's of the world and
Speaker:the Elon Musks and the Richard Branson's and the Steve Jobs's and all
Speaker:that. Well, they're outlier humans. They have been
Speaker:able to win by ignoring popular opinion and just moving forward.
Speaker:Most of people are not gonna have that, and I think it's
Speaker:not enough to to just ship it, to just
Speaker:iterate in public because you are producing an entertainment that people will
Speaker:give exactly one shot. I always recommend do a bunch of
Speaker:shows, stick them under your bed, go back to them later. Could they
Speaker:have been better? If the answer is yes, then make them better.
Speaker:From the get go, I just wouldn't release something that you're not proud
Speaker:of. Could you can release something that you know could be better as your skills
Speaker:get better. But if you could have fixed it yourself, maybe
Speaker:do that before you release it because it there's just you know, your
Speaker:competition isn't another Cubs podcast. Your competition is Netflix. Your
Speaker:competition is, you know, the new David Gilmore album. Your
Speaker:competition could be silence. And so when you're first starting
Speaker:out, one of the things that can make your show
Speaker:set apart from other brand new shows is, as Tom said,
Speaker:think about it a little bit. Let it sit under the bed. Get some feedback.
Speaker:And then one of the big chapters in the book is
Speaker:all about editing. There's 3 levels of editing, I
Speaker:think. I you know, level 1 is I don't edit at all
Speaker:because I'm authentic. Well, authenticity,
Speaker:yeah, authenticity means different things to different people. If I'm being authentic,
Speaker:it's that I want to present the very best side of myself and
Speaker:my ideas for my audience so that they will be understood in the
Speaker:way that I want them to be understood. And for me not to do that
Speaker:is to be inauthentic. So yeah. But, you know, I think, you know,
Speaker:level 0 is no editing at all. Level 1 is where I think a lot
Speaker:of podcasters are at, and that is, you know, let's remove the cough noises
Speaker:and the ums and the ahs and someone stumbled and said, can you back up
Speaker:and all that? And that's sort of hygiene level editing. And sometimes your podcast
Speaker:needs a podoscopy. But advanced editing is this.
Speaker:And I think, really, the podoscopy that I talk about
Speaker:is a very careful and detailed listening
Speaker:back to one of your shows and getting it completely
Speaker:human transcribed. Every every
Speaker:every hiccup, get it completely transcribed. Read through it and take a
Speaker:red pen to it. Circle paragraphs and say, you know what? That should have been
Speaker:before this paragraph. This would have been explained so much
Speaker:better if I'd have asked this first. Well, you can do that in
Speaker:editing because the job is to create an entertainment. It's to
Speaker:create a narrative arc. It's to create something that from start to finish
Speaker:answers the next question that the listener had, and you have the opportunity to
Speaker:do that with editing. That's a lot of work for people. A lot of people
Speaker:are gonna say, I don't have the time to do that. I don't have the
Speaker:desire to do that or whatever, and that's totally fine. Don't do it. But
Speaker:it is the path to a larger audience. That's you know, make no question about
Speaker:it, is doing the is doing that work. And it's funny how everybody
Speaker:says, oh, my content is fine. I saw someone in a
Speaker:Facebook group saying, hey. How can I grow my audience? And,
Speaker:look, we all start wherever we start. But I listened to the
Speaker:show, and the first two minutes was the one cohost was
Speaker:complaining they had a cold and they had a sore throat, and then
Speaker:the other, cohost went into some other tale.
Speaker:And I look. I'm no prude. They dropped a bunch of f
Speaker:bombs that made, some adult jokes that weren't exactly funny, but that
Speaker:was the first five minutes of the show, and that's one of the
Speaker:areas that Tom feels a lot of people just blow it. The first
Speaker:5 minutes of a podcast. And I think podcasters of all
Speaker:sizes are guilty of a lot of throat clearing in those 5 minutes.
Speaker:And that's not how a great TV show that you watch starts.
