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Is YouTube Good for Podcasting? A Deep Dive with James Cridland
Episode 310 • 25th May 2023 • The Podcast Accelerator: How to Grow Your Podcast • Mark Asquith
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In this episode, I'm taking you on a deep dive into YouTube's long-awaited new podcasting features that have the potential to increase and enhance the way that we, as creators, connect with our audience. Join me and special guest James Cridland, the founder and editor of Podnews, as we explore these new features and address some critical questions.

We'll begin by discussing the specifics of YouTube's new podcasting features and who has access to them. James and I discuss the process of getting your podcast on YouTube using and delve into the possibilities of RSS integration in the future.

Together, we'll compare YouTube's analytics to other platforms and examine if their podcast offering integrates with current podcast hosting and distribution platforms. We'll also talk about the various formats that may excel or flounder on the platform.

Monetization is inevitably on the minds of indie podcasters, too, so we'll tackle questions regarding how YouTube handles pre-roll and mid-roll ads, the platform's compatibility with your own ads, and the potential for dynamic ads when RSS is finally supported. We'll also chat about Ashley Carman's recent article and the insightful "Up Front with Simon Jordan" data as reported by Podnews last week.

As we venture further into YouTube's podcasting offer, James and I will discuss the potential implications of YouTube being another "walled garden" for the medium and what it means for the open podcasting ecosystem. We'll also consider how this development could impact major players like Apple and Spotify, amongst others.

Finally, we'll explore whether YouTube's entrance into podcasting will have different effects on small, indie creators compared to larger, more financially successful creators, branded podcasts, and media companies like Wondery.

My special guest today:

Useful links from the episode

Fan of the show? Find it helpful?

You can become a supporter of the show via a one-off tip that I'll use to buy a beer at this link: Support The Podcast Accelerator: How to Grow Your Podcast.

Your next steps

I teach podcasting a lot and for free. So, here's what I'd recommend you do next:

  • Watch my free podcasting tutorials on YouTube: YouTube (Captivate)
  • Ask me anything at all about podcasting over on Twitter: Twitter

If you need help with anything at all regarding your podcast, get me on Twitter (Twitter ) and I promise to respond.



This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:

OP3 - https://op3.dev/privacy
Podcorn - https://podcorn.com/privacy
Podtrac - https://analytics.podtrac.com/privacy-policy-gdrp

Transcripts

[Mark]:

As YouTube enters the fray when it comes to podcasting and reveals its plan for the

[Mark]:

medium, will it change the way that we think as indie creators and how will it

[Mark]:

impact the bigger media companies amongst us? Here with me today is someone that has

[Mark]:

probably got more experience in audio, in radio, in podcasting than the rest of us

[Mark]:

combined. It is, of course, the one, the only, the founder and editor-in-chief.

[Mark]:

of Pod News, Mr James Cridland, welcome mate, you alright?

[James Cridland]:

Thank you. Thank you very much. I have no idea where Editor-in-Chief

[James Cridland]:

comes from, but I'm a fan of it. So yes, let's go with that.

[Mark]:

I think that's like a Perry White thing. That's probably my old Superman comic reading

[Mark]:

days. And now I just think that everyone should be called that.

[James Cridland]:

Hehehehehehe

[Mark]:

So I'm good with that, but we'll go with that one. And from now on, I'm going to

[Mark]:

call you Perry. How are you? You're doing all right. Congratulations on the podcast

[Mark]:

business journal, by the way.

[James Cridland]:

Yes, yes, I'm very excited about having two things to write now. I, you

[James Cridland]:

know, I'll need some stuff in a bit. That'll be a nice thing. But yeah,

[James Cridland]:

so, you know, having a daily newsletter and now a weekly one that just focuses

[James Cridland]:

on the business of podcasting. It's really good to be working on that and

[James Cridland]:

really enjoying it.

[Mark]:

I love it, mate. Yeah, congratulations. I was thrilled when I saw it. And I think the

[Mark]:

business of podcasting is something that for me, I think a lot of independents

[Mark]:

are starting to think about a little bit more. They're starting to think about,

[Mark]:

you know, actually, this is an industry. This is a media. This is something that we

[Mark]:

as Indies get to play with before we start becoming more serious. But to a lot of

[Mark]:

people, to a lot of

[James Cridland]:

Mm.

[Mark]:

VCs, to a lot of... media companies, to a lot of producers, to a lot of creators,

[Mark]:

writers and so on and so forth. This is a genuine industry. So YouTube getting involved

[Mark]:

in this industry, it feels like quite a big deal. So I'm looking forward to getting

[Mark]:

into that one. But first and foremost, the thing that I want to do, and I think, inimitably,

[Mark]:

no one can do this quite like you can, let's just summarize what's happened. What

[Mark]:

has YouTube done over the last three, four weeks? And then... I guess proceeded with

[Mark]:

a beta or a beta, whoever's listening from whatever country a few

[James Cridland]:

Yes.

[Mark]:

months ago. So what's going on? What have YouTube done in podcasting?

[James Cridland]:

Well, about a year and a half ago, there was an awful lot of rumour about

[James Cridland]:

YouTube jumping into podcasting and YouTube ended up sponsoring the podcast

[James Cridland]:

show in London this time last year, with YouTube logos all over everywhere.

[James Cridland]:

But you went to ask anybody at YouTube, what are you doing with podcasting?

[James Cridland]:

And they said, Oh, well, we can't tell you. And then I discovered something

[James Cridland]:

a little bit earlier than that I discovered something that YouTube were

[James Cridland]:

actually going and talking to podcast customers, podcast publishers about

[James Cridland]:

in terms of what their plans were. And I published one of those slides and

[James Cridland]:

YouTube got very, very angry with me. So clearly this has been something

[James Cridland]:

that they've been planning for a while. So what they've basically done

[James Cridland]:

now is that, I mean, for many years, people with podcasts have been uploading

[James Cridland]:

them to YouTube. This very podcast has been uploaded to YouTube in the

[James Cridland]:

past as well. And if you... have a definition here of a podcast being a

[James Cridland]:

piece of audio first content. So this podcast will work perfectly happily

[James Cridland]:

if you close your eyes. That's absolutely fine. Joe Rogan, when he was on

[James Cridland]:

YouTube, was a podcast. So what YouTube has now done is that they have

[James Cridland]:

launched something that they call podcasts, which is a way to get these

[James Cridland]:

properly marked as podcasts on the YouTube platform. And in the US as well,

[James Cridland]:

you can listen to podcasts on YouTube Music, which is their music app.

[James Cridland]:

So podcasts, as YouTube calls them, are now available on YouTube everywhere

[James Cridland]:

in the world and within YouTube Music in the US, which is a real step forward.

[Mark]:

That's, number one, really interesting from a functionality perspective. But number

[Mark]:

two, I think it's interesting because that definition to me of podcast has subtly

[Mark]:

shifted, whether we like it or not, audio first content. Of course, we've got the

[Mark]:

argument about delivery via RSS. I had a chat about that with myself and Danny Brown,

[Mark]:

actually, last week when I, when I, when I published the interview that Danny did

[Mark]:

with me and the thought process around, of course, that is, that is a podcast, that

[Mark]:

is open podcasting. But If I'm a publisher, and you know, we, you and I are pretty fortunate

[James Cridland]:

Mm.

