471. Amazon Shuts Down Wondery App. Bad Sign for Podcasts?

0:04 Good morning podcasting, Morning chat. Today is Wednesday, March 11th, 2026. Today it's our news and comment episode and get into stories like a tiny SEO detail. Many podcasters overlook big side hustle trends for creators, and Adobe Podcast is rolling out some powerful updates. So if you're listening live on Clubhouse, hit the share button, bottom left hand side of the screen and share it. However Clubhouse lets you. And if you're catching us via podcast or YouTube, please share this episode with a fellow podcaster. And now give us about 30 seconds. We'll get things rolling. Thanks for being here.

1:20 Good morning again podcasting Morning Chat. Thank you so much for being here. I am your host Mark Ronik and currently on stage with me. We have producer Ashley Feller, Ralph E Step, Sid Meadows, Dr. Faye, Nick Naul back BC Babbles, Alex Baelish and Tide AKA Nicky is on stage with us says well thank you all for being here. Today is our news and comment day. Before I dive into that, I do want to pause and check in with Ralph because he's shared with us before that his wife Jennifer had surgery recently. I think she's two weeks out now. So Ralph, just curious, how's she feeling?

2:02 How's she doing? Well, she's doing really well, Mark. She had some corrective surgery to some stomach issue she was having and that was I think it was 2 Wednesdays ago. Today actually she developed a little blood clot, which is a little bit of a scary thing, but that's been taken care of. But I got to share this mark. So last night my wife has been trying to get rest and I'm trying to get her the most rest she can get. Well about 1:30 in the morning, all of a sudden we hear this noise. It sounds like bombs going off. And with that, we have a German Shepherd. She's 6. Her name is Piper. She comes running down the hall. She just about leapfrogs on top of my wife, which is not a good thing when she still got tubes in and all this kind of stuff. Turns out there's a wedding venue down the street from our farm and in their infinite wisdom at 1:30 in the morning, decide it's time to test off sending off fireworks into the air.

2:49 So Needless to say, if you have a, a pet that doesn't like fireworks, Piper does not like fireworks. And so anyway, I so I, I put a call into the authorities. I'm like, this is ridiculous. I can understand they want to do fireworks on the 4th of July or even on a Saturday night. That's fine. But 1:30 in the morning on AI got Tuesday or Wednesday, man, it just, it's too much. And so I felt bad for my wife Mark. It made me feel like you feel when you can't get good rest. I know how that's so tough Mark, but thank you. Thank you for checking in and I'll pass along. Yeah, please do. That's crazy. That Monday night, like, yeah, sure, I would have expected over the weekend they're having a wedding, but just a random weeknight. Kind of odd.

3:30 Oh well. Well, I'm. Asking myself whose wedding is on a Tuesday night that's ending at 1:30 in the morning. I mean you must be paying like the the budget rate for that reception. I guess I don't. Know, all right, let's dive in to today's news. And by the way, shout out to Billy for being the first member of the audience this morning. So let's do how I like to do this. Start with some podcast data. And I'm going to actually do something a little different than the normal routine here. So this comes from Buzz Sprout. Every so often we dig into their global stats. I believe you can get that at buzzsprout.com/stats. If I'm wrong, just Google, Google it and you'll find it and we'll put it in the show notes for you as well. So one area I like to look at is the episode downloads across the industry.

4:26 Now granted this is a cross Buzz Sprout, but Buzz Sprout has a wonderful representation of independent podcasters, which we believe is the core of our target audience. So this these numbers represent number of downloads over the first seven days. So if you've received and I'll share the number in a second, this certain amount of downloads in those first seven days, you're in the top whatever percentile. Again, I'll share in a moment of all independent podcasts on Buzz Sprout. So for example, if you get on average 28 downloads in your first week, you are in the top 50% of all podcasts on Buzz Sprout. And again, if you're not somebody on Buzz Sprout, doesn't really matter if you fall under the independent podcaster category, I think that this still applies to you. If you've received 104 downloads over the past or over the first week, you're in the top 25. 428 downloads puts you in the top 10 percent. 1050 downloads puts you in the top 5%. And if you want to be in the top 1% of podcasts that publish an episode within their first week, you need to hit 4763 downloads in that first week.

5:55 Again, I want to remind you that downloads don't mean people are actually listening to your whole podcast. It means they've pressed play and listened to roughly 60 seconds or so of that podcast. That's where it counts as a download or a play. It's something to gauge. It's just I, I don't want everyone putting a ton of weight into that because if you got 4700 people pressing play but no one's listening, you have some work to do. And I can help you with that if you'd like. Just check in with me at ironicmedia.com or send me a note through Podcasting Morning chat.com if you'd like.

6:36 Just use the contact page. Also, just this is some fun data as well. Also coming from these stats from Buzz Sprout, if you do an episode that's 40 to 60 minutes long, you're in the top 20% of podcasts that also do the same 20 to 40 minutes. Thirty, you're in the top 31%, 10 to 20 minutes, you're in the top 16%. If you're doing less than 10 minute episodes, you're in the top 19%. And by top, I just mean that these are the percentages of podcasts that do it for those periods of time, that duration. And if you are episodes, if you're publishing an episode every 8 to 14 days, you're in the 39 percentile three to seven days.

