Buzzcast

New Stats Are Coming + Spotify Misbehaves... Again

January 17, 2020 Buzzsprout Episode 17
Buzzcast
New Stats Are Coming + Spotify Misbehaves... Again
Buzzcast Supporter
Become a supporter of the show!
Starting at $3/month
Support
Show Notes Transcript Chapter Markers

This week we talk about Spotify's new podcast ad tracking (ugh), early 2020 podcast conferences we'll be going to, and why podcast critics shouldn't be in your target audience.

Get early access to Buzzsprout's new advanced podcast stats by subscribing to our YouTube channel.

Q1 Podcast/Marketing Conferences:


Check out our recently revamped How to Start a Podcast guide if you're new to podcasting.

Have an idea for something we should talk about? Submit a topic in our Listener Suggestions form or post it in the Buzzsprout Podcast Community on Facebook.

Support the show

Contact Buzzcast


Thanks for listening & keep podcasting!

Travis:   0:00
if you are not yet a part of our super tracking Facebook group, then make

Alban:   0:05
way. Make sure that you do. We just crossed 10,000

Travis:   0:10
poor souls that are having their data

Alban:   0:12
mined by Facebook. God is not going to think this out. Uh, I gotta catch

Travis:   0:20
my breath. Everybody. Welcome back to another episode of Buzz cast. Hope you're 2020 is going super well so far. Just a little teaser here. At the end of this episode, we're gonna tell you about something really cool that were coming out with. So make sure you stick around to the end.

Alban:   0:37
Are you teasing a teaser? Teasing a tease? I just wants

Kevin:   0:41
a podcast. They could just skip there right now.

Alban:   0:43
You know what? I'll even put a chapter Mark. Go ahead. Is that generous? You really wanna skip

Travis:   0:47
ahead? Find the chapter marker Ghost in the teaser. Come back here. Um, we got a couple cool conferences coming. This is falling apart. Alvin, tell us about some conferences were going to of unity.

Alban:   0:59
I'm really not sure if this is actually making it in, or we're gonna re record decision. We'll do it live. Okay. Uh, So we're going to a bunch of conferences. First up, podcast movement, Evolution's. It's all about what's changing in podcasting and there. You know, we've got a podcast movement every year that it's been around and they're doing a totally new um, style conference. So we're gonna see what it's like. Seems pretty cool. I really like the ones that have a little bit more of like, distinguished tracks, which is what they're doing here. John is speaking. John is one of our programmers, and he's talking about Stapp trends in the podcasting industry. So he's going back through all of years and years of play data and trying to get good information, telling people what trends were seeing. Um, so come by and check that talk out

Travis:   1:53
and that's where is that That conference

Alban:   1:55
that is L A L A. And it's February 12th to the 16th.

Travis:   2:01
Oh, if you need you need, ah, fun place to take your ah, Valentine's date taking the podcast movement. Evolution's out in L. A.

Alban:   2:08
Well, that I just realized John and I are gonna be just developed states. Our wives and kids are gonna be back home in Florida, and we're gonna be like, Oh, great. What do we know? We're not going to dinner tonight? I don't know. Um all right, so second conference. Ah, Travis, this is you you're going to spark. Yeah. Why don't you tell us what spark is?

Travis:   2:30
So Spark is, to my knowledge, the first Christian podcasters conference, and I'm gonna be talking about analytics so specifically howto take the stats that you can see in your dashboard and and all these other places, like the Spotify dashboard and apple podcasts and things like that and actually figure out Okay, what is this saying about how my podcast is doing, And how do we make informed decisions with it? So my podcast grow and do better. So that's what my talk's gonna be about, um, pretty pumped about it, actually. A lot of fun.

Kevin:   3:01
And one of the Buzzsprout creators. Krystal Proffitt is also going to be at that conference

Travis:   3:05
and she is also speaking, I believe on how to start a podcast. Yeah. So which were? That'll be great. We have Ah, as as the Internet does you build relationships of people over the internet, and then it's like, Oh, it's great to meet you in person. This is wonderful, but a face to ah, profile picture.

Kevin:   3:21
So what are the dates on? Spark

Alban:   3:23
Spark is February 21st 2 20 seconds and then we're getting right back to it with one of our other conferences. I think we've gone every year to this one as well. Podfest is down in Orlando. That is March 5th to the eighth. And I'll be speaking on podcast monetization specifically for podcast with less than 10,000 listeners. You are somebody who couldn't get a deal with male chimp or something. They're not superstition talking to you until you've gotten hit a certain threshold. How can you monetize your podcast and it be meaningful like a real amount of money. So I'll be talking about that at Podfest, and we're going to take a lot of buzz about customers. All the

Travis:   4:10
Buzzsprout customers. Um, every single Buzzsprout customer. That's the goal. We're gonna violate the fire.

