491 - He Built a Podcast Network From Scratch. What 15 Years of Podcasting Taught Him

In December 2025 I made the decision to bring back my podcast answer man brand to celebrate my 20th

anniversary in podcasting. And one of the things that I did during that season was to invite some

folks that I worked with well over a decade ago. Today I'm going to share with you a conversation

that I had at that time with Jason Kabassi. We did a live stream sharing his story online. You see

I've had the privilege of helping Jason get started with his podcasting journey back in 2011.

And since then he's produced more than a thousand podcast episodes and he's built an entire podcast

network around television shows that he genuinely loves. In this episode you're going to hear his

story but I think it's important for you as you listen I want you to hear the patterns beneath

the story. What does it actually take to sustain a podcast over 10 to 15 years? What decisions do you

hear him making as he shares his journey? What do you do when things get difficult especially when

it comes to growth and monetization? And what do you do when all of the original excitement that

early honey moon period after all of that has worn off how do you stay engaged in the game?

There's a lot here that will directly apply to what you are creating.

Today I am super excited to talk with Jason Kabassi. He and I worked together for four weeks in

May of 2011 helping him get launched into the podcasting world. And today he has produced

well over a thousand podcast episodes but not only that he's launched his own very successful

podcast network and that's what we're going to talk about today. Jason Kabassi great to have

you on here. Welcome my friend. Hello great to talk to you. It has been a long time and I'm excited

for everything that's going on with you right now. Well I'm excited about what's going on with you

and I happen to know I think was what the walking dead was that your biggest show that you've done?

That's what got us started. Yeah tell us the biggest. Let's get into that. Let's start with your

biggest show. How did you get into doing a fan podcast related to the walking dead and then we'll

go into how it changed your life. So back in back actually a few years before the walking dead

was everything. My friend Karen and I used to love the show Lost. I know you've heard of that show

and that was right around the time. I mean I feel like Lost was really the show that got TV

podcasting going because there was so much theorizing to be done and speculating and so I went

looking for a podcast to listen to. I found a couple. I never found yours. I didn't even see it.

I know I would have listened to it if I had but there were a few you know so maybe I just clicked

on the first one I found but it was the Jay and Jack podcast. I'm sure you know of them.

Jay and Jack were great. Yeah they were great and and so you know we really got into it. Me and my

friend Karen he used to go watch zombie movies together. We well I guess I just jumped ahead of

myself a little bit but we we were very much into Lost and the Jay and Jack podcast and then we

thought man that would be fun. We should do something like that ourselves sometime but we didn't

know for what but we used to go watch horror movies together and I loved the Walking Dead comic

and I always wanted it to be a show and so when I found out it was she was the first one I called

and I was like we should do this we should do it and she goes yeah and so we did and we started

about six now let's see July August 3rd in a row three or four months before the show even

premiered. We didn't know if it was going to be any good you know and we just started talking

about rumors and and little bits of news we started reviewing some Frank Derribot movies because

he was the original showrunner and and it was really fun I remember being really nervous the first

time we sat down with the mic together but once it was over the first podcast feeling like I think

that was good we got some good chemistry going on here and it was really fun and so we just kept

going with it until the show premiered and then I remember watching the the pilot and it was

fantastic and I was relieved that it was actually good this thing that we'd been already dedicating

so much time to and so we just went from there and and you know that's that's how we got the start.

I love that story and what really stands out to me is the fact that you were already a massive fan

of the of the story the background the community the comic of the walking dead which by the way

that I just learned something new I haven't ever watched a single episode of the walking dead

but I did not even know that it was based on a on a comic series so that's awesome but I

I'm thrilled that you found something that you were already invested in as a fan and as a result of

that and the fact that you said that you also had hoped like this should be a show one day

and then when it came about it's like okay I'm definitely interested and it reminded me of

the bionic woman do you got do you remember when the bionic woman the new version came out in like

2008 somewhere around there 2007 2008 I have a vague recollection of that but I can't even

remember who started it yeah so yeah neither do a lot of people but the fun thing is as you

know Stephanie and I got started podcasting about the TV show lost and then we branched out and did

the Grey's Anatomy fan podcast and we did the desperate housewives fan podcast and all of these

shows were already in production when we started them right still was able to reach a massive audience

it was fun but we're like hey it'd be nice to to start some podcast and like be in on the ground floor

there were two one was a show with Nathan Filion and we're like how can a show with Nathan Filion

fail there's just no way because obviously Firefly was still on everybody's mind at the time

and he had a show called drive I don't know if you remember that

and so we started the drive fan podcast and we knew that you know retro everything coming back and

the bionic woman so we started the drive fan podcast and the bionic woman fan podcast both shows

we started them and our first episode covering the first episode the first podcast episode covering

the first television episode of each of those shows was the last episode we did for those podcast

because they were terrible oh yeah and the network it's good to be real about it because it

takes so much work and you don't want to put that much work into something that you're not into

like I I I also podcasted on the show for you're the walking dead which was the spin-off

okay and it started getting really really bad towards the end and I was just feeling like oh my

god we're just ripping this to shreds every time and I it's kind of fun but also that's not

really what we're all about you know but the listeners kept saying you should keep podcasting

about it we don't care if you don't like it and so I said all right here's what we're gonna do