Speaker:That's not how a great movie that you enjoy starts. It doesn't start with the
Speaker:actors talking about what they had for dinner last night. Alright. Now let's get into
Speaker:the script. That doesn't happen. And equally with the largest
Speaker:podcasters, nothing irritates me more than, you know and I'll
Speaker:I'll throw one out here. I listened to the Bill Simmons podcast, and
Speaker:the first 4 to 5 minutes of it are ads. Well, your favorite
Speaker:TV show doesn't do that. Your favorite TV show starts with content. It
Speaker:starts with hook, then some ads. It does not start
Speaker:immediately with the thing you absolutely did not tune in for, whether that's
Speaker:an ad or extraneous content that isn't your topic. And it's
Speaker:people's time is so valuable that it just it it it
Speaker:literally pains me when I hear podcasters of any size waste
Speaker:it. For me, Conan O'Brien, I like many of the
Speaker:guests he has on his show. I think he does good interviews, but I
Speaker:have to skip 7 minutes. And sometimes that's not
Speaker:enough to actually get to the interview. And you can't
Speaker:use those big shows as examples for stuff like that. Like, you know, if you
Speaker:type well well, Conan O'Brien does it. Okay. Step 1, already
Speaker:be Conan O'Brien. Yeah. That's gonna take a little while
Speaker:to do. Now the last thing, if we think about this, we
Speaker:have put a couple episodes under the bed. We let them
Speaker:sit, then we got them out. We did a little podoscopy on
Speaker:them. How do we know when we're done? How do we
Speaker:know when it's good enough? Yeah.
Speaker:That's a that's a really, really good question. I mean, I I think for that,
Speaker:you know, you really do need to get some advice. And, you know, look,
Speaker:writers workshops stuff all the time. You know, there are all kinds of
Speaker:systems and applications and and methods out there for writers workshops, and I'm a big
Speaker:fan of podcast workshops. I think getting their opinion in workshops, and I'm a big
Speaker:fan of podcast workshops. I think getting their opinion and their input into the process
Speaker:as much as you possibly can is going to make it better. And,
Speaker:again, that doesn't mean that you are giving up your vision or your road map.
Speaker:And as a lifelong media researcher,
Speaker:I think research is often blamed for things that it doesn't do. I think what
Speaker:asking for people's opinions even at the basic level of, quote, unquote,
Speaker:research, it at least gives you the guardrails of
Speaker:what not to do. Don't turn that far to the right. Don't turn that
Speaker:far to the left. But in between those rails, that's where you can make your
Speaker:art. And I think knowing both of those things is super valuable. If you wanna
Speaker:get the book, I'll have a link in the show notes. Go out to school
Speaker:of podcasting.com/949, or just visit
Speaker:Tom's website for the book, audience is listening book.com.
Speaker:But before he left, I had a couple things I wanted to ask Tom that
Speaker:he kinda threw out there. He worked with Howard Stern. I was dying to know
Speaker:what he did for The Howard Stern Show. I was studying the audience, and I
Speaker:was you know, a lot of it was Howard has always created
Speaker:controversy, and a lot of it was how wide are those
Speaker:feelings? Is this a a noisy minority,
Speaker:or is he really screwing up? And that was the thing that, you know, syndicators
Speaker:and and local affiliates really wanted to know. And, you know,
Speaker:I can tell you that the, you know, the FCC investigates
Speaker:when for for AM FM radio. The FCC investigates every single
Speaker:complaint as if it were a a bomb being dropped. And
Speaker:I think over, one stretch of time, there were something like 233
Speaker:complaints against Howard Stern, and 200 of them were from the
Speaker:same person. And so it looks like it's like shark attack. If you
Speaker:if if there's 2 shark attacks at a beach, then don't go to that beach.