Alban:   4:16
Chris, Chris, uh, would be thrilled if we brought all I think that would be the largest podcast conference of all time. But we're not bringing everyone, but we will probably bring almost all the people who want to go. So if you're listening to this, we'll send out an email

Travis:   4:33
yesterday. The past? Yes. We will have sent out an email.

Alban:   4:36
You were sending out an email tomorrow. So to you yesterday. And ah, we're gonna put that email out. And you could just fill out the information if you want to go to Podfest because we bought a lot of tickets and we're excited to take you

Kevin:   4:49
right. So the important thing there is that everyone has to cover their own travel and accommodations while they're there, but we will cover the ticket on. The only thing that we ask is that you are 100% confirmed that you were actually gonna show up because we are out of pocket on the ticket whether you actually show up or not. That's why we're gonna ask you to confirm that you will actually be able to attend and you have a place to stay, and then we'll cover the ticket. And what's really exciting is that we are we're hoping to get a significant number of buzz brought customers to this event. Triple digit. It's triple digits. Yes, 100 plus and we want to do something fun for everybody in the Buzzsprout family. So we're thinking Thursday night, Thursday evening, probably somewhere between five and 9 p.m. We're tryingto come up with some really fun but sprout event that we can all get together and meet each other. Ah, hang out at a minimum, hang out. But maybe more. Maybe we can come up with some fun. Games are fun activity for all of us to d'oh.

Alban:   5:40
Yes, If you want to meet the people that replied to your e mails and design the product that you use, you'll get to and it's it's always fun just to talk to other podcasters. I mean, I think that's the most fun and most of people who end up going or from the Southeast. So were a lot of people from Florida and, you know, Georgia. And so it's got a cool. You're like, Oh, wow, there's podcasters nearby and you kind of connect and keep in touch with a lot of these people. Um, for the rest of the year.

Kevin:   6:06
Yeah, I feel like so many people are now involved in the buzz about Facebook community and interact with each other all the time. They're thing would be really fun to be able to. You might chat with somebody all the time in the Facebook group, and now you're able to actually meet him in a conference and hang out. So we want a special time just for Buzzsprout family to be able to get together and hang out, meet everybody and connect faces with online profiles and podcasts and all that stuff.

Alban:   6:26
I feel like Tom from MySpace right now, like Oh, and all these people just met because of our facebookers. Um and then the last one is trafficking conversions. That's the end of March, the 31st to the second of April. That's the fourth month, Um, and we're just running a recording booth so everybody will be able to come by record their podcast. We've been there now the last four years, and I think it's really cool. Conference. Um, it will be fun to see everyone that's out in San Diego. And if you're there, come on by the booth and let's talk about podcasts.

Kevin:   7:02
Yeah, if you haven't been the team see before, it is a huge conference. It's really well run. It's not specifically podcasting, but I opened my right, saying They do have podcasting track this year. Yeah, that's more podcasting focus. But it's also it's just marketing in general. So I mean, if you're doing things beyond podcasting and you'll be able to pick up a lot of great information on other things like, you know, email marketing, direct marking all the basically anything marketing related. And now they also have all this amazing podcasting content on the podcasting track as well.

Alban:   7:29
Yeah, going there for four years has actually been really illuminating to for me because I go and I see the marketing world as a whole and people kind of know podcasting year one year, two years. Three. It was a little bit Maur, and last year people are like, Oh, Buzzsprout. Yeah, I used you guys I know about Buzzsprout or I use one of your competitors and I was shocked at how many more people used Buzzsprout or we're writing podcast for clients for actual businesses, and it's just really interesting to see the level of sophistication rise so much in one year. So I'm very excited to go back this year and maybe it'll falling off a cliff. Everyone's like broadcasting. That doesn't work. You were like No, I imagine it will be much

Kevin:   8:17
me The charger, for sure. Podcasting is

Travis:   8:19
exploding awesome and will be a more conferences throughout the year. But those are the kind of the ones on the near horizon. So if you're looking for a way to kind of grow your craft and network with other podcasters and learn from from the industry experts, all these conferences air great great investments, long term investments for you and for becoming better podcaster All right, so if you're listening to this, you are not listening to it on Spotify because this podcast is no longer on Spotify. Um, it just I don't I don't know, Kevin. I don't even know what is. What is life

