Neal Veglio guests; Spotify Comments; Pary Bell from TPX

This week, James is joined by Neal Veglio from Podknows Podcasting - https://podknowspodcasting.co.uk/

We speak with Pary Bell from https://www.thepodcastexchange.ca/ and talk about YouTube being #1 (is it?) and Spotify's new Comments feature.

Transcript

James Cridland: 0:00

It's Friday, the 12th of July 2024.

Jingle: 0:04

The last word in podcasting news. This is the Podnews Weekly Review with James Cridland and Sam Sethi.

James Cridland: 0:14

Yes, sam is away in Greece on holiday, again with a glass of ouzo in his honour.

James Cridland: 0:19

I'm James Cridland, the editor of

Neal Veglio: 0:21

, and I'm Neal Veglio from Podknows Podcasting, a company that, funnily enough, does podcasting.

James Cridland: 0:27

Well, there's a thing Who'd have thought it In the chapters today, spotify adds comments, the most popular microphone in the world, and YouTube is biggest again plus, I'm Pary Bell.

Pary Bell: 0:40

I am the chief executive officer of the Podcast Exchange, and later we're going to be talking about podcasting in Canada.

James Cridland: 0:47

He will. This podcast is sponsored by Buzzsprout, with the tools, support and community. To make sure you keep podcasting, start podcasting, keep podcasting with Buzzsprout.

Jingle: 0:59

From your daily newsletter, the Pod News Weekly Review.

Neal Veglio: 1:04

So, Neal, who are you then then? Oh, that's a question that my parents often ask me when they're looking at me with disappointment. Um, essentially I'm an ex-radio nerd like yourself. Um, spent a couple of decades in that industry and fell in love with audio and started experimenting with podcasting stuff in the early 2000s, like many of us did us OGs, as the new breed like to refer to us and, yeah, I started doing sort of podcasting for myself, fell in love with the medium and then branched out essentially into consulting, working with brands, and so now sort of a bit of a double approach really. I do a lot of work with brands and getting their brands out there through podcasting, but also individuals that need a little bit of guidance and some help with, you know, tidying up their podcast, making them sound a little bit more engaging, and that's what I love to do is sit and just listen to podcasts all day and get paid for it. It's fantastic. I recommend it as a job, james.

Neal Veglio: 2:10

And people would have recognised you because I think you contacted this very show what a year or so ago, and you basically said the edits are awful. No, I would never have been so rude. No, I have indeed been on the show before. I believe Sam and I once had an edit off in the previous iteration of this show and that was great fun.

James Cridland: 2:24

That's right yes, yes, a long, long while ago, but no very good. And for people who recognise the voice and will go oh, I recognise this person. Where would they recognise your voice from prior to podcasting?

Neal Veglio: 2:36

I mean years and years ago. You'd have heard a nasally version of my voice on Talk Sport where I used to do the breakfast show with Mike Parry and Alan Brazil. That's all I used to get was on the forums the fan forums Like this guy. He's so nasally and he's always sick because the air conditioning was terrible. I'm totally blaming it on their own air conditioning. But yeah, I've been around the sort of you know the local radio side of things. More recently I did a bit of time at it literally feels like I did time actually at Jack FM in Oxfordshire and also the Reading version where I co-hosted the breakfast show there with Robin Banks for a couple of years, which was a very interesting time. Let's just leave it at that. Robin Banks.

James Cridland: 3:13

There's a name that comes out Anyway. Running around. Anyway, enough of that, let's get on to what this show is supposed to be about, which is podcasting news.

Neal Veglio: 3:22

So, james, this is really fascinating. Actually and I know that your co-host has had a lot to say about this as well. On his socials, spotify has launched comments which, they're saying, allows any listener to leave comments now on your podcast episodes. What are they playing at?

James Cridland: 3:38

Yes, well, the feature is actually rolling out from today, so the feature isn't necessarily with any of us. I can tell you this because I've had no comments at all. I mean, nobody listens to the Pod News Daily or indeed this show on Spotify much, but even so, absolutely no comments at all so far. But it's pretty cool. They've actually done two different things They've launched comments and they've also fiddled around with their app so that their app works for everybody. Wherever your podcast is hosted, you'll still get analytics and notifications and additional information and stuff like that. So it's pretty good and it seems to have been worked out in the right way in terms of the comments that people leave are private until you approve them to make them visible. You can block trolls and you can publicly reply to them all things that you can't necessarily do with Apple Podcasts. So I think they've done a pretty good job there, really. What's your thought on this, Neil?

Neal Veglio: 4:41

I mean, I have to put my slight reservations around Spotify aside for this, because I think this is one of the best things they have done. I agree with you it's fantastic to be able to look at the comments that you get from listeners and actually engage with them. It just gives you that feeling of you know we're not just broadcasting now. This is almost like a two-way communication. It was really nice to be able to go back to some old episodes that we've published in the past for clients where they have actually posted you know poll results and things like that. You know they've taken part in polls and they've left.

Neal Veglio: 5:13

You know the reviews, as it was obviously back then and to be able to go in and say thank you so much for that review, really appreciate it. It'd be lovely to know if you're still listening and actually put some call to actions in there. Like you know, by all means, leave us a voicemail on our, on our website, and think so for that. I think it's a really good opportunity for podcasters to just come away from the microphone and get a bit more into that social media aspect which I feel has been missing out. Certainly, apple podcasts allow you to leave reviews, but, like you say, you can't really do much about the comments that are a bit negative and you can't respond to them. So this is a brilliant opportunity, I think, for all podcasters.

James Cridland: 5:51

Yeah, I think it's pretty good. Good Pods, of course, has comments as well, which you need to log into Good Pods to have a look at. There are comments as well in. There's another product which has comments in there and I'm desperately trying to remember what it is I mean, obviously.

Neal Veglio: 6:06

Apple Podchaser.

