How Jeff Umbro Built a Podcast Agency: The Journey Behind The Success of Podglomerate

[00:00:00] Publicity, Marketing, Cross Promotion, Pitching the Apps and Paid Acquisition. We do a little bit of all of that. We like to make it like a big holistic campaign. That said, depending on what your goals are, there are things that are going to work better than others.

[00:00:23] What up, potty people? And welcome back to Clipped. As always, I'm Eric, your host. And Clipped brings you the tips, resources, and people to help you crush your content goals.

[00:00:31] This week, I'm speaking to my new friend, Jeff Umbro. He's the founder of Podglomerate. Head on over to podglomerate.com to see all of his company's offerings.

[00:00:43] They do various things, a couple of which are podcasts, production, podcast monetization, podcast growth and marketing.

[00:00:50] Jeff actually started in the podcast industry over a decade ago. He was a bookworm, had a job early on after college as a book publicist.

[00:01:01] And that led him and his interest in authors and writing and books to creating a podcast where he interviewed authors that he admired and looked up to.

[00:01:12] And it's funny, I always say it, but that past experience leading him to where he is today, to owning a podcast agency, you're going to hear that whole story.

[00:01:22] You're going to hear his philosophies on work, on podcasting. And I think the most important thing you're going to get from this, it's at least the most important thing I got was,

[00:01:32] you really got to determine your goals. And this is before you start a podcast. But hey, if you've already started, check in with yourself and be like, okay, why am I doing this?

[00:01:43] What do I hope to achieve? And how do I get there? And really engineer it step by step.

[00:01:49] Too many people start podcasts without really a goal in mind because podcasting is kind of like a buzzword now.

[00:01:56] Every company wants to start one. Probably your friends want to start one, whatever.

[00:02:01] But ask them and ask yourself like why and what do you hope to achieve?

[00:02:06] But more importantly, like whatever, if your goal is 100,000 downloads, how are you going to get there?

[00:02:11] You can't just say that. You need a framework and a roadmap and different milestones to hit that you can look at to achieve whatever it is that your goal is.

[00:02:21] This podcast is sponsored by Riverside. Head on over to Riverside.fm and take advantage of all their tools.

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[00:02:39] AI transcriptions, AI show notes, and Magic Clips.

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[00:03:15] Without further ado, Jeff Umbro, CEO, Podglomerate. Let's give it a go.

[00:03:34] Jeff, thank you for coming on the podcast.

[00:03:37] Thanks for having me. This is going to be fun. I love talking about podcasts.

[00:03:41] Yeah, man. And I'm excited to get to know you. Definitely familiar with Podglomerate and what you guys are doing, but have never officially met you.

[00:03:49] So excited to talk to a fellow podcast agency owner.

[00:03:54] But just before we get into it, just to kind of set the tone for the listeners and to get a little bit about who you are.

[00:04:00] Where are you originally from?

[00:04:02] I grew up in New Hampshire, a town called Exeter.

[00:04:05] I spent, I don't know, a dozen years in New York in between.

[00:04:09] And in 2021, I moved back to New Hampshire, a town right next to Exeter called Portsmouth.

[00:04:16] So I love it here.

[00:04:19] And growing up, did you kind of see yourself as an entrepreneur?

[00:04:23] Did you have any of those traits?

[00:04:25] I know you hear the whole classic, well, I sold candy as a kid or any of that.

[00:04:30] Or were you like, did you have your eyes set on like a career or kind of like, what was that like?

[00:04:35] I was convinced that I was going to be some famous like J.D. Salinger type.

[00:04:39] I worked in bookstores growing up.

[00:04:41] I was a writing major in college.

[00:04:43] My first job out of school was as a book publicist.

[00:04:46] Well, my second job out of school was as a book publicist.

[00:04:51] My first job was like a four-month gig that I had marketing an iPhone app development company.

[00:04:59] Which actually, as I think back, is probably the first point in which I saw a glimmer of entrepreneurship.

[00:05:07] But I mean, I'll be honest, I never had any desire to be an entrepreneur.

[00:05:12] It was never anything I set out to do.

[00:05:15] I eventually launched this company because I couldn't get a job making podcasts.

[00:05:21] So no, I was a salesman at the bookshop that I worked at.

[00:05:26] And I had a million other jobs that taught me a lot of the elements that I use today.

[00:05:30] But I don't think it was very intentional that I ended up doing what I do today.

[00:05:36] Dude, that's funny because I used to freelance at different studios here in Los Angeles.

[00:05:41] But it always seemed like I could never get a good, steady gig.

[00:05:46] I mean, I did some good things that I'm proud of and worked on some stuff.

[00:05:49] But it was always very freelance or very part-time.

[00:05:53] And it was hard to get a steady gig.

[00:05:55] I don't know why.

[00:05:56] I feel like I always sucked at interviews too.

[00:05:58] Even before that.

[00:05:59] Even when I was younger with just crappy jobs.

[00:06:03] It's interesting how that happens.