I'm gonna put it behind my patreon paywall call it fear the walking dead roundtable rants

I will put way less time and energy into it and I'll give you guys what you want in our own private

little space and so we did that for the last like two or three seasons oh I love that idea

that's awesome but yeah I'm thrilled for you that the walking dead ended up being the success

and the runaway hit that it was but it also opened up some opportunities I I know you got some

really cool things that came out of that so tell me what some of the most exciting things that

came up for you so much came out of that but the most exciting I mean we we reached out right

away in our sort of naivete you know sort of beginner mindset and said let's see if we can

get any of the actors on and I remember writing to Stephen Young's publicist and he just said yeah

okay what time like what okay I guess they were sort of knew what they were doing too so they were

just saying yes to anybody who reached out for interviews right so we ended up interviewing most

of the cast over the course of the series and that was a lot of fun and then I put it out there

I I said I had two intentions when I started one is I wanted to try to get to interview some of the

cast and two is I'd love to be a zombie on the show I just said that on the podcast right who knows

if it's actually going to happen that's what I'd love to happen and then I became friends with one

of the listeners who lived in Georgia where the series was filmed and I just so happened to be going

out that way for vacation with my wife and my friend said hey they're doing a big call for a bunch

of zombies for this one episode and I think I can get you in and so I looked at my wife and like

do you mind if I just go away for a couple of days and she said okay so I ended up spending four

days on set filming as a zombie on the show one of the key episodes that is so amazing I love it

so what episode of the show is it can we see you in that episode yeah so people who know the

walking dead know that season two is about Herschel's farm and in the season finale a hundred

zombies storm the farm and every time they would ask for volunteers I would raise my hand so

if you look close you can see me all over that episode but um but there's one shot in particular where

uh the lead character Rick and his son Carl are climbing down the ladder of this RV right next to

this barn and there's a fence separating them and the zombies but they're all reaching over trying to

grab them and I was the one right next to Rick and uh I could have totally grabbed him if I wanted to

but then I would have gotten fired so uh anyway then um it was funny because on AMC's website after

that all summer long they had the ad for the walking dead and you could see Rick and me and then

the AMC logo over all the other zombies so it's me and the lead character that is so cool man that

was a peak experience of my life that whole thing really was all because of podcasting all because

of podcasting that what a phrase that is there's so many amazing things that can happen all because

of podcasting I love I love that story I love the fact that you had the naivete to just reach out

and say listen I want to interview the people on the show whereas some people would just think

there's just no way that anybody's gonna give me this opportunity why even bother and you never

know unless you ask that's right and I I always found a good mindset to have and it was easier for

me to have this mindset back then when it was just a hobby is uh who cares if it doesn't happen it's

worth a shot and it's like throwing pebbles in a pond just see what happens and I was surprised at

how much came of that attitude I love it okay so the next place I want to go Jason is what was your

first podcast you ever launched that was it it was the walking dead okay so that was your first

your first show is like the the the major show that that got you on television got you interviews with

the cast nearly everybody in the cast that you'd want to talk to of your favorite television show

from your favorite series of comics from years ago that just right out of the gate that that is

incredible but it's not your first it's not your only show so what else have you done what did

it spawn if you will I wonder if this is the place to mention I'll say one more thing that the

walking dead cast spawned was at more podcasts started coming up around about the walking dead I

think there were about 60 at the peak and when new ones would come out I would listen and a couple

sometimes I would be like wow these guys are really good and I early on decided not to freak out

about that and think of everybody as competition but instead to think of like collaborators and so

