Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
Roger Nairn, founder of JAR (now JAR Podcast Solutions), explains why most branded podcasts fail to build an audience, how the JAR system actually works, and what the next era of branded content looks like beyond download counts.
Agency Forward explores the future of agencies as tech and AI drive down the cost of tactical deliverables. Topics include building competent teams, developing strategic offers, systemizing your business, and more.
New episodes delivered every Tuesday.
Chris DuBois 0:00
Hey everyone, today I'm joined by Roger Nairn. Roger is the founder of Jar, a branded podcast agency that has spent a decade helping enterprise brands like Amazon and Wharton create shows that actually do something. Jar recently rebranded from Jar Audio to Jar Podcast Solutions, and I'm only bringing this up because I think it's a shift that reflects how much this industry has evolved. I wanted to have Roger on, because branded podcasts are having a moment, but most of them, honestly, are terrible. Roger has a point of view on why that is, and more importantly, what it takes to build one that works for both the brand and the audience. In this episode, we discuss why most branded podcasts are glorified press releases nobody listens to. How jar's advertising background shapes how they build shows. How to prove podcast ROI to a CMO who only thinks in MQLs, and more. Lead gen is the hardest part of running an agency. For most, it's unpredictable, it's slow, and it's usually expensive. Gia flips that it's the all-in-one growth platform that turns your existing relationships and client work into a steady pipeline. Gia automates lead gen follow-up and content, and it's all from the work you're already doing. You can check it out and get some free bonuses at Get gia.ai/dynamic a agency, and now Roger Nairn. It's easier than ever to start an agency, but it's only getting harder to stand out and keep it alive. Join me as we explore the strategies agencies are using today to secure a better tomorrow. This is Agency Forward, you Why did Jar rebrand from audio to podcast solutions?
Speaker 1 1:50
Yeah, it's a great question. So, so you know, I'll take you a few steps back, which is that Jar started almost 10 years ago, and in podcast years, that's a long time, and at the time we were the, you know, one of the only games in town when it came to brands and podcasts, or essentially, you know, being an agency that, that exclusively, you know, help brands create their own podcast. Now, fast forward, you know, we got through Covid, and we're now in a position where I don't want to say podcasting has become commoditized, but there's just a ton more competition, and over those years we've actually built up this incredible bench, you know, we're a team of 23 and a big chunk of our team are strategists, and so we've really emphasized strategy in everything we do, and so we came to the realization that Jar is not just a production team, we are, we are, you know, a true marketing partner with our clients, and you know, we have a saying that every podcast has to have a job, or every podcast needs a job to do, so, and what that you know, what that really means is every podcast needs to serve a purpose. Now, that could be, you know, building awareness, it could be educating the market on a certain topic, you name it. So, the jar in this, sorry, the J and jar stands for job. We then need to be crystal clear on who our audience is, and I don't just mean demographics, I mean, what is their entertainment behavior? What do they like to read? What do they like to watch? What video games do they like to play? Because guess what, your podcast is competing with all of that. Your podcast is competing with time, and so we really need to understand who that audience is, and then, most importantly, what do they need out of your podcast? Do they need to be taught something? Do they need to be entertained? Do they need to have a laugh or a cry? Because we then ask the brand, you know, of those things they need, what can you deliver that is unique to your brand? And then, finally, results, you know, it's really important that we understand going into our shows what does success look like, you know, what are we measuring, what, what you know, what at the end of the day is going to make us all look back and say this, this is actually doing its job, but also, as you know, as a podcaster, a podcast is not a live thing, so it is, though, a living, breathing thing, so it can be edited, it can be, you know, it can evolve over the course of a season based on the data that you're being shown. So we have to be measuring the right things to understand, you know, what's working, what isn't, you know, we were able to track a ton of different things, because that's all going to factor into the content itself, so this is a long way of saying that Jar changed its name to Jar Podcast Solutions, because we truly use podcasts to solve business problems, and I'll give you a, I'll give you a sneak peek into, into, you know, one of the reasons we kind of landed on this. Idea