[Mark]:

to see a lot of indie and we're fortunate enough to have a foot in the publisher world

[Mark]:

as well. You know, me through global,

[James Cridland]:

Yeah.

[Mark]:

you through being you.

[James Cridland]:

Yeah.

[Mark]:

To the publishers, YouTube must be attractive. And as much as we can say, is it really a podcast

[Mark]:

if it's not got an RSS feed? There is that argument of it being audio first, hence

[Mark]:

That's the definition of podcasting. Thus, of course we should embrace YouTube.

[Mark]:

Of course as a publisher, I'm going to theoretically dive straight into this and

[Mark]:

take a look. Where does right now, and then we'll maybe speculate about this

[James Cridland]:

Hmm.

[Mark]:

as well, but where does RSS sit when it comes to YouTube? And the first and most

[Mark]:

pressing question is, do they accept RSS feeds?

[James Cridland]:

No, they do not accept RSS feeds. Not yet. What they have said and what

[James Cridland]:

they've been pretty consistent in saying in the last one and a half years

[James Cridland]:

is that they are going to be looking at RSS and they are looking at the

[James Cridland]:

possibility of automatically ingesting people's podcasts using RSS. But

[James Cridland]:

right now, if you want to get your podcast onto YouTube, then you upload

[James Cridland]:

it using YouTube's systems, the same system that anybody would use to upload

[James Cridland]:

a video. to there. Now many podcast hosts are also allowing you to upload

[James Cridland]:

your shows directly to YouTube through their own systems So I know that Libsyn

[James Cridland]:

does that. I know that there's a bunch of other podcast companies who are

[James Cridland]:

working on that right now And that's and that's very exciting or you

[James Cridland]:

can use tools like Headliner I use Zapier to to upload and those are good

[James Cridland]:

too But at the end of the day, it doesn't use RSS yet It uses direct

[James Cridland]:

uploads onto YouTube. And what that also means, of course, is for analytics.

[James Cridland]:

You won't get analytics in your Captivate dashboard unless Captivate have

[James Cridland]:

written a magic piece of code to go and talk to YouTube. You won't get, you

[James Cridland]:

know, in any typical podcast host. Certainly you won't get any of those

[James Cridland]:

stats in there because, again, it's not using RSS. It's not downloading it

[James Cridland]:

from your podcast host. So actually, you know, in terms of in terms of

[James Cridland]:

YouTube, it is its own space. But it's as you say, it's a really important

[James Cridland]:

space. I mean, you know, it's a very large content platform. They say it's

[James Cridland]:

the second largest search engine in the world after Google. And I would

[James Cridland]:

probably agree with that. So I think from that point of view, you know,

[James Cridland]:

it's a really important place to be on. I think also we forget that YouTube

[James Cridland]:

music is very big in some parts of the world. That's their music app.

[James Cridland]:

So it's a bit like Spotify in that every single music track that you want

[James Cridland]:

to have listened to is on that particular app. And of course, all of

[James Cridland]:

the podcasts are also on that app as well. And if you want to see how that

[James Cridland]:

works, you just have to fire up a VPN to pretend that you're in the US and

[James Cridland]:

automatically you can see all of these shows in there as well. And I

[James Cridland]:

think that's really exciting because that probably enables podcast publishers

[James Cridland]:

to reach new audiences than they've ever reached in the past. Some genres

[James Cridland]:

will work better than others, as I'm sure that will go on to. But I think

[James Cridland]:

it's certainly a really important audience for podcasters to be in front of.

[Mark]:

To that point, do you think that perhaps YouTube long term, and this is completely devil's

[Mark]:

advocate and completely speculating, but the idea that a publisher, so someone that

[Mark]:

has got resource, someone that has got potentially a team, so I'm thinking things

[Mark]:

like the Jordan Harbinger Show, Jordan does great content, and it's very well produced.

[Mark]:

is the person sat in the bedroom producing content, you know, that may, frankly, get enough

[Mark]:

downloads to really be well monetized, but not be classed in their mind as a media

[Mark]:

production or anything that requires big levels of grandeur or production levels.

[Mark]:

It's just good quality audio through a decent microphone. We've spoken at Lent in

[Mark]:

the past, and I know a lot of people have thought about this idea that podcasting

[Mark]:

is kind of... fractured and that sounds like a loaded word, it's not intended to sound

[Mark]:

as negative as it sounds, just

[James Cridland]:

Mm.

[Mark]:

the notion of it being one side of the chasm being that independent creator that's

[Mark]:

recording with accessible good quality technology like this microphone and the mic

[Mark]:

you're using versus the other side of that fracture which is the big production company

[Mark]:

and the media outlet and the publisher. It feels

[James Cridland]:

Yeah,

[Mark]:

to me certainly

[James Cridland]:

yeah.

[Mark]:

that the bigger people who can do good quality content multi-camera work, well edited,

[Mark]:

thoughtful titles, maybe even, you know, we know what it's like to grow YouTube channels,

[Mark]:

keyword research, description optimisation, thumbnail optimisation, all the stuff

[James Cridland]:

Hmm.

[Mark]:

that we've got to do to grow a YouTube channel. It feels like the big publisher will

[Mark]:

benefit from that. So I suppose two questions from that are, what's your opinion

[Mark]:

on that? And then the follow-up is... Is there a place for YouTube

[James Cridland]:

Hmm.

[Mark]:

music, the audio only element of this, that may go towards helping the indie creator

[Mark]:

that can't offer the production values?

[James Cridland]:

So I mean, the talk of podcasting three, four years ago was that people are uploading

[James Cridland]:

their podcasts as audio to YouTube with a little graphic or maybe a little

[James Cridland]:

waveform that bounces up and down as you hear audio. And the talk four years

[James Cridland]:

ago was that the YouTube algorithm was marking that down, that they were fake

[James Cridland]:

video. I think somebody was calling them and that was the talk of you know,

[James Cridland]:

why would you do a fake video because the algorithm won't actually see you?

[James Cridland]:

I'm not sure necessarily that I agree with that for a start, but I think,

[James Cridland]:

you know, that there's a whole set of people who are perfectly happy to produce

[James Cridland]:

something like, for example, the Pod News Weekly Review. That's an hour's

[James Cridland]:

show, which is just a fancy graphic bouncing up and down. And it looks

[James Cridland]:

fine and people use it. And that's all good. And then you've got people

[James Cridland]:

like you that will spend a little bit more time in terms of the video,

[James Cridland]:

make sure that the video side looks good, because we're recording this in

[James Cridland]:

video as well as in audio as well, and that works for certain things.

[James Cridland]:

But I tell you what, if you're making a true crime podcast and you try making

[James Cridland]:

that in video, you're making a documentary. Documentaries are hard to make.