I would just reach out and say hey I do a walking dead podcast too I listened to your stuff it was

great and sometimes that would lead to working together on things and one pair of podcasters in

particular started what they called the Walker Stalker podcast and I did that with them and I

helped them figure out how to get their own interviews and they ended up putting on a convention

for the walking dead the premier walking dead convention Walker Stalker Con and it went on for

years and they asked me and my co-host to come out and do the panel Q&As and so I ended working

with them for six or seven years and so then I met you know all the cast I'd hang out with them

sometimes and just be up on stage doing Q&As that convention if anybody knows it kind of went down

the tubes at the end but while it was great it was just a ton of fun that's okay for me to mention

that yeah no it's it's a dude mention anything you want in this interview because I'm eager to

hear from your experience I love that and what that really points out to you speak to the mindset of

a content creator when maybe you are the first or an early person to a particular niche

and today that's a little bit more challenging than before although when in the entertainment

fan podcasts there's always new movie series coming out there's always new television shows

that are coming out and so you may be that first and I will tell you that Stephanie and I were

not the first lost podcasters J and Jack were out there before us Ryan and Geno Zawa with the

transmission podcast were out there before us there was a couple of other shows out there

and we were welcomed with open arms by everyone it was incredible and in fact we had the J and Jack

got together with Ryan and Jen and one other podcast and they created what was called the lost

podcast network and and that was basically one of them started up a blogger account that was

then owned by Google at the time they had Google had purchased it so they just had a user name

login and it of course blogger account blogger blogs had an RSS feed and then we used feed burner

to take that feed and media and close those files that were linked in it so what we did is we

I was invited once we started podcasting to join the lost podcast network so by our third

episode we're a part of a network that's been around for an entire season before we got started

in podcasting so this network already had a massive audience and when we were invited to with

the login credentials to go in and publish our third episode just put our show notes in there

as a blog post linked to the MP3 file our third episode was downloaded by 27,000 people

as like what and it's it's that kind of not seeing everybody as competition but cooperation and

you know the rising tide raises all boats kind of philosophy I like that

yeah it not only did it feel better but it did lead to more success absolutely you know I did

the same thing with if you've heard of the bald move network they have a bunch of TV fan podcasts

they're very successful and when they started their walking podcast I reached out to them and then

we ended up collaborating on a podcast on a different show later and you know just being friends

and inviting each other to things and things like that so opportunities opened up that is awesome

all right so you mentioned back when I was doing this as a hobby it was easy for me to kind of just

like it's okay if that doesn't happen so that leads me to think that podcasting made a transition

from a hobby to something more full-time at some point tell us a little bit about that journey

yeah I was working at a soul sucking job you might know a little something about that too and

and as podcasting became more fun and more lucrative because I started doing some sponsorships I

decided to just get rid of that and do it full-time and I was you know sort of building it up first

just testing out to see if I thought it would be a good idea I started a patreon I decided I

should probably have a network because I mistakenly thought the walking dead would end at some

point apparently it never will but um so I wanted something to outlive that right so I started the

podcast to cut network and we had a show on Game of Thrones and another show that my friends did

on comic books and those three were kind of the three beginner starting podcasts for our network

but you know we've had like something like 30 35 podcasts since then and I'm on maybe a little less

than half of those I would say so I've been doing that since I think 2014 so it's been a little

over 10 years that I've just been doing podcasting as a job I love that has there been a time where

you're like man I wish this was still just a hobby uh no I mean I yeah the thing about podcasting

so I when we started the walking deadcast I was 39 and I'm 54 now so it's been 15 freaking years

and um before that in all my 39 years I never had a job that I felt like oh my god this is my

calling you know or I just love everything about this even when it's hard and that's how I feel

about podcasting I mean sure there's some things that I like better than others but it's just I

still have joy when I do it you know even to this day I still I've actually come to like the editing

which I didn't like so much at first so now I really love it I mean the hardest part is it's not

making as much money as I would like well speaking of yeah speaking about that how how has the

income generation happened for you right you talked about sponsors you talk about speak

patron feel free to be as cagey with details as you want to be or as open and authentic and

transparent with details it's up to you completely yeah I mean I star it's two fronts advertising

and crowdfunding you know and uh I was with um a group called mid role for a while there and doing

a lot of ad reads that we would do ourselves these days it's more dynamically inserted pre done ads

I'm with a group called podglomerate now so I just put in spots where the ads go and then they

get the ads for us and I can choose which categories I'd like for them to include or not

and then um on the crowdfunding side I have a patreon and that has also been amazing like one

of the things that we did with patreon is I'm like okay I need some perks let me try uh