[00:06:04] And then you kind of create it for yourself.

[00:06:06] It's funny.

[00:06:07] I had one job post-college that I consider a real job.

[00:06:11] And I had that for seven years.

[00:06:13] I moonlit a little bit for third-party companies.

[00:06:16] And then I launched Poglomerate, which is now the longest tenured job that I've ever had.

[00:06:21] It's the exact opposite of every friend that I ever had.

[00:06:24] I don't know if it's a millennial thing.

[00:06:27] But everyone I know lasts about two years at their job and then gets a new one.

[00:06:31] So I feel like I'm the outlier in that equation.

[00:06:33] Because I like to keep jobs for a long time and really absorb as much as I can.

[00:06:41] But also, it's crazy for me to say that.

[00:06:44] Because the longest job I've ever had is like eight years.

[00:06:47] And if you ask our parents' generation, most of them had their job for like 20 plus.

[00:06:51] Oh, yeah.

[00:06:53] Prior to Poglomerate, did you want to work in podcasting?

[00:06:57] Had you been listening to podcasts?

[00:06:59] Because it's funny because a lot of people didn't even start listening to podcasts, I feel like, till the pandemic.

[00:07:06] What was that like?

[00:07:06] Were you listening to them?

[00:07:07] Was it a writing thing?

[00:07:09] Like, I want to write narrative stuff?

[00:07:11] Or no?

[00:07:12] Yeah.

[00:07:13] No, it's a great question.

[00:07:14] It's funny.

[00:07:15] I feel like this is kind of everybody's first experience with podcasting.

[00:07:20] But I had a friend in high school that burned me a CD with a bunch of episodes of This American Life.

[00:07:25] In high school?

[00:07:26] In high school, yeah.

[00:07:28] Wow.

[00:07:28] Which for me was 2002 to 2006.

[00:07:32] Similar.

[00:07:32] And he'd like downloaded them from iTunes.

[00:07:34] And I think you could only fit like three episodes on a CD or something at that point.

[00:07:38] And so that was my first experience.

[00:07:40] I also grew up, my mom would listen to the radio.

[00:07:42] Like she listened to Delilah when she was like driving to my baseball games.

[00:07:47] Which if you know Delilah, it's hilarious because it's like this woman, I can't tell if she's crazy or like a saint.

[00:07:53] But she is famous for having like seven husbands and adopting like 18 kids.

[00:08:00] And but she's like, she is a legend.

[00:08:03] She's like the fifth most listened to radio personality in the world or the US anyway.

[00:08:08] It's very much like, you know, she'll take phone calls from somebody who's like having a rough day with their husband or something.

[00:08:15] And then she'll be like, she'll tell him like, oh, I got this song for you.

[00:08:18] And then you'll hear like, like Celine Dion or something.

[00:08:21] And I just have memories of me like growing up listening to that in the backseat of my parents' car.

[00:08:25] And then the This American Life stuff.

[00:08:28] And then I just became a consumer.

[00:08:29] I was like everybody else.

[00:08:30] Like when I really jumped on the bandwagon, it was like around startup at Serial and Reply All.

[00:08:35] And like the early 2010s when all of that stuff was really blowing up.

[00:08:40] And I started a podcast when I was a book publicist called Writers Who Don't Write.

[00:08:45] Where I would interview authors about like their careers and one story they could never tell.

[00:08:51] And it was like silly little conceit that my friend Kyle and I came up with because both of us had these dreams of becoming these big authors.

[00:09:00] And like we kept on coming up with excuses for why we didn't want to write these stories in our head.

[00:09:05] And so we're just like, let's just ask everybody else that's already done it like how they got over that hump.

[00:09:11] And I did that for four years.

[00:09:14] Just kind of fell in love with it.

[00:09:16] And this was at the tail end of my book PR days.

[00:09:18] Like towards the end of that tenure, I kind of just said to myself like, I have this one thing that I love doing.

[00:09:25] I don't know how I'm going to make money doing it.

[00:09:27] And then I have this other thing that like I used to love, but it's just not for me anymore.

[00:09:32] So like, let's take that leap.

[00:09:34] Life is short.

[00:09:34] And I did.

[00:09:36] And I launched Poglomerate in January of 2017.

[00:09:39] Very cool, dude.

[00:09:40] And it's interesting how you started that first podcast and then you were probably like, well, I don't know everything, but I at least know how to like put a podcast together.

[00:09:49] And that's probably more than most people.

[00:09:51] So maybe I can build a company out.

[00:09:53] It was actually like very backwards.

[00:09:57] So today Poglomerate does three things.

[00:10:00] We produce podcasts, we market them and we monetize them.

[00:10:03] When I officially launched the company, I tried to...

[00:10:07] It's a funny story.

[00:10:09] I had this podcast, Writers Who Don't Write.

[00:10:11] It was getting like, I don't know, 5,000 downloads an episode.

[00:10:15] Solid.

[00:10:15] Yeah.