[James Cridland]:

You know, so so I think that works in certain genres, but doesn't necessarily

[James Cridland]:

work in all genres. So I think really, you know, you are going to get some

[James Cridland]:

larger companies who can afford, you know, the full video and the full and the

[James Cridland]:

full editing of the video and the titles and the and the Astons that

[James Cridland]:

come up at the bottom and all this kind of stuff. And that's going to

[James Cridland]:

be very exciting to them. But I think the difference here is now that

[James Cridland]:

YouTube is asking podcast publishers to mark something as a podcast on

[James Cridland]:

their platform, so that the platform knows that this is a podcast, this

[James Cridland]:

is a piece of audio first content, that to me would suggest that YouTube

[James Cridland]:

have a slightly separate algorithm for podcasts and a slightly separate algorithm

[James Cridland]:

for, you know, that sort of... that sort of content. And I don't think necessarily

[James Cridland]:

that they're going to be, you know, marking people down just because

[James Cridland]:

they've uploaded a nice image and a nice piece of artwork and stuff like

[James Cridland]:

that.

[Mark]:

It feels to me a little bit Google-y this. So what I mean by that is that Google,

[Mark]:

if we think of Google's core product search, it's the core of everything that they

[Mark]:

do. It's always been about relevance. It's always been about serving the users. If

[Mark]:

I ask Google a question, its only

[James Cridland]:

Hmm.

[Mark]:

job is to give me the best answer, which is why all these algorithm updates come out.

[Mark]:

It's why results and refinements in results and the SERPs continue to develop because

[Mark]:

Google just wants to deliver the product, which is the information that indexes. That's

[Mark]:

the most basic version of Google. So I think for me,

[James Cridland]:

Hmm.

[Mark]:

when I think about YouTube, it almost, there's a way to almost frame YouTube's entry

[Mark]:

into podcasting as more of the same, because people were doing it anyway. We've

[Mark]:

got tools like Headliner, we've got tools like Repurpose. I'll be honest, we at

[Mark]:

Captivate, you'll know this as a former advisor, we... We actually had YouTube publishing

[Mark]:

about two and a half, three years ago, and we never rolled it out. And the reason

[Mark]:

we didn't roll it out was because they kept changing the terms or the API. It was

[Mark]:

one of them that made it the maintenance on it was heavy compared

[James Cridland]:

Mm. Mm.

[Mark]:

to the relatively small gain for podcasters. So it feels to me as if it's potentially a

[Mark]:

way of saying, OK, look, people are doing this anyway. If we just give them a way

[Mark]:

to label it. If we just give them a way to kind of feel like this is a little bit

[Mark]:

more purposeful, we as YouTube can probably do a little bit more to surface that audio,

[Mark]:

which theoretically does two things. It helps with the discoverability challenge

[Mark]:

in podcasting. Okay, I can say, look, regardless of whether you're a highly produced

[Mark]:

podcast with video or whether you're someone in their bedroom with great audio and

[Mark]:

that's it, that's cool. I will give you more quote unquote views or listens or

[Mark]:

whatever however we term it. But the second

[James Cridland]:

Hmm.

[Mark]:

thing it potentially

[James Cridland]:

Hmm.

[Mark]:

does, which leads directly to the next question, is it potentially gives YouTube inventory,

[Mark]:

more inventory, to do more monetization with. Where they can, as you say, they can

[Mark]:

tweet the algorithm and adapt the way that they sell ads, adapt the way that they

[Mark]:

deliver ads because they know that this is audio first and it's a little bit, potentially,

[Mark]:

a little bit more passive. So what do we know about, as it stands today, what do

[Mark]:

we know about what YouTube is doing with It's own pre-inserted ads, it's own sort

[Mark]:

of mid-rolls as we see them where

[James Cridland]:

Hmm.

[Mark]:

we get the lovely little skip ads button on YouTube. What do we know about that situation

[Mark]:

as it exists today when it comes to YouTube and podcasts?

[James Cridland]:

Well, I think there's a couple of things there. I think firstly, yeah, I mean,

[James Cridland]:

YouTube, at the end of the day, just like Google at the end of the day

[James Cridland]:

doesn't necessarily exist to put new exciting pieces of content in front

[James Cridland]:

of people. It exists to flog advertising. That's its main focus. And clearly

[James Cridland]:

by, you know, seeing the numbers out there of over 4 million podcasts and they're

[James Cridland]:

there thinking Wow, if we can get the majority of those to come onto

[James Cridland]:

our platform, then we can sell ads against those. Um, and, you know,

[James Cridland]:

I mean, the amount of new, um, of new podcast episodes that are published,

[James Cridland]:

there's one podcast episode published every naught point eight seconds,

[James Cridland]:

uh, right now. So, you know, if, if, if they can actually get the benefit

[James Cridland]:

of that, then. Wow. You know, that's, um, lots more inventory, as you say,

[James Cridland]:

uh, for them to advertise. And I think that's why. They've only launched

[James Cridland]:

podcasting into YouTube music in the US because the only place, as far as

[James Cridland]:

I'm aware, that they're actually delivering audio only advertising is alongside

[James Cridland]:

YouTube music in the US. So they're not selling audio advertising anywhere

[James Cridland]:

else in the world, only in the US, which is why they're rolling it out

[James Cridland]:

in the US for podcasting as well. And you will already hear adverts apparently

[James Cridland]:

if you don't pay for YouTube as I do because I'm Random enough to want to

[James Cridland]:

pay for it. But if you don't pay for YouTube you will hear ads appearing

[James Cridland]:

sometimes in front of a podcast that you want to have a listen to And certainly

[James Cridland]:

see them if you're playing it on the normal video app that you're using

[James Cridland]:

so From YouTube's point of view, great. You know, if they can get the

[James Cridland]:

millions of new episodes that are made every single month and they can flog

[James Cridland]:

advertising in front of those, then that's fantastic. And the interesting

[James Cridland]:

part about that is, of course, all of the infrastructure is already there

[James Cridland]:

to pay us, to pay the podcast publishers, because they're already doing this

[James Cridland]:

for larger YouTube creators. If you're a large YouTube creator and you have...

[James Cridland]:

have increased above the minimum that YouTube asked for for you to be a monetized

[James Cridland]:

channel, then all of a sudden you start earning money from the ads that YouTube

[James Cridland]:

is selling against your particular pieces of content. So that's great news for

[James Cridland]:

anyone that wants to get paid for their creative passion. If they're large

[James Cridland]:

enough, and that's a big if, but if they're large enough... then the monetization

[James Cridland]:

here works in exactly the same way as it works for YouTube videos and

[James Cridland]:

everything else, and you get paid in exactly the same way too.

[Mark]:

There's a lot to unpack there and I think that leads to another couple of interesting

[Mark]:

questions but I just need to get to this first. I am also one of the two people

[Mark]:

in the world that pay for YouTube without the ads. I have a child that loves Bluey and

[Mark]:

loves Bing and the adverts are just, they just come between her and Bluey dude so

[Mark]:

I gotta pay for that thing. So maybe we'll start to see a little bit

[James Cridland]:

Yeah.