Speaker:It's a shark beach. Yeah. Okay. But, you know, the thing about Howard
Speaker:and why Howard has been and continues to be so successful, you know,
Speaker:his notoriety may be around controversial things that have been
Speaker:said. Howard Stern is one of the 2 or 3 best interviewers on the
Speaker:planet. He has the ability to immediately disarm a
Speaker:guest and immediately get them to share things that they never would
Speaker:have dreamed they would have been sharing in an interview show, and that's a gift,
Speaker:and that's genius, and that's skill. And since Tom works in what I
Speaker:call the advertising bubble, right, there are different bubbles in podcasting,
Speaker:and Tom works with these big agencies and giant shows
Speaker:around the advertising market. And so I wanted to ask
Speaker:him because so many advertisers are worried
Speaker:about buying advertising and podcasting because somebody might say booger,
Speaker:to quote WKRP. And so why can't a podcaster
Speaker:at the beginning of his episode just say, hey. The following views and
Speaker:opinions are not necessarily, those that are shared by their
Speaker:sponsors, and here was his answer. What you are establishing here is
Speaker:not a legal precedent. You are acting in the court of public opinion.
Speaker:And I think I'll I'll say this about brand safety and brand suitability because I
Speaker:hear it a lot from our partners. We have many of our content producing partners
Speaker:who who produce true crime content. And they hear from
Speaker:advertisers, I don't want my brand associated with murder. Right? I don't want,
Speaker:you know, murder brought to you by Toyota. Toyota, drive to your
Speaker:murder. That, I think, is dramatically overstated
Speaker:unfairly in podcasting because those same advertisers, you
Speaker:know, watch any network news broadcast, watch any, you
Speaker:know, either police procedural show like, you know, NCIS
Speaker:or Law and Order or things like Dateline NBC or, you know, any kind
Speaker:of true crime thing on TV. They're brought to you by insurance companies and
Speaker:pharmaceuticals and financial services. They don't seem to have those issues on TV.
Speaker:You know, I think that that those things are more a function of
Speaker:skeptical buying public than any specific
Speaker:objection to to to questionable content. Merely giving a
Speaker:disclaimer does not let you off the hook. And then he let me know
Speaker:one thing that's going on inside of ad agencies. Here's the
Speaker:thing, Dave. The number one goal of 99%
Speaker:of media buyers, brand teams at agencies, and so on, they have they
Speaker:all share the same goal. So don't get fired. And one of the reasons why
Speaker:this book is so good, yes, Tom works with big agencies.
Speaker:However, never forget You know, I may earn a living
Speaker:by partnering with, you know, with big podcasting. Right? With the larger
Speaker:networks and things that are our partners, it sounds profitable. But, you know, my
Speaker:feet are also squarely with the indies. I've been a podcaster myself since the
Speaker:mid 2000. And some of the things that I talk about there
Speaker:are lessons for big and small. And that's what makes the book
Speaker:great. Again, the website for the book, audience
Speaker:is listening book.com. I'll have links in the show notes.
Speaker:Thanks, Tom, for coming on the show. I deeply appreciate it. Dave, an honor. You're
Speaker:a legend. Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker:Couple things that really stood out from this is
Speaker:I don't think I'm that crazy when it comes to editing. I really do just
Speaker:kinda level 1 stuff. The thing I noticed if you notice, we started
Speaker:off with me kinda live with Tom, and then I switched
Speaker:formats. Can you do that? Hey. It's my show. Yeah. I switched to a
Speaker:narrative style podcast. You know why? It wasn't a bad
Speaker:interview, but I I've known Tom over the years,
Speaker:and I kept just saying something and not asking
Speaker:a question. And so I went in and listened
Speaker:to some of the questions I did ask and listened to the answer. One of
Speaker:the questions you didn't hear was, how long ago did you write the
Speaker:book? Because does it matter? Like, would you buy the book if it
Speaker:was a year old versus 4 years old? No. I'm telling you right now,
Speaker:it's a really good book. So I took that out. And when
Speaker:it comes to the opening of your show, I love the
Speaker:line from my cohost of the podcast
Speaker:review show, Eric k Johnson. You can find it at podcasttalentcoach.com.
Speaker:He says nobody's getting on a bus without knowing where it's
Speaker:going. And so the intro of your show
Speaker:should be welcome to the blah blah show and explain what that's
Speaker:about. So welcome to the School of Podcasting where I help you plan, launch,
Speaker:grow, and if you want to monetize your show. And then
Speaker:explain what today's show is about, today's episode is about,
Speaker:and then get to that as quickly as possible. That's really
Speaker:it's not that hard of a recipe.