Facebook group maybe that'll be cool and it ended up being a real community of friends who

have meetups every year where they pick a different part of the country and rent an Airbnb and get

together you know or we have we got to throw each other through covid we had like multiple nights

game nights per week for a while there just that really saved a lot of people just to have that

social and so there's been it's been like way beyond my wildest dreams and the the network is really

filled with those people like the ones who would call in and have really insightful stuff to say

or just be really fun I didn't invite them to guest and then it you know if it went well I'd ask

them if they wanted to do more and so that's really how the network has built out just with

listeners who became hosts I forgot your question oh it was about the money but you get the idea

it's mostly the crowdfunding and the advertising yeah so when you started the Facebook group as one

of the perks was that before patreon included uh discuss or discord servers uh as a part of

something that you was automatically baked into their system yeah it was yeah and um I've been

offering discord now and Facebook recently got rid of group connected chats after I'd spent

a long time building all of that out and so then I was like okay we have this discord sitting

over here that I've offered but it haven't put much into it it hasn't been that active and I really

started advertising it more to people so it's been getting more and more actively because I'd like

to have something that I have a little bit more control over but I also feel like you know at first

when I first started doing this I wanted to control it like wait you guys are having a chat over here

that I'm not a part of what's going on with that and now I'm just like no no no just let it evolve

and be what it wants to be and try to meet people where they are and yeah just kind of

shepherd it rather than trying to confine it or you know control it too much does that I mean

how do you feel about that have you ever had experience with those kind of feelings yeah absolutely

I have so when I started building our community for our GSPN network the generally speaking production

network back in the day I was using PHP BB boards off of our hosted servers so it was just the old

school bulletin board yeah those are cool yeah online forums were the thing I mean heck that we

we modeled ours based upon what the official lost television show was doing so they had their own

PHP BB board the fuselage the fuselage yes yes so we had our own GSPN version of the fuselage

and that's what we were using because Facebook groups weren't a thing yet and Patreon wasn't a

thing yet but I would imagine that I would have some of those same kind of concerns that I would

be weighing through do I want to move this over to a Facebook group and you know how much control

do I have over this I think the kinds of questions that you're saying those are questions I've had

with other things that I've created I have what the reason why I was asking you is I was thinking

man it seems to me that if you didn't already have a park that is a Facebook group that a discord

seems to be a plug-in play solution that works fairly well with some other content creators that are

there and so that's why I'm curious sure I mean things to think about for me as far as all that

goes is my audience is more is closer to my age I think they're a little younger but they're

you know mid 30s to 40s yeah 40s and 30s and I think they're more comfortable with Facebook

they're already there so it's easy to just click over and see what's going on in the we call it

Zadhead Zadhead community and I think when I did start promoting discord and where they're like

we have to download an app how does that work you know but once people get into it I think they

have fun with it yeah that's you're bringing up the the right things to consider for sure and

there I don't think there's a right or wrong answer to what you offer there there are pros and

pros and setbacks to any of these platforms but yeah that the fact is is that down I can tell you

right now to this day I'm an incredibly technically literate person I mean I could figure out how to

do practically anything I wanted to do technology wise to this day I am subscribed to actually I

I have joined somewhere between seven to ten slack channels since slack was first introduced

but I have logged in exactly zero times to any of those channels to ever read or interact or

engage on a slack channel I don't know what it is it's just an extra app that just I guess what

I'm I'd say to the point you were making there hasn't been a slack channel community that was

important enough for me to go in and log in and check out what's going on there yeah and I feel like

I don't know I should do a poll or something but the people some of the people anyway who are

more active on our discord are the people who are just really disenchanted with Facebook I know

that for sure and they want they were glad when I started promoting it more but I think there are

just some people who are like all right I don't really want to download an app but I love this

community and Jason keeps saying that there's chat going on there so I'm going to go check it out

and see what's up yeah and some of them stick around so when you have other shows that are hosted

by other people in your network how are you handling the scenario where what what to how to get

people get paid to do it to the other host of other shows are they getting paid are they getting

a shared revenue source or anything how are you handling that actually it's mostly volunteer

and I tend to give them something at the end of the year depending on how much I've made

how much we've made so it's really a labor of love for most people that do it yeah you know when

I started generally speaking podcast network it was myself and my wife what so we were the hosts

of most of the shows but then I launched there was no show on our network where myself or my wife

were not one of the co hosts so we each had our own solo hosted show or shows we each had we did

our own co hosted shows for a lot of entertainment shows and other various genres but my wife had a

show that had a co host that was one at one point called full-time mom then they came back a couple

years later and they started a new show called authentic life radio and so she had a co host

there but same thing the her friend who co hosted with her knew that you know this is how we're

earning an income and living and she was just happy to be on this show to to have a voice and to

be of encouragement to a community so it was she totally understood that this is just a volunteer

scenario then I had a podcast called help I got a Mac with Chris biting and he and I talked I'm

like listen this is how I'm trying to learn or earn an income and even the network was not even

enough to pay our bills so for us we were I was doing podcast coaching and consulting on the side

and he's like Cliff that's no big deal I love sharing this and what what's fun is over the course

of the years that he was my co host for that show he upgraded his professional career path three