[Mark]:

of money coming back our way instead of flowing through just to YouTube.

[James Cridland]:

Hehehehe

[Mark]:

Let's think about Indy's for a second then. Let's think about the creator,

[James Cridland]:

Hmm.

[Mark]:

I suppose the hobbyist, independent podcaster who thinks to themselves, okay, here's

[Mark]:

an opportunity to monetize potentially via YouTube if I get big enough. Here's a way

[Mark]:

for my podcast to be surface to more people. But actually, here's another thing

[Mark]:

that I've also got to do. another hour,

[James Cridland]:

Yes.

[Mark]:

another two hours per week on my already stretched podcasting schedule. How would you,

[Mark]:

how would you advise them to get started with this without piling on the pressure? Because

[Mark]:

there's so many, like there's almost like

[James Cridland]:

Hmm.

[Mark]:

two juxtaposed pieces of advice that you see in podcasting, which is be everywhere.

[Mark]:

And that's usually from like the quote unquote entrepreneur crowd, which I totally

[Mark]:

understand. Just be everywhere. And then there's the other side of the coin, which

[Mark]:

is just focus on one place, which may be your podcast's RSS distribution and grow

[Mark]:

that into a meaningful channel. So how would you approach that? If someone comes up

[Mark]:

to you at a conference, you're on stage, you've just got off stage, Q&A with James Quidlin,

[Mark]:

someone says, what should I do? Should I be worried about the time it takes? Should

[Mark]:

I really bother with YouTube? What's the answer?

[James Cridland]:

Well, my answer, I mean, with all of these things is automate as much as

[James Cridland]:

you possibly can, because automation is a really important thing. So

[James Cridland]:

if you look at YouTube and you go, there might be an opportunity there,

[James Cridland]:

but I'm not sure yet, then please don't spend, you know, 20% of your of

[James Cridland]:

your creation time every week feeding the big YouTube monster, because that's

[James Cridland]:

not necessarily really going to help you very much. So there are automatic

[James Cridland]:

ways your podcast host may offer you one certainly headliner does where

[James Cridland]:

you can automatically get headliner sitting there watching your podcast

[James Cridland]:

feed. If somebody you know if you publish a new episode it will automatically

[James Cridland]:

produce a video version of that and upload it into the right playlist

[James Cridland]:

on YouTube so that it goes into your podcast on YouTube. So and that is

[James Cridland]:

not taking any more time. to end up doing. So I would certainly start

[James Cridland]:

looking at that sort of thing. Probably won't give you the best return in

[James Cridland]:

terms of the amount of people who are finding your channel, but at least

[James Cridland]:

you're there and you're starting to publish and you can start to see if there

[James Cridland]:

are particular trends. And what I'm noticing with YouTube and the Pod

[James Cridland]:

News Daily has been there for, you know, well over a year now, what I'm

[James Cridland]:

noticing is that some shows do really well. and by really well I'm talking

[James Cridland]:

about 60 or 70 views. Some shows do really badly, about nine or 10 views.

[James Cridland]:

And it all comes down to what that particular story is about and what the

[James Cridland]:

key words that I've mentioned are. And the one that did particularly well

[James Cridland]:

was from March of last year, which was YouTube's plans for podcasting. which

[James Cridland]:

I managed to get a leak of. And so of course, you know, that, of course,

[James Cridland]:

did very well on YouTube itself. So I think, you know, just sort of see what

[James Cridland]:

works and what doesn't, and then you will know at some point in the future

[James Cridland]:

whether or not it makes sense for you to go into something which is a bit

[James Cridland]:

more time consuming, like producing video. Or there are halfway houses

[James Cridland]:

as well. There's a piece of technology... called Adore Studio, which is

[James Cridland]:

based in the US, and another piece of technology called Vizzi, which is

[James Cridland]:

based here in Australia. They both do much the same sort of thing, which

[James Cridland]:

is to add visual accompaniment to your podcast. Vizzi exports it as chapters

[James Cridland]:

as well for some of the new podcast apps out there too. So you can get

[James Cridland]:

at least a more engaging viewing experience than... just a logo and a bouncing

[James Cridland]:

waveform. So there is a sort of a halfway house there as well, but I certainly

[James Cridland]:

wouldn't necessarily give 20% of your creation time to YouTube, unless

[James Cridland]:

of course it's doing more than 20% of your numbers, and in which case

[James Cridland]:

that's probably a time to have a think about what you should be doing.

[Mark]:

Common sense approach and it feels very much like Spotify did in the early days. You

[Mark]:

know, it feels very, you know, it feels as a hosting company,

[James Cridland]:

Hmm.

[Mark]:

it feels like anything like Spotify did, Amazon did even face, but when they sort

[Mark]:

of dipped the toe a little bit, everything seems quite limited, yet it causes quite a

[Mark]:

fuss because the brand name is so big. So it feels

[James Cridland]:

Yeah.

[Mark]:

that pragmatism I like

[James Cridland]:

Yeah.

[Mark]:

and I'm always, you know me, I'm always a huge fan of that and thinking about as an

[Mark]:

indie, how can I remove that pressure? But how can I make sure that I know enough

[Mark]:

about what's going on that I can assess it properly? So I love that. Now, Ashley Carmen

[Mark]:

wrote an article

[James Cridland]:

Yeah,

[Mark]:

saying

[James Cridland]:

and

[Mark]:

that.

[James Cridland]:

I think you're absolutely right in actually saying that there's a couple

[James Cridland]:

of different... Sorry, I was just going to say, I think you're absolutely

[James Cridland]:

right in terms of saying that it's the YouTube brand which is driving this.

[James Cridland]:

I mean, this is no different, perhaps, to a product called Verbal, which

[James Cridland]:

was out a couple of years ago, which asked you to upload specifically

[James Cridland]:

to that particular platform, and you could do X, Y and Z things on there.

[James Cridland]:

and nobody really bothered because, well, there wasn't really anybody

[James Cridland]:

using that particular platform, whereas, you know, YouTube being so big and

[James Cridland]:

having so many billions of users actually using it, you know, that's a

[James Cridland]:

really important thing. And I think YouTube can certainly deliver those

[James Cridland]:

numbers if you're the right genre and the right content for that particular

[James Cridland]:

platform.

[Mark]:

The size of YouTube and the fact that it's an indexed search engine, let's be honest,

[Mark]:

is a huge deal. And when it comes to searchability, when it comes to optimization,

[Mark]:

Spotify is spotty. Apple is, well,

[James Cridland]:

Hehehe

[Mark]:

Apple is Apple. The podcasting apps are not. necessarily known for their ease of

[Mark]:

navigation, nor for their ability to surface decent content, even when I get reasonably,

[Mark]:

number one, specific with my searches, but number two, reasonably specific with my

[Mark]:

listening behavior. It's traditionally just not fantastic. YouTube has heritage with

[Mark]:

this, technically, and

[James Cridland]:

Hmm.

[Mark]:

in

[James Cridland]:

Hmm.