7:29 So you're posting episodes every week or maybe even less than a week, every week, 31%. And if you're doing a daily podcast like us, you're in the top 7%. One more thing to share with you before we get to D Rs Top fives. I saw this from Pod news the other day. How much of your podcast do people actually hear? This is what I was just talking about a moment ago. It's beyond just pressing. Play Bumper analyzed more than 100,000 episodes and found the average completion rate on Apple Podcasts and Spotify is about 76% shorter.

8:13 Shows perform even better and episodes under 30 minutes average 85% of listener completion. Something interesting to think about because I know a lot of podcasters for whatever reason feel like they have to fill an hour and there's no real set rule on that. And it's interesting to see that of 100,000 different podcast episodes, it's the ones that were under 30 minutes that had the higher completion rating or that I guess that's a good, that's, I guess a good way to put it. The data also shows the biggest drop off tends to happen in that first minute, which means you got to really make that first minute count. The data shows the biggest drop off trends to happen in the first minute.

9:00 Like I said, smaller dips around ad breaks where some listeners skip ahead and we talked a little bit about the skip button not being as big of an issue as we thought. We talked about that last week on the news last Wednesday. If you want a deeper breakdown from Bumper, we'll share the link in the show notes, but you can go to wearebumper.com, check their blog section and you can find it. There, check that out because it says episodes under 30 minutes. I wish they would have gone even further down, like episodes that are 15 minutes, an average of 15 minutes to see what the completion rate on that wouldn't would because there's a lot out there that are around that time. Yeah, that's true.

9:47 And I want to say that they do get a little more specific. I think I might have just been summarizing a little bit. Just to give. The high arcing view, but I think they they're some of their, they share some charts that might break it down even more for you actually. Yeah, now I'm looking at the article here, Dr. and it stops at 30 minutes or less. So it says here 85% or 30 minutes or less, 83 percent, 30 to 60 minutes and 65% or 60 minutes or more as far as complete. Maybe next year, maybe they'll see how many podcasts are actually 15 minutes, and then they'll readjust.

10:28 Maybe we shall see. With that, Dr. would you please share the top fives from Apple and Spotify? Hey, sure. And you know, I was a little disappointed this week because there's really nothing new in the lineup. These are going to sound like the usual suspects, especially on Spotify. So #5 is Crime junkie #4 is the Tucker Carlson show #3 start that Timpani is the daily #2 the Shawn Ryan Show and the number one show is the Joe Rogan Experience. What a surprise. All right, So what do we got from? Apple Now here's where we do have a little bit of a there's something new in this one.

11:15 This one's kind of interesting. So #5 is Adults Room only. It's a show called Adults Room Only. I think it's a kind of a new show, but I'm I'm willing to check that out only because the title is kind of intriguing to me #4 is Dateline, Trace of Suspicion #3 is the Joe Rogan Experience. Thanks for the timpani #2 is Crime Junkie and the number one show is The Daily. All right, so that new show or a newer shows that we don't talk about often adults in the room and trace of suspicion. Trace of Suspicion is actually a Dateline show, so it's not really new. They've been in the top five before. OK, gotcha.

12:02 Adults in the room being the newer one, right? Gotcha. And that's a news, I think that's a news show. I'm not entirely sure, but. News and information is what they have. Yep. OK, so check those out if you feel so inclined and let's keep it going and share some events going on around the world of podcasting. Podcast movement Evolutions is arriving in just two days and of course, a little different than they've been doing it in the past. Evolutions is Podcast Movements Spring conference, which takes place this year at South by Southwest in Austin, TX. That happens March 13th through the 15th. I'm very curious to hear how that all goes, just because again, they've been doing it more traditionally their own space outside of something like a South by South, South by Southwest.

13:00 This year they're merging with the event and doing it there. So I'm curious to hear how that goes. And again, that does happen in Austin, TX. Also, I've shared before Podcasting Made Simple Live. This is a pod match production. It's a premium podcasting virtual event focused on helping podcast guests and host improve their craft so they can make a bigger positive impact on the world around them. Think of this like a one day podcasting conference, if you will, that has one track that goes most of the day. I think it's yeah, from 11:30 in the morning to 4:00 PM in the afternoon.

13:40 Eastern Daylight Savings time. So check that out at podmatch.com/event. Alex puts on a wonderful event, and this next story feels weird for me to actually do myself, and I think it would be weird for Ralph to do so. Dr. has volunteered to take this story. You'll understand in a moment. Dr. are you free to do it? Yeah. Go for it. For immediate release, the Content Creators Accountant named title sponsor of Empowered Podcasting Conference 3. Veteran accountant and podcast host Ralph Estep Junior announced today that the Content Creators Accountant will serve as the title sponsor of Empowered Podcasting Conference Three, scheduled for August 21st through August 23rd, 2026 and hosted by the Empowered Podcasting.