Speaker:And Tom calls it throat clearing where we're just like,
Speaker:I'm getting ready to get ready. And I loved his point
Speaker:about you don't see that on TV. You kinda see
Speaker:it in movies. And what I mean by that is I am one of
Speaker:the weird people that when I do go to the movies, and I don't go
Speaker:that often, I I go to see the trailers.
Speaker:But he's saying when the movie starts, you don't see
Speaker:them chit chatting. And I always say, put the
Speaker:chitchat. Hey. What you've been up to there, squirmy?
Speaker:Oh, well, you know, Nobles, I've been doing
Speaker:this. Well, put that at the end where your superfans are still
Speaker:listening. You really only have a
Speaker:chance to make a you know, to get your hooks into them to where they
Speaker:go, well, I wanna hear more at the beginning.
Speaker:And it is kinda sad that there are apps. I'm right now
Speaker:playing with Podcast Guru, and this might be
Speaker:the app because it's got my favorite, which is a smart
Speaker:playlist, where I can say, hey. When there's a new episode
Speaker:from this health related show, put it in my health playlist.
Speaker:I can have it download stuff. I can program what
Speaker:speed I wanna listen to at, and it has the whole podcasting 2 point o
Speaker:streaming thing. Although, I will say that right now, the
Speaker:streaming satoshi things is kind of on pause unless you're using
Speaker:truefans.fmorfountain.fm.
Speaker:And so the feature
Speaker:that more and more apps are putting in, Overcast,
Speaker:Podurama, and now Podcast Guru, they make it
Speaker:so that when you hit play on a podcast, you can skip Truefans,
Speaker:by the way, truefans.fm. You can skip x amount of minutes
Speaker:to get to the meat and potatoes. And I just
Speaker:don't think that's the way to hook somebody in
Speaker:by bombarding them with stories about your cat and
Speaker:advertising. Think of your title of your
Speaker:episode as a promise and get to that as soon
Speaker:as possible. If you wanna hear more about this, I
Speaker:do have a show. Yeah. I only do it when people pay me
Speaker:for it. It's at podcast rodeo show dot com where I grab
Speaker:a podcast and see how long I can hang on, and you will hear
Speaker:people blow their first impression over and over
Speaker:and over. Now if you I do have multiple ways. If you're looking for
Speaker:feedback, I've got multiple ways of doing it. There's the
Speaker:podcast rodeo show. There's the podcast hot seat.
Speaker:That's where you get a free month at The School of Podcasting when you
Speaker:order basically me to look at your episode and your
Speaker:website and give you feedback. And while you're at The School of Podcasting,
Speaker:you get unlimited consulting. Now if you want
Speaker:more than one opinion and what an opinion it is, you can have
Speaker:myself and Eric k Johnson, who I mentioned earlier, the podcast talent
Speaker:coach. We do a show called the podcast review show, where, again, we
Speaker:look over an episode, and we look over your
Speaker:website. We bring you on live to kinda go over
Speaker:what you were thinking, what's the the brand vision
Speaker:of your show, and kinda help you polish it up a little bit. So
Speaker:if you're looking for feedback on your show, we've got you
Speaker:covered. And over the almost 20 years now that
Speaker:I've been podcasting, I notice 2 things that
Speaker:go hand in hand. A person says, I'm trying to
Speaker:grow my audience. And when you ask them, did you get someone not
Speaker:named mom or somebody that you're not related to to listen
Speaker:to your show and give you constructive feedback? The answer is
Speaker:always, oh, no. I don't think
Speaker:that's a coincidence. I really don't. And that's something
Speaker:you might want to consider even if you've been doing it for
Speaker:4 years. I see a lot of low hanging fruit. Now another
Speaker:mistake I'm gonna tell you about right after this.
Speaker:When you are talking about a service you use so
Speaker:let's say you're using Patreon. You shouldn't be
Speaker:telling people, oh, go to patreon.com/davejackson.