[00:10:16] And this was back.

[00:10:17] This was way back.

[00:10:17] So like, who knows how many actual listeners that are when you look at like the metrics of today.

[00:10:22] But I was getting a lot of emails from listeners, like real people who loved the show.

[00:10:29] And I'm just like, oh, this is awesome.

[00:10:31] And a couple of companies came up to me, companies that you know, and said like, we'd love to sell ads on your show.

[00:10:37] I told them how large the show was.

[00:10:39] And then they said, I'm so sorry.

[00:10:42] You're too small for us to do this effectively.

[00:10:45] And like that really annoyed me because I'm just like, well, we clearly have an audience.

[00:10:49] Like, why don't you guys want to sell against it?

[00:10:51] And today, I know why that is.

[00:10:54] Like, the unit economics just don't make sense on a show of that scale.

[00:10:57] But at the time, I was telling myself, like, this is crazy.

[00:11:01] There's a market fit.

[00:11:02] Somebody's not doing this.

[00:11:03] I'm going to do it.

[00:11:04] So I went out and I got a collection of like 10 shows that were about the same size as Writers Who Don't Write.

[00:11:09] I put them together.

[00:11:10] I bundled them.

[00:11:11] And I would go to all of the ad agencies and try to sell them.

[00:11:14] And that was the initial genesis of the Puglumery.

[00:11:17] And the idea was that I would also make my own shows that I could plug into this network.

[00:11:22] So I'd monetize it through the sales.

[00:11:24] And then I'd make these cool shows that I had fun doing.

[00:11:28] And I'd be able to monetize those because I'd already built these relationships.

[00:11:31] I learned very quickly that that wasn't going to work.

[00:11:35] Like a network.

[00:11:36] You were like forming your own network, basically?

[00:11:39] That's exactly what it was.

[00:11:41] And I didn't even have the language to call it that at the time.

[00:11:44] So I did that and I built it and it made some money.

[00:11:47] But it was just very small scale.

[00:11:49] I was still freelancing as a book publicist to pay my rent.

[00:11:52] And I started making shows like I planned.

[00:11:56] Eventually, I got really lucky.

[00:11:58] And I got a couple people who hired me to make them these podcasts.

[00:12:03] So I had a couple of production deals to help supplement what I was doing on the network side.

[00:12:07] And this whole time, my buddy Kyle, who I was making Writers Who Don't Write With,

[00:12:12] kept on telling me over and over again, like,

[00:12:14] Hey, man, you have this skill set of promoting books.

[00:12:18] And a podcast is basically a book.

[00:12:20] So why don't you start offering that as a service?

[00:12:24] And for like a year, I kept telling him like,

[00:12:27] No, that's silly.

[00:12:28] Nobody wants that.

[00:12:29] That's exactly what I'm trying to get away from.

[00:12:31] Eventually, somebody asked me if I would do it.

[00:12:33] And I said yes, because I needed the money.

[00:12:35] And all of a sudden, that became the business model,

[00:12:39] where I would charge a fee to run a promotional campaign on a podcast.

[00:12:44] And it kept developing into a more robust growth engine.

[00:12:49] And more people kept on asking me to do this work.

[00:12:52] And that's ultimately how we got to where we are today.

[00:12:55] We still do the network side.

[00:12:57] We still do the production side.

[00:12:58] And we still do the marketing side.

[00:13:01] It's just now we have 10 employees.

[00:13:02] And we work with these world-renowned shows.

[00:13:06] And we get to do it more and better, is I guess the way to put it.

[00:13:11] What do you enjoy more?

[00:13:12] The marketing or the production?

[00:13:14] Where do you fit in that?

[00:13:16] Well, it's funny.

[00:13:18] Marketing makes up a little more than a third of our total revenue.

[00:13:22] All of the departments are profitable at this point.

[00:13:24] But they're all different.

[00:13:25] We have half of our employees work in the marketing department.

[00:13:28] And then the rest are divided between production and monetization.

[00:13:32] So there's a lot of mechanics that go into how we determine what's profitable and what's not.

[00:13:38] But that is the biggest part of the business.

[00:13:41] Which is, it shifts every couple of years.

[00:13:43] At some point, I'm sure production will top out on that.

[00:13:48] And then at some point, monetization will.

[00:13:50] And then marketing will come back.

[00:13:52] It's a cyclical thing.

[00:13:54] But in terms of what I enjoy the most, it's a funny question.

[00:13:58] Or just running shit.

[00:13:59] Do you enjoy running the whole thing?

[00:14:01] I hate running shit.

[00:14:04] That is the part that I kind of despise.

[00:14:07] There are moments where it's really fun.

[00:14:10] And there are some benefits and privileges of being the one who started everything.

[00:14:15] But I really enjoy making shows.

[00:14:18] And it's funny because I'm fine at it.

[00:14:21] But I don't think I'm particularly talented there.

[00:14:24] I know what to do.

[00:14:25] And I know the mechanical side of it.