different times getting promoted to a new position in a new company each time with a significant

pay increase directly as the result of being a co host on the show and then the same happened

same kind of things happened with Eric Fisher for social media serenity and there was Andy

tribe with business tech weekly and so those guys all were volunteers never once did they ask for

to be paid we we we made sure they understood that it wasn't a paying position when they came on

as co hosts and yet I also made sure I want to know how is this a win for you and and all of them

will tell you there's so many wins that came into their life as a result of that exposure to those

audiences yeah I mean I yeah it's good you have to be super clear of what's being offered

and a lot of the times hosts on my network have asked me can I do a show and I always from the start

have when it was just me and Karen have said okay there's two things I want this to be it has to

be fun if it's not fun anymore then especially when it's a hobby right there's no point in doing

it if it's not fun and I want it to be good so we got to put enough into it that it's going to be

good it's not just some throw away thing where we don't try so anyway that's kind of what I say to

all the hosts too and I tell them if you're not having fun anymore there's no problem if you decide

you don't want to do it I ask hosts if they start a season of a show if they would just try to

finish the season out and then if they don't feel like coming back for the next season no problem

at all yeah so have you done any shows for like the modern day successes like

severance or there's pleuribus is out now any what what's your have you dabbled in any of those

fields with your network absolutely yeah one recent success for us I was really shocked

it was the white lotus and I got my wife involved you know kind of took after you a little bit

it was me and her and another host and we during uh last year there was kind of a gap because of

the whole writers and actors strike so there wasn't a lot of new interesting content coming out so

we just went back started from the beginning with white lotus and covered the first two seasons so

we were ready when season three came out and then that that podcast just got a lot more downloads

than we were getting on a lot of other things so that was really fun now she's doing her own podcast

with another host on the show heated rivalry that's out on HBO right now about hot romance with

hockey pro hockey players but pleuribus I love so much I mean I so Karen my original co-host she kind

of got burned out on the walking dead towards the end and she decided she didn't want to do it

anymore so I found another co-host and she's been you know aside from a few guessing things been

gone for recent years but she's her batteries are recharge so she wanted to come back in and cover

pleuribus with me you know so so happy for that so we're a lot of our listeners who just loved her

and loved hearing us together so anyway we've been back covering that show and we're really loving

it so much we're huge fan-skilligan fans and you know I had high expectations and hopes for that show

but it's really been great are you digging it oh gosh I love it and I am after we're finished with

this conversation today I'm going to go look up your pleuribus podcast because I am I I can't

listen to their bonus episodes because they're phoned in and usually you know they're not key

people in the production at the level of what's there in studio recording in the main episodes

but I there's just such joy as this podcast coach in the world when I start a major television

production and the very first splash screen is after you watch this episode listen to the official

podcast for this production I'm like I love that it's so great they've been skilling in has a

history of that they had the official breaking bad podcast and better call Saul and now they're

doing pleuribus and one thing I like about what they're doing is they tend to cover the production

details and not analysis of character and story quite as much so they're kind of complimentary

that's what I always say when we talk about their podcast is like yeah you should listen to that but

we're different so we we cover some bases that they I think fan-skilligan just doesn't want to

tell people what to think he wants them to come to it themselves you know yeah and I like that

yeah yeah and and I love the production but there have been oh yeah there have been three

different times where I watched the episode and then I listened to how it was made and I'm like

I'm gonna go watch that episode again and pick up on details that I missed the first time and

and it is such a wonderful show so recently I decided to try a different tactics so I have a

bunch of show podcasts that are dedicated to that show and I one day just thought wow I have

all these podcasts especially with the TV landscape these days where they just do a few episodes

and then they're gone for like maybe up two years I have all these podcasts that are dormant most

of the time and it's hard to build up an audience so I decided to start a single podcast it's

called wax episodic where I just cover different shows that I love pick pick really good shows

and bring in different hosts that I think would be great for those and so we started with alien

earth earlier this year which I thought was fantastic and then we went back into the first season

of fallout which I love so we could be ready for fallout season two which is playing right now

and then that's where we're doing pleuribus and we're doing it welcome to dairy it's got a bit of a

horror flavor right now I might want to change that a little bit and do some other types of things

that's a new thing that I've been doing instead of separate podcasts trying to do a single one

where I keep the audience going what about stranger things did you get involved with that

yeah so I have we have a podcast called strange indeed that has different hosts and that's

their baby and I'll go on there and guest every once in a while but they in between seasons which

is a long time with that show they've just done other Netflix shows like black mirror and just

different Netflix shows in that feed or yeah really how does that work out indeed uh I mean they

have their audience and that love them you know and that follow along and a lot of times with all

our shows we hear that people watch shows that they wouldn't have otherwise because we're

podcasting on it which is kind of fun uh one thing that I think we all all of us podcasters hate

about Netflix is that they release the seasons all at once yeah so and we're doing weekly you know

because we want to really dive into each episode and unpack it so over there on strange indeed with