James Cridland: 6:07

Oh, podchaser, yes, Podchaser, yes, and Apple has a review, obviously has reviews in there as well, which are very confusing because the reviews are different for every single country. So if you go and have a look at the Apple Podcasts app, you will only see the reviews You're in the UK. You'll only see the reviews from people in the UK. I will only see the reviews from people in Australia. And, yes, it's very confusing to actually see that. So we've now got to check multiple apps, don't we?

Neal Veglio: 6:42

That's the thing I was going to say to you. Actually, james I mean the man with the inside track I know that you're on the phone every week with the people at Apple Podcasts. Can you see them following on this now and say do you know what Spotify they've actually beaten us to this? We've got to get on this, guys. Or is it going to be another typical Apple podcasting thing where they just go? We'll just sit back and be ourselves?

James Cridland: 7:03

Well, I mean, you know, the one thing that I have noticed, having now got a beautiful iPhone rather than the Android phone that I was rocking is that Apple don't necessarily do things first, but they do things kind of properly and they do things that won't get them into trouble. I suspect that some of the transcript stuff was because they were going to get into trouble if they didn't have transcripts, but also, on the other side, they've done them properly. I mean, undeniably they have done transcripts in the correct way, so that we are in control of the transcripts if we want to be, and seemingly that's what's going on with Spotify as well here. I don't know whether Apple would really want to turn on comments. I mean, obviously YouTube has comments as well, which was the other app I was going to mention, small app I should probably have mentioned.

James Cridland: 7:57

So, yeah, don't know whether Apple Podcasts will be doing it, but they've certainly got the infrastructure to sort that out. I mean, everybody who uses Apple Podcasts is, of course, signed in right now, so that will be doing it, but they've certainly got the infrastructure to sort that out. I mean, everybody who uses Apple Podcasts is, of course, signed in right now, so that will be a good start to actually, you know, get those comments in there. And I think that's been one of the problems with not getting cross app comments through podcasting 2.0, in that, you know, it's just very complicated to deal with all of the user accounts and all of that kind of stuff. If you're trying to keep things open and make sure that you know nobody actually owns all of this stuff.

Neal Veglio: 8:34

Incredible. This is a learning moment for me that YouTube are involved in podcasting. I had no idea Nobody had mentioned anything about that up until this point. The podcast host has run their 2024 podcaster gear survey, so I'm going to say this through clenched teeth James, what's the most popular microphone?

James Cridland: 8:55

James. Well, the most popular microphone is A blue Yeti. What?

Jingle: 9:05

What, what, what.

James Cridland: 9:09

Yes, a Blue Yeti is the most popular microphone Now. Having said that, people who've been podcasting more than five years, ie people who know what they're doing, have pretty well moved on to Shure microphones, either the MV7 or the SM7B or the SM58. Is it the SM58 or the SM58? I've got no idea. Anyway, but you can very clearly see, yes, everybody jumps into podcasting at first with a Blue Yeti. I'm assuming, neil, that you are not a particular fan of the Blue Yeti. Would that be a good assumption?

Neal Veglio: 9:43

I mean they would have to prize my Rode microphone out of my cold dead hand to get me to use a Blue Yeti. Honestly, I'm not a huge fan of Blue Yeti. This is the interesting thing, actually. So OK, without wishing to turn this into the Neil Velio LinkedIn campaigner thing, because most of my followers on LinkedIn they'll know that I'm the anti-Blue Yeti guy and it's sort of there was a colleague yesterday actually mentioned whenever I see a Blue Yeti or mention of it, I always think of you, which means obviously I'm on brand.

Neal Veglio: 10:15

But the point is the Blue Yeti it's not actually as terrible a microphone as we love to, you know, to give it that trademark, but it's just the types of people that buy the Blue Yeti and I think you'll agree with this, james, when we have the radio background or audio professional background, we learn how to use these things.

Neal Veglio: 10:35

I mean, at the beginning of this recording you might have sort of questioned whether or not I knew how to use a microphone because I was clipping quite a bit, but still, we have a rough idea of how to use microphones when we're doing this thing and the people that are buying them because of the SEO and because of the aggressive marketing that they have for this thing in places like Amazon. It's the go-to microphone that people buy and they always use it wrongly. They talk into the end of it. It's like they're talking into its helmet rather than into its face, which is where you should be talking into it. So the microphone itself isn't necessarily terrible. It's just that it's designed to be used in a better recording environment. Ironically, where most people that have that sort of setup they probably wouldn't put a Blue Yeti in there, would they?

James Cridland: 11:19

Are you the only person saying this, Neil, or are there other people saying this too?

Neal Veglio: 11:24

This is the beautiful thing I get to actually have some backup here, because a friend of ours I think he's been on the show before Joe Casabona, who is a US-based chap he actually did a comparison video between the Shure SM7B and a Blue Yeti. He actually bought a Blue Yeti. I thought he was mad, but when I figured out why he was buying a Blue Yeti, he actually bought a Blue Yeti. I thought he was mad, but when I figured out why he was buying a Blue Yeti, it all made sense. He wanted to do a comparison side by side and put this argument to bed, and I believe we've got a short clip to play of his experiment.

Joe Casabona: 11:57

The Blue Yeti, if not configured correctly, picks up a lot of sound, and so if you have it next to your laptop and your laptop fan is going, people are going to hear the fan. It's a mic that it's easy to get started, but it's not very straightforward if you want to use it correctly and so you can hear the difference in the two. So I'll just do my normal podcast introduction. I will set this to cardioid gain all the way down. This is plugged into my computer. No processing whatsoever, right, it's just the clean audio from the Blue Yeti.

Joe Casabona: 12:37

Hey everybody, and welcome to another episode of how I Built it, the podcast that asks how did you build that? It is opening week here in the United States, aaron, how are you today? Okay, so now I'm talking on the Yeti, I'm going to switch back to the SM7B. So now you've got the comparison. Both about the same distance, gain all the way down. Would I recommend this microphone for podcasters? No, there are better options out there at the same price point, like the Samsung Q2U is good, the Audio-Technica AT2100X really good. They are both the same price and I think they are better.