[00:14:27] And I know how to build a business model behind a show.

[00:14:30] But I'm a pretty lousy reporter and producer.

[00:14:34] I'm great at recognizing talented people.

[00:14:36] And I've hired them to help me.

[00:14:38] But that is where I have the most fun.

[00:14:40] And what I'm best at probably is the marketing side.

[00:14:44] But we have a really amazing team for all of our departments that are doing most of the heavy lifting when it comes to all of this work.

[00:14:53] I do find myself as a little bit of a pinch hitter.

[00:14:57] So whenever we need a little extra muscle in any of those areas, I get a Slack message or an email.

[00:15:04] And I jump in and spend a few hours trying to help out where I can.

[00:15:07] So that's kind of where I see myself today.

[00:15:09] I have three jobs, really.

[00:15:12] One is to make sure that there's money in the bank.

[00:15:14] Two is to make sure that everybody's happy.

[00:15:17] And three is to make sure that I'm not going to go insane.

[00:15:22] And are you guys all remote?

[00:15:24] Yeah.

[00:15:24] We have 10 employees in seven states.

[00:15:27] So who's your ideal client?

[00:15:29] Do you guys serve a specific group or sector?

[00:15:33] Just for the audience's sake.

[00:15:34] So they, you know, in the event that they may want to work with you or just to, you know, get some more education out there about who you are and who you serve.

[00:15:42] Yeah.

[00:15:42] Yeah.

[00:15:42] I appreciate that.

[00:15:45] We have a lot of experience working with like universities, think tanks, media companies.

[00:15:52] And what I would call like institutional clients.

[00:15:55] So like nonprofits and stuff.

[00:15:57] That traditionally is the makeup of the people that we work with.

[00:16:01] But in terms of like an ideal client, I think it's really just like somebody who understands like what their goals are and like has a KPI in mind to measure that.

[00:16:11] I'm sure you deal with this all the time, but...

[00:16:13] Oh, yeah.

[00:16:14] Because nobody...

[00:16:15] Well, it's kind of like a buzzword now.

[00:16:16] It's like every company thinks they need to have a podcast.

[00:16:19] And maybe they do.

[00:16:20] But like, yeah, it's kind of like, well, why are you doing it?

[00:16:22] What do you hope to achieve?

[00:16:24] Exactly.

[00:16:24] You know, you're probably not going to monetize it.

[00:16:27] Maybe.

[00:16:28] Maybe you will.

[00:16:29] But like, yeah, it's probably not to make money.

[00:16:31] A lot of these people.

[00:16:32] Lead generation, thought leadership, brand awareness.

[00:16:35] Do you find that they know that or you have to kind of coach them through that?

[00:16:39] I'd say it's about 50-50.

[00:16:42] That's always the first question that I ask.

[00:16:44] And to this day, I'm still surprised at how many people don't have an answer.

[00:16:48] Yeah.

[00:16:49] Yeah.

[00:16:49] Same with me on this show.

[00:16:50] Yeah.

[00:16:51] Why am I doing this?

[00:16:54] Well, but that's the thing.

[00:16:55] It's like, I actually, it's funny.

[00:16:58] I'm friendly with Ashley Carman, who is the podcast writer at Bloomberg.

[00:17:03] And as we record this today, actually, she just published an article that I'm quoted in.

[00:17:08] It is all about how people are using podcasts to like, you know, kind of a little bit like

[00:17:15] Trojan horse their way into a meeting and like booking an interview with somebody so that

[00:17:20] they can sit down and talk to them for an hour.

[00:17:22] And that all was kind of the result of a conversation that I think, I assume, I can't really say

[00:17:28] this, but I believe that this was a result of a conversation that we had a while ago where

[00:17:33] I told her about one of our clients who they sold this like really expensive software.

[00:17:37] It was a SaaS company.

[00:17:39] Every month they would make like 50k if they got a client.

[00:17:41] They started a podcast so that they could bring in like CMOs of the companies of people who

[00:17:48] might hire them.

[00:17:50] And they would basically just get to sit in a room with them for an hour or two and had an excuse to

[00:17:56] follow up with them over email and talk to them about the service.

[00:17:58] And so they were spending, you know, whatever they spent on the podcast.

[00:18:02] And then anytime that they actually got a client, they made that back like tenfold.

[00:18:07] So yeah, I don't know.

[00:18:13] There's a million reasons why people would start a podcast or should start one.

[00:18:17] But the thing I always tell people is like, should you start a podcast or should you buy

[00:18:22] ads on a podcast or should you try to get interviewed on podcasts?

[00:18:26] Podcasts like podcasts are great and everybody should have them as some part of their media

[00:18:31] plan.

[00:18:31] But that doesn't mean you have to make one.

[00:18:34] Yeah, just developing those relationships in the industry.

[00:18:36] And who knows how that's going to come in handy in the future.

[00:18:39] But, you know, relationships and connecting is always key.

[00:18:43] Yeah, yeah.

[00:18:44] I couldn't agree more.