was a, it was a book I read, and I know you're going to ask me this question near the end of the interview, but there's a fantastic book out there called Madison Avenue Makeover. It's written by Michael Farmer, and what he did was he sat in with the agency Huge, which at the time was one of the largest digital agencies in the world, and they went through the same sort of challenges, well, you know, more competition, needing to position themselves, and what they did was they started to productize their, their, their agency, essentially, and so we've done the same, everything we do is is based on, you know, solving a specific business problem, and and so when a client comes to us and says I need to build up, you know, we need to build up thought leadership in artificial intelligence, you know. We have a, we have a product for that, our solution for that, and that is, you know, XYZ type of show that's going to answer, or that's going to have this type of, you know, host and these types of guests, and it's going to have this sort of cadence, and we're going to, you know, craft the, you know, the format, this sort of, this sort of way, and we've had a lot of success with
Chris DuBois 6:04
it, right? So,
Speaker 1 6:06
man, that was a long
Chris DuBois 6:07
answer
Chris DuBois 6:07
problem. Oh,
Speaker 1 6:10
terrible podcast guest,
Chris DuBois 6:11
you do this for a living. The everything I do with my clients, like we try to focus in on a single problem, because, like, most generalized agencies, it becomes very hard for you to actually market and get attention, but when you have a problem that you solve, it's like people aren't, you know, nobody goes like window shopping for agencies, right? Like, they're they're looking to get a solution to their problem, so when you say we solve this,
Speaker 1 6:40
yeah,
Chris DuBois 6:40
it's like you become one of the only like agencies that, that they're even considering, absolutely. So, yeah, the fact that you like that's where you are, and you have like the different solutions. I think being able to also productize means you guys have like you've gotten the reps of doing these things right, and so now not only on the like the demand side of being able to attract new business, because you saw this even on the supply side, for being able to deliver, it's like you're just better, you're more efficient, like your team has gotten the reps in of doing this, and so
Speaker 1 7:12
we're over 75 individual podcasts now, individual shows,
Chris DuBois 7:17
right, that you're continuing like managing,
Speaker 1 7:19
I mean, right now we're managing, I want to say it's in the 20s, 25 to 30s, it fluctuates, but the actual, like, you know, full service of, you know, individual original productions is over 75
Chris DuBois 7:34
What is the like through those? What has been the most common, I guess, problem that people are trying to solve for their business with the podcast.
Speaker 1 7:44
Yeah, it's, it's, it's engagement, it's, you know, relationship building with a specific audience, and it's usually something quite niche. And I'll give you a perfect example. Amazon came to us with a, with a business challenge, which was that they wanted to create better engagement with small business owners, because the I didn't know this at the time, but it's, I think it's now over 70% of the products you buy on Amazon are actually just sold by small business owners, it's little mom and pops all around the world, Amazon's just the sort of the distribution hub for it all, and so they wanted to attract, you know, better and, you know, more diverse small businesses, and so they came to us with that challenge, and we really dug deep into what that audience needs, and it turned out they need more resources, and they needed more resources around, you know, things like, you know, what do I do if I have a partnership that's gone south, or how do I set up, you know, what do I do for my personal brand, or how do I set up, you know, a marketing flywheel, things like that. And so we crafted a show for them called This a Small Business. We found this amazing host, Andrea Marquez. She herself is looking to start a business, so she treats the show as her sort of learning vehicle for, you know, what she wants to do. It just happens to be that the the audience is listening in and gets to learn from what she's learning. Found, you know, amazing guests that are, you know, entrepreneurs themselves, and it's kind of the, but it's, it's the behind the scenes warts and all of what goes into starting a business, and, and we actually just surpassed a million downloads, which is really exciting.
Chris DuBois 9:26
Yeah, so you said something interesting here, like you found a host, obviously, for a company the size of, like, Amazon, right? That's probably important to, like, find, find a good host. Smaller businesses probably not, not as easy for them to hire out, I guess. How important would you say it is for someone within the company to be like the face of the podcast and running that show versus finding someone else who is a professional interviewer or host?