14:32 The annual event brings together podcast creators, industry professionals, and thought leaders to share practical strategies for launching, growing, and monetizing podcasts in today's rapidly evolving creator economy. Ralph Estep said the decision to sponsor the conference was rooted in his personal experience attending the previous event. Empowered Podcasting 2 was the very first podcast conference I ever attended, Estep said. It introduced me to an incredible community of creators who are passionate about using their voices to make an impact. I wanted to help ensure this conference continues to grow and remain a place where creators can learn, connect and succeed.

15:19 Mark Ronick, founder of the Empowered Podcasting Conference, welcomes the partnership. Having Ralph and the Content Creators accountant step in as the title sponsor is incredibly meaningful for our community. It's not every day that sponsors come directly from the community of the event was built for. Ralph understands the mission because he's lived it as a creator and as an attendee. That kind of alignment is rare, and it makes this partnership especially special and valuable. So for more on this story, check out the POD news.net. Yep, Pod news.net, they actually haven't officially released today's news stories, but I we do know James is covering that today and you'll be able to find it there at podnews.net.

16:10 Thank you for sharing that story, Dr. And yeah, again, a big thank you to Ralph for stepping up as our title sponsored. We do have other sponsorships available. It does not mean that we are done looking for sponsors. It simply means that the creator, content creatorsaccountant.com is our official title sponsor. They will get top billing at the event and this is really, it is really a big deal. I mean, in in some ways you could say Ralph is kind of saved the event because we were really again struggling to get sponsors to commit and Ralph saw this opportunity and jumped at it and we couldn't be more thrilled. Like I said in that article, it's really special when I believe when the sponsor comes straight out of the community. To me, it's a perfect alignment.

17:07 It it because we could partner with some random podcast industry company that doesn't really know us well. And I think that that can there might be a little bit of a disconnect there. Well, not the case here. So before I go to UBC with your question, just want to give Ralph any opportunity if he wants to share. Yeah, I just want to say I'm humbled by all of what you said, Mark, because I think back to last September when I was sitting there in the lobby at the hotel after exercise, and I see you setting up for the podcast morning chat live show with Dave Jackson. And I said, I think that's Mark Ronic. I'm just going to go over and say hello. I didn't know you at all. And to think how involved I've gotten here on the chat and the people and the connections I made, I've been amazing.

17:52 And when I saw the EPC three, I said, you know, there's an opportunity to really help independent podcasters and people that I meet everyday. So Mark, it is an honor. It's a privilege to be the title sponsor. I am very confident that is going to be an excellent event. And I'm putting my full efforts and everything behind the event because I want to see it being super successful. Also, Mark, you've launched an awesome thing. You've got to a bunch of great people around you, so I am totally looking forward to it this year, not just sitting in the audience, but actually being involved in a high level. Thank you, Dr. for your reading of that press release. It was very nice of you this morning. Thank you, Ralph BC you had a question. Quick question for anyone listening who might be another prospective sponsor for the event.

18:36 Is there an official cut off date for submissions for additional sponsorships? Just to make sure that all the follow through for any sponsorships for the event can take place properly. We will likely have some sort of sponsorship available for a few months to be honest with you. But as far as the title sponsorships go, there are some other levels of title sponsorships and there are they are limited, right? Because if we just give away title sponsorships to anybody, it wouldn't feel like a title sponsorship anymore. So yes, there are still opportunities available and coming soon. We have some sponsorships available for our community, something that we believe is affordable and gives our community members an opportunity to get some prime exposure associated with the Empowered Podcasting event.

19:32 That's coming very soon. More to come. It could come as soon as this week. So stay tuned here cuz we will make that announcement here for sure. Thank you for that question. BC if you want to get tickets, if you want to get sponsor information, all of that's available at empoweredpodcasting.com. And by the way, it is official Empowered Podcasting is now its own edit entity. It has its own LLC, and it's no longer under the umbrella of Ironic Media. My company, we've made it its own business now and really excited about it. It feels like it's growing up now. So thank you all for helping to make it something special.

20:15 Quick tip, smart move. Yeah, content creators business fight. So we're going to get to Ralph's Content Creators Business Byte, and it is brought to you by that guy who's hosting it, Ralph Esteb Junior. And of course, the company we just talked about, Content creatorsaccountant.com. Ralph is a licensed accountant and my accountant, and with over 30 years of experience at contentcreatorsaccountant.com, he helps creators stop guessing about taxes and money, turning financial chaos into clarity. And like I said, I've been working with Ralph now for a couple months, and it has been one of the best decisions my wife and I have made. And I encourage you to check out his website at contentcreatorsaccountant.com.

21:05 And by the way, it was brought to my attention recently by somebody in the community that this promo I do for Ralph is, quote, weird for some people. And I get that. And I realized the reason why it might come off as weird is because I really never acknowledged it. And by the way, DRUR unmuted. Oh, I'm so sorry. That's OK. I really never realized that or I never really explained why we do that, why I say this segment sponsored by. So in some ways, I think I made the assumption that you got the idea, but content creatorsaccountant.com, Ralph is also sponsoring this very segment, right? This isn't me just throwing Ralph a bone. This is an arrangement we made, so I just wanted everybody to know that.