Rima and Pake they are always behind the listeners who binge the whole thing and they force themselves

not to watch ahead and I think they probably lose a lot of listeners along the way who just

binge did and then there they don't have time for the podcast but there are the loyalists who stick

with it but I really I did a couple of shows like that where they came out all at once and I didn't

like that aspect of it so now I really try to stick to the ones that come out weekly and I hope

if Netflix actually does go through with this purchase of Warner Brothers and HBO that they don't

make HBO do that we'll start releasing all the shows all at once you know yeah I know some people

like that as as consumers but as podcasters it's much better weekly and personally meet it like if

a show that I really like comes out all at once yeah I'll probably watch a couple episodes or more

at once but I think you can have a greater appreciation of it if you have to take some time to

think about it in between so just a inside baseball kind of thing have you thought about creating

a feed for stranger things that only has stranger things episodes in it and the reason why I say

that is because there may be I mean stranger things is a phenomenon right and so there are people

who are I by the way my wife and I binge watched the first four seasons like two and a half weeks

before we finished the four seasons right before episode one one through three four dropped of

season five so there are people who are like us and then there are going to be people who start

watching this show even after it's finished and I would imagine that the archives of your show

could be incredibly valuable to somebody who wants to go back and they're listening to episode

season one episode one and then listen to your podcast about season one episode one or podcast

episodes about that and and go through but if there's all of those other shows and other stuff

that's in there I just wonder if you had thought about the idea of having a pure feed only for people

who later come to this this particular brand of show and every episode in the archives is just that

we yeah I mean we keep going kind of back and forth about you know what I was talking about a

minute ago whether to have a single podcast for a single show or to put multiple shows in one and

I I had thought about I asked Rima the host of Strange Indeed if she thought we should just

break all the shows that they cover out into their own separate podcasts but I don't know if we

ever thought about doing both having the stranger feed with all those shows and then a separate

stranger things feed yeah that might be a good idea just for the archives you know you can I mean

you got the audience that are subscribed to the to the one I would not do anything to change that

but just duplicate the feed you could just import the RSS into another podcast plan and then

delete all of the episodes that are not homogeneous to that particular show yeah maybe I should

actually like I said I started wax episodic it has alien earth it welcome to dairy pleuribus

and fall out and I should consider doing that with this too I mean we're what 35 episodes in

so it's not a super long feed but that's going to be an issue going forward when these

yeah what it does is it makes these this content evergreen especially since these shows are on

demand and can be streamed and people can join in even after the production of the show has ended

I mean even on the walking dead we get listeners often coming in saying hey I just found you

a couple months ago and I binge through all your walking dead stuff 11 seasons worth really wow

thank you so check this out I'm looking here there were two if you go to lostpodcast.com

there were 261 episodes of the lost podcast the last episode that was produced was

the finale part two so that was June 12 2010 that podcast still gets hundreds of new downloads

every month today it's great and what is that 15 and a half years later that's another show that

was a great pick to do oh it's such a classic you talk I mean I yeah that that we always talk about

TV the TV show lost changed our life forever and of course podcasting along with it it was that

that was right place right time for everything it's amazing yeah it changed TV yeah it's a big deal

so Jason what has been would you say your biggest joy with podcasting over all of these years

and what would you say has been your biggest challenge or frustration

biggest joy has just been getting to have these experiences of connection and I don't know why

with the word juiciness is coming into my mind because when I'm in the middle of a podcast and I take

a ton of notes but we go off script it's not really a script but we just discover something in the

moment whether it's something funny or interesting or whatever and that's like the key to why I

think I've been able to keep doing this is because I just love those moments and with the network

really being built out so I've had a chance to podcast with a lot of different people and get to

know them and connect with them and and appreciate their differences in their own unique perspectives

just that there's a lot to love about podcasting but that's the one probably that stands out the

most just moment great moments what about your biggest challenge over the years I some of these people

I don't like you know I'm just kidding getting rid of them no it's been it's been the money it really

has like I yeah I just I'm not a good marketer you know I'm good at making podcasts but I'm not

so great at promoting them and so that's probably been where the biggest area of improvement for me

and I'm doing well enough with it to keep doing it but it's you know it always feels like a struggle

gotcha well you know I'm just getting ready to publish this Friday episode 478 of podcast answer man

in it I'm going to share Steven Bartlett's tips for how to grow your podcast he created a podcast

episode a while back called how I made $1.2 million a year with this podcast and he shares and he

says at the beginning of it and by the way I'm going to share with you how any of you could do this

as well following these six or seven simple tips and my episode is basically sharing what he said

and how I call bologna on that however I do share at the end 10 tips on how you can expand your

audience to to grow your to get in front of a new audience pretty consistently so I'll make sure

to send you a link to that Jason after it publishes podcast answer man dot com episode 478