Kevin:   8:56
anymore. That's a heck of an injury

Travis:   8:58
like Okay, so we pulled our stuff from Spotify because, you know, they were doing some fishy stuff, thrown ads around podcasts and, well, we don't want to be part of that. And then

Kevin:   9:08
no, originally, it wasn't really about that. It was mostly about the last three. Every hosting. Yeah. Yeah, and the uncertainty about whether they what they were gonna d'oh about advertising. Especially for people who weren't like on their premium where they're gonna be putting ads in between podcasts and right. Yeah, I gotta side with that uncertainty. Ah, Still a big question mark around a lot of that stuff we said, Hey, we're not gonna jump. When we launch these shows. We're not gonna throw him into the Spotify directory. Then Spotify comes back and they say, Hey, here's through some conversation. Here's another option. We won't re host content will go ahead and play by the same set of rules that nobody else does. And we will enable this thing called Passed Through which, you know, actually, let's the files be served from there. The hosting provider of the podcasters choice. Great. We enabled out we jump through all the hoops toe, get that working for the entire Buzzsprout network. Now we're listing Spotify and then here we are, three or four weeks later to

Alban:   9:58
its one episode later, I think, wasn't it like what

Kevin:   10:02
you got? Not long, and they come out around the hills of CS This big announcement that they have enabled all this new ad tracking technology within the Spotify ecosystem specifically around podcast. It's stuff that they've been doing in the music world for a long time, but now they're moving at all into the podcasting world, and it's it's tracking. It's targeting ads based on demographic information on your listeners and listening habits. I mean all the way down to I think they're pressure, Lee said. Something about like we can't even determine the mood of your listener and served in the appropriate ad. It's like That's that's just not in line with the values of Buzzsprout. We value privacy way too much and ah like and

Alban:   10:48
we really feel like the idea

Kevin:   10:50
of targeting and add in podcasting in and of itself is not terrible. It's when you start getting into using people's personal information. T make ads. Maur targeted to them that we feel like it crosses the line between targeting based on interest. And now you're using information that you know about me to manipulate my purchasing decisions. So you know, because I'm feeling, you know, it's the New Year and everyone's on these diets or whatever and I'm listening thio sad, melancholy music and you feel like I might feel a little down on myself. You're going to now targeted ad about, you know, Pelle Aton or

Alban:   11:24
something to help you get in shape.

Kevin:   11:26
And I'm gonna end up buying this $2500 bike and subscribing to

Alban:   11:30
the background. There's this algorithms like you listen to Bon Iver for like, 12 hours straight like, Hey, what about antidepressant pills? Okay, I know I just got broken up with

Kevin:   11:40
right, and it just crosses the line between like, someone's listening to a show about technology so they're interested in technology stuff. Let's run an ad for a new smartphone and now it crosses into Here's a way that we can manipulate this person kind of based on their mood or something. It's just feels creepy. It feels bad that we don't think it's in line with what's best for a healthy podcasting ecosystem. It feels more in line with what Facebook and Google and stuff I've had to d'oh as we move away from intent based searches and the targeting capabilities there because you're searching for something specific and now we have to get into we have to know a ton about you and again, all the way down to your mood or your level of education or household income or number of Children who haven't. And once it crosses that line cash, we don't want to see that stuff infiltrate podcasting, so we can't support it now. That said, everyone has their own choice to do what they want with their shows. So we're not pulling out the functionality, of course, to be able to Smith the Spotify through Buzzsprout. It's your show. And we've always believed that. And you can do what you want with your show. But for us, it just doesn't feel right to push our content there.

Travis:   12:49
Yeah, and as I was reading through the kind of press release of like, look how amazing this is. So this is on Spotify for brands dot com. This is their website. Um, and they say Spotify podcasts ads offer the intimacy and quality of traditional podcast ads with the precision and transparency of modern day digital marketing.

Alban:   13:13
The intimacy of sewing going through your window.