Speaker 1 9:55
Yeah, great question. I wouldn't say it's vital, however, you. There are instances where it's important to have at least a voice from from the company on the show. Now, one thing we love to do, and it's a, it's a great sort of hack for finding a host, is is look to the radio world. There's a lot of, you know, fantastic voices out there that, frankly, are looking for more work. There's also a lot of opportunities in the academic world, whether they're professors around certain topics, they're great talkers, and they love to have a presence. They love to build their own personal brands. There's also ex-journalists or current journalists that are out there, and there's a number of different ways that you can. They're very approachable because they are always looking for leads, and you know, so they usually leave their contact information available. Now, you know, we often get the, you know, the question, like, can our CEO be the host, and you know, of course, they can. However, anytime I would put anybody from the company in as a, as a sort of leading voice on the show, I just, I would be very cautious, because it can easily stray into press release land, essentially, where they're just spouting off about the brand itself, and they're saying all the all the great things about XYZ industry, because that's just their natural muscle memory, right, and and and so we always want that to be as sort of, you know, dialed down as possible, because nobody wants to listen to a 30 minute ad, essentially, and nobody wants to hear about all the, you know, all the, you know, the smooth things that go on. They want to hear the rough things as well. That's just that's what great podcast listening is, is, is, is true sort of unvarnished conversations, and you know, not every brand is willing to go down some of those scarier roads, and or maybe have sort of diverse viewpoints on a certain topic. Now, one thing we love to do is, is sort of have, let's say, you know, one of our shows was was with Aldeans, the insurance company, in fact, it was the topic was trade insurance, which even just saying it out loud, I can't think of a boring topic. In fact, when I went to my business partner, Jen, who's our chief creative officer, and I said, like, "Hey, we got a new client, she's like, "Great, what's it about, like trade insurance? She's like, "Are you kidding me? Why would, why would.. anyways, what we did, though, is we took, you know, we sort of threw that boring topic on its head, because trade insurance is all about risk, right? That's just that's the insurance world in general. And so we created almost like a game show called Wheel of Risk, and so the podcast is called Wheel of Risk, and essentially every guest that comes on the show gets to spin the wheel of risk, and then we talk about that certain topic, now one one thing we would do, though, is, is you know, after we had sort of told the story about the, the guest, and what their kind of risk story was, we would then bring in an expert from Molly Ons to kind of fill in, fill in some of the gaps, and I'm not saying that they would come in and say, you know, we got a product for that, and we got a product for that, but they would, they would lend their own, you know, insights into the topic, and it worked out great. It's, you know, award-winning, very, very successful show. And you can, you can imagine that, you know, folks from IBM have the most amazing thought leaders. You know, we work with a quantum computing company called D-Wave, that's literally leading the charge on quantum computing, which is the next thing after AI, and so it only makes sense that they're, you know, their lead engineer is the host of the show, because there's literally nobody else in the world who could talk about quantum computing, or him. Now we have to train him, or we have to, you know, we have to give him the opportunity to sort of work out some of the kinks, because you know, talking into a microphone is not something everyone does, and every day, but even more so, it's, it's, you know, interviewing something, you know, interviewing people is something that is quite unique to a lot of people, so we, we run them through training, and we give them a really good opportunity to, you know, feel as comfortable as possible,
Chris DuBois 13:59
right? I wish I could remember what. Just recently, I guess, talking to my wife the other day, and there was some industry that I had multiple conversations with. For whatever reason, I was like, man, if there was just one person in this industry that had a sense of humor, you would crush with a podcast, right? But I wish I could remember what it was. I'll send that to you later. Was it
Speaker 1 14:20
funeral homes
Chris DuBois 14:22
that would be a good one. Anyone in Mortuary Affairs, which actually some random story for the audience, we have one funeral home back in my hometown, Northern Maine, and I older family members passing away, but the funeral director or funeral home director is always there, like, man, every time I see you, I feel like someone in my family is dying, and they had no sense of humor, so it's like, okay, well, there we go.