I mean yeah back in the day when you were doing that show before I subscribed and listen and got so

many great tips from you and so much inspiration you know I um you were a key figure early on in my

podcasting and I'm excited that you're going to be back and the landscape has changed so I'm

curious to see you know what you're going to say about how things are different now and all your

tips and everything so that's great great to hear I love it um are you doing any video with the

shows that you're creating we we record on zoom and I have the video but I'm trying to figure out

how I can put that into my workflow and be able to do it with the time that I have of two kids

and uh it's you know already podcasting is taking up a lot of time I think I over edit

that's one lesson I did not learn from you I you know get in there and really tinker with it and uh

I've gotten a lot faster over the years but I want to because I know that these days a lot of

podcasters that are really successful have a YouTube presence well I'll definitely have you

listen to episode 478 little teaser there podcast answer man dot com slash 478 if anybody's

interested of course that won't be live until the friday after we're recording this but um

yeah I don't think that the video is the answer for everyone but there certainly some things if

you ever want to happy to brainstorm with you on what Stephanie and I did back in the day

you say that you're already doing the recordings of these on zoom yeah it doesn't hurt to just

do the recordings of those live streamed so you could actually let your community know that we

record this podcast unedited live in front of an audience and then all of a sudden if you wanted to

you could bring in people's comments from the audience if you want to uh it's good to have

a moderator by the way or two or three you could take in live callers if you wanted to do that

and you and they could be included into the recording and all that stuff and then technically speaking

you have a live audience you're recording the actual show with no much more with actually no

additional time required than having the zoom call without an audience maybe an extra 10 minutes

on the front end an extra 10 minutes on the back end but really nothing more than that

and then you have your recordings and you may or may not include that audience live participation

in there and you can still do the edits and it that alone streamed live on youtube facebook linked in

a ex platform that you you you might be surprised at how well that would do that is not a bad idea

I mean one of the reason so I figured with youtube I would never even dream of doing us thorough and

edit as I do to my audio but maybe I could just you know trim the beginning and and stick it up

there every once in a while there's parts in there where we say something and I'm like no I don't

think I'd want that going out to the public but I think if we were live streaming it that we would

that would not come out right yeah yeah you would if you know you're streaming live to an audience

that you will be very self selective you'll self filter what what you need to filter there

yeah like personal details or whatever like that yeah right and so you and I are doing this

interview right here and wait this is live no it doesn't say live stream right in between this at all

but here's I can't read I forgot to tell you that yeah yeah but the the fun thing is is that

this interview when I invited you to this interview I invited you to a live show interview where

I'm doing a series called where are they now people I helped launch a podcast more than a decade

ago what are they doing in the world of podcasting today where is podcast intake in them

and then if you look at that that invitation you'll notice this and I may include a portion or

the entire part of that of our interview in one or more of my podcasts and so the way I see this

is that this will exist in its own form as a live stream unedited but if I do choose to put this

and more than likely there will be a place where I would put this and it's called the what are you

creating podcast and so it'll be a because it's my only interview format show that I have and it's

basically talking to people who are creating things in the world that they love and we talk about

what is it that you are creating and for you the answer will be a podcast network about television

shows that I love and so this would be a great fit for that but if I put this in there I have one

of two options I could just take the entire conversation from beginning to end and just drop the

MP3 file in or and what I likely will do is go through and just check to see if there's any

logical edit points that need to be made and the more edited more tightened production will go

out into the podcast feed whereas I will do nothing to change what happened on the live stream

and that's how I handled we were doing live streams of the lost podcast and those other

entertainment shows way back in the day even before we had the live stream for YouTube we were

using ustream.tv and all sorts of other weird stuff that was available back in the day.

This is turned into a coaching session it's great my question for you is

my schedule is all over the place because I have one of my co-hostes in Scotland and you know it's

just people have different availability do you I think I know the answer to this but do you

think something like that could work if I'm not so regular about when they go up?