21:53 And I want you to know that if you're interested in sponsoring an episode of PMC or a segment, let's talk about it. I would love to make this more communal. I would love you to participate in that way. And it is a goal for 2026 of mine to monetize this show because I can't afford to keep doing it unless I monetize. So I'm all about promoting what you have going on. And I'm happy to work out a solution that works for all of us if it's possible. So e-mail me, Mark, Marc at Ironic Media, IRONICK, media.com and we can talk about it.

22:33 Happy to talk to you about it. So with that, OK, Ralph, what do you have for today's business bite? All righty. Thank you, Mark. And today's business bike comes from an article in Ink magazine. Now this article is about the fastest growing side hustles in 2026. And when you read the list, you realize something rather quickly. Content creators and especially podcasters are sitting right in the middle of several of these opportunities. Now this article highlights things like AI services, digital marketing help, online education, e-commerce, and even freelance creative services. Now think about that for a second. Podcasters already live inside this ecosystem because when you run a podcast, you're naturally building 3 things that side hustles need.

23:18 First thing you're building is an audience. An audience is leverage. A podcast audience can turn into coaching services, courses, affiliate income, consulting memberships. A lot of things can turn into that. Second, it's about expert positioning. When you talk about something every week or every day, people start seeing you as the person who understands it and expertise turns into opportunity. Many podcasters end up getting speaking invitations, consulting clients, brand partnerships, or new business ideas. And 3rd, and I love this one, a testing ground. A podcast is one of the best ways to test business ideas in public because you can ask your audience questions, you can talk about a concept, you can see what really resonates.

24:03 And suddenly that side hustle idea becomes validated by real listeners. So here's the key take away for creators. The fastest growing side hustles in 2026 are not random at all. They're built around skills, they're built around knowledge, and they're built around audience. And podcasters are uniquely positioned to build all three at the same time. So this is the question I want to throw back to the room this morning. What side hustle or business opportunity has come directly from your podcast? Because for a lot of creators, the podcast isn't the business, The pockets is the engine that creates the business. And that's your business by for today. You could call PMCA side hustle. Yes, it's under my brand, under my umbrella, but I mean it has produced results for me in multiple ways. It's gotten me business, right.

24:51 I working with other podcasters, helping them start a podcast, grow their podcast, etcetera. But look, it's also created business opportunities with you, Ralph, right? Like here we are, we got a, you are our sponsor of Empowered Podcasting. You sponsor A segment here on PMC. So yeah, it that side hustle has paid off in many different ways for for me, for the podcasting, morning chat. For both of us, Mark, I mean, it's been a win, win situation. It's been a win for me. It's been a win for you. It's been a win for the community and it's going to be a win for everybody moving forward as we get into EPC 3. And we're going to really, we're going to help people. We're going to change people's impact in their show. So I I think you're absolutely right. And maybe I shouldn't, even though I know the articles calling it side hustle.

25:38 For me, I'm kind of looking at it more like a revenue stream than a side hustle. And I think that's important because you have to delineate what is your mindset. And that's one things when I work with people that are content creators, I use the word content creators more because I do podcasting, YouTube, photography, all those type of things when I work with people. Yeah, For a lot of people, it is their main source of revenue and it changes your mindset. And I know, Mark, I'm going to challenge you a little bit. We're changing your mindset, You and I working together. We're changing the way we're thinking about things. And as a content creator, you've got to do that. And Mark and I are going to talk more about that journey as we move forward. So absolutely, Mark, I concur with you 100%. Yep.

26:18 Thank you, Ralph. Just want to make sure anyone else want to chime in BC I see your hand is up, but I'm not sure if that was from earlier. So the surprise when I said that. OK, cool. Yeah, Thank you, Ralph. Appreciate that. What is the difference between a source of revenue and a side hustle? Ralph, you want to take that? I don't know that there's a big differentiation. I think the idea when people say side hustle, it means you have another full time job. I think that's the way I look at it. So I would say Dr. it's an additional revenue stream. Now there's a lot of people in the content field where that is their main revenue stream. So for them, as Mark alluded to, that's not a side hustle anymore. But for a lot of people, and this is something I encourage actually, is start it as a side hustle, start it as an additional revenue stream because you don't think about what you, you know, the insurance, we don't think about retirement plans.

27:09 All those things are so vitally important to the content creator. And you might say, well, I've got enough revenue coming in that I can make this work, but don't overlook benefits, don't overlook retirement, don't overlook all those other things. In my view, Dr., that's the differentiation is the side hustle just means it's an additional revenue stream, but it could be your main revenue stream. Thank you, I appreciate it. Thank you, Ralph. Yeah, I appreciate that as well. Let's get into some news bites. These are stories that I look at and say, I don't know if we're going to have a huge conversation around them or not. And they're, they're in my opinion, important to dig into. So first story from Pod News just the other day, a very quick update on Netflix's new podcast category since we've talked about that a bit over the past month or two. The video podcasts on that platform are watched more on mobile devices than on your say smart TV and watched more during the day, according to Netflix CFO Spencer Newman. Nothing more to share on that.