Speaker 1 14:50
Not to not to be too self-serving, but I actually have a podcast, a personal podcast called Dead Dads, and I created it after my dad died, be and one of the things. You know, I really was missing was one thing I saw was that there's not enough, you know, there's not enough conversation, conversation about death, and frankly, there's not enough, you know, kind of black humor and jokes about it, especially amongst men. We're not great at talking about death, and so my buddy Scott and I started it. So, check out Dead Dads, it's a lot of fun conversations about death. We actually interview other men who have just lost their dads as well, and we, you know, we swap stories and, you know, share what they've learned about their experience.
Chris DuBois 15:30
No, that's, and so I mean, pulling that back to, like, just the idea of having different jobs for a podcast, even for a personal podcast, it's like there are people looking for that right now? Like, I mean, I, I know plenty of people, like, through my life who would like, like, I can go refer that podcast to them, and it makes sense that
Speaker 1 15:49
Dead Dads podcast.com
Chris DuBois 15:51
talking about, like, finding interviewers and hosts and stuff. Like, it is interesting that there's, like, there's a specific skill set that comes to podcasts, like I've read books to try getting better at, like, having these conversations, like, what questions should I be asking, but every now and then I'll be on someone else's podcast, and it's like they're they're just talking to me, but it's like it feels so good, like they're so curious, and like they know the next question that they should ask, like how is there a way to cultivate those skills, like for a host, like, or what are you thinking about?
Chris DuBois 16:27
That's a
Speaker 1 16:28
great question. The first thing I will say, and you said it yourself, is curiosity, and, and you also need to get into a bit of a, you know, you need to get into a sort of zen-like state where you're not thinking about anything else except your guest, and you're listening, and your brain is just sort of jumping off to the next question based on the conversation. Now, that being said, I would, I would, I would, I would bet that that great podcast host that you had the experience with had a bit of a roadmap going into the conversation with you, much like you do, as well, like you have questions, they don't necessarily have to be like strictly asked questions, but you know, oftentimes like I'll go into a conversation with, you know, just sort of notes on some of the things that that I want to either touch on or some possibilities for directions that the conversation could go down, and that way you're not just freestyling, you know, you have a, because at the end of the day, you know, when you go to do your edit, you do want to have a, you know, a story arc to the conversation, and so if you're, if you're talking about just random topics, and it's all over the place, it's just going to be a bit more of a, you know, bit more of a cluttered conversation, and might not be the best listening experience, but if to your point, you just have a great conversation and happen to be hitting on certain topics that are important to the audience along the way, I think that's that's the recipe for success, nine times out of 10.
Chris DuBois 17:56
Yeah, and I think that's where, so, like the episodes that I find, like, are stronger for me are the ones where I do just have a conversation, because I'm, I'm interested in the topic, and I'm trying to learn, and, like, I'm pulling this information out for me, versus other interviews where it's like, I get in this mindset of, I have to, like, help my audience, I have to find the right questions for my audience, and it's pulling me out of the conversation to be able to, you know, to do this, and so,
Speaker 1 18:26
but that's actually, that's actually a really good thing to mention as well, is though, that sorry, my coffee machine is turning off, I'm gonna wait for it to, I don't know if you can hear it or not, no, it's annoying, you can edit this part out, that's a really good, you know, point, because the, you know, the, the audience you have out there is, is, is an active audience, and, and a really well done podcast, you know, is gonna, you're gonna have a relationship with your audience, and they're gonna want to help you craft the show, because it's for them, it's not for you, it's for them. And so one thing we always recommend is to reach out to your audience and say, "Hey, I'm interviewing Roger Nairn. We're going to talk about the podcast industry. Does anybody have any questions? And you'd be surprised the amount of people that would fire back stuff. And there's, you know, there's other things you can do these days, whether it's, you know, newsletters, and then you've got email addresses, or sometimes with our shows we'll do text campaigns, obviously opt-in text campaigns, but the, you know, that sort of community aspect is really important for building audience, and so they're, you know, the questions that you come up with are one thing, but you know what do they actually want to hear is another,
Chris DuBois 19:40
right, probably also helps to actually care about that topic, right? Like, just knowing, like, if I actually want to learn these things, because I know it helps my audience, like, that's that's where that works. But totally, I want to, all right, most podcasts fail, right, just straight up, and part of it is a consistency issue, they just make. Can't, like, I can't even remember the super small percentage that gets to, like, 20 episodes. Yeah, but even beyond that, it's like they're just not delivering something of value, or what? I guess. What are you seeing as the issue that stops podcasts from actually becoming successful?