So here's as a coach here's one of my philosophies the most important story you will ever hear is

the story you tell yourself about yourself so you can you can make up your own narrative about

what things means so if your schedule was I can be consistent at the same place the same time

every single week that certainly has its benefits and it's probably going to give you the most

amount of people who will consistently show up and put it as a recurring reminder on their calendar

but given the fact that that's probably the highest truth that there is the reality is is that

I could make an argument on how what you just said could work to your benefit

and that is it's nobody really knows when the show is going to go live which means that is

an incentive to sign up for your patreon so that they will be notified when you choose the

date and time of the next live stream the only people who get notified are our patreon subscribers

now anybody can join us if you happen to see that we're live but at least you know we all

because our co-host situation is different countries schedules all this other stuff it changes

from week to week and so we always know at least 24 or 48 hours in advance and as soon as it's

on the schedule we immediately notify all of our patreon supporters see well parks

it's great I love it hey before we wrap up is there anything else that you would want to share to

somebody out there who is thinking about starting a podcast I would say go for it first of all I mean

that's such a broad thing that you know the different reasons why somebody might want to do it

but for me it's essential for me that I care about whatever it is I decide to podcast on

enough to really want to talk about it and that pulls me through all of the stuff that's

a little more of a something to overcome potentially like learning the tech or just figuring it all

out I mean the excitement of actually doing it pulls me through all of that so if you feel excited

to do it then yeah it's so much fun try it you know do that thing that I said at the beginning where

hey who knows how this is going to go let me just try it and find out and also I would say

and probably everyone says this and you may have already heard it but don't worry about it being

perfect just worry about you know the feelings around it you know how how much fun is it to think

about doing it and you know have a talk with somebody and and over time I've really refined things

and shaking things up occasionally when things feel stale so it changes over time it doesn't

come out fully formed the first time you do it it's you learn by doing as you go so that's

another thing you know I know some people think okay I'm gonna do the podcast but I just have to

get everything all straight before I ever start and I would say no just get the bare minimum that

you need to do it and go for it I love that that's great advice you know I the first 30 or so

episodes of the lost podcast would make me cringe to play it out loud and have other people

listen to it with me in the room but but you know what I put them out there and like I said by the

third episode I'm sitting there talking to 27,000 people in the around the world and we weren't

they mean totally it was terrible I mean it was terrible audio quality it was yeah and I

wasn't the best host either right it did I bet you started off pretty good I challenge you to

listen really I don't know yeah quality is the thing when I go back and I know we're doing a

rewatch of the walking dead right now so we went back to the first episode and with full knowledge

of the series and just going one by one we've been on that for like two years and I have not

gone back to listen to my early ones in part because I don't want to color my current opinions but

also I'm a little bit nervous to hear what I sound like back then but occasionally I will pull

on up and mostly it's the audio quality that gets me it sounds like I'm in a cave or something yeah

well in 2005 we didn't have a lot to be compared to and and quite frankly if you were even

remotely close to your microphone you sounded better than 90% of all podcasts that were in

existing spec in the day so it's great stuff all right when we have guests on they tend to go like

this and just talk over here and I'm like just see how much better it sounds when you actually get

close you know that that's why I say if you got a guest or a co-host never let that person sit

there and talk with you in a podcast episode without them having headphones on where they're

monitoring their own voice because they need to hear when they turn their head that that it

just did that and it's like oh wait a second when I talk over here my voice the volume of my voice

changes it's like yes it does stay on the bike fun stuff Jason thank you so much for sharing your

story it is a joy to know that you're still out there crushing it that it's still providing a living

for you well I mean thanks so much for inviting me to talk about this I'm honored I saw that yeah

you were you were going to be the podcast answer man again and I'm happy to be a part of this new

launch awesome thank you Jason oh by the way podcastica.com right is that where you want them to go

that's it all right before you go if you are building something meaningful as a business and you

are using content and your voice to share your message with the world and you'd like to surround

yourself with other people who are thinking at a high level about their work and their life

and their next season of growth I would love to invite you into the next level mastermind this is

something that I created in 2017 because I saw so many people out there who had made the big leap

into self employment but then found themselves isolated and struggling on their own to figure out

what it is that they didn't know that they needed to know to create a successful business I have

two different groups of the next level mastermind depending on where you are in your journey I have

a group for those who are like myself established entrepreneurs you have already validated your

products and services you've already shown up in the world and have people that have paid for your

services who have lots of praise they say great things about the results and the transformation they

get from experiencing the work you do in the world if you are an established entrepreneur I've

got a group for you then there are those who are out there trying to find their way in the online

business world if you are not making at least $10,000 a month every single month consistently without

fail I have a group for aspiring and early stage entrepreneurs I personally facilitate each of

these groups I am in every meeting and I would love to do life with you if you're interested email

me today Cliff at Cliff Ravenscraft dot com until next time my friends we encourage you to take your

message your voice and whatever business pursuits you may have to the next level podcast it's a man