28:17 I just you, we'd like I said, we talk a lot about Netflix or we have and their entry into this space. So I thought it'd be important to share a little bit about what's working for that platform. In other news, Rd. just released the new Roadcaster Video Core and it looks like a play for podcasters who want to level up their video setup without buying a giant button heavy Switcher. It's a compact software controlled production console that handles things like video switching, the changing from say 1 camera to another, audio mixing, recording and streaming in one box with support for up to four video sources, scene switching, graphics and multi view.

29:08 The real hook for podcasters is that it can link directly with the Roadcaster Pro 2 or the Duo through its Roadcaster Sync, which means creators already in the road ecosystem like myself, can build a more serious video podcast workflow without starting from scratch. So in plain English, this seems like Rd. is betting that more podcasters want a clear path from audio first to polished live or recorded video content. Now I'll tell you this is not necessarily a super cheap device. I believe it's around $600.00.

29:50 And I would say it's not something I would recommend to a new podcaster unless you've got a lot of money, you've got a big budget, you've got a big business plan behind what you're doing. But I don't think that if, if this is your side hustle, if this is a source, a revenue stream, I think you don't have to jump into something like this right away. And there will be a learning curve for sure. I think even for somebody like me who's fairly comfortable around the these, around this kind of equipment, I still think there would be a learning curve for myself as well. So if you're not familiar with this, again, if you're going to get it, give yourself some time to learn. If that's the price point for this new piece of equipment, I would definitely say stick to like stream Labs. You know, it comes with comes for free. Make sure you got plenty of RAM on the computer and you should be able to handle that and multi angle show that you're aiming for or or you said were you announced a little while ago, I think it was Riverside now does like in person multi angle as well, right?

30:52 Yep, Yep. So yeah, I would say stick with those for sure. I would. I'm wondering though for to clarify, is the the road sink you mentioned, is that a Bluetooth feature or does it physically plug into the road caster? As I was reading it, I was thinking to myself, man, I hope that somebody doesn't ask me what that is because I can't. I can't remember now, but it is, I think. Let me look here. I'm just going to tell you as. This black box. Sorry, I'm looking at an actual video which isn't really helping me. I think it is actually really a piece of hardware, if I'm not mistaken. OK, here, here it is from Rd. itself. What is Roadcaster Sync? It is a piece of hardware. It's at least it looks like it here. Hold on.

31:35 Yeah, using a single USBC cable it it connects it to the Roadcaster video core. Yes. Gotcha. So it is a piece of hardware. I don't see the price point on this particular page. It is a piece of hardware that you'd have to get if you want to connect it all together. Oh, it's separate. It doesn't come with the the new piece. It's not built in with the core, no, it's a separate piece. Oh so it's like 3 pieces if you want a good set up. If you want the a full maximum set up, yes. I mean the video core can work by itself. It doesn't have all of the same audio features as the Roadcaster Pro 2 or the duo. It doesn't have the sound pad it, you know, it has certain feature or missing certain features. So that's why this third device will can marry it all together and really create a a, a what do I want to call it? A command Center for your production process while you're recording?

32:32 Yeah, absolutely. Understood. Cool, thank you for the question. DRI will see if Dr. Do you want to go to that next story here? Story #5. Sure. So podcast host Lipson, you know, the OG of podcast hosts, just rolled out a quote UN quote new and improved. I always get a little skeptical when I see that new and improved episode publishing flow that turns what used to be 1 simple page into four steps. And some people are reporting it kind of feels like extra friction for something that used to be quick and simple. Meanwhile, the company broke a bunch of three O 1 redirects back in late 2025, and those are still not fixed, which makes leaving the platform harder than it really should be. We asked for an update last week and we did not hear back. Go figure that according to Live Wire, Lipson is also setting an OK, also setting at an all time low when it comes to its share of new podcast episodes.

33:46 More unsettling signs, in my opinion, that Lipson is in trouble. We talk a lot about Lipson on this show and usually it's not like really good news. And I don't want anyone to get the impression that we have it out for them. But damn, they need to buck up. They need to do something good. They need. To do something good in this world. Things, there's definitely things happening behind the scenes there that we can only speculate. And I'm glad you said that, Dr. It's not like we have anything against Lipson. In fact, Lipson was my very first podcast host 20 years ago. So they've been around for a long time and really paved the way for a lot of these companies that we see now. It's troubling as you said, it's a shame to see what looks like they're falling apart and this is just from the outside looking in.