James Cridland: 13:23

Well, there we are. Joe Casabona has spoken. Yeah, I mean I, I you know it's interesting. There is a there's a national radio station in the UK that you'll be aware of. It's called Boom Radio and it's full of old folk who are doing all of their own shows from home, and the chief engineer of that radio station tested an awful lot of cheap USB microphones and basically went okay, which is the right microphone for the broadcasting talent that we've got on this station, and you know what they actually send out to new.

Neal Veglio: 13:57

DJs. I would take a guess. Would it be the Samson?

James Cridland: 14:03

It's the Blue Yeti. No, yes, so when you're listening to not necessarily David Hamilton, but when you're listening to somebody of that ilk on that radio station, chances are he's using a Blue Yeti Apparently. A Blue Yeti, if you use it correctly, isn't a bad mic, but if you don't use it well then it kind of is. And I do wonder whether or not people in podcasting, conferences and things, we talk a lot about equipment and we don't necessarily talk about how to use it correctly and I think you know we kind of forget that we learned all of this stuff in radio school a long, long time ago. I actually paid some money for my radio school a long long time ago.

James Cridland: 14:48

And we kind of forget that and possibly that's kind of a mistake on our part that actually there are quite a lot of new people into audio who don't really understand how close to be to a microphone, what to do when they're talking into a microphone, and so on and so forth.

Neal Veglio: 15:05

Maybe that's a marketing idea for Blue Yeti is to, with the sale of every microphone that they make, they should throw in a free microphone technique course from a PDF or something like that. That might be quite useful. So YouTube is now the most used platform for podcast consumption, says a report from Cumulus Media and Signal Hill Insights.

James Cridland: 15:29

Yes, yes, the most used platform and it's not just them saying that, but apparently three studies across 2023 and 2024 has put YouTube as the most used audience platform in the US. Now, in the US is important because the US works differently to other countries and if you'd have seen the keynote that I gave at the podcast show in London then you would have very much seen that. But, yeah, 31% say that it's the platform they use the most, followed by 21% for Spotify and Apple for 12%. And I'm kind of looking at that and I'm thinking is this measuring what I think they're measuring podcasts, or is it measuring what people think are podcasts on these platforms? Because I have a feeling that there are lots of people who say that they're using YouTube a lot for podcasts, but what they're actually consuming on YouTube aren't podcasts. Am I getting a bit sort of confused in my OG status here? Neil?

Neal Veglio: 16:37

I mean this is an interesting one, because I kind of take the same approach to this that our friend of the show, mark Asquith, takes, where he puts it like what's my mother calling it? My mother doesn't think it's a podcast, my mother just sees it as content on YouTube and she's watching that and I kind of there's a part of me. I mean, yeah, we're OGs. We remember the days when you couldn't be a podcast unless you had an RSS feed coded. It was plugged into the very few podcast apps that we had back then.

Neal Veglio: 17:08

But at the same time, I do understand that you know there needs to be a way of measuring the consumption of this content. I think there's nothing wrong with calling it a podcast. The problem is that you need to then make that differentiation between is this podcast that is served via audio or is this a podcast that's served via something else, and in which case maybe there needs to be aJAR was to suddenly say OK, so an internet radio station that's broadcasting seems like it's a bit of an unfair kind of, you know, crowbarring in of right. Well, youtube gets to take over all the measurement, gets to take over all the rankings, because it's the biggest platform, oh, and it happens to have something on it that people call podcasts.

James Cridland: 18:18

Yes, and I mean, when I go to YouTubecom slash podcast, which is apparently their podcast sort of homepage, most of the things in there aren't what I would call a podcast. I mean there's, you know, there's the American NBC News from yesterday. Is that a podcast? I'm not necessarily sure that it is. Somebody actually worked out that a good definition for what a podcast is on YouTube is a video where you can see the microphone, and I thought that was pretty good. That was a pretty good thing. You know, if you can't see the microphone it's not a podcast, but if you can, it's a podcast.

James Cridland: 18:54

But I do worry that the numbers that we're getting now are just confusing things. I mean, you know, I've just had this email from somebody. I'm not going to mention the company, but they have two shows, right, two shows Now, one of the people I've heard of, one of the people I haven't, but nevertheless two shows and they are claiming more than a billion impressions a month. Now I've replied and I've said hello, keegan, the person who has done the PR for them. More than a billion impressions a month. What does this mean, please? The company has two podcasts. One of them gets 25,000 views for episodes because you can see that on YouTube. The other one gets about 125,000 views for each episode. How is the company getting to 1,000 million impressions per month, please? I mean that you know, and what's an impression anyway? So I'm kind of there thinking.

James Cridland: 19:51

I don't really understand what the numbers are and I'm a little bit confused whether what people are calling a podcast for these surveys, because these surveys aren't based on anything more than just asking somebody how do you listen to podcasts? I just wonder what these numbers really are. But you know, fascinating, and doubtless YouTube will be talking about that even more when they keep on talking up YouTube as a destination. The only thing I can say is you know, if you look at the podcasting ecosystem, you don't need hosting companies if YouTube is number one. You don't need sales houses, because the sales will be done by YouTube. You don't need. You know what I mean. There are great swathes of the industry which will just go away if YouTube ends up being number one. So be careful what you wish for, I think.

Neal Veglio: 20:44

Very true. Great point there at the end as well. Absolutely Be careful what you wish for. I think it's true for a lot of things in podcasting. Moving on, then. So a brand new rewrite and redesign of the popular iOS podcast app, overcast, is going to be appearing soon, james.