Speaker 1 20:17
The number one thing we see is that it's podcast is being created for the creator and not for the audience, and I think when you go to create your show, you know, sure, you're probably going to, you probably will come up with the idea first, and then start looking for exactly who that audience is, but it should really be the other way around, or at least you should have the little bit of a nugget of an idea, and then sort of craft it based on what's actually a value for, you know, for that audience, so you know we just talked about my personal podcast, Dead Dads. You know, I one thing we did was we started talking to friends and people around us who had lost their dads, and you know, we said, hey, this is a little bit of a nugget of an idea for a show we have, but really, if you were to listen to a podcast about, you know, your the grieving process, especially, you know, amongst men, what would you like to hear? What are some of the things you'd like to get out of it? You know, some said that they'd like to hear real stories about other people's experiences. Some of them said they'd love to learn sort of tips and tricks on, you know, how to deal with their grief. Some of them said that they wanted to learn about sort of resources out there that they could, you know, lean on. And then we craft the show based on that. Now, obviously, we're going to have our own sort of desires and input that we want to apply to the show, because it's, you know, it is also for us in the sense that it's our creative product, however, much like you know the film world or the TV world, they really lean on audience data, and they really lean on focus groups for a very good reason. It's also the reason why you know Marvel will make 10, you know, 10 versions of the same type of movie, because it works, and that audience is asking for more, and so you're crafting based on the audience versus what you want to see, and I think a lot of shows are based on just the me, me, me side of it versus the you. So one of the things we talked about, we talked about it in our company is everything we produce, or every relationship we start with an audience member, we should be going in sort of palm up versus palm down, so palm up being here. I have something for you. Here's a, here's a gift, here's a free, you know, free gift, free podcast versus taking, you know, and you know most advertising is taking based, right?
Chris DuBois 22:34
I like that. I'm gonna, I'll, I'll cite you, but I'm going to reuse that. Speaking of just, even just advertising, it's like, okay, so at the Stinger bumper, I guess, whatever you want to call it, with your, with the podcast, might have different terms, having, like, how important is it to have the same CTAs, or like, are we changing it up every time, like we know we want someone to take a certain action by listening to the show. How do you think about structuring that in order to achieve those desired results?
Speaker 1 23:13
That's interesting. I mean, I wouldn't, I wouldn't necessarily say that all shows that we do need a CTA, I mean, so oftentimes the shows that we produce are top of funnel. It's, you know, it's about it's about brand building. So we very rarely talk about the brand in any of our shows. We don't put ads for our clients and their products or services in the middle of the of the show, sometimes we do, and then we oftentimes will not say at the end of the episode, you know, if you want to learn more about quantum computing, go to D Wave dot, you know, you know what I mean, now we will say, if you want to, you know, if you want to subscribe, you know, please do so, and if you want to listen to more episodes or watch more episodes, go to XYZ, and that's obviously an action we want them to take. Now, you know, your original question, though, if there is a scenario where you do want to have sort of brand-based, you know, sort of sales-based, you know, CTAs, yeah, we'll try all sorts of different things, and actually the way that podcast technology works these days is essentially you're you're adding donuts to the end of every episode, and then you're you're able to dynamically insert whatever that you know called action creative is, and so you can be testing all sorts of different things, and same goes with the midpoint, or same goes with any point in the episode. You can put donuts in there, and then dynamically insert whatever message you want to include, and test, you know, test based on that. Now, obviously, you're going to want to include things like unique URLs, and you know, so that you can track conversions, but the actual insertion of those. So you know, messages, you know, you can test. I would say, I would say, though, just be careful. I think podcast is a very unique medium in that it is an intimate experience you have with that audience, and so then to then go in, sort of, you know, hand down versus hand up can really sour that relationship quickly, and so if you're injecting too much of the brand into the episode, you can, you can lose, you can lose, and you can lose audience members. And I will say, also going back to the, you know, the access to the data you have in the podcast space, you'll be able to tell where audience members are dropping off of episodes, and you'll be able to correlate that with where you've injected more of your brand into the episode, and so you'll be able to tell quite quickly if you're turning people off.