Speaker:You should be saying go to ask the podcast coach.com/awesome.
Speaker:Why? Because I control that website.
Speaker:And one of the things that when you first launch your
Speaker:podcast, you wanna put links to
Speaker:your show on places like Apple and Spotify
Speaker:and Amazon and such. And there have been a
Speaker:number of websites that have popped up. And one right now is
Speaker:getting a a fair amount of people talking about, and that is episodes.fm.
Speaker:It's a handy site. Nathan is the guy behind it.
Speaker:And you can go there, search for your show, and it will give you
Speaker:links to your show on Apple and Spotify and about
Speaker:50 other websites. Now what I don't wanna hear people
Speaker:do well, it's your show, but I wouldn't do this. Episodes.fms/whatever.
Speaker:School of podcasting. Because right now, episodes.fm
Speaker:is not charging anything. And I have noticed, again, in my
Speaker:years of doing this, that free is not a good business model.
Speaker:So if you're going to do that, do your
Speaker:website.com/follow, which is what I do,
Speaker:except I point to Podgagement. And then the other
Speaker:thing I do is I have a page, school of
Speaker:podcasting.com/subscribe. And that's typically what I
Speaker:recommend. You want that page on your
Speaker:website or a domain that you
Speaker:control. Because if you were to
Speaker:share school of podcasting.com/follow,
Speaker:I really don't get any Google juice from that because it just says, oh,
Speaker:that website's really over there on Podgagement. So I'm not
Speaker:getting any SEO from that. So I always recommend putting the
Speaker:links on your website, have it some sort of easy
Speaker:to remember address like slash follow.
Speaker:And now that I work for PodPage, I
Speaker:wanna point out something else that I went, oh, you might wanna pay attention to
Speaker:that. Because with PodPage, you can go into settings
Speaker:and then go into I believe it's podcast player links or
Speaker:something of that nature. And you can put the link
Speaker:to your show on Apple and Spotify, and it does exactly what I
Speaker:just said. It actually makes a slash follow page, and it's on your
Speaker:website. So it reinforces your brand,
Speaker:and it makes it super easy for people to listen on whatever platform.
Speaker:But then you're like, ah, I gotta go get the link to my show on
Speaker:Spotify, which isn't hard for the record. You search for your show,
Speaker:hope that you can find it, and then there's a the 3 little buttons
Speaker:that you see, you know, the 3 little dots. You click on those and copy
Speaker:the show link, put it into your website, and there you
Speaker:go. Well, you might go, oh, you know what? I can just get my links
Speaker:from this episodes.fm place. And that sure looks
Speaker:like you could. But here's the thing. When you search for
Speaker:your show and you find it, the
Speaker:link you are actually top, copying and this is
Speaker:not a, you know, sinister thing
Speaker:that the owner of episodes.fm is doing.
Speaker:But when you go there, you type in your show like, oh, there's all my
Speaker:links. Well, here's the thing. The link to my show on Apple
Speaker:from episodes.hafem is episodes.fm/launch,
Speaker:question mark show equals ID, which is my Apple
Speaker:ID, 8365-8679, whatever it
Speaker:is, at platform equals Apple, which will work
Speaker:as long as episodes.fm, a
Speaker:free service, is around. So
Speaker:if you wanna use episodes.fm, a, it is super
Speaker:simple. However, I would
Speaker:say find the links yourself, put them on your
Speaker:website to help reinforce your brand, and
Speaker:boost your SEO. Now, like I said, I use school of
Speaker:podcasting.com/follow to point people at
Speaker:my Podgagemens, site with the links there. At
Speaker:least that's a, you know, URL that I own.