[00:18:46] And that's probably weirdly my favorite part about podcasting in general.

[00:18:50] Like when I started Writers Who Don't Write, like I was just a, you know, schmuck book

[00:18:56] book publicist that like nobody really knew.

[00:18:58] And I got to sit down and have conversations with like my idols.

[00:19:02] Yeah, we had Lev Grossman and Stephanie Dandler and Peter Heller and like a million more.

[00:19:08] And I just got to sit there and ask them questions about these books that I'd loved.

[00:19:12] And I'm actually like very sad most of the time thinking about how like I don't make the

[00:19:16] show anymore.

[00:19:17] I just got too busy and couldn't keep doing it.

[00:19:19] But now I have a podcast called Podcast Perspectives where I do something really similar

[00:19:24] and I talk to people in the podcast space.

[00:19:26] And like it kind of operates like in a similar way and lets me flex that muscle a little bit.

[00:19:31] So that part's nice.

[00:19:33] And I'm assuming the show, even though you're not active, it's still up, right?

[00:19:37] It's still live on all the platforms, right?

[00:19:40] Yeah.

[00:19:40] I do not recommend that people listen to it.

[00:19:43] But yes, it is live.

[00:19:45] That was like the baby version of me who like I'm really proud of it.

[00:19:51] It's just like I'm embarrassed by many of the things I said a decade ago.

[00:19:55] I think we launched it in 2014.

[00:19:57] Wow.

[00:19:58] Yeah.

[00:19:59] I hear stories about like the quote unquote like glory days and maybe even before that

[00:20:04] earlier on.

[00:20:05] I work on one show.

[00:20:06] I've only been working with them in the last like two years, but they launched into that.

[00:20:11] It's called The Art of Charm.

[00:20:12] Oh, yeah.

[00:20:12] Yeah.

[00:20:13] I know those guys well.

[00:20:14] They told me that back then, I think it was like, this is probably wrong, but like maybe

[00:20:19] 2006 or something.

[00:20:21] And they're like, dude, back then you release an episode and there wasn't a lot of podcasts

[00:20:25] and your downloads would just be going up, up, up all the time.

[00:20:29] And like it was so easy to get like tens of thousands of downloads.

[00:20:33] And you were saying your show around 5,000 downloads.

[00:20:38] I mean, and that's 2014.

[00:20:39] Even then it was probably a lot easier to build an audience just because there wasn't

[00:20:43] as much of the content.

[00:20:44] Right.

[00:20:45] Did you do anything like actively to market or did it just kind of happen?

[00:20:50] Oh, yeah.

[00:20:50] Yeah.

[00:20:50] We were.

[00:20:52] No, it was a little organic for sure.

[00:20:55] But like we were written up in newsletters and Apple put us into a noteworthy and Spotify

[00:21:00] did some stuff with us.

[00:21:01] And but it's funny.

[00:21:02] It's I don't know if you remember this article, but there is an article from like 20.

[00:21:06] It's probably from 2015, 2016 in the New York Times talking about Steve Wilson.

[00:21:11] It was now at QCode.

[00:21:12] But at the time was like the only guy that worked at Apple podcasts.

[00:21:17] And this article is called one guy.

[00:21:21] God, I forget the name of the article, but it was some version of the man who can make you

[00:21:25] famous or something.

[00:21:26] He was talking about how he could basically he was like a kingmaker because he had the

[00:21:33] ability to put you on that carousel in Apple or new and noteworthy.

[00:21:37] And to your point, like there really was not that much competition.

[00:21:41] It was not nearly as saturated as it is today.

[00:21:44] And if you got that kind of real estate, then you were going to get a lot of people who

[00:21:48] clicked on your show.

[00:21:49] And that's exactly what happened with Serial and Startup and Joe Rogan and Marc Maron.

[00:21:55] Maron.

[00:21:56] Yeah.

[00:21:57] What the fuck with Maron?

[00:21:58] Yeah.

[00:21:59] He was early.

[00:22:00] Yes.

[00:22:00] And those shows are all still amazing and like doing well.

[00:22:03] But like with everything that's happened over the years and like the just the data consumption

[00:22:07] and like what's available to us to figure out like what's a listener versus download

[00:22:11] and everything like I would love more than anything to have that data from like 15 years

[00:22:16] ago to see like how it compares to today.

[00:22:18] I feel like Libsyn was one of the main ones back then.

[00:22:21] Who did you host the show with?

[00:22:22] Initially, it was Libsyn.

[00:22:24] There was actually a minute where we were on SoundCloud and then we went to Acast and

[00:22:30] then at one point we were on Simplecast.

[00:22:34] Now we're on Megaphone.

[00:22:36] I basically use because of the nature of like my history and all of the shows that we work

[00:22:42] with.

[00:22:42] We work at any given moment with more than 100 podcasts.

[00:22:45] I have like seen basically every hosting platform at this point.

[00:22:50] Yeah.

[00:22:50] But there was a time where I was on Libsyn.