[Mark]:

the mindset of users, the people I use to the algorithm, being decent enough to send

[Mark]:

us down a 2am rabbit hole after a whiskey or two. Will

[James Cridland]:

Yes,

[Mark]:

this,

[James Cridland]:

yes.

[Mark]:

number one, transpose to podcasting do we think? And number two, does this affect

[Mark]:

Apple? Does it affect Spotify? Does it just not matter to them? Where do we feel

[Mark]:

like that's headed?

[James Cridland]:

Well, I think number one is that YouTube is a really good search engine.

[James Cridland]:

It's run by Google. They know a thing or two about search. And, you know,

[James Cridland]:

I mean, I was talking to quite a senior person from Spotify a couple of weeks

[James Cridland]:

ago, and they were admitting that their search is not particularly great.

[James Cridland]:

And that's something that they're, you know, of course, continuing to

[James Cridland]:

work on. So I think you've got that sort of side of it. But you've also

[James Cridland]:

got the side, as you so rightly say, of when you get to the end of a YouTube

[James Cridland]:

video, then YouTube will give you more that it thinks that you might be interested

[James Cridland]:

in. And it's got that algorithm working very, very well indeed. Guess what?

[James Cridland]:

That's there for podcasts right now. So if you're there and you listen

[James Cridland]:

to a particular podcast that it thinks that, you know, at the end of that,

[James Cridland]:

if it thinks that you will like other podcasts, then it will give you

[James Cridland]:

other podcasts to have a listen to, which I think is really interesting because

[James Cridland]:

that could make quite a difference in terms of podcast discoverability and in

[James Cridland]:

terms of people finding new shows. And I think it's interesting to watch

[James Cridland]:

that actually Spotify have just launched something which is quite similar.

[James Cridland]:

Now when you reach the end of a podcast on Spotify, it will give you more

[James Cridland]:

podcasts that it thinks you will like. Probably Joe Rogan will be in there.

[James Cridland]:

because so many people use the Spotify platform to listen to Joe Rogan,

[James Cridland]:

so it's always going to appear in that particular algorithm. But I think that

[James Cridland]:

that's really interesting, and I think that that has great opportunity

[James Cridland]:

for all of us as creators, you know, to see our stuff in those lists if

[James Cridland]:

we can manage that. You know, so I think that that's a great step forward.

[James Cridland]:

I think also, you know, I mean, at the end of the day, Google podcasts

[James Cridland]:

were supposed to be so massive because Google podcasts search results were

[James Cridland]:

appearing in Google searches, where the difference is there, though, is that

[James Cridland]:

people weren't necessarily Googling for pieces of audio to go and have

[James Cridland]:

a listen to, whereas particularly if you're using the YouTube music product,

[James Cridland]:

you are literally looking for stuff to listen to. That is your user state.

[James Cridland]:

And so therefore, this is answering that particular user state. And I

[James Cridland]:

think that that's a very interesting, you know, move forward in terms of what YouTube

[James Cridland]:

could potentially be offering. So I think, you know, YouTube's knowledge and

[James Cridland]:

understanding in this in this world is, I think, really interesting. I find

[James Cridland]:

it fascinating. You know, I get recommended the pod news daily on YouTube.

[James Cridland]:

When I'm there using YouTube, I'm watching, you know, there's some bloke

[James Cridland]:

at the moment who is doing a documentary on every single motorway in the

[James Cridland]:

UK And I watch and I watch his shows not because I'm particularly interested

[James Cridland]:

in motorways, but he's very very funny And so I'll watch that and at the

[James Cridland]:

end of that it'll say oh and we also recommend This version of the pod news

[James Cridland]:

daily and I'm there going I did that last week. Why are you recommending

[James Cridland]:

that? So yeah, I think that that that could be really really big

[Mark]:

fascinating to see the way that that could impact people especially when it comes

[Mark]:

to from my perspective discoverability is interesting because the power of YouTube

[Mark]:

for me when it comes to the recommendations is this is really cool content I would have

[Mark]:

never ever discovered had you as YouTube not recommended it so that is quite fascinating

[Mark]:

and I love the point about I was excited about Google's surfacing podcast episodes and

[Mark]:

I did a little bit of experimenting with that and it worked to a degree to forgetting

[Mark]:

ears and eyes on the content. It did, but you had to do the keyword research. You

[Mark]:

had to be a little bit savvy with that. However, I think you're absolutely right. You

[Mark]:

know, podcasts as content versus content that is simply there to answer a question,

[Mark]:

you know, because that's what we do in Google, isn't it? We just ask questions

[Mark]:

off Google and it's a very different type of search. So I'm waiting with bated breath

[James Cridland]:

Hmm.

[Mark]:

to see what happens with that one.

[James Cridland]:

Hmm. And yeah,

[Mark]:

Sorry, go.

[James Cridland]:

I was going to say that, you know, YouTube, of course, is on so many surfaces,

[James Cridland]:

they call them in the business, so many devices, you know, it might be on your

[James Cridland]:

mobile phone. It's also on your TV. It's also, you know, on your laptop.

[James Cridland]:

It's it's all over the place. And I think that is something that, you know,

[James Cridland]:

certainly things like Apple podcasts aren't and Google podcasts aren't.

[James Cridland]:

And so I think, you know, again, there are more opportunities there to

[James Cridland]:

surface new content for you to go and have a listen to. And I think, you

[James Cridland]:

know, it's really interesting watching where people listen to podcasts right

[James Cridland]:

now, where they could be listening to podcasts and see if they can actually increase,

[James Cridland]:

you know, the amount of shows that people have a listen to. I mean, you know,

[James Cridland]:

one of the things that I surfaced earlier on in the year at the podcast show

[James Cridland]:

in Las Vegas was numbers from PodTrack which showed the amount of podcasts

[James Cridland]:

that a typical Apple podcast listener was listening to versus the amount

[James Cridland]:

of podcasts that a typical Spotify user was listening to and it turns

[James Cridland]:

out that Apple podcast users are listening to nine times as many episodes

[James Cridland]:

as Spotify users and so anything that Spotify can do to increase the amount

[James Cridland]:

of shows that their users are listening to will really help them. And

[James Cridland]:

exactly the same going on here in terms of YouTube as well. The more

[James Cridland]:

shows, the more episodes which are being consumed, the more times that YouTube

[James Cridland]:

can flog advertising in and around those particular shows. And I think

[James Cridland]:

that's really exciting.

[Mark]:

And also to build on that, I think the exciting part from an industry perspective.

[Mark]:

So if we think about brands looking to enter the space and, you know,

[James Cridland]:

Hmm.

[Mark]:

we as an industry, frankly, we want to see more money inevitably and continually

[Mark]:

more money flowing through the space because everyone does well, including

[James Cridland]:

Yeah.

[Mark]:

potentially the trickle down to creators, you know, TBC on how that's all going to work.