Speaker:I am not getting any SEO from that. So make up your
Speaker:mind which one you want. There are multiple ways of doing it. You could point
Speaker:people at, you know, any of these sites. Their Podlink was another
Speaker:one back in the day. You can use those. Just realize
Speaker:you're sneezing away your SEO. And like I said, you want to
Speaker:get links that are the link to those platforms,
Speaker:not something in the middleman. Another
Speaker:service I've talked about with not a lot of, well, I
Speaker:just didn't like it, is Listen Notes. And
Speaker:somebody brought up a point, and I went, well, yeah, that
Speaker:does become something you could use it for. So I've somewhat
Speaker:changed my opinion on it. I'll explain why right after
Speaker:this. The school of podcasting.
Speaker:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Alright. The following is just an opinion.
Speaker:But if you're talking to someone and they go, well, I'm a top
Speaker:0.5% podcaster at
Speaker:listen notes. And if you're new to the show, the reason why that's
Speaker:kinda bunk is Listen Notes compares you
Speaker:to 100 of thousands of podcasts.
Speaker:Many of them like, congratulations. You're beating that show about
Speaker:Tiger King from 2020. Yeah. I hope so. My
Speaker:buddy, Steve Stewart, had a show that was ranking, I believe, in the
Speaker:top 5 or 10%, and he hadn't put out an episode
Speaker:in 7 years. So if someone, in my opinion,
Speaker:quotes their listen notes stats as a way
Speaker:to validate their,
Speaker:I don't know, podcastness. I think I'm gonna make up a word there. I
Speaker:think that's bunk, for lack of a better phrase. It's just like, okay.
Speaker:Congratulations. You've you've beaten something, you know, that show
Speaker:from 2,011 about whatever.
Speaker:Yeah. Congrats on that. So that's I've I've always kind of
Speaker:cringed. I I actually have friends that do that. I'm like, because to
Speaker:me, they know that. If if they're worth
Speaker:their weight in in podcasting consulting, they should know
Speaker:that status is bunk. It's
Speaker:and yet if they still use it, that means either a, they're just gonna use
Speaker:it because it's marketing. And, you know, marketing's kinda lying or
Speaker:or just kinda politely pulling the wool over people's eyes.
Speaker:And I'm like, I nope. Sorry. But
Speaker:somebody did go, couldn't you use listen notes for this?
Speaker:Then I went, well, yeah, you could. So what
Speaker:is that? And I still think this is not a a great idea, but
Speaker:I I've switched my opinion on well, yep. You could use listen notes
Speaker:for that. And these are people that are trying to get booked
Speaker:on big shows. I wanna get booked on the top shows of
Speaker:podcasting and, you know, money will fall from heaven.
Speaker:Yeah. Okay. So even though the way they rate
Speaker:shows is is flawed, It
Speaker:is consistent. So if you wanted to see
Speaker:what the biggest shows were in your field,
Speaker:you could use that. Just realize that I
Speaker:would not put in my marketing materials, I've
Speaker:appeared on a top 0.5% podcast, etcetera,
Speaker:such as such and such because there are people that know that
Speaker:stat is, like, not good. And you're gonna end up being
Speaker:kind of a millivanilli kinda way where all of a sudden, everybody's gonna find out
Speaker:and go, oh. Now that's just my opinion,
Speaker:but I've seen it happen before. And so I guess
Speaker:if you really want to see the top shows now you could also go to
Speaker:Chartable and search the charts that way. You could go to
Speaker:Apple and search the charts there. But I I think you're
Speaker:missing one of the key points of being on
Speaker:shows. It's not about being on the big shows. It's
Speaker:about being on the right show because you could be on
Speaker:a top 200 show about beans,
Speaker:but your show is about motocross. And,
Speaker:sure, some motocross people may eat beans,
Speaker:but wouldn't it be better to be on a show about, I don't know, motocross?
Speaker:So that's my thought on listen notes. And
Speaker:since I somewhat almost went, yeah, I guess that
Speaker:would work, I thought I would share. I'm always open to suggestions
Speaker:and ideas just because I expressed an opinion that's based on
Speaker:the facts and the
Speaker:actions and results that I see in the podcasting
Speaker:space, and I might be missing something. So I'm always open
Speaker:for new input. The school of
Speaker:podcasting. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Last little thing I
Speaker:wanted to throw in here and as I mentioned earlier, I'm all about
Speaker:feedback. And I got some feedback from my buddy Ralph
Speaker:over at ask ralphpodcast.com. If you're looking for a show
Speaker:about finance from a Christian point of view, check him out at askraufpodcast.com,
Speaker:and he was listening to the show I do called Ask the
Speaker:Podcast Coach. And we were getting, I would I
Speaker:that's a show I do crowdfunding. I do I have a, an account
Speaker:at Supercast. I used to use Patreon.