Chris DuBois 25:50
Yeah, so I guess briefly, what tool are you using to be able to track like listen rates?
Speaker 1 25:57
Yes, so
Chris DuBois 25:58
where the drop
Speaker 1 25:59
offs are, so most of that is done through the the host server that you're using, we happen to use co-host a lot, but we've also used Omni Studio in the past. There's others like Libsyn, and you know, there's a number of different companies out there. I would, I would say to check, you know, check out their, check out their sites, ask for free trial, just so you can get a feel for the high, you know, behind the scenes. We happen to use co-host because we've, we've trialed a whole bunch, and they, they happen to be the best when it comes to brands or the brand metrics that we're able to see within the, you know, within the dashboard. Excuse me. And so the, you know, the platform for us works best, but I would say that all of them out there are quite good at what they do, you know. Buzz Spout, Buzz Sprout is great, you know. We've a lot of times our clients will come to us with a show that already lives on a certain platform, we'll just keep it there because it's, you know, it's working for what it needs to do.
Chris DuBois 26:58
Gotcha. Yeah, I'm using transistor.
Chris DuBois 27:01
Yeah,
Chris DuBois 27:01
I love it for the simplicity, but I can't see that that data metric, which would be fascinating for me as a marketer and someone who loves seeing this stuff. Like, I would, I would love to see where, like, are people falling off at a certain point.
Speaker 1 27:14
Oh, it doesn't help that.
Chris DuBois 27:16
No, I've been, unless I just don't know how to use the use the tool. I'll
Speaker 1 27:21
tell you, you know, I feel like this is an ad now for co-host, but one of the things that we can do with co-host is, and this is, that's it's not my company, but one thing we can do with co-host is we can tell what companies or organizations are listening to our clients' podcasts, and so essentially what's happening is the IP address is connecting itself to, you know, whatever organization is attached to it now, is it? Is that a perfect measurement? Because no, because technically you know they could be working from home, or they could, you know, somebody else could be using their computer, but it does give us a lot of really interesting data. I mean, we run, yeah, the signal is incredible, like we work with a lot of financial institutions, and one in particular said, as one of the sort of goals of the show, is he wanted to be a show that is listened to by more people in the halls of government, essentially, and we're able to see that, you know, people from the House of Representatives are listening and people from Senate are listening, and you know that's just gold for them,
Chris DuBois 28:23
yeah, man. So, if he's got their ear, I'm sure there's a lot of people that have some advice they want to get out. It's
Speaker 1 28:30
lobbying,
Chris DuBois 28:31
okay? As we, as we start winding down here, what, what should I have asked you about anything around podcasting, for like, really around, like, what? What should people be thinking about with podcasting? Like, what didn't I ask you here? That,
Speaker 1 28:52
yeah, I think I think the one question you didn't ask is, what's going on with video?
Chris DuBois 28:57
There you go.