[Mark]:

But the notion that relevance plays such a big key. You know, if you think about

[Mark]:

brands that invest in podcast advertising, whether that is through marketplaces, programmatic

[Mark]:

or direct sales, host reads, whatever, the idea is that relevance creates confidence

[Mark]:

in brands and does click throughs and actions, whatever those actions

[James Cridland]:

Mm-hmm.

[Mark]:

might be. The idea that YouTube's algorithm is more advanced already and is, as you said,

[Mark]:

on more surfaces already. That's an exciting prospect when it comes to relevance

[Mark]:

because suddenly as a brand, as a company that's putting money from my marketing and

[Mark]:

advertising budget into podcasts, I can be much more confident theoretically that

[Mark]:

I'm going to be matched with

[James Cridland]:

Hmm.

[Mark]:

a warmer set of people because the algorithm is significantly more advanced. Is there any

[Mark]:

merit to that? Is that just wishful thinking or is there any merit to that?

[James Cridland]:

Yeah, I mean, I think there's certainly merit to advertisers being more comfortable

[James Cridland]:

with YouTube in general, because advertisers have in many cases already used

[James Cridland]:

it, so they'll understand how the thing works. The world of podcasting

[James Cridland]:

is in many cases quite alien to them. So being able to help them understand

[James Cridland]:

something is really helpful. And of course, you know, they get different

[James Cridland]:

analytics from YouTube. YouTube has excelled in the sorts of analytics where

[James Cridland]:

you can see exactly where somebody is fast forwarding, exactly where

[James Cridland]:

somebody is skipping through a video, where people are coming in, where

[James Cridland]:

people are leaving, all of that kind of information, YouTube is very,

[James Cridland]:

very good at. And again, advertisers are comfortable with that, they're comfortable

[James Cridland]:

with the demographic information that they get from the platform and so on and

[James Cridland]:

so forth. So... I think giving advertisers, you know, I mean, at the end of

[James Cridland]:

the day, advertisers are very lazy. They want things that they understand

[James Cridland]:

that they don't have to learn, and they want things that they can earn money

[James Cridland]:

out of. And YouTube seems to have shown itself time and time again that

[James Cridland]:

that is certainly, you know, part of that model, that they're very, very

[James Cridland]:

good at doing that. And I think, you know, again, that's one of the reasons

[James Cridland]:

why we're seeing the staggered rollout for the audio only version. because

[James Cridland]:

it has to tie in with the availability of audio advertising on the platform,

[James Cridland]:

which of course is something that Apple Podcasts doesn't necessarily have

[James Cridland]:

to worry about. And Spotify using as a loss leader really in many parts

[James Cridland]:

of the world, they're only now rolling out the Spotify audience network

[James Cridland]:

in parts of mainland Europe. So, you know, I think... There are opportunities

[James Cridland]:

here that you can see YouTube going, okay, as we roll this out, we can see

[James Cridland]:

that there's going to be more and more growth, you know, coming from this

[James Cridland]:

and more inventory, yeah.

[Mark]:

Demographics you mentioned there, which is a really interesting word in podcasting,

[Mark]:

because it's very difficult to get demographic data and to get any other kind of data on podcasts,

[Mark]:

consumption,

[James Cridland]:

Hmm.

[Mark]:

you know the drill. YouTube can get that because it's essentially a closed ecosystem.

[Mark]:

So I upload my audio, even if I ingest that audio via RSS, you would imagine that

[Mark]:

YouTube... And this is pure speculation. You would imagine that they'd maybe want to

[Mark]:

still host that data and to host that audio. So

[James Cridland]:

Hmm.

[Mark]:

they can give the

[James Cridland]:

Yeah.

[Mark]:

data that the advertisers are already used to, to them so that they can do what we've

[Mark]:

just said. So is this just another wall garden in podcasting? And what does it mean

[Mark]:

for the open podcasting ecosystem, for that landscape that we're striving to maintain

[Mark]:

and to help to thrive?

[James Cridland]:

Well, I think if this was anybody other than YouTube, the podcast industry

[James Cridland]:

would be up in arms and saying, no, you know, this is a bad thing. We shouldn't

[James Cridland]:

be involved in it, go away. You might remember Mark Cuban, who was doing

[James Cridland]:

something that vaguely sounds as if it might be a bit like this two and a

[James Cridland]:

half, three years ago, very, very quickly changed his mind. It's not a thing

[James Cridland]:

that the podcast industry is interested in. Having said that, I think

[James Cridland]:

it is a thing. in terms of YouTube, because of course YouTube being so

[James Cridland]:

large. So I think there's a there's, you know, a bit of a bit of a difference

[James Cridland]:

there in terms of will it be a closed platform? I mean, YouTube are talking

[James Cridland]:

about using RSS feeds, but I think they're talking about using RSS feeds

[James Cridland]:

as methods of ingestion, as methods of pulling in the audio once. so that

[James Cridland]:

they then serve the audio. And if there's one thing that I get frustrated

[James Cridland]:

about in terms of the podcast industry, is that we seem to have this sort

[James Cridland]:

of religious belief that the audio that our users upload to our platforms

[James Cridland]:

is not to be played with in any way, shape or form. And I think that's

[James Cridland]:

a bit of a mistake because actually what YouTube has shown us is that

[James Cridland]:

they will... pull in a piece of video, they will make lots of different

[James Cridland]:

versions of that video so that it works on any bandwidth, it works on

[James Cridland]:

any phone, any device. If you happen to have something which deals with

[James Cridland]:

the AV1 video codec, which is a new super great video codec, then great,

[James Cridland]:

but if it only deals with an old version of MPEG-4, well that's fine

[James Cridland]:

because YouTube has a version of that as well. And so I think that YouTube

[James Cridland]:

will continue using that. It's one of their... strengths I think. And

[James Cridland]:

so we'll continue to see YouTube's network being used as it is. I mean apart from

[James Cridland]:

anything else, my understanding is that YouTube in many of the large internet

[James Cridland]:

service providers, they have their own caches actually within there to save

[James Cridland]:

the ISP's money in the same way that iPlayer does in the UK, that Hulu

[James Cridland]:

does in the US and so on and so forth. So, you know, anything that YouTube

[James Cridland]:

does, they get the benefit of. And enabling pass through to RSS so that

[James Cridland]:

it goes and grabs the initial audio files, it's not necessarily, I wouldn't

[James Cridland]:

have thought, anywhere on YouTube's, you know, you know, ideas. I don't

[James Cridland]:

think that that's ever going to be a thing that YouTube gets particularly

[James Cridland]:

interested in, which means, of course, that Dynamic advertising is going

[James Cridland]:

to be much harder, if not impossible. And of course it very dramatically

[James Cridland]:

changes how advertising works in the podcast industry. And I don't think

[James Cridland]:

the podcast industry necessarily has woken up to that yet. That actually every

[James Cridland]:

podcast that you hear on YouTube, you won't necessarily be able to sell, you

[James Cridland]:

know, certainly dynamic advertising in that's going to be really hard. You can

[James Cridland]:

probably sell baked in advertising. But everybody keeps on talking about dynamic

[James Cridland]:

and programmatic advertising, and that just simply won't work on the Google

[James Cridland]:

platform unless you buy through Google. So I think there are quite a lot of

[James Cridland]:

changes to happen there. And I wonder whether or not many of the podcast

[James Cridland]:

industry in that, you know, in that field has actually properly thought

[James Cridland]:

about what that means for their business.