James Cridland: 20:59

Yes, I'm very excited by this, very excited I can hear it. Yes, I'm very excited by this Very excited. I can hear it. Yes, very excited indeed. It's almost Overcast's 10th birthday. That happens on July, the 16th, and yes, so Marco Arment was talking on the latest Under the Radar podcast and says that it's going to be quite a big redesign and he's also expecting quite a lot of negative feedback.

Marco Arment: 21:25

I kind of have to do what I think is right for the overall design, for me right and for new customers, and I try to respect existing customers as much as I possibly can. But at the end of the day, like it's not a democracy, I have to do what's right for the app and so I'm going to just take the feedback and again, some of it I will. Some of it will inform actual change, Like if I get enough complaints about something and I think there might be a better way to do this, I'm willing to change it and I think you know I'm very excited for this.

James Cridland: 21:50

Because you know I'm very excited for this because Overcast is the main podcast app that I use. I do use others, but it's the main one that I use. Super excited by it. I'm assuming no podcasting 2.0, because he's been very vocal about that sort of thing in the past, but it'll be interesting to see. What podcast app do you use, neil?

Neal Veglio: 22:08

I'm a bit of a Luddite, I'm afraid I am very strictly.

Pary Bell: 22:12

Do you use Spotify?

Neal Veglio: 22:13

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no Apple Podcasts. And there is a reason, honestly, why I use Not that I'm making an excuse for it like it's something to be ashamed about, it's not like voting for reform or something, but you know it's like it is a case of for clients, it is the number one podcast app, regardless of what you know people like Signal Hill Insights and Cumulus Media might be telling us. You know, and to have an idea of how your podcasts are performing in the app is obviously quite fundamental to being able to do your job as a podcast manager and consultant. So that's kind of like the main reason why I started using it quite religiously, but, honestly, it does what I need it to do. It's simple. It's got the time shift if you need it. It's very clean, it's very reliable. It rarely goes down. So, yeah, do you know what? I'm old fashioned? What can I tell you?

James Cridland: 23:06

Yeah, I think the only reason that I use Overcast I find the current version certainly I find it very difficult to get around, very difficult to get around, very difficult to understand how to subscribe to a new show and all of that, you know hugely complicated.

James Cridland: 23:20

But the reason why I use Overcast is the smart speed feature, is the volume boost feature, is all of that stuff that Marco Arment has done really, really well and that is essentially the product that he owns and he had to build a podcast app around it and I think he's done a fantastic job.

James Cridland: 23:39

If Apple was to put silent skipping into their app and a bit better speed control, then and I hear Adam Curry getting more and more angry every time I mention speed control, but yes, if Apple were to put that kind of thing in there, then I would probably jump straight to Apple in a heartbeat there, because that's the thing that I want. I want to be able to chomp through quite a lot of shows in relatively fast time. But you can also see on Apple's side that they will get lots of criticism from people like Adam Carey saying how dare you put silence skipping in and how dare you put you know additional compression and all this kind of stuff in there as well. So you know again, it's Apple doing things properly and doing things right, and that probably means that we're never going to end up seeing any of that. But I'm fascinated to see what Marco has done and see whether or not it's a little bit easier to end up using. So that's coming out anytime soon, which is very exciting.

Neal Veglio: 24:47

Can I get a little bit of showbiz for a moment, James?

James Cridland: 24:50

For a moment, Neil.

Neal Veglio: 24:52

Well, OK, for this particular moment, and just say how honoured I am to be in the company of a colleague of Howard Stern's, given now that the Pod News Daily podcast is broadcasting on Sirius XM in America.

James Cridland: 25:14

And yeah, you and Eminem are going to be going to the company dinners I'm sure in the near future. But, yeah, congratulations. Now this is a very, very laxly worded update on LinkedIn where I said that Pod News, the Pod News Daily, is now available on the SiriusXM app, and everybody has jumped to the conclusion, as you have, that I'm now broadcast on SiriusXM. It's absolutely not the case. I'm just a podcast available on the app. It's nothing more exciting. Yes, but I was particularly excited to at least be in there. It's not something that every single show gets, so I was quite pleased about that.

Neal Veglio: 25:49

Well, I'm delighted for you and I think we need to really work on your marketing in terms of how you absolutely present this stuff in the future to the outside world. But anyway, with the Pod News Daily podcast, which of course I listen to all the time, I'm sure you see Oxford showing up in your stats every single day. You go all around the world with this show. So what does your frequent flyer account look like, james?

James Cridland: 26:11

My goodness, I'm very close to Lifetime Gold, which I'm very excited by, and I'm kind of thinking, when I hit Lifetime Gold, which should be in about two years, I'm kind of thinking is that it? Can I actually stop flying around the world? Then that would probably be useful. The airline that I use loves me so much that during the pandemic they sent the in-flight magazine to my house just in case I missed it. So yeah, but anyway, earlier last month I was in Canada at the Power Up podcast summit there and I bumped into Perry Bell. Now he's the CEO of TPX, the podcast exchange, and I was curious about how podcasting works in Canada and what the podcast Exchange was. The Podcast.

Pary Bell: 26:56

Exchange is a I would call it a boutique agency in Canada that specializes in understanding the research and the platform of podcasting, with a rich history of being a first mover in Canada, and it offers services of helping brands and agencies connect with listeners on podcasts by representing publishers that are in Canada, both Canadian and international publishers. We also offer research and production assistance and other services, but the majority of our business really is in let's call it evangelizing the benefits of the podcasting platform to agencies and brands who are looking to really connect the dots with their audience and their targeted users. So that's where we live.

James Cridland: 27:46

And you joined from Rogers Sports and Media and transitioning away, I guess, from sort of sports broadcasting and sports work into podcasting. What was your initial impression when you joined TPX earlier this year in terms of the Canadian market?

Pary Bell: 28:02

Yeah, I have been working in the Canadian media industry since 2000.