Speaker 1 28:58
Yeah, I mean, it's there's. it's no secret that YouTube is absolutely killing it right now, and you know the numbers fluctuate, but you know there are periods of time where YouTube is the number one source for where, so this is important distinction, it's the number one source for where people are finding podcasts, it's not necessarily the number one place where people are consuming podcasts, and actually the data shows recent report came out from Signal, sorry, not Signal Sounds Profitable, which is a sort of podcast industry think tank, let's call it. They came with some research that said that people are platform hopping, so because of the algorithm, we all know that YouTube has an incredible job of, you know, bubbling to the surface content that we're gonna be interested in, and so oftentimes they'll, they'll, you know, they'll pop a podcast in front of your eyes and you'll, you'll maybe start watching it, but then life goes on and you need to walk the dog and you need to drive to work or you need to go to this, you know, you. Need to hop on the bus and go to school, so oftentimes people are switching to Spotify or Apple, or you know, whatever podcast listener they like to. Sometimes they continue on on YouTube. Now, the important thing to remember, though, is that YouTube is its own beast, you know. You can't long are the days where you can just record a podcast like this and necessarily expect like total success by just, you know, flinging it onto YouTube. You need to develop the show so that you can win with the algorithm, and that includes everything from from the titling of the episodes to the show descriptions to the tagging, you know, really strong hook to the episode. You need to think about the thumbnail, like there's just a lot more to consider. Versus on Apple and Spotify, there is no real algorithm to beat, whereas you know if anybody's ever had a show on, you know, if anybody's ever had a video on YouTube, you know that that algorithm is, is your make or break, and it's there's a whole, like, cottage industry on how to beat the algorithm, and it's, it needs to be thought of as its own strategy, which is why, you know, we've built up our video team as like a separate team within the company. Now they all work together with our, you know, with our audio team, but we didn't just take audio producers and all of a sudden put a hat on them, saying you're now video producers as well, which is what a lot of agencies have done. I'd say the majority of them have done, which is not fair, first of all to the producer, but also it's not effective because it's a completely different beast that you need to be considering. So we went out and found the best YouTube strategists and the best video editors for YouTube, and in fact, you know, some of our editors just won the very first ever Emmy Award in podcasting for the For Amy Poehlers podcast. Good hang, like these guys are the best, like they're there, they rock when it comes to success on YouTube. So you need to kind of, you need to think completely different.
Chris DuBois 32:01
That's a yeah, I haven't explored YouTube the way that I should, mainly because I don't, because I do my own editing, I don't want to have to deal with the video, yeah, someone had said, like, basically there's no reason not to just RSS feed your podcast, like your audio onto YouTube, because like it's still searchable, so like if you're not going to do the video, at least you can get it there, and most people aren't watching necessarily, they're like it's in the background while they're working,
Speaker 1 32:34
yeah, yeah, and then that's a really great point, is is is you know, so you know, as an agency owner, one of the big sort of, not really dilemmas, but one of the big conversations I now had to face with a client was, okay, client, you want to be on YouTube, well, now we need to think about video, okay, that's going to double the budget, essentially, maybe not always in some cases, but a lot of times, if you want to do a good job, it's, it's, it's going to double the budget. Now, Why do you want to be on video? You know, why do you, why do you want to be on video on YouTube? Oh, because it seems to be what everybody's doing. It's the old, like, you know, Tick Tock or social media sort of thing, where it's like everybody else is. We should too. Okay. But why, like, you know, first of all, do you have any data that shows that your audience is actually using YouTube? Well, yeah, we actually, now that you've mentioned it, you know, we don't have a lot of our audience on YouTube. Well, then let's not spend, you know,
Chris DuBois 33:32
right,
Speaker 1 33:33
six figures extra on on on a YouTube video product, because, you know, because the other thing to your point is, is are they actually going to be watching it, or are they just going to be consuming it in the background, and in which case you've just spent a lot of money for something visual that really you just need audio for. That being said, sorry to sort of cut off, but that being said, I don't really, I feel like the whole like RSS feed connection to YouTube, like, it's all.. I think it's all still quite a clunky mess, and I
Chris DuBois 34:09
can't even get them to, to go public in the.. I have to manually go into YouTube and move them from private to public if I want them to be seen there. So,
Speaker 1 34:17
yeah, I've actually turned them off. I, you know, my personal podcast, again, we, you know, we did that, and it felt really confusing, as to, like, what's the video versus the audio. We had to, like, relay, we relabeled all of our artwork, so that it said, you know, but then, like, the content was because our show is actually what we would consider to be video first, you know, we record it in a studio, and we have professional editors, and then we, you know, we do an audio version. A lot of times, it's sort of the other way around, because of that, it was essentially the same audio. So, actually, the algorithm is sort of hearing two of the same things, and I don't know if that's really helping, and so. We, we removed it, which, see, I think, is at least we made it private, so if you really want to listen, you know, we can give you the link, but the, the, you know, the, yeah, the whole UI of that is just very, very clunky,
Chris DuBois 35:17
yeah, I can definitely agree with that, but two more questions for you.
