Takeaways:

• The Frequent Miler on the Air podcast has officially joined the Voyascape podcast network, which signifies a shift in a few ways.
• Listeners of the audio version will notice new network identifiers and advertisements, which were previously absent from the podcast. (Viewers via YouTube will not see any change.)
• The transition to Voyascape will not alter the core content of the podcast, as we remain committed to producing original material without external influence, as always.
• Advertisers featured in the podcast will primarily be travel-related, ensuring relevance to the audience's interests. But we'll look for advertisers who are not too related to the specific topics we tackle in our episodes, so we can maintain the integrity of the content and make sure it's very clear to listeners the difference between the podcast content and the host-read ad segments.
• By joining Voyascape, we aim to diversify our revenue streams, moving beyond reliance on credit card affiliate links.
• The collaboration with Voyascape also presents an opportunity to potentially expand our audience by attracting new listeners interested in travel.

We're doing this special edition of Frequent Miler on the Air to announce that we are joining a podcast network called Voyascape.

Frequent Miler on the Air starts now.

Voyascape is a travel related podcast network.

And we thought it was important to let you know that we're doing this because it's going to mean some changes.

Specifically for those who listen to the podcast in audio format.

It's not really going to affect people who watch on YouTube at all.

But for those of you who listen in audio format, you're going to be noticing some changes.

So we're going to get into that.

Very good.

So first of all, we should probably mention what it is.

So Voy Escape is a travel podcast network.

As Greg said, they've got some shows that you may already know about, like Travel Intent, the Fromers travel show, Travel Tales with comedian and TV host Mike Siegel.

Yeah, and they're growing rapidly.

So they started fairly recently and growing quickly with new shows like ours.

The first thing you're gonna notice that changes is just a network identifier.

There'll be like a tune at the beginning of our show and it'll say something like, this is a Voyascape podcast, you know, and I don't know exactly what it says, but.

And to be clear, that means that we'll be part of the Voy Escape network.

It doesn't mean that the podcast is like taken by someone else and the content is changing.

It just means that we're part of their network.

It's still our podcast and, you know.

Still all of our content, let's be clear, 100%.

And, and the, the content we produce for our shows will be completely the same.

And because just as always, we, we will record without having anything to do with the network that we're on, because we record once for both the audio format and for YouTube and then things like ads and network identifier is added later.

So it's not going to affect the show, but it will mean that you're going to be listening to some ads.

So we haven't had ads ever on the audio version of the podcast until now?

That's right.

There have been ads on the YouTube version.

YouTube has ads, but we haven't had them yet on the audio version.

So again, first it'll be that network identifier that you're going to start hearing at the beginning.

And then you'll hear some post show promotions for other Voicescape shows, explaining some of the other shows on the network.

So you know what other stuff there is to listen to at this point.

As we get ready to launch this, I think we're the only miles and points related podcast on the network.

There's a bunch of other travel related podcasts that you might be interested in listening to if you like to travel.

Yeah, yeah.

And when it comes time for us to introduce ads, these are going to be mostly travel related ads and they will be mostly, if not all host read.

That means Nick and I will read an ad.

But when I say read, I really mean we will be discussing whatever the topic is.

Like there might be destinations where they are paying us to talk about Aruba or wherever the destination is.

And, and so it's not that we're just going to be reading ad copy that someone gives us, we're going to be talking about why we like that destination.

If we do, we might ideally even throw in some things like, hey, I know you can get there using miles in this way.

Right.

So we hope to add some actual useful content and hopefully make it entertaining as well.

So we'll see about that part.

But so why, why, why are we doing that, Greg?

So, like, I mean, yeah, okay, it should be fun and entertaining and hopefully we'll be able to tie it in to miles and points content.

Like Greg said, it's going to be hopefully our 2 cents on these advertisements.

And, and to be clear, the clearly advertisements I believe too.

I mean, we, we're certainly intending to make it clear when it's an ad and what we're talking about.

But, but why, why, why are we doing it?

Yeah, yeah.

So when we started the podcast, we always intended to have ads on our show at some point, but we were waiting for the right fit.