34:42 I tried to reach out to Lipson. I know Pop News has tried to reach out to Lipson to get more info and nobody is really getting very far. All the all the people that I knew that were with Lipson are now no longer with Lipson. Yeah, yeah, very true. I was about to say, I have a client who's who was on Lipson before I came to work with her, and she's still on Lipson. And part of me wants to say, you know, we need to maybe start looking around, maybe move to, you know, captivate or something. She's not that easily swayed by stuff like that. So I don't know. It's going to be a hard conversation. Yeah, and I think it's going to be a hard decision for a lot of people, and I think people are.

35:26 I've seen podcasters are questioning whether they should pick up and move somewhere else before it's too late. Although, look, I've seen this happen with other platforms before, like Lipson. They usually give you a, an ample period of time to adjust if they are actually going to shut down. So I don't think it's, you know, I don't think it's something that you have to do right away, but maybe you want to give yourself a little more time before or if in fact Lipson decides to close shop. But yeah. I kind of think it's going to be, yeah. That could. Very well be too. That could very well be too. Thank you, Dr. and. Mark, Mark, can I interrupt for just one second? Because what you just talked about is something that I think we need to talk about for a second and that is contingency planning.

36:15 Anybody who's a content creator should have a contingency plan that what if, if Libsyn decides to change, if Captivate decides to change, if the script doesn't do it, if Adobe goes away. That's one of the things that I see as a weakness when I'm working with content creators. You need to have a strategy that what happens if, as we're talking about this and I'm not saying anything negative about Libsyn, you could say this about anybody have a strategy that what if scenario plays out so that if tomorrow you go to do something and that tool doesn't work anymore, be prepared for another tool to jump in there. So I appreciate you. Let me bring that to everyone's attention, Mark. Absolutely, yeah. Thank you, Ralph, BC I'm going to ask you again, is that hand raising a legacy thing? It's a brand spanking new hands.

37:01 Oh. Good. Go for it I. Was going to, I was going to say it's, it's so interesting because back in the day when I began podcasting, which was back in 2019, and I didn't learn until after the fact, but I used Anchor the days of Anchor FM, yeah, that was my first host. And it wasn't until after and I was some ways in where folks were like, be careful with Anchor. They claim to have this issue where they get to say that your contents, their content, it's their property. And so if you try to do a three O 1 redirect and go somewhere else, they may not let you take that content with you. And I went to Lipson after anchor and to see now you know, Lipson in the state that it's in. And again, to DRS point, we're not coming for Lipson officially to see it ironically where it is now with the three O 1 redirect issues and things like that.

37:47 It's just like, wow, I'm happy I bounced away from those two when I did and I went to popping for a bit and and thanks to the recent suggestions of our team here, I have moved recently to captivate. But I'm happy I dodged those bullets when I could. Great points and I'm going to keep it moving. Here's a little community news story that I almost forgot to get to and I'm glad I didn't. Just want to give a big shout out and send some love to Simona Costantini, who was a long time host here on the Podcasting Morning Chat and has since been a little too busy to join us regularly. She tries to pop in when she can and I'm congratulating her because she had a baby girl just a few days ago. Sunny Sunny Mae is the baby's name and if you want to see pictures of that cute little thing, just check out Simona's social media.

38:43 She's posted to Facebook, Instagram, etcetera and go wish her a congratulations while you're there. Congratulations to you, Simona and Sean as well. I'm really excited for you guys and looking forward to hearing all the adventures. Another baby in the podcasting morning chat family. I think the last one we had was Nick's child, Arya. Who's now? What Nick? How old is Arya now? She. Just turned 2 in December. Two years old? Well then, congratulations. Happy birthday to Arya as well. All right, I'm going to keep it going on purpose with Jay Shetty the podcast.

39:24 And by the way, one of the bigger podcasts out there, it's leaving I Heart Media this July. Hat tip 2 pod news for spotting this one. Shetty's Now show was noticeably missing from the recent I, Heart and Netflix flicks. Wow. Can I speak? Missing from the recent I Heart and Netflix podcast deal, which raised some eyebrows. In an e-mail to advertisers, the company said. We love Jay. We have enormous respect for him and what we've accomplished together, including doubling his audience and revenue. Oh, I like how they're taking credit for doubling his audience and revenue. But as sometimes happens with professional relationships, we're going in a different direction. That's the extent of the story that I have thanks to pod News, but really interesting considering how popular that podcast is.

40:18 It's often in the top ten of most podcast platforms, and it's definitely in the top five for, I believe, the mental health category. So it's surprising to hear that they are no longer going on with I Heart and a little surprising. Just it always surprises me when a platform takes credit like that for doubling his audience. He could probably argue that because he has built quite an empire for himself. And I don't think that was just because of I Heart. Sid, did you want to comment on this? Maybe we should start a pool around where he's going. You know, it's a little fun pool because my guess is he's going to go to that new production company.

41:00 This is just a random guest that new production company from the Diary of Aceo Guy. That's not a surprise. That wouldn't be a surprise. I'm with you there. That would make some sense. And they're both. Going to lips in, of course. Right, Alex. Good, good call there. Yeah, it could very well be. I could see that they're both, I believe, from England, and I think they do know each other. So more to come on that. We'll see where J Shetty lands. I like the idea of putting a pool together. Sid. Yeah. BC what do you got for us? Quick question, I just had out of curiosity, do you any other any other American based media companies like iheart do podcasting like Beasley or like Clear Channel anything like that? Well, I think Clear Channel is now I heart media so I'll take that back.