Speaker:And while I'm doing it live, people are doing super
Speaker:chats because it's on YouTube. And,
Speaker:apparently, and I know I'm guilty of this, I often call
Speaker:those donations. I'd be like, hey. Thanks so much for the donation.
Speaker:And Ralph, being a guy with 30 years of
Speaker:tax knowledge, politely said, hey,
Speaker:Dave. You might wanna be careful throwing out the word
Speaker:donation unless you're an actual nonprofit
Speaker:because the FTC doesn't like it when you bend the
Speaker:truth. And so that's why the FTC has busted influencers
Speaker:who are saying they'll hold up a bottle of something. They're like, I love this
Speaker:stuff. Yeah. Well, you need to let your audience know that you just got paid
Speaker:$35 to hold that up. There are the FTC is
Speaker:now going over people who are fudging your numbers. So if
Speaker:you have a bunch of people overseas clicking on
Speaker:iPhones to run up your numbers, especially if you
Speaker:have advertisers, I like to call that fraud, but the FTC
Speaker:is starting to crack down on that. And so
Speaker:as influencers, and that's a word I am really not comfortable with, but
Speaker:you get the idea. When we have an audience, we have to be careful
Speaker:what we say because the bigger we are, the bigger the
Speaker:chance that the FTC might come knocking on our door,
Speaker:and they go, okay. So I understand you're a nonprofit. And you're
Speaker:like, no. And they're like, well, you've been accepting, in quotation marks, mister
Speaker:Jackson, donations. And then in the immortal
Speaker:words of Ricky Ricardo, I got lots of explaining to do.
Speaker:What kind of accent was that? I have no idea. But, just thank
Speaker:you, Ralph, for the input. And, so what do you call
Speaker:it when somebody sends you money? I talked about it a a couple episodes
Speaker:ago, but there are these ways for people to support your show,
Speaker:And I believe that's the phrase I'm gonna be using. Thank you so much for
Speaker:your support. That was an old remember Bartles and James? Anybody
Speaker:around here from the eighties? There was a, 2 old guys on a
Speaker:porch drinking wine coolers, and they'd be like, thank you so much for your
Speaker:support. Maybe that's the line we need to adopt. Instead of thank you
Speaker:so much for the donations, it's thank you so much for the
Speaker:support. And with that, I say, thank you so much for your
Speaker:support. Anybody who went out to thanks davejackson.com,
Speaker:That's the thing I threw out there just to see if anybody would. So thank
Speaker:you to everyone who did that. If you are looking
Speaker:to really, like, take your podcast
Speaker:up a notch and you need some feedback, and and you need
Speaker:somebody to go, hey. You got some low hanging fruit there.
Speaker:I would love to help you. It's what I do. Go to school of podcasting.com/listener
Speaker:or just use the coupon code listener when you sign up. That's great
Speaker:on a 30 or 30 day or yearly
Speaker:membership. And if you're worried about that, don't because you can go, hey, Dave. It's
Speaker:day number 29. Can I get a refund? And I will go, yes. And
Speaker:that comes with unlimited consulting. It comes with an amazing
Speaker:an amazing community with people like Ralph and Craig
Speaker:and Chrissy and the whole Chrissy, I shouldn't have named names Stephanie. See,
Speaker:I could be here for an hour now naming names. And, also,
Speaker:step by step courses on how to plan, launch, and grow your podcast.
Speaker:And if you wanna monetize, there's stuff on that too. Schoolofpodcasting.com.
Speaker:Thanks so much for tuning in. Until next week. Take
Speaker:care. God bless. Class is dismissed.