Pary Bell: 28:06

So I've been a pioneer on the digital space and I've seen the digital evolution from traditional broadcasting and traditional magazines and the the growing pains that went with it. And in stepping into the podcast industry, I've noticed it feels a lot like 2009 or 2010 did digitally, where there was a race to acquire inventory and scale and learnings from the past, and, and so I find it a very interesting, almost wild west where it's finding its footing both in Canada and internationally, and there is no doubt that the platform is growing in leaps and bounds. Everyone, even my own 79-year-old mother, is listening to podcasts, and it's amazing how passionate people are about it. But what I would say is lagging is the connecting the dots for marketers to understand how rich a platform it is. I think there's still a concern over the measurability, over the inherently trackable digital behavior that can be challenging in podcasting, and so there's a resistance to putting what I would say is probably the right amount of budget into podcasting. There's still hesitation and there's still a little aversion to that at the moment.

James Cridland: 29:26

That's my broad picture and do you think the measurement piece is just a misunderstanding or do we have somewhere to go in terms of the industry?

Pary Bell: 29:37

I think if you're only comparing it to digital platforms. I think that was where some of the challenges are. If you look at media more holistically, you understand that magazines were measured for 100 years without actual any tracking or any pixels or any attribution. You simply found a sample that you agreed to and you move forward. Same thing with television, same thing with outdoor signage. You get comfortable with the measurement.

Pary Bell: 30:03

I would say podcasting is still in that stage of there's a desire for it to be as completely digital as other digital platforms. Yet the convenience of it is by being downloaded and being offline. There's certain things you can't actually get, and so from a user perspective, it's actually really nice and convenient, but from a deeper tracking perspective, it's not there, and so I think the industry needs to figure out that balance point where you understand the values of the platform and the limitations and you move forward. So I'd say it's more a nascent issue, it's still not understood and it hasn't come to a comfortable spot.

Pary Bell: 30:44

One thing I find incredible, having stepped into this industry relatively recently, is the notion of collaboration across the whole industry, that there are competitors who understand that it's on all of us to increase the awareness of what podcasting can do and that relationship with the listener and how intimate it is. We are all. I mean the old saying of all boats rise with the tide. We all will benefit if we work together. It's been fascinating to read some of the stuff that you've been writing about with regards to ad standardization, about a community. I have felt a sense of community, even with our competitors. So one of the things I've done is I've been meeting with our competition and I haven't worked in any other media industry where it hasn't been knives out. This has been incredible. There is a genuine interest for everyone to make podcasting successful, so I found that really inspiring.

James Cridland: 31:44

You have a big neighbor to the south of us. What's the difference, do?

Pary Bell: 31:57

you think, between the US podcast industry and the Canadian podcast industry, it's both a blessing and a challenge at times.

Pary Bell: 32:01

In terms of the US culture does definitely roll into Canada. So in terms of often, the biggest shows and the most popular shows are the ones that are in the US Canadian culture in Quebec, the French culture is very similar to Australia, where there is this notion of nationalism, and your top shows are going to be intrinsically French, canadian, and they're going to not be replaced by France, but in English Canada, our biggest and most popular shows are generally going to be the US shows. The challenge with the Canadian market is that we are a fraction of the scale in terms of population. We have a community that tends to be we're, very cautious people. I think Canadians historically have taken risks, but we are often very conservative on our approach and we like to wait and see, and so it puts us in a situation where there's tremendous growth happening in podcasting in Canada, but we are probably four or five years behind the trend line of what it is in the US per capita, and so there is still opportunity. I see it as continuing to evolve, but we're behind.

James Cridland: 33:17

What podcasts do you represent in terms of ad sales? You're representing Canadian stuff, or is it more than that?

Pary Bell: 33:25

We have a mix. We have some brands that we have helped get up and going, we host, we provide nurturing and support with them, and they are good Canadian grassroots businesses like the Looney Hour. We have brands that we represent in Canada, some exclusive, like Chorus, some non-exclusive, like the CBC. We work with great Canadian publishers, but we also do a lot of our work is with some amazing US content, with iHeart Media, with All Things, comedy, Soundrise, with WNYC. We've been extending our own networks and we're doing a lot of business development around trying to find appropriate premium publishers to partner with.

James Cridland: 34:12

How many podcast ad companies are global in nature? You've got Spotify out there, you've got Acast out there, Globals, DAX, although that's sort of changed a little bit. In this market, what advantages does TPX have in being a Canadian focused on Canada?

Pary Bell: 34:37

in being a Canadian, you know, focused on Canada. I think it's another. Again I step back into the media industry. There is something great about being Canadian, about being focused on Canadian people, on Canadian listeners, on Canadian brands. There is always a strong global presence In digital. In the past it's been and continues to be Google and Facebook and Instagram and TikTok. It was Yahoo. In the past it has been other brands.

Pary Bell: 35:03

I guess they're still around, but in terms of dominance, there was always a look at Canada from the international perspective as well. We'll just open it as a sales territory without really understanding the culture, without really understanding the culture, without really understanding the problems that marketers in Canada might have that might be different from Sweden, or they might be different from the UK, or they might be different from America, and so one advantage that we have is we are very Canadian and we're very focused on Canadian solutions. So we are 100 Canadian. We are not selling. So we are 100% Canadian. We are not selling internationally. We are focused on monetizing and helping Canadian marketers connect with Canadian listeners. I think that oftentimes, global companies look at Canada as a little bit more of a you're just like the America market, and so we are often treated very homogeneously and thought of as very similar to our American cousins. Once you step into Canada, you realize that there is a nationalism, there is a unique identity and culture, and so our approach is very much through that Canadian lens.

James Cridland: 36:08

And where do you see the future going in terms of podcast advertising? And I guess I'm particularly interested in whether there is something that the industry could be doing to help the industry grow.