[00:22:53] Yes.

[00:22:54] They're like, yeah.

[00:22:56] One of the OGs.

[00:22:58] One thing I'm really interested in and I'd like to kind of get in more of it myself.

[00:23:03] But tell me about like original content versus like your client shows.

[00:23:08] Was the original content like how does that work?

[00:23:10] Do you do people come to you with ideas?

[00:23:13] Do you have ideas and then seek out hosts and stuff?

[00:23:16] Or what's that like?

[00:23:17] Sure.

[00:23:17] It's a little bit like the flavor of the year.

[00:23:20] Some of the original shows that we have produced have been people who approached us and some

[00:23:26] of them are things that we have come up with and commissioned.

[00:23:29] So the two like most recent and notable ones would be Podcast Perspectives, which is basically

[00:23:36] my version of your show.

[00:23:39] And I make that for a bunch of reasons.

[00:23:42] But one, I like doing it and it's fun to talk to people in the space.

[00:23:46] Two, it allows me to create a bunch of content that I can publish on all of the different

[00:23:51] platforms.

[00:23:52] Three, it allows me a platform to experiment with so I don't have to experiment with client

[00:23:57] shows.

[00:23:58] Four, it's a great way for lead generation and for me to like get meetings with people

[00:24:01] and that kind of thing.

[00:24:02] So we make a show where it's audio and video and I publish every two weeks.

[00:24:07] I have a lot of fun doing it.

[00:24:09] We also made a show a couple of years ago in 2022 called Missing Pages, which was a literary

[00:24:15] true crime.

[00:24:16] We did two seasons of it.

[00:24:17] It's hosted by book reviewer Beth Ann Patrick, who's this like wonderful, smart, like world

[00:24:22] renowned book reviewer.

[00:24:24] We essentially like covered like the dark underbelly of the book publishing industry.

[00:24:30] So banned books and like scammers in the space and that kind of thing.

[00:24:36] It was super fun.

[00:24:37] It was really, really expensive.

[00:24:39] The purpose of that was to like build a portfolio piece, win awards, get critical acclaim, make

[00:24:44] some money.

[00:24:45] Get IP.

[00:24:47] Yeah.

[00:24:47] And it worked.

[00:24:48] Like we, I had a list of 10 goals.

[00:24:51] We made nine of them happen.

[00:24:53] And the 10th was make money.

[00:24:55] And we didn't do that.

[00:24:57] So, and if I could go back in time, like I would do it totally differently.

[00:25:01] Like the reason that we couldn't monetize that was because it was a limited series that published

[00:25:05] in the middle of like the ad apocalypse in 2022.

[00:25:08] But, uh, and like, you know, today I would tell you like make some kind of, um, like, uh, broad audience oriented show that is always on and can command an audience for a long time to come, which I know is probably easier said than done.

[00:25:26] But anyway, with missing pages, like it was great.

[00:25:28] I'm glad we did it.

[00:25:29] We didn't renew it for a third season and we probably shouldn't have for a second based

[00:25:33] on everything I just talked about, but I just liked doing it.

[00:25:37] So for the originals, like it kind of depends on what makes sense.

[00:25:42] Um, we had, uh, a few shows over the years, like the wave with Matt Fuller and writers

[00:25:49] who don't write and story bound and a couple of others that were ideas that like people

[00:25:54] brought to us that we wanted to see in the world.

[00:25:56] So we made them.

[00:25:56] But today, I don't know.

[00:25:59] I view, I don't know if I'm rambling too much, but I view the, no, no, no, no.

[00:26:03] I view the, like there are three kind of tiers of like, um, productions.

[00:26:07] In my opinion, one is a work for hire production, like a white label thing.

[00:26:12] So you, Eric, come to me and say, I want to make a podcast to promote my business.

[00:26:18] I will give you X dollars per episode to develop and create this thing.

[00:26:22] And then we do it.

[00:26:24] And like, we are work for hire service for you.

[00:26:27] Two is what I would call like a distribution deal.

[00:26:30] So there's some kind of partnership happening.

[00:26:33] So maybe I'm producing a podcast that I've come up with and am selling to Odyssey or Apple

[00:26:40] or something.

[00:26:40] Or maybe like you come to me with this idea and say like, Jeff, I want to partner with

[00:26:44] you on this.

[00:26:45] Let's share IP or like, I'll pay you.

[00:26:48] But then I want to recoup that from like the ad sales before we have a split or whatever.

[00:26:53] So that's some kind of development partnership deal.

[00:26:55] And then the third would just be original IP where you are producing something to own in

[00:27:00] order to monetize that in some way.

[00:27:02] So that's kind of how I break it all down now.

[00:27:04] Frankly, like I'm interested in all three.

[00:27:07] But if you ask me today, like I'm much more interested in the work for hire stuff just because

[00:27:12] we all have bills to pay.

[00:27:14] If you like just handed me a few million bucks, then I have a few shows in mind that I would

[00:27:20] make.