Travis:   13:19
Um and so So yeah. And so what was interesting, though, is like, as I kept reading, you can definitely tell this is written for marketing agencies like that is their target market. For this is people with money that they're trying to spend, and they're like, we're the place to spend it. Um, but what's funny is when they talk about like, these are the benefits of using Spotify ads like they're not actually benefits. If you consider that these capabilities already exists in the podcasting ecosystem, if you know what you're doing so, like, one is reach the audience you want to reach, right? So, hey, you know who your customers are, You know who likes your products. And so we'll give you all this data so you can on Lee send your add to them. Right? But the great thing about podcasting is people self select into these groups based on the podcast they listen to. Yeah, well, based on their

Kevin:   14:12
interests, for sure. But the more granular you can get with your targeting, the more valuable those that's become and again because it it's that we crossed the line between I'm just giving you an offer that you may be interested in based on kind of what you're listening to, what you've self selected into and

Alban:   14:34
making you an offer. You can't refuse

Kevin:   14:35
you. And now I'm making you an offer based on information that I know about you that you didn't necessarily know. I knew that about you. And that, in my mind, is manipulation. Now

Alban:   14:45
you can

Kevin:   14:46
say I mean, of course there's an argument to say. Well, any sort of advertising is manipulation at some level, and that is absolutely true. But we all have to decide for ourselves how far is too far like and I and I feel like we've all had those experiences where we've been on Facebook or, you know, we've been talking in our kitchen about something, and we've got one of these listening Dingus is in our kitchen or something. And then all of a sudden we go on Facebook and we see an ad for just what we're talking about. Our kitchen. What

Alban:   15:10
is this thing listening to me, right? There's definitely a

Kevin:   15:13
line, and it's different for everybody. But Buzz crowds position is that podcasting doesn't have a lot of this in the space right now, right? Podcasting doesn't feel creepy, and I don't want it Thio. And so I don't want to put our shows are content that we're creating in an environment where people are trying to move it into more and more of that creepy space. Yeah,

Travis:   15:38
yeah, well, then some of the triple points are like Deliver your ads with confidence, like we'll be able to tell you if and when they listen to the ad. It was like, Well, but if you look at data, most people listen to almost all the podcast episode every time. So it's not like only 20% of people heard your ad even though it got 1000 place. It's like No, no, no, Probably like 920 people heard your ad if it was at the end through the beginning, like 1000 people did. Yeah, right.

Kevin:   16:08
I mean, there's no doubt, though, Travis, I mean, Spotify understands the audience of who they're selling to, so they're They're creating a product for advertisers to get advertisers to spell, spend a lot of money on their platform. And when your audience is advertisers or brands or marketing agencies, the Maur information you can give about the people who are hearing the ads, the more targeted you can make those ads, the Maur Confirmation Day that you can provide around that people actually listen to something instead of skipped over it or even like at the level of controlling the ability for people to skip over content or not, Um, the more you can charge for all of that stuff. Yeah, And Spotify is has said that they're going to be putting these ads in all podcasts. Well, they're starting with their own exclusive content, but they offered the ability they want to move in the direction of offering the ability for anybody that put these ads in any podcast, not just their exclusive shows. Oh, that's not happening yet. And it's it's gonna they're gonna be serving the ads regardless of whether your Spotify premium customer or not. And so a lot of people are saying, Well, this doesn't affect me cause I'm Spotify premium. Well, actually does affect you for sure. And, um, whether you're you hear ads in the podcast, you listen to or not. They're still collecting listener data on you. So they're still building profiles of individuals so that whenever they enable this stuff for the shows that you listen to, they have the information they need to be able to target and again, in my words, manipulate your purchasing decisions.

Alban:   17:36
Yeah, one of the things she said earlier was the where people kind of feel like their phone is listening to him, and I think that I don't believe that is happening. We don't really have evidence for it. But what is? It actually may be creepier than that that if you would understand it, if it looked at your phone, there was actually one listening and going, Oh, target that ad. But it's more creepy than that that you aren't having these conversations in a way that it can hear you. But everything else that you're doing in your life leads them to the conclusion. You're the kind of person who's in the market for cat food right now, and it's so well timed and it's so well done. And it's based off of thousands of data points that we do not understand that a re collected and so much of tech right now is just hoovering up all of this data in the hopes that not just it'll be great ads now, but it'll be even better ads in the future and greater models of what kind of person you are and what kind of person you will become. And one of the one of the places, like one of the only spots on the Web that you don't have to have that happen. I mean, libraries and five guests. So you stay out of our libraries and stay out of our podcasts. Yeah. So how does this

Kevin:   18:52
affect our podcasters? And I think the question for the podcasters is Spotify is not, um, pushing ads into your your podcast content if you have a list on Spotify right now and they're not even offering the ability for youto opt in to get ads. But what we should be aware of right now is that Spotify is collecting information and building profiles around the listeners who are listening to our shows through Spotify. And so that is the reason that we've decided to pull our shows is because out of an abundance of caution for anybody who decides to listen to our show, if they were listening to on Spotify, they might not be aware of. Spotify is tracking your listening information and they're tracking it specifically not just to give the past the information back to us as the creators of the contents that we can improve our content. Although they do do some of that. They're also building it for their own benefit of being able to create post profiles of our listeners so they can target ads to those listeners, whether it be on our shows are their own exclusive shows. And so