[Mark]:

I could spend another full episode and perhaps we will on that one because I have

[Mark]:

a lot of thoughts as you know about that side of things and particularly the

[James Cridland]:

Yes.

[Mark]:

way that a lot of us in the podcast industry think because let's be honest it is

[Mark]:

now an industry as much as we might want to fight it but that is probably for another

[James Cridland]:

Yeah.

[Mark]:

episode. Let's wrap up with... a quick visit to the Bloomberg article written by Ashley

[Mark]:

Carman, which

[James Cridland]:

Yeah.

[Mark]:

is an interesting article because it's a sound bite. It's a short one. And let's kind

[Mark]:

of preface this with the idea

[James Cridland]:

Hmm.

[Mark]:

that this is early days for YouTube. It's early days for the publishers that have

[Mark]:

jumped on there.

[Mark]:

The basic headlines were NPR, Slate, New York Times have popped podcasts over to

[Mark]:

YouTube, they've theoretically finished in slates, I think in slates words, they've

[Mark]:

finished that move, if you like, but the views

[James Cridland]:

Hmm.

[Mark]:

are not there. But then in complete dynamic contrast, you reported on Upfront with

[Mark]:

Simon Jordan, which is a, and I'm going to air quote this quote unquote podcast. just

[Mark]:

to placate

[James Cridland]:

Hehehe

[Mark]:

some people for a laugh that launched over on YouTube.

[James Cridland]:

It's a real podcast, it's available on RSS as well, but yes, but I know

[James Cridland]:

what you mean. And that is doing fantastically. So, you know, I mean,

[James Cridland]:

actually, of course, one of the drawbacks of publishing stuff on YouTube

[James Cridland]:

is that people can see your playback numbers, which we don't have in podcasting.

[James Cridland]:

So quite a lot of people wish to, you know, if you're not using new technology

[James Cridland]:

like OP3, which I know that you do on this particular show. But otherwise,

[James Cridland]:

no one knows what your downloads are unless you tell them. That's not the case

[James Cridland]:

on YouTube. You can see the view numbers. And so Ashley has very cleverly,

[James Cridland]:

because she's a good journalist, gone through and checked, for example, NPR's

[James Cridland]:

numbers, 168 million global downloads in April. And then she's gone and

[James Cridland]:

looked at YouTube, which, of course, is different numbers, looked at

[James Cridland]:

YouTube and worked out what the average View number is on an NPR show and

[James Cridland]:

it's well 178 Nowhere near nowhere near what it should be And so she has

[James Cridland]:

quite rightly Questioned the people at NPR and Slate saying were you expecting

[James Cridland]:

this to be higher? You know, why have you spent all of this time? Getting

[James Cridland]:

onto onto the YouTube platform, you know, and of course one can assume that

[James Cridland]:

it is going to grow and everything else. But I think that that was a fascinating

[James Cridland]:

article. But then people reaching out to me and saying, actually, we're seeing

[James Cridland]:

completely the opposite. So Folding Pocket, who make up front with Simon

[James Cridland]:

Jordan, which if you're interested in sports ball, it's absolutely for you. But

[James Cridland]:

that particular show. number one sports podcast on Spotify, number one sports

[James Cridland]:

podcast on Apple podcasts right now. It launched last week as we record

[James Cridland]:

this. And so therefore, you know, it probably would be because of the way

[James Cridland]:

that those charts work, but even so it's also done more than half a million

[James Cridland]:

views on YouTube in less than a week. And that's particularly striking because

[James Cridland]:

it's a UK podcast or UK show. And that means that the YouTube music effect

[James Cridland]:

isn't there because in the UK, you guys don't have YouTube music with

[James Cridland]:

the additional podcasts in there. And I do I do think that this comes

[James Cridland]:

down to just different genres of stuff working on different platforms. I

[James Cridland]:

have yet to find a podcast about podcasting that does very well on Spotify.

[James Cridland]:

And it occurs to me that all of the podcasts about podcasting that I ever

[James Cridland]:

see, and the PodNews Daily is one of those, we get useless numbers out

[James Cridland]:

of Spotify, completely useless, because podcasters are not using Spotify to

[James Cridland]:

listen to podcasts. They're using a proper podcast app. And so, of course,

[James Cridland]:

those numbers are going to be down. And my suspicion is that some of the

[James Cridland]:

typical NPR listeners Some of the typical slate listeners aren't necessarily

[James Cridland]:

using YouTube in the same numbers as they are some of the other platforms.

[James Cridland]:

Whereas sports, you know, sports fans certainly are and younger people

[James Cridland]:

certainly are, you know. So I think it is a genre thing, but I think it's

[James Cridland]:

not necessarily fully understood yet which genres really work on those platforms.

[James Cridland]:

And of course, it will be different in every single. country as well,

[James Cridland]:

which is the other side to bear in mind as well. You know, Brits watch

[James Cridland]:

different things in different places than Americans do, than Australians

[James Cridland]:

do, than people in Indonesia or Japan do. And so, of course, you know, we'll

[James Cridland]:

end up seeing different genres going on there. I mean, you know, Japan is

[James Cridland]:

so, so different that the Amazon Music app is the number three most popular

[James Cridland]:

app in Japan. Imagine that. So you can imagine how different all of these

[James Cridland]:

individual countries are. But yeah, I think it's fascinating. Do we know

[James Cridland]:

what's going to work on YouTube? No. Do we know, you know, what will be the

[James Cridland]:

runaway successes? I think we can all make guesses, but yeah, it's quite

[James Cridland]:

hard to work it out.

[Mark]:

What fascinates me about that as well is that the real kind of fundamental background

[Mark]:

to, you know, NPR, the New York Times and Slate, they pop everything over on YouTube.

[Mark]:

Of course, the people that give the 168 million downloads aren't going to just

[Mark]:

go, okay, do you know what? Today, I ain't going to listen there. I am going to

[Mark]:

go over to YouTube and I'm going to listen in this new place. It's just, it's,

[Mark]:

it's... It's simply not the case, which then leads me to the upfront with Simon Jordan

[Mark]:

show, which

[James Cridland]:

Hmm.

[Mark]:

has some very interesting differences for me. Number one, it's a very highly produced

[Mark]:

video show. Secondly, as you rightly pointed out, it's UK based. And one of the

[Mark]:

first episodes is Graham Suen, he's a very famous football manager known for, you

[Mark]:

know, it's not a wallflower. All right. And... The title is a nice sound bite that

[Mark]:

has been pulled out of the interview and the point that I'm getting at is twofold.

[Mark]:

Number one, it feels like YouTube for those kind of companies is an opportunity to

[Mark]:

gain new listeners through new strategies. So that's the first thing that struck me. The

[James Cridland]:

Mm,

[Mark]:

second thing was,

[James Cridland]:

yeah.