Pary Bell: 36:24

I'm really excited about the opportunity, I think, as the media world gets more and more challenging, to prove the return on ad spend as marketers have more and more challenge to prove the return on ad spend, as marketers have more and more challenge in defending their budgets. One of the really interesting things is podcasting is one of the platforms where the data shows that if it is good advertising, it's contextual and you're leveraging that host listener relationship, people don't mind listening to the ads. In fact, they will listen to the ads and they'll act on the ads, and so I think that there'll be a bit of an awakening as more marketers are actually looking to legitimize where they're spending their money and they will find that they will start to increase. So the first step is trying it and then they'll get good feedback. Whether it's through brand attribution, through brand list studies, there is a way to show that there is ROI on their spend.

Pary Bell: 37:24

I think it's getting harder and harder and harder for marketers to defend that, and so ultimately, this area of growth is. It's fascinating to watch. Thank you so much for your time Our pleasure, thank you.

Jingle: 37:37

The Pub News Weekly Review. With Buzzsprout Podcast hosting made easy.

Neal Veglio: 37:43

So let's take a trip around the world then, James.

James Cridland: 37:46

Yes, let's. Let's start in Sydney, in Australia, where I am, there's a company who says that traditional ad agencies don't understand podcasting at all, creating wastage for advertisers and jarring ads for audiences. It's a company called earmax media, which I quite like earmax as a name, because it turns out that one of the people who runs it is andy maxwell, so you can see what they've done there. Nice, um, but uh, yes, um, uh, they are australia's first specialist podcast media agency, which will probably come as a surprise to the podcast media agencies that already exist here.

James Cridland: 38:21

But yes, ralph Van Dyke is the other guy, who is a very good audio creative, has won lots and lots and lots of awards, so congratulations to them, and also in Australia, while we're here, to them, and also in Australia, while we're here, 45% of Australian podcast listeners listen to true crime podcasts, according to a study from a company that nobody has heard of, called On Device. Now, on Device say that 53% of Australians listen to podcasts each month. That's a high number, compared to 55% in Singapore and 61% in the UK. Those are all high numbers as well, so I'm not quite sure where this data has come from, but apparently the least popular podcast themes, neil, include fashion, beauty, politics, fiction and technology. Wow.

Neal Veglio: 39:10

I always thought the Aussies were just badly dressed and knew little about tech.

James Cridland: 39:13

personally, yes, yes, we invented Wi-Fi here we invented yes, we invented Google Maps. I don't know why I'm saying we, they invented Google Maps.

Neal Veglio: 39:25

Well, you're part of the hoi polloi there now, aren't you? I mean, it is we. Shall we go to the US? Let's go to the US. Happy 100th birthday to WNYC. Shall I do it in the Howard Stern way? Wnyc? Oh no, that was a different radio station, wasn't it? The New York radio station went on air from the municipal building above on July the 8th 1924 at 8.54 pm, and there's special programming throughout the month, and the station is looking for New York stories. That's very sensible, isn't it? It produces a number of popular podcasts, including On the Media and Radiolab.

James Cridland: 40:02

Yes, on the Media, which is a podcast I listen to every so often. I know that a lot of other people do. It's a very interesting one. I would also recommend Media Watch, which is from the ABC, which you can get on the biggest podcasting place in the world, youtube, although WNYC I mean it's a talk radio station and is podcasting going to overtake it.

Neal Veglio: 40:26

Yes, because in the US podcasting is almost as big as talk radio. According to Edison Research, for people aged 13 to 64, podcasting is already bigger.

James Cridland: 40:36

Yes, old people don't listen to podcasts as much as young people do. That's clearly it. And then, finally, in the UK, the BBC's Newscast You'll like this, neil. They did what the BBC breathlessly called an amazing experiment. It was a six-hour show broadcast live. Wow, I mean, imagine, imagine broadcasting a show live. Lest us remind ourselves that the BBC started doing a very similar amazing experiment in 1922, when they were broadcasting radio shows live, just 37,122 days ago. But anyway, congratulations to all involved. I'm very proud about doing a live show. Wing on their chips, james.

Neal Veglio: 41:23

Come on, it's quite a thing, come on.

James Cridland: 41:28

It's quite a thing. Right People news Dave Zorob has left Chartable Chartable, of course. Rob has left Chartable Chartable, of course, bought by Spotify in 2020. He and his co-founder, harish, are busy planning on something new, apparently, so that's going to be exciting. I wonder whether that means that I'm going to see him at Podcast Movement. If I'm seeing him at Podcast Movement, that means that whatever it is he's working on is something to do with podcasting, but it might not be, so who knows?

James Cridland: 42:00

Let's go diving into events very quickly and a ton of interesting events and awards. One of the things I would mention is the Asian Podcast Awards. If you classify as an entrant for the Asian Podcast Awards, which means that you produce a podcast in Asia or the Pacific so that does include Australia, I think If you are producing shows in that, then you might get yourself a flight to Kuala Lumpur in September to attend the Radio Days Asia Conference and Podcast Day, and you'll get even more of me in person if you do that, so you can enter that. Yes, nobody wants that. Plus, the Australian Podcast Awards have announced a number of judges as well, and congratulations to the 2024 Earworthy Independent Podcast Awards winners. You'll find a full link on that on the Pod News website and, of course, coming up Podcast Movement 2024 in Washington on August the 19th and, of course, podcast Day Asia on September the 3rd in Kuala Lumpur. There's codes to save and all of that sort of thing in podnewsnet slash events, the tech stuff on the Pod News Weekly Review.

James Cridland: 43:19

Right? Well, it's the stuff you'll find every Monday in the Pod News newsletter. Here's normally where Sam talks technology, but it's Neil, a man, who has told me just before we came on that he doesn't understand technology at all.

Neal Veglio: 43:33

What's an RSS feed? Again, just explain that to me, would you? Now, you know that don't you Just about Finally figured it out. Now this is going to really test my Spanish, isn't it? Hoy en el pey is now measured by OP3. I know, I've got that. Now this is the interesting thing. My wife is actually she's a Costa Rican native. She would be screaming at me right now. Some episodes are doing almost 500,000 downloads, apparently.