Travis:   19:55
yeah, well and like you brought up an interesting point, not aim just the opt in of the listener side with the option of the podcaster side like it would not surprise me if they're new terms of conditions. When they refresh, it says you're also giving us the ability to run ads on and around your podcast as a requirement for being listed in Spotify like we won't list you unless you sign off that we can do this. And then one of the odds that they're gonna share that revenue with broadcasters. I'm skeptical. So So I think

Kevin:   20:23
it's sad, and it's it seems as though it's been a very strategic and, um, like another. You know, they're slowly but steadily building their influence in the podcasting space, so they're getting more and more people who are listening to podcasts through their app and the Maur attraction they get in the space, the more they can exert their influence and authority and control over podcasters. And so it I mean, it's it's tough right now, not for us so much because we've been in and out of spotted by so much. We haven't built a big listenership in Spotify. But if somebody's been in Spotify, you know, since Spotify launched their podcast director, you might get, you know, 2030% of your plays through Spotify. So that's a really tough pill to swallow. Yeah, if you say hey, you know, from an ethics perspective, I agree with, like the same stance that Buzzsprout is taken and I want to remove my show. But you have to go now. You're potentially giving up 20 to 30% of your audience to be able to make this principled stand. And that feels even worse because it's almost like Spotify has laid the game out and had been playing the long game here of they have had targeting tech and all this stuff built into their platform for years because it's all part of their music streaming service. So it's not like they could have implemented a date one. But it's almost like they intentionally saw like, Hey, well,

Alban:   21:46
we have

Kevin:   21:46
to become significant in this space before we can start, you know, putting the stuff in that could be objectionable. So let's make sure we're getting, you know, 20 to 30% or more of the listening audience of the general podcast listening audience overall before we start pushing our ad targeting tech because some people are gonna object to that. But we're gonna make it harder for them to remove, because now you've become dependent upon us. Well, it's only gonna get worse. That kind of is a good transition into some of the new news that's coming out about how popular Spotify really is when it comes to podcast consumption.

Alban:   22:17
Yeah, there's been a handful of articles, um, or kind of citations and pod news. The past few days about Spotify is the largest podcast directory. There's more people listening to podcasts and Spotify than anywhere else and, um, different. Like surveys that are done. They keep finding, you know, it's been two or three different results that have come out that way. Um, but that's not our data. We see a significantly lower in apple podcast is still dominant. Over half of listens last year were on apple podcast, just the app. Then you add in watches you add in iTunes, it gets even larger. Spotify significant was something like 25%. Um, you know, we get exact numbers in the last episode. So it's interesting to hear I'm wondering if maybe some other countries Spotify is much larger. But it has definitely grown a lot which, like Kevin, saying, um, if you're concerned about the privacy stuff, it gets harder and harder the longer you've been there to leave, um, you may have a very strong I mean, in some way. I feel like we're stuck in this with Facebook like we have this cool Facebook community, and all the time I feel like a little bit. I don't love logging in and going and working on the community and talking to people, cause I just don't love Facebook, and but it becomes harder and harder to leave the longer Eve invested in something right now. The other side of relationship advice D'oh Thea! Other side of that coin

Kevin:   23:53
is there a lot of people who have written in to us on support and said, Hey, I love the idea of what you're doing in your Facebook community and connecting with other podcasters and be able to share ideas and all the benefits of that. But I'm not going to be on Facebook like there have been too many privacy violations and I'm not comfortable having a Facebook account. So it's unfortunately can't interact with you in that way. And so and we totally agree with that now, Why? Why take the principal stand in podcasting? And but we run a Facebook group that seems right, like to face for sure. And we understand that, Um, but in a lot of ways, we all agree that the privacy ship has kind of sailed in the most of the Web, right, like there had been massive privacy violations, not just through Facebook but ah splattering of companies all over the place. And so we don't feel like there's such. There's this amazing opportunity to preserve something that is still pure and podcasting. I think we have that. I think there's there's not a lot of this tracking, especially on the listener side. There's not personally identifiable information being used to target ads and stuff, but its people are trying to push it in. And so that's why we're really big on protecting it in the podcasting space. But we do also have the same concerns on the Web overall. And so it is something that we're thinking about is there. We have a thriving podcast community group for buzz about customers, and it lives in Facebook. And this is not healthy environment to be able Thio. It doesn't reflect the values of buzz brow. It doesn't reflect the values of the majority of our podcasters. Probably. So is there a way that we can facilitate a community that doesn't live inside of a system that thrives or benefits from sucking as much personal information out of people as possible? And so we're exploring those ideas. We may set up a slack channel. We may there's other community like type software that we might explore, but right now we're kind of stuck with the tools that are available and the biggest and easiest one for most people opt into it. It was just Facebook,

Alban:   25:49
which is why it feels like it's important right now to make sure our podcast certain Spotify Because we were two years from now. 70% of our listeners were on Spotify listening to this podcast.