[00:27:20] For sure.

[00:27:21] Yeah, the work for hire.

[00:27:22] That's largely what I do.

[00:27:23] So as far as like your growth and marketing arm, like what kind of channels or outlets

[00:27:28] are you plugging shows into?

[00:27:30] Is it like buying ads?

[00:27:32] Is it swaps?

[00:27:34] Is it buying features on like the like Overcast and Pocket Cat, like the ones that let you

[00:27:39] buy like ad space for banner ads?

[00:27:41] Is it a little bit of everything?

[00:27:43] Or do you focus mainly on one kind of outlet?

[00:27:46] Yeah.

[00:27:46] Yeah.

[00:27:47] So we have what we call our five tier approach.

[00:27:50] So publicity, marketing, cross promotion, pitching the apps and paid acquisition.

[00:27:54] We do a little bit of all of that.

[00:27:56] We like to make it like a big holistic campaign.

[00:27:58] That said, like depending on what your goals are, there are things that are going to work

[00:28:01] better than others.

[00:28:03] So if your goal is like thought leadership, depending on like who you are and what you're

[00:28:06] doing, then the PR side is going to be really important because you need that third

[00:28:12] party validation to show people that this is like the real deal.

[00:28:14] That could be like an interview or review, a feature, a list of shows surrounding certain

[00:28:18] topics.

[00:28:19] Like if you're making a food podcast, it's pretty cool if like Eater makes a list of like

[00:28:23] the top 10 food podcasts.

[00:28:25] The second lever would be marketing, which is just like how do you use your owned and

[00:28:30] operated channels to promote a show?

[00:28:32] So newsletter, website, social media.

[00:28:35] And then there's a lot of ways that you can track attribution on this stuff to show like

[00:28:39] what works and what doesn't.

[00:28:40] And then you can iterate on that to do more of the stuff that does and less of the stuff

[00:28:43] that doesn't.

[00:28:44] Cross promos are a really great way in a free way for many people to grow a show.

[00:28:51] So you can interview on other shows.

[00:28:55] You can run feed drops.

[00:28:57] You can, which is publishing an episode of your show on somebody else's feed or you can

[00:29:01] run audio swaps.

[00:29:02] And there's a lot of tools where you can track attribution on that so you can see what's

[00:29:06] effective.

[00:29:07] Pugglomerate has run more than 150 million impressions in that regard.

[00:29:11] And we have data on all of it.

[00:29:12] So we know like, yeah, it's good for you.

[00:29:15] That's huge.

[00:29:17] Thank you.

[00:29:18] It's a fun spreadsheet.

[00:29:20] But we know exactly like how effective all this stuff is based on like whether it's 30

[00:29:27] seconds versus 60 seconds or host versus producer or what's in the script and what your call

[00:29:31] to action is and what genre or category you're in.

[00:29:35] That all matters.

[00:29:37] And anybody can do it.

[00:29:38] Like, you know, if you're listening to this and you have zero dollars to promote your show,

[00:29:42] like just pull up your show on Apple, scroll to the bottom.

[00:29:45] It'll tell you like a list of recommended podcasts that other people are listening to

[00:29:49] today and that are subscribed to your show and then just shoot them an email.

[00:29:53] You can find it on like, you know, their Twitter feed, Podchaser, a few other places

[00:29:57] and say like, hey, I'd be interested in collaborating.

[00:30:00] Would you be open to a cross promo?

[00:30:01] And there you go.

[00:30:03] And fourth bucket is pitching the apps for features, editorial or algorithmic or paid.

[00:30:09] And then the fifth bucket would be paid acquisition, like what you were talking about, like Overcast

[00:30:14] and Podcast Addict and stuff.

[00:30:15] And with everything, like there's a lot of stuff that is more effective than other things.

[00:30:21] But ultimately, like there is a lot of different ways to do this.

[00:30:28] And there's no right, there's no one right or wrong way.

[00:30:32] But there are certainly things that have like been proven to be more effective.

[00:30:36] But it really comes down to like, are you looking for just sheer numbers?

[00:30:39] Are you looking for lead generation?

[00:30:41] Are you looking for qualified listeners?

[00:30:44] And I think most people are in the bucket of like qualified listeners.

[00:30:48] And there's a different approach for that as opposed to like sheer numbers.

[00:30:52] Do you think these days, and unless you're creating a podcast strictly to like have beers

[00:30:57] with your friends and talk and shoot the shit and have fun, like not including those people,

[00:31:03] but do you think that like it's necessary these days to have a paid strategy?

[00:31:08] Or do you think people, and this is a loaded question, but can have success with just like

[00:31:13] organic marketing techniques?

[00:31:17] Yes, 100%.

[00:31:18] I like to think of paid as kind of like a superpower that can like speed up your audience growth

[00:31:23] and development.

[00:31:25] It's tough though.

[00:31:26] The organic thing is tough.

[00:31:28] Yeah, but that's the thing.