41:48 But like Beasley, do any other American based ones do podcasting or is it just I heart media? I know SiriusXM has a podcast platform that they kind of separate from the actual satellite service. Who else am I thinking? I mean, as far as bigger names like in media like that, I think I heart kind of cornered that market if I'm at least at first thought. I can't think of anybody else other than SiriusXM that's kind of in that. Well, your next story, your next story's about Amazon, right? Yeah. Don't they have a stand alone? They do. They did. OK. That's the story. Thank you for that. That's the story. Transition.

42:29 OK, sorry. No, that's a great transition. I love it. Dr. Amazon is shutting down the Stand alone Wandering app and Wandering Plus, which tells me the company is rethinking its podcast strategy as listening habits continue to change and evolve, Variety reports that Amazon is moving away from the separate Wandering experience and pushing listeners into the rest of its audio ecosystem. That follows last year's restructuring, when Wandering's narrative shows moved into Audible and its creator and celebrity podcasts shifted to a team focused on talent, partnerships, sponsorships and cross-platform growth.

43:12 The bigger take away may be this Amazon is not treating podcasting like its own destination anymore. It's folding podcasts into a larger media business built around creators, monetization and consolidation. We'll see if that potential take away comes true. But yeah, I mean, in some ways not a surprise because I don't know many people that say Wandering was their go to app for podcast consumption. So not a big surprise, but we will see where that leads. Dre, you want to comment and then take the next. Story. Yeah, I was about to say it's so hard to really know what these stories mean because everyone has their own podcasting app that they listen to. I mean, I am Pocket Casts, someone else might be Pandora or something, you know, everyone, all these different apps that you can get these shows on.

44:14 So it's always kind of confusing to me as to what stories like that actually mean to the consumer. Yeah, I know what I'm saying. Yes, I, I think that's a good point. And I know what it means to the company in this case with Amazon, because I think part of the story that I didn't share were all the layoffs that came with it. It has a big impact in that regard. But yes, I'm, I'm with you there. I, I, you know, it's, it's kind of goes to my argument also about why bother joining a podcast network. It's the same idea because most listeners have their go to platform to consume a podcast and they're not going to the network.

44:57 In many cases, they're not going to the network to consume the podcast. They're going to Spotify, they're going to YouTube. They're maybe they're going to good pods, but whatever it is, they're usually going to a player. They're not going seeking out a network. Alex wanted to comment. Go ahead, Alex. It's interesting that Amazon is doing this, especially with the play that Netflix is doing. I know we can't look at it right now, but how successful is what Netflix is doing with their podcast platform? Are people actually, obviously people are listening, but is it as great as they think it is and is this a play from what next? You know what I mean? They've got to be intertwined in some way. I know Ralph will probably try to find the money in it, and I'm not trying to be funny when I say that because it is big money.

45:45 With Jay not going, it's going to be interesting to see how it plays out. I would love to see what the long game is for all this because are people really consuming content and how are they consuming? Agreed, it'll be interesting to see how it all plays out for sure. Thank you, Alex. What we're talking about money and thank you Alex. What things you notice is a lot of these companies go bankrupt every few years. So that's the bigger issue. A lot of these platforms, a lot of these networks end up going bankrupt. So you have to question if this is a viable business model. You know, they sign a lot of people, they spend a lot of money, but in the long run, is it actually moving the needle in a positive way? So I think that the jury's still out on that one.

46:26 Yep. Thank you, Ralph. And all right, Dr., do you want to take that next story? The podcast boom didn't die, it just stopped inviting new people from podcast news daily. The podcast industry is hitting a strange turning point. Fewer new podcasts are launching in 2026, yet the number of active shows is actually climbing. And what that translation is, is instead of a flood of new podcasts, brand new podcasts that disappear after 7 episodes, more existing shows are actually sticking around. That signals a shift from hobby podcasters testing the waters to creators who treat podcasting like an actual long term platform.

47:13 The area of endless new launches may be slowing, but the shows that survive appear to be putting down roots now. The highlighted points of this story is the total number of active podcasts has increased despite fewer launches. Many short lived hobby podcasts from previous years have already disappeared. Growth is coming from existing creators staying consistent rather than new entrants, and the trend suggests the market may be stabilizing after years of explosive growths. Thank you, Dr. Yeah, really interesting to hear that. Yeah. Although launches are down, podcast production is up from a business perspective for me where I work with podcasters on production, I work with them on growing their shows, etcetera.

48:07 I've definitely seen a trend where I'm seeing less interest in starting a podcast, but more interest in consulting. I'm not seeing people coming to me saying, hey, help me start a podcast. But what I'm getting is, hey, I have a podcast, can you help me improve upon it? So that seems to be in line with that trend. Thank you for that story, Dr. We're going to go to BC now. BC sometimes covers what we call podcast entertainment news, but we've also recognized that sometimes there's just not a whole heck of a lot of celebrity news that's really worth sharing. So BC will also on occasion do a segment about new products, new services for the content creator. So take it away BC.