Kevin:   26:02
Right then your hands were tied. Yeah, you don't really And that's what's happened with YouTube. Like right now, if you want to start a video channel, it's It's

Alban:   26:09
real. It's almost impossible

Kevin:   26:10
to do it in any other platform except YouTube. There are some other video platforms available, like video. And, uh, what's the other one with TIA with Thea s. So there are

Alban:   26:21
other places the publish video content, but not with this social aspect. Yeah, no one's

Kevin:   26:25
going to discover it. No one's gonna find it. And so, like, YouTube has kind of won. That battle ship has sailed. Their Facebook is kind of one like the online community battle, at least for now. And so it's really hard to find an alternative that is effective in anyway. We don't want Spotify to do that same thing in podcasting. Podcasting is too great, and it's like the last remaining refuge of privacy that's like in this world of connected things. Um, so we're out. I encourage all of our listeners to think about it from your perspective. Make the right decision for your show. If you join us. If you're saying that makes sense to me, that message resonates with me. Um, hit us up on Twitter or drop us an email on and let us know maybe we can I don't know, get a page together. The people here is heading against this E S

Alban:   27:21
O. I thought there was that one really interesting interaction I had on Twitter this week about podcasting, and I kind of wanted to get your eyes feelings on it. Um, well, Williams, who's written on our block before, and a friend of the pod, um, she wrote, and she's like a podcast journalist and critic wrote, If you want to make a podcast is a fun hobby their friends and not make money or make art or be famous, I support you wholeheartedly and want you to have so much joy. But then it's illegal for you to get mad at me. A journalist and critic when I don't care about it thing whole threat of like, apparently people reach out and we're like, Oh, my gosh, please review my pod You know, it's like me and two dudes in my basement were, like, talking about dungeons and Dragons. And you're like, Okay, well, I'm not into this. I don't think you guys are super interesting and like, the sound quality is actually subpar. And we were like, Oh, my gosh, I'm just do this is a hobby. And you're the jerk, actually, Yeah, and like, so just the threat of that. And people kind of discussing it. Um, And I kind of was, you know, I was like, I agreed with it, and I was trying to think through my thoughts on you know, this area. And I kind of came to the conclusion Maybe is okay if I read my response, you're allowed? Yeah. All right. This is Ah, this segment is called Alban Reading Twitter of Life. The joy of podcasting is you don't have to care what critics think. You just have to find 200 people who are into the same niche thing that you like talking about. If the target market is 200 people than it's going to be mind numbingly boring to 99.99% of people, by definition, if this is your podcast. Don't spend time reaching out to influencers or critics. Chances are they're going to be bored and not like your show. If you're trying to talk to people who are complemented of your podcast, the best way to do that is by putting out a great show and then asking your listeners toe leave reviews. And I Really what I love so much about podcasting is like You don't have to appeal to everybody, and you just have to make your show about what you want. And even if you're just doing talking about your own thing with a couple people who no one's super charismatic like this show, then like you can get 200 listeners, you get 600 listeners. People will like listening to your podcast as long as you're enthusiastic about the thing you're into, and you don't have to try to impress people who aren't going to be into this podcast.

Travis:   29:59
Well, let's take a quick poll here. So how many? We all listen to too many podcasts. How many of us have decided to subscribe to our podcast because it won an award show of hands

Alban:   30:11
hands? But yeah, I was like way. No, this medium. Really? Well, okay, well, so you guys could see the results of the room and they're staggering. Let's move on to the next topic. Let's think about this way. The point. The point

Travis:   30:24
being that's winning an award appealing to a critic. It's It's like it's like rotten tomatoes. You have the rotten tomatoes score and you have the audience score and it's like they're looking for different things. When a movie credit goes to a movie, they're looking for something that's gonna be different or edgy, controversial. That's what it's going to get a positive rating from there. The audiences like I Want to Go and I'm gonna be entertained. And if I am, then I'll give it a positive score. And so you can see, like these vastly different scores on movies. We're

Alban:   30:53
also what's The critic is gonna write like, Well, Williams is gonna write about you in polygon or something to be like, Here's a great new show. Here's exactly what they're doing. They're being these really interesting new things that they're going to a totally new space. Let me talk about that, And but most podcasts are like the equivalent of, like a YouTube channel, which is just, like, really, really focused talking about something, you know? Hey, I'm talking about running sales. Inside sales at the pharmaceutical company is like something so focused that most people going to go. I have no interest in that.