James Cridland: 44:03

Yes, they're doing very, very well. It's a massive, great, big show. It's essentially the equivalent of the Daily, but out of Madrid, from the El Pais newspaper. That's how I pronounce it because I don't know any better. But they're now using OP3 as open, independent measurement as well, which is a good thing. Have you used OP3 for any of your stuff, neil I?

Neal Veglio: 44:26

haven't, but I have been watching it with interest and I think it's definitely going to be on the plan for me. I've got another podcast I'm launching quite soon actually and I'm very seriously opening that one up because it sort of lends itself the podcast itself lends itself to transparency, so I thought that would be a really good opportunity to try it out actually. So that's good.

James Cridland: 44:43

Oh well, that sounds like a good plan. It's an excellent tool and it's always nice just to have completely comparable data with other people, because you know, some people might claim a billion impressions, but it's just nice being able to actually have a look at other things Captivate. Who do you host with Neil, do you?

Neal Veglio: 45:07

host with Captivate. Interestingly, I do host with Captivate.

James Cridland: 45:08

Yes, I had a feeling that you do. You should host with our sponsors Buzzsprout Get podcasting, keep podcasting. I'm still trying to remember their new thing Start podcasting, keep podcasting. Anyway, yes, but enough about Buzzsprout. Captivate is getting a new Captivate dashboard with a fresh new user interface, multiple new features. They say it's going to be announced on July the 16th. Have you any idea what these multiple new features are?

Neal Veglio: 45:38

I've got an idea what one of them is because I've been asking them for ages and ages for it and that is a little bit of a tweaking to the membership aspect where you can actually have individual podcasts, perhaps having their own membership that you can connect to Stripe. But I'm waiting to see because they're very cagey over there at Captivate about their updates.

James Cridland: 45:57

Yes. Well, if you're going to be part of a massive global conglomerate, then I guess you need to be a little bit quiet about all of that sort of thing. Also going on, courtney Kosak has written a really nice thing about value for value on Descript. Mark Asquith from Captivate has just done a podcast about is value for value dead, so that's always nice to see.

Neal Veglio: 46:22

Says podcasting's number one value for value advocate.

James Cridland: 46:25

Yeah, I think you'll find that's not quite me. Matthew Passy was on In and Around Podcasting last week and he was talking about a thing called a podcast beacon and the idea is that you go up to somebody I can see you doing this, neil. You go up to somebody and you say I do a podcast, you should get my podcast. Just tap this and you have, I don't know, on your wrist or maybe on your key ring, something which you just tap a mobile phone to and it automatically opens your mobile phone and takes you to the podcast, which is quite a neat thing.

Neal Veglio: 47:04

I love that. I've actually become quite addicted. Linkedin has a similar thing to this. It's a QR code on your profile page that if you click on that, someone can automatically follow you on LinkedIn. So it sounds like a similar idea. It takes away all that need for business cards or flyers and all that. So, yeah, well done, matthew. I think this is a great thing for the industry.

James Cridland: 47:25

Yeah, I think it's going to be very cool. It'll be showcased. He says a podcast movement in August. Now I've been playing around. I bought some NFC stickers not so long ago. I was playing around with those, actually for a podcast movement two years ago where I wanted to share my contact details by saying just tap your phone here. And it turns out that Apple doesn't support the contacts thing in NFC so it didn't work. But I didn't know that at the time. But I know that now. But I think it's such a clever idea to do that with a podcast. So hurrah for Matthew is all I can say. And two final things. Firstly, streamyard. Something weird is going on with StreamYard there. They've got rid of their pricing page. What happens if you're getting rid of a pricing page on a website, neil? Does that mean that it's going to close or what's the deal there? Have you any idea?

Neal Veglio: 48:19

I wonder. I mean, could it be that they're about to massively increase the prices and they don't want negative press ahead of that move? Or are they going to close? I mean, StreamYard's just been bought out, haven't they?

James Cridland: 48:32

Yes, they've been bought out twice now. But they've been bought out um, uh, twice now. But, um, they've been bought out now by the owners of evernote and meetup, which is a weird company called bending spoons. Uh, and they're based out of um italy milan, I want to say, but maybe turin, but anyway, they're based out of um, there somewhere and also talking about weird things going on. So you've got streamyard there, but you've also got tune in, because what's going on with TuneIn? That is in Tesla cars, it's in Sonos speakers, and all of that.

James Cridland: 49:01

From January the 5th, you've not been able to add new podcasts into TuneIn. They put a little sign up on their website saying we've stopped you from doing this temporarily and we're just reworking something and it'll be back soon. And here we are, in July, and you still can't add a new show to TuneIn. Yeah, so yeah, and I've contacted the company. They say, unfortunately, we are currently unavailable to provide you with any updates relating to this issue. Thanks for that, very helpful. So there's a thing, but I'm sure they know what they're doing.

Jingle: 49:34

Boostergrams, boostergrams. So there's a thing, but I'm sure they know what they're doing.

James Cridland: 49:48

Yes, it's our favourite time of the week where Sam and I get lots of messages and the occasional boost and stuff like that. Jim James left us a very nice message on LinkedIn saying Thank you, sam Sethi. Thank you, sam Sethi, you and James Criddon. Oh, that's all right. You and James Criddon really are the trusted source for me on all things podcasting. I'm excited to hear what Riverside have in store, because we had a candle on from them a couple of weeks ago. Seems they've been really ramping up and setting the industry standard for video. Thank you, jim, for your kind comments. Thank you also to Albin Brook, who has used Buzzsprout's fan mail. If you want to use fan mail, there's a link in our show notes and you can send us a text message. He says thank you for the kind words about the Buzzsprout rebrand. As much as I'd love to take credit for it, says Buzzsprout's head of marketing. Buzzsprout's VP of design, cameron Mole, led the project and he's done an excellent job on that.