[00:31:29] It's like, that's what you really have to ask yourself.

[00:31:31] Like, you should be talking about how you're going to market this thing the day that you

[00:31:35] decide to make the thing.

[00:31:37] Because, I don't know, it's like the whole, if a tree falls in the woods and nobody, you

[00:31:41] know, hears it, did it really, nobody sees it like, did it make a sound?

[00:31:46] Like, you want to be thinking about how you're going to put this out in the world.

[00:31:49] And if you're going to make a show with a goal in mind of like, you know, driving thought

[00:31:54] leadership or awareness or lead gen or whatever, like you need to think about how you're going

[00:31:58] to actually reach those people.

[00:32:00] And that could be through like your own channels.

[00:32:03] If you're a brand, like maybe your company has a newsletter that's really effective.

[00:32:06] And you should look into that before you make the show.

[00:32:08] Like, how many people are subscribed?

[00:32:10] What's the click-through rate?

[00:32:11] What's the open rate?

[00:32:12] Like, if we have done similar promotions in the past, like how effective was it?

[00:32:17] Like, I know Puglomerate has like, you know, a few thousand people on our newsletter list.

[00:32:21] I know if I put a link in there, I know exactly how many people are going to click it, like

[00:32:25] within some margin of error.

[00:32:26] And like, you know, it's not hard information to find.

[00:32:30] So everybody should be looking into doing that.

[00:32:32] There's also like partnerships and like creative like collaborations with other people.

[00:32:39] So anyway, I'm rambling a little bit.

[00:32:41] But like the point really is that there are ways to do it.

[00:32:44] It's not always easy.

[00:32:45] But as long as you're out there, like trying to make the best thing that you can make and

[00:32:51] really like add value and contribute to the conversation, there's probably people out there

[00:32:56] who want to listen to it.

[00:32:57] And like we see it time and time again.

[00:32:59] It is really hard to find the organic stuff that works.

[00:33:02] But like there is some kind of like initial contribution that you have to just put into

[00:33:08] this like and understand that you're not going to have overnight success on what you're

[00:33:12] trying to do here.

[00:33:13] Like you have to allocate like the time resources and and in a lot of cases budget to like do

[00:33:17] this the right way.

[00:33:19] Yeah.

[00:33:20] Social media stuff is great.

[00:33:21] Like but but that's not the thing that's going to really drive actual clicks and traffic.

[00:33:26] And like I have a million data points to prove that.

[00:33:28] And even even like, you know, publishing like a YouTube short to drive to the podcast like

[00:33:33] I've seen has been really ineffective in many cases.

[00:33:37] Like there's outliers to that.

[00:33:38] But like short form is tough to lead to long form.

[00:33:41] But but that's kind of I guess the overall point, though, is like you need to dedicate

[00:33:46] a lot of like time to really hitting your goals and like, you know, showing people that

[00:33:52] you really mean it and you're like in it for the long haul.

[00:33:55] And part of that is like just sitting down on day one and defining what your goals are

[00:34:00] and like making sure that they're realistic.

[00:34:03] So, for example, like I had somebody come to me the other day who said like my goal is

[00:34:08] to get a hundred thousand downloads on my show in the first six months.

[00:34:12] And it was a really niche show.

[00:34:14] Lofty goal.

[00:34:16] Yes.

[00:34:17] And I told him like, you know, it's not that this is impossible or by any means, but like

[00:34:23] you can't just say that without having a plan behind how you're going to do it.

[00:34:27] And so we talked through what that plan was and like at the end of the conversation, I

[00:34:32] said like it is more likely that you are going to land at like 10 to 20 thousand downloads

[00:34:37] in your first six months of doing this.

[00:34:41] And also like, you know, you need to consider what that means in terms of actual human beings

[00:34:45] listening to this as opposed to just some download metric.

[00:34:49] And like, is this still worth it for you to do that?

[00:34:52] And and that was a great conversation because now he's either not going to do it and save

[00:34:56] everybody like having a bad experience in six months or he does.

[00:35:01] And like he goes into it with like much more realistic expectations.

[00:35:05] And I think everybody needs to ask themselves those same questions.

[00:35:08] I love that.

[00:35:09] I think that's important.

[00:35:10] And I agree.

[00:35:10] I think people need to do that more.

[00:35:12] Hell, I need to do it more.

[00:35:13] I tend to fly by the seat of my pants.

[00:35:15] But Jeff, tell the good people where they can find you.

[00:35:19] Plug away what do you got going on?

[00:35:22] And yeah, where can people reach out?

[00:35:24] I am at Puglomerate.com.

[00:35:26] If anybody wants to chat, shoot a note to listen at the Puglomerate.com.

[00:35:31] All of our socials are just Puglomerate or Puglomerate Pods.

[00:35:34] Thank you, Eric.

[00:35:35] This was super fun.

[00:35:36] I'm glad that we got to do this.

[00:35:38] Hell yeah, man.

[00:35:38] We will talk to you soon.

[00:35:40] Until then.