Kevin:   31:29
Yeah, 100% agree. Like I think about it like this. Most people who know me on a personal level. No, I don't know exactly what I do, but they know I do something in the podcasting space. And so I get this question all the time of Hey, I know you're really into podcasts. What podcast shouldn't be listening to what the hot new shows and I think they expect. And you would expect it sounds logical. Like I should be able to rattle off 10 or 15 new podcast that that might be of interest to them. Right? But I never can I find myself thinking through all the podcast that I'm listening to you right now and then what? I know about this person in front of me and, well, I love this show, but they're not gonna be interested in that. And I love this show, but they're not gonna be interested in that. And I just found this one. But that doesn't apply to them. It's a it's It's crazy. My wife. She knows I do something in podcasting again. Not sure she doesn't know exactly what I do, but she doesn't do something in podcasting. So she asked me all the time. She's like, I've got a two hour drive today. What should I listen to like Oh my gosh, I don't

Alban:   32:25
know because our interests

Kevin:   32:26
are different, right? I listen to a lot of business shows out

Alban:   32:29
of Big Kevin's, like, recommending like, Hey, listen to this three hour talk accidental tech podcast where they talk about the apple keyboards not working correctly, That was like, Wow, this is what you doing? Give it Now it feels like a four hour drive, and so it's hard to make recommendations. Every now

Kevin:   32:47
and then I'll stumble upon a show that I'm like, Oh, my wife would love this or this friend would love this and I'll tell him about it. But on the spur of the moment questions, it's hard, at least for me. It's been my experience. It's hard to make recommendations because podcasting is so personal, and it's so niche nish.

Travis:   33:04
You say that word get ad, you gotta add

Alban:   33:07
the niche. Um, Nietzsche? Yes. Oh, it's something

Kevin:   33:11
to think about. Especially even you're reaching out to critics and journalists and saying, What do you think of my show? Oh, my gosh, if you don't Gosh, you don't ask any questions unless you want scary answer. Yeah, that show is gonna appeal to that particular critic,

Alban:   33:25
right? And, ah, the people you should be reaching out to. We talked about this sometimes in the marketing materials would put out people you reaching out to You are the people who are in your community who are probably not listening to podcasts yet. So if you are doing a coin collectors podcast, go into your coin collector forum and be like, Hey, here, we're talking about the ah, the wheat penny today. And like, this is an amazing penny. It's on this podcast, and those people are gonna be able to give you good feedback like are you totally blew it. You didn't mention this penny or something. What about the buffalo nickel? So you could get feed? That's the people you want the feedback from, Um If you want feedback on how your mike sounds, then then you reach out to a podcasting person.

Travis:   34:11
Yeah, it's just it's an interesting conversation, cause I think the idea of, like winning award for something or getting some kind of validation of like the thing that I'm doing is worthwhile. It's very easy to look for it in, like those more visible senses of like, this podcast critic said. My podcast was great. So therefore I feel great about it. But you're asking You're not asking the right people. If your podcast is great, you'll be asking.

Alban:   34:34
The ultimate validation is 100 people listening to your show saying This is good. That's the ultimate about that is such so validating. You don't need someone who's gonna listen to one time say, I love your mic technique. It is so good. I'm so impressed.

Travis:   34:50
Well, and so one of my I haven't shared this with you guys yet. One of my favorite things about what we've done with Buzz cast so far is that we have never gotten an email from anyone saying, I love your mic technique.

Alban:   35:02
Yeah, this is going down somebody's writing. Uh,

Travis:   35:06
if you love or Mike technique. Feel free to write us in. But we have consistently since this went out, gotten emails asking, Hey, Priscilla, where is the Taylor Swift podcast? Because she was on here and we're talking about it. And she said, If 10 people right in asking for this Taylor Swift podcast, I will make it and people wrote in saying, Let's do this Taylor Swift podcast. So she's working on it. She's just gonna be, ah, woman of her word and she's gonna make it happen.