James Cridland: 50:43

And that's a man who knows how to do marketing. Clearly.

Neal Veglio: 50:46

Yes, he's very, very good, it's not down to me, it's down to my other brilliant colleagues. That's a marketer for you.

James Cridland: 50:52

Yes, that's exactly the right thing, and we've received a number of boosts, haven't we?

Neal Veglio: 50:57

We have. I love this one from Gene Bean. Now I'm supposed to know the technical reason for the two two, two and two, aren't I? But I don't, because I'm still very, very primitive around the whole value for value.

James Cridland: 51:09

It's a row of ducks. It's just called a row of ducks.

Neal Veglio: 51:11

Oh, a quack, quack, quack.

James Cridland: 51:13

It's like bingo.

Neal Veglio: 51:16

Where's legs 11? I'm looking forward to the native app version of True Fan Sam, as it will enable me to recommend it to many more people. Sadly, pwas are hamstrung, says Gene Bean.

James Cridland: 51:28

Yes, he's Gene Bean, friend of the show. He has done this show in the past as well. He also says Dear Lord, sam, I noticed it's all messages for Sam here. I don't know what I'm doing on this podcast. I sure wish we did our elections in just six weeks. The spam texts and calls during an election year are horrendous. Yes, imagine what it must be like, neil, being American.

Neal Veglio: 51:54

I know right. I love this one from Andrew Grummett Again a row of ducks and he simply says Boost, boost.

Jingle: 52:04

That's amazing.

Neal Veglio: 52:06

I want those sorts of texts. We have the boosts we have the boosts.

Joe Casabona: 52:11

Yeah, we have the boosts.

James Cridland: 52:13

Andrew, thank you so much for that. I mean and you know you call yourself an OG, but my goodness, andrew really is the OG. He was in the podcasting world before there was a thing, but before it was even a twinkle in Steve Jobs' eye and talking about OGs 10,000 sats from Adam Curry who listened last week and said, for what it's worth, I loved the birds in the background. Yes, that was the interview with Kim Foxx. That was actually on my back deck.

Neal Veglio: 52:43

Oh nice, oh, look at you geographic dropping. I love it. Yes, there you go.

James Cridland: 52:51

Finally, thank you 500 Sats from C Brooklyn, using Fountain, who just sent 500 Sats to the Pod News Daily. That's very kind of you, c Brooklyn. I mean, it's a different podcast, you probably won't even hear this, but thank you so much as well. And thank you as well to our power supporters, dave Jackson, mike Hamilton, matt Medeiros, marshall Brown and Cameron Moll. Cameron Moll there he is again. Cameron Moll there he is again. Most of whom pay us $5 a month, which goes into the Sam Sethi Uzo fund, which is probably keeping him very happy. This week he posted a very nice picture on LinkedIn. I don't know if you saw it.

Pary Bell: 53:30

Neil, I did yes.

James Cridland: 53:32

This beautiful, you know, and it's a swimming pool and rolling hills and everything else. Not working for a week is going to be quite a thing. But he even said on LinkedIn bye, see you in a week. So yeah, so it does sound as if it's actually going to be a proper holiday, nah he's on social media every five minutes talking about stuff.

Neal Veglio: 53:53

So yeah, he's on a working holiday. Can you imagine Sam doing anything else?

James Cridland: 53:57

Well, you know, I mean, who knows, who knows? Anyway, this is normally the time where we say, sam, how's your week been? But that would be a little bit weird. So, what's a typical week look like for?

Neal Veglio: 54:09

you then, neil, so I don't get to do my Sam Sethi impression. Okay, that's absolutely fine, I'll move on from that then. So for me, it's quite simple. It's just listening to podcasts, essentially, sometimes for clients and sometimes for just pleasure. But yeah, essentially I do podcasting all week long. I love it, I live it, I breathe it, I dream it. My wife is getting fed up of me in the middle of the night, waking up in a cold sweat going oh no, I forgot to edit the ums, so yeah, that's literally my life.

James Cridland: 54:44

What happened for you this week, james? Not an awful lot, to be honest with you. It's been a nice, quiet week. I've been planning a few conferences that I'm speaking at one in early October, which is going to be very posh indeed. I'm speaking in front of some very, very impressive people. The boss of the BBC is going to be there. Yes, tim Davey himself is going to be there, fun fact that you will appreciate, Neil, and no one else will.

James Cridland: 55:09

Before he worked at the BBC, a long long time ago, tim Davey worked for Pepsi, and one of the deals that he did a long, long time ago, tim Davey worked for Pepsi. Oh, and one of the deals that he did a long, long time ago was sponsor something called the Pepsi Chart. No, that's him, yes, and he was in charge of that. So there's a thing Radio history right there the Pepsi Network Chart Show I remember that was one of my first jobs was playing the ads in the middle of the Pepsi chart in the extra hour that the cheap radio stations got the cheap radio stations. I love it. Anyway, that's it for this week. If you enjoy the podcast, the Newsletter's, better find it at podnewsnet and also find the Pod News Daily wherever you get your podcasts, and there are longer interviews in the Pod News Extra podcast, as well.

Neal Veglio: 55:55

You can support this show by streaming Sats, you can give us feedback using the link in our show notes or, of course, send us a Boostergram.

James Cridland: 56:03

Our music is from Studio Dragonfly. Our voiceover is Sheila D. We use Clean Feed for the audio and we're hosted and sponsored by Buzzsprout. Start podcasting. Keep podcasting with Buzzsprout.

Neal Veglio: 56:15

And thank you very much, neil. Oh, it's been an absolute honour and pleasure, james, and thank you so much for asking me and thanks to Sam for going on holiday Get updated every day.

Jingle: 56:26

Subscribe to our newsletter at podnewsnet.

Pary Bell: 56:30

Tell your friends and grow the show and support us, and support us. The Pod News Weekly.

Jingle: 56:35

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