[Mark]:

as you pointed out, of course certain content will do much better on YouTube and

[Mark]:

something like that upfront with Simon Jordan is almost guaranteed. in the climate

[Mark]:

that we have right now to do better than a podcast about podcasting, because the

[Mark]:

UK is full of really good, if we just take football or soccer, if you're in the US,

[Mark]:

it's full of great shows. Ben Foster's show under the kosh that

[James Cridland]:

Yeah,

[Mark]:

are revealing

[James Cridland]:

yeah.

[Mark]:

little stories and tidbits. It's almost like when you watch Gazaron, an interview you're

[Mark]:

like, this is brilliant. I've seen Gazaron TV 30, 40 times in the last 10, 20 years, but

[Mark]:

something So it knows where it's aiming. It knows what it's trying to be. And right

[Mark]:

back to that beginning point earlier on that when we sort of discussed that YouTube,

[Mark]:

it's almost like YouTube probably had to get into podcasting because people were

[Mark]:

doing it anyway. It almost feels like something like the Simon Jordan show was made

[Mark]:

for YouTube, but thought about and strategized and designed in such a way, and even edited

[Mark]:

in such a way that it's just good audio as well. And That then brings me back to the

[Mark]:

old, and you'll appreciate this, the kind of mum factor. My mum doesn't care whether

[Mark]:

this is delivered via audio first RSS. She doesn't care whether or not it's on YouTube

[Mark]:

or on

[James Cridland]:

Hmm

[Mark]:

Spotify. All she cares about is the topic that she enjoys. She can enjoy where

[Mark]:

she chooses to enjoy it. And that feels like... the big thing that we really deeply

[Mark]:

embedded in the industry, a lot of us have yet to figure out, because like you said

[Mark]:

earlier on, there's a lot of holding on to... I don't want to say beliefs, but to

[Mark]:

holding on to old tropes that may need to develop. And I just find it fascinating.

[Mark]:

I'm not going anywhere with that with the question. I just find that to be a massive

[Mark]:

challenge. for us within the industry, you know?

[James Cridland]:

Hmm. Now I think it's fascinating and I think that there are so many changes

[James Cridland]:

happening at the moment in terms of, I mean, the media in general, of

[James Cridland]:

course. I mean, you only have to look at some of the large incumbent broadcasters

[James Cridland]:

in the US who are seeing considerable additional money coming in through podcasting.

[James Cridland]:

But the rest of their business is falling apart. while they sit there. And

[James Cridland]:

it's fascinating watching. It's a very different world in Europe, but

[James Cridland]:

it's fascinating watching that happening in the US. And I do wonder whether

[James Cridland]:

some of the more outspoken people in the industry, particularly in the

[James Cridland]:

podcast industry, are there being outspoken because they are worried about

[James Cridland]:

what these changes might actually mean for them personally? rather than necessarily

[James Cridland]:

what it means for the entire industry as we move forward. I think there

[James Cridland]:

are fascinating things happening and I'm really excited about the possibilities

[James Cridland]:

that a strong podcast platform in YouTube might actually give us. I think

[James Cridland]:

that that's really interesting in terms of what that means to audio. And clearly,

[James Cridland]:

I think it will only work for certain genres. I mean, audio fiction,

[James Cridland]:

working on YouTube, I find that that's going to be really hard.

[James Cridland]:

So I'm not necessarily sure how that bit is going to work. But I think

[James Cridland]:

that certainly for certain shows in certain genres, YouTube is going to

[James Cridland]:

be really interesting. Spotify is already really interesting again for certain

[James Cridland]:

genres, not for every single genre coming up. And I think the big change

[James Cridland]:

which will happen at some point, because they will do this because they're

[James Cridland]:

not stupid, is Apple podcasts launching an Android app. Because Apple podcasts

[James Cridland]:

can't sit on their hands for the next five years and watch while Spotify

[James Cridland]:

and increasingly now YouTube takes away all of the opportunities that Apple

[James Cridland]:

has by being the market leader there. And so at some point, Apple is going

[James Cridland]:

to have to launch an Android app. And that again is going to be really interesting.

[James Cridland]:

That's gonna be a real reckoning for Spotify that's been able to run away on

[James Cridland]:

that particular platform and be number one in most countries, just because

[James Cridland]:

it's the only real platform that anybody's heard of. I think that's gonna

[James Cridland]:

be a tremendous. opportunity for us going on. So I'm hugely excited about

[James Cridland]:

where the future is going. And I think watching what YouTube does is going

[James Cridland]:

to be a fascinating glimpse into where podcasting goes and how podcasting

[James Cridland]:

earns its money.

[Mark]:

James Cridland, always insightful and always, he's always fascinating to chat to

[Mark]:

you, mate, and I'm looking forward to doing it in person. And the very final question

[Mark]:

I'm going to ask you is actually, we all love seeing you face to face, mate. So

[Mark]:

where will we see you for the rest of 2023? You're heading over to London for the

[Mark]:

podcast show, so I hear, will we see you elsewhere?

[James Cridland]:

Yes, I'm speaking at the podcast show. I am the first speaker. So please turn

[James Cridland]:

up early. 9.10. I'll see you in the Amplify room, which last time they put

[James Cridland]:

me in a tiny little room, which I think seated 100 people and nobody

[James Cridland]:

could get in because it was full. This time they've done the opposite and

[James Cridland]:

they've put me into a room that seats 400 people. So please, if you're

[James Cridland]:

going to that, if this goes out before then, then that would be a good

[James Cridland]:

thing. But also, PodNews is doing two live events in the UK. One in June

[James Cridland]:

in Salford in Greater Manchester, or Salford next to Greater Manchester, I should

[James Cridland]:

possibly say. So that's... people get very upset. Salford, Manchester.

[James Cridland]:

But looking forward to that, which is in the middle of June and then in

[James Cridland]:

the middle of September, in fact, the day just before the British Podcast

[James Cridland]:

Awards. Pod News Live will be in London and I can probably tell you where

[James Cridland]:

it's going to be, which we've not actually mentioned yet. We're actually

[James Cridland]:

going to be in the old television centre in White City, which is gonna be an

[James Cridland]:

incredible venue. really looking forward to that. Sam came to me the other day

[James Cridland]:

and he said, right, so I've got these three venues. The first one is Inside

[James Cridland]:

Television Centre. Right, that's it. Don't even want to know what the

[James Cridland]:

other

[Mark]:

Hahaha!

[James Cridland]:

ones are. That's the one. So hugely looking forward to both of those.

[James Cridland]:

It's a day that we've specifically built to be a day all around... all around

[James Cridland]:

talking to other people in the industry. So it's very much a networking

[James Cridland]:

event, just as much as it is great people talking as well. But podnews.net

[James Cridland]:

slash live is where to find out more about those.

[Mark]:

Thank you very much. Looking forward to being there for both of those. It's always

[Mark]:

great to see you and the great work that you and Sam do. So once more, James Cridland,

[Mark]:

thank you ever so much, my friend.

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