You know, for one thing, we didn't want to be going around looking for advertisers and spending our time doing that instead of creating content for the show and for our blog.

But also we didn't want things that were completely unrelated to our show.

You know, all of a sudden talking about just, you know, best brand of toilet paper or something doesn't seem like a good fit for the show.

Unless it's travel toilet paper.

You never know, you might be able.

To pack that in your b, Greg.

Yeah, then, then it would be fine.

But we also, we also were kind of wary about doing things that are too close to the type of content that we talk about all the time because we don't want people to get confused about what's an ad and what's not.

We don't want people to think there's a conflict of interest.

So for example, if we're talking about a great credit card welcome offer and that credit card company is also a, a sponsor of the ads, that could get pretty hairy there.

And so we're hoping to avoid that kind of conflict of interest as much as possible.

Here we are.

It took us what, six years to figure out the right fit.

And we think voy escape is that because Voyascape is travel related, they're only planning on selling travel related ads.

They're going to do all the work for us.

So they're going to be out, out there pounding the pavement trying to find advertisers that are a good fit for their network and they'll come to us with, you know, here are some advertisers and we'll have the right to say no, we don't want to do that one for whatever reason.

And so, you know, we'll be using our judgment around that and hopefully it'll work out to be a decent way for Frequent Miler, the business to earn additional revenue while at the same time being still hopefully entertaining to the audience.

Not too off putting having the ads there.

We have a desire as a business to diversify our revenue.

Most of our revenue to date has been through credit card affiliate links where we get paid.

When people click through our links and get approved for a card that leaves us sort of at risk because things change all the time in that area.

And so we're hoping to not be so tied to that single revenue stream.

And this should help a lot with that.

Oh, I also want to point out this is very similar to what we already do on the blog.

And since the beginning of the blog we, we've been part of Boarding Area which is a blog network that's, that's a travel points and miles related blog network.

They sell the ad space and we, and they keep a percentage of the ad revenue.

Same thing here.

Voyascape is a travel related.

It's not points and miles, but it's still travel related.

And they sell the ad space, they keep a percentage of the ad revenue and we get the rest.

And also in both cases they handle all the hosting costs of the technical hosting experience.

And yeah, oh, finally I forgot to mention this could also I talked about sort of the primary reasons we, we joined Voyascape.

But a potential other benefit is we might grow our audience.

You know, Voyascape has an audience of people interested in travel.

That doesn't mean they necessarily know anything about points and miles.

We think as soon as they hear about our show, have A listen, you know, they might get interested, and so we could potentially bring the Points and miles game to a lot more people this way.

Yeah, you know, and I think it's really important to emphasize that there's no.

Voicescape's not going to have any influence over our content in the sense that it's not like we, you know, have given up the show to someone in the same way that boarding area doesn't have any influence over our content.

They're both just essentially entities that are going to help bring advertisements that hopefully are relevant to our audience to the table.

And, and so I wanted to re.

Emphasize a.

That there's no, uh, no influence over our overall content coming there.

And also that, like Greg said, the benefit of joining a network like this is that we don't have to spend our time trying to figure out that part.

Like, instead of taking away time where we could be making another podcast, writing another post, coming up with an interesting idea, we'd have to be out there running around trying to figure out advertising.

And neither one of us is particularly interested in stepping away from Miles and points stuff to become an advertising salesperson.

So it's very helpful for us to have a network that's established to be able to do that part of things and hopefully get some, some, Some very good related stuff.

So I think hopefully there'll be some interesting things to come out of this and it will hopefully create some more benefit in the sense that it may even create ideas for us that we say, oh, well, we wouldn't have thought about talking about A or B, but this actually triggers a whole nother conversation about something else.

And so I think it'll hopefully be A in the long term for listeners also, in the sense that it makes it possible for us to come up with some other interesting ideas, but it's still all going to be our ideas and our content.

And I think that that's the most important thing for everyone to know, that that's.

You can expect the same from us that you always have.

There'll just be an ad now and then, but that'll.

And it will take some time before we get to that point.

That's right.

Yep.

Very well said.