48:53 Yes, and today is definitely a new product today, so Podstock launches an agent or sorry a program called Agent which is a brand new AI assistant. So Podstock which is a podcast analytics and management platform used by numerous networks and studios has launched this brand new product. The tool is designed to help podcast of businesses automate operational tasks like analytics analysis that seems a little bit redundant, planning advertising campaigns and managing show inventory. Now, unlike ChatGPT or Gemini, this one is built specifically for podcast operation workflows. So some of the key features here is that it's an AI powered analytics assistant. It can act as a data analyst for podcasting teams. Examples would include allowing people to get real responses on certain queries, like how did the show perform last month, which episodes generated the most and revenue? Which audiences are growing the fastest. It's also able to act as a campaign and advertising planner, so it'll help in building media plans across multiple podcasts, manage inventory matching advertiser requirements with available ad slots. And in practice, that means AI can help networks translate advertiser goals into real campaign placement across shows. It's also able to help automate operational workflows. Podstock's CEO emphasized that Podstack operate podcast operation teams spend a lot of time on repetitive tasks, but the new agent program will automate things like onboarding new shows, planning admin

50:26 inventory, and preparing reports. It's got a couple of other features as well. But why this is important is that this means AI is moving into podcast operations. Until recently, AI and podcasting usually just meant transcripts showing notes clip generation. But now this tool targets the business side of podcasting, like analytics, advertising, operational planning. It's also it also means that podcast networks are becoming data businesses. So large podcast companies now rely heavily on multi platform distribution, ad inventory, cross the show campaigns and performance analytics. So this is a pretty big, you know, new element for the podcasting world, especially if you're if you're we're already working with Podstock.

51:08 So the big take away for the story is that AI is in podcasting used to help creators write show notes, but now it's starting to run the business side of podcasting. In other words, tools like this signal a shift toward an AI assisted podcast management, especially for networks and larger studios. Thank you BC very interesting. I have not checked them out yet other than gone to their homepage podstock dot IOI believe is the URL. More to come, we will see how this all pans out. It sounds a little bit similar to what our friend Janae is doing with Pod Glue, which is I think launching officially next month. Someones leaking this stuff to larger companies. Janae got to tighten that system. Man, that's right.

51:57 But I, I have seen Janae product and I absolutely love it. As he puts it, it's like an operating system or podcasters. So lots of interesting tools being developed courtesy of AI. We will keep on these stories and share them with you as they come. OK, I want to get to at least one more story, so stick around here with me. And by the way, thank you for sticking around. And if you want to learn more ways you can connect with us, catch us live, for example, or find different podcast platforms to listen later, you can go to podcastingmorningchat.com/join us. So this next headline I want to share with you. Most podcasts are ignoring a tiny SEO move that could boost discovery.

52:47 This comes from a new pod SEO analysis. It says that podcast tag lines may be doing a lot more heavy lifting than most creators realize. After reviewing more than 330,000 active English language podcasts, the company found a strong correlation between tagline use and better keyword rankings on both Apple and Spotify. Pod SEO says the strongest performance came from shows using taglines in both the title and author fields and only and that only .58% of podcasts are using that approach. The pod The post argues that this is a major missed opportunity because 91 almost 92% of podcasts use don't use taglines at all and only 8.27% use any type of tagline. One of the most interesting findings is that the author field may be more powerful than the title field alone. Pod SEO reports better average ranking performance from author field tag lines then title only tag lines on both Apple and Spotify.

54:05 The article is careful to say this is correlation. It's not causation. In other words, its own methodology notes that better optimization podcasts may be doing multiple things right at once. It's an important part to just keep in mind. Pod SEO defines tag lines as descriptive text added with separators like A-A pipe or semi colon and says that they can help with keyword context, listener clarity, authority and differentiation. The Apple podcast correlation was stronger than Spotify in this data set, with Pod SEO reporting 6.7 times multiplier on Apple and 5.6 times on Spotify. And again, this data comes from 332,000 plus active English podcasts using ranking data from February 24th, 2026 and tracked keywords ranking in the top three positions across Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

55:10 So it makes sense on how to have this implements with the tagline, you know with the title, which is typically more creative. The tagline is where you can definitely plug in those solution oriented key phrases. But it mentioned also doing that for the author. How does that work out in the author space? Yeah. And actually it's not only saying that, it's saying it's more effective. It can be more effective if you're putting a tagline in the author spot. So from what I gathered from this article is I got some examples. Basically it's your name. So like BC babbles podcast strategy expert, there's your tagline or you know, Doctor John Davis, clinical psychologist and researcher.

55:54 It's putting a title with your name and ideally using some keyword friendly words in in that tagline. So that would mean when you're setting up in your host then and you're building your account, you'd have to probably make sure to put that in your actual account name. Because usually when you're going to produce a new episode, all you