Episode 39

Sam Sethi gives a tip about the production of your podcast

Consistency and persistency are the keys to successful podcasting, according to Sam Sethi, CEO of TrueFans and co-host of Podnews Weekly. With years of experience in the podcasting industry, Sam shares his journey from early podcasting to launching a new platform that embraces the latest podcasting technologies. He emphasises the importance of maintaining a regular release schedule to build and retain an audience, as deviating from this can lead listeners to seek alternatives. Sam also highlights the unique human connection that podcasting fosters, setting it apart from other media forms in an increasingly AI-driven world. Tune in to hear more about his insights and tips for aspiring podcasters.

Takeaways:

  • Consistency and persistency are crucial for building an audience in podcasting.
  • Podcasting fosters a unique human-to-human connection that AI cannot replicate.
  • Establish a reliable schedule for your podcast to retain your audience's attention.
  • Engaging content is essential; provide your audience with something interesting to listen to.
  • Launching a podcast festival can open doors to new opportunities and collaborations.
  • Utilising modern podcasting tags can enhance the discoverability of your podcast.

Links referenced in this episode:

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This podcast is produced and edited at The Sound Boutique by Gareth Davies.

Mentioned in this episode:

The Sound Boutique

Transcript
Sam Sithek:

Hello, I'm Sam Sethi. I'm CEO of TrueFans, which is a new podcasting app. I'm also the co host of Podnews Weekly with James Cridland.

And today I'm going to give you a tip about, well, I'd say the production of a podcast. I've been building TrueFans for about two years. It's a brand new podcasting 2.0 platform and it uses all the new podcasting tags.

How did I get into podcasting? That's very cool. Actually, I started off in the first wave of podcasting doing a few podcasts way, way, way back.

And then like many people, I got bored of it all. It didn't really seem to be going anywhere. A bit like blogging.

I started blogging, then gave up, but I then got back into radio and I started doing a radio show.

And then I led from doing a radio show to a more interview based radio show, but it wasn't really what I wanted because the radio had a very fixed structure. So I got into podcasting.

I started a podcast called Sam Talks Technology and I did over 100 shows in that that then led me pre Covid doing a podcast festival called, well, sadly called the Podcast Festival. Not very original, but I did have some amazing guests.

Kara Swisher from the New York Times, George the Poet, the award winning podcaster here in the uk, Dan Snow, James Cridland and many more.

So that was very, very exciting to do something I'd never done, which was an online conference around the globe that led me to partnering with James to start Podnews Weekly and get involved in the podcasting 2.0 market. And through that I had the itch to start to build my own platform. As I say, TrueFans. And so for the last two years, that's what I've been doing.

The thing I love about podcasting is that it's this, it is this moment. It's the human to human connection. In a world of AI, we need more human to human connection.

And podcasting has that authenticity, it has that real feel of being connected to another human. Now, you might be listening to me in your ears, in your car, or from your laptop at the desk that you work at.

It doesn't really matter where you are, but we are now one to one, connected. And whatever we're talking about here will now resonate with you. And again, that's something that I feel AI can't do. The big tip is very simple.

Consistency and persistency. That is the key to podcasting.

You will find an audience if you have something interesting to say and that audience though gives you permission to be in their ears at a particular time every week.

So if you happen to produce your podcast on a Thursday at 10am every week that is when that audience will give you their time and attention and if you miss that and you mess around with their timings and you produce it on a Friday or a Saturday or a Monday they will soon give up on you and find another podcast. So my big tip is be consistent in the time you produce and persistent it takes time to build an audience. Where can you find me? Very simple.

I'm @samsethi nearly everywhere so X, LinkedIn, Facebook but you'll find me more often now on a platform called Mastodon which is an alternative to Twitter. So if you want to find out more about this technology though of course go to TrueFans.fm or you can go to podcastindex.org and thanks for listening to the Podcasting People. Speak to you soon.

About the Podcast

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Podcasting People
Tips & advice for independent podcasters.

About your host

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Gareth Davies

Composer of music, producer of podcasts. Latest TV series: Toad & Friends (Warner Bros. Discovery). Current podcasts include The Music Room, Podcasting People and The Sheppertonian.

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Mark Asquith £4
Top work, mate - keep it up!
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Keep up the brilliant work Gareth! This is exactly the kind of show the podcasting industry needs!