Kevin:   35:32
Yeah, the update. I talked to her about it at lunch yesterday, and she actually has, I think she said three or four episodes recorded. Yeah, and now she's planning the lunch. So it has a real thing. It's happening

Travis:   35:40
and some production. So what I love is that that that is a snapshot of what is really cool when you create a podcast community when you create, when you have a relationship with your audience, right? And whether a critic likes Buzzcast or not has no impact, no bearing on that connection. So, um so, yeah, Taylor Swift brings us all together. That's the moral of story. All right, so Here's the teaser that we t used the teaser to the teaser. Um, we've kind of been dropping hints the last couple episodes and in different places in our content. But we're rolling out some new advanced podcast stats in the very near future. We're going to be releasing a video on our YouTube channel before the next Buzzcast episode comes out telling you how to get, uh, early access to those advanced statistics. And so, if you are interested in kind of unlocking that before we roll it out to everybody that make sure you go and subscribed to our YouTube channel, Um, if you want to get it as quickly as possible, you can click the notification bell. So you get a little notification on your phone saying that the new video came out and we'll show you how to magically turn your current Buzzsprout stats into our new advanced podcast stats, which we've been working really hard on. And we're really excited for you guys to start seeing him

Kevin:   37:00
right? So rolling something like this out is a huge undertaking, and so weird we're not quite ready yet to be able to flip the switch for every single Buzzsprout account, but it is stable enough, and the systems are getting to the point where we can start to let people in little by little. And so we thought it would be fun for people who, like Listen to this podcast or, ah, follow us on YouTube to be ableto show them how they can get it first. And so, like Travis that just go to YouTube, search for Buzzsprout, subscribe. Turn on the notification and we're gonna drop a video, probably sometime in the next week or so, roughly showing you how you can enable this stuff in your Buzzsprout account today. And, um, definitely. I mean, I imagine it would be at least another week. Plus, after after we drop that video until we're gonna be able to flip the switch on for everybody so you'll get quite a quite a jump. Yeah, it

Alban:   37:52
is a big it's a big update. So you're going to see totally new charts and graphs in all sorts of data. And then when people say things like Spotify is the number one podcast that you can go well, let me show you all the apse that have ever listen to my podcast and you can go show all of your data.

Travis:   38:09
Yeah, And I would tell you

Kevin:   38:11
this to that, even though we're just, you know, letting some people in early doesn't mean that you can't share the information. So if you, um, log in and see the new stats and you're like, Oh, I had no idea this was our most my most popular app, for this was my most popular country or city or whatever new day that you find. If you want a screenshot that and sharing on your social networks or help use it to build your show, promote your show or whatever, we're totally fine with that. In fact, we would love it, especially if you tag us will give you a thumbs up or a heart or whatever we can do to interact with the help of your audience will

Travis:   38:38
give you social media confirmation media lo love. Yes. Validation. So So, yes, it'll be on the lookout for that. Uh, Anything else, guys, Anything else before we wrap up? I don't know.

Kevin:   38:51
We talked a lot about a bunch of stuff.

Travis:   38:53
I'm hoping we can in the future move past having to talk about Spotify every other episode. I'm looking forward to that.

Alban:   39:00
Yeah, I feel like

Kevin:   39:02
I'm really dropped down to 20 minutes.

Alban:   39:04
We're like, we're like the ex boyfriend. I don't think about her anymore. I definitely don't think about Spotify anymore. Okay, So anyway, here's what Spotify did again. Another bad thing like Spotify message me and said they're so sorry and they're gonna change and everything would be different now passed there. Now it's gonna be awesome. Oh, no other. Thank you. My data

Travis:   39:25
anyways. Well, that'll wrap it up for us for today. Uh, if you're not already a part of our Facebook group, make sure that you jump in there. We just crossed 5000 people, which is amazing. It's it's incredible to jump in there and see podcasters helping each other Answer each other's questions, offering advice. So if you're not there yet, make sure the year there. And if there's something that you want us to cover on a future episode of Buzzcast maybe something not Spotify related. If you really nice, there's a link in the show notes and you could submit a question for a topic and we can talk about it.

Kevin:   39:51
Oh, yeah, And if you're new to the podcasting world, check out our how to start podcasting Guide, which has just been completely revamp for 2020 with a bunch of amazing videos. Travis and Alban worked really hard on those, and they are a great resource if you're just starting out in the podcasting space.

Travis:   40:05
Yep. Solid willing to that as well. But thanks for listening. And we'll catch in the next one key podcast.

5,000 poor souls...
Q1 Podcast Conferences
Spotify introduces targeted ads in podcasts
Who is your podcast really for?

Podcasts we love