Speaker 1 35:23
Yeah, for
Chris DuBois 35:24
sure. With the first one, which you may already have answered, unless you want to change your answer. What book do you recommend every agency owner should read?
Speaker 1 35:31
Yeah, I would definitely recommend reading Madison Avenue Makeover. It's first of all, it's just a really good sort of behind the scenes of I think what's going on with a lot of creative agencies right now, especially with consolidation, and especially with, you know, the, the, you know, the big five taking over and struggling themselves, you know, plus AI, you, you know, I think there's just a lot of agency owners that are asking themselves, sort of, what's our next step, us included. We're constantly thinking about that, and it's a really good behind the scenes, literally from day one, where they want, you know, the executives went on a retreat to sort of start rethinking the business all the way through to, you know, the success of the agency. Now, really good behind the scenes. I'll throw another quick one out there, which is called Very Good Copy. It's by Eddie, Eddie Schleicher. Yeah, I
Chris DuBois 36:30
think
Chris DuBois 36:30
just
Speaker 1 36:30
sorry,
Chris DuBois 36:31
I have it right here from my counter this
Speaker 1 36:34
morning. That's one of my favorite reads in the past couple years, and I think given you know the rise in AI writing, and it's just a really simple form of writing, I find his is, and you know, you're gonna learn a ton from the book itself, but actually his writing style, I think, can be replicated by pretty much anybody. It's very emotive, but also very simple, and I think it works great in social, you know, if you're somebody that writes a lot of LinkedIn posts, like his style is very short and sweet. It's like little mini, little mini blog posts, but in, you know, 500 words, sort of thing, or 500 characters, sort of thing. I really enjoyed that one.
Chris DuBois 37:17
Yeah, I read,
Speaker 1 37:17
actually, just signed up for a course of his, which doesn't start till June, which I didn't realize till I signed it up. I'm like, that I feel like I'm gonna forget.
Chris DuBois 37:24
Yeah, no, I read that entire book on a flight from I was going to Alaska from Maine, but it was from Maine to, like, Seattle or whatever, like, consume the entire book. It was just like, yes, like, I don't know, I put it down the entire flight, so
Speaker 1 37:42
yeah, and it's one of those books, like you have it's, you know, just off the side of your desk and flip, flip through it in between calls, some good stuff in there.
Chris DuBois 37:52
Awesome. Last question, where can people find you?
Speaker 1 37:55
Yeah, you can check us out at Jarpo podcast.com also on LinkedIn, Roger Nairn, love to meet people, reach out. We also, you know, attend a lot of events. So I'm going to be at the brand branded, sorry, branded content, sorry, branded content world, branded content days in a couple weeks in New York. I'm not sure when this episode's coming out, but I'm going to be talking on stage there about the success of one of our shows that we did, a, we did a brand left study around, so yeah, hopefully see some of you at some of the the advertising and marketing and creative conferences coming up.
Chris DuBois 38:33
Awesome, Roger. Thanks for joining.
Speaker 1 38:35
Thanks, Rod, sir. Appreciate
Chris DuBois 38:40
it. That's the show, everyone. You can leave a rating and review, or you can do something that benefits you. Click the link in the show notes to subscribe to Agency Forward on Substack. You'll get weekly content, resources, and links from around the internet to help you drive your agency forward.
Unknown Speaker 38:56
You
Transcribed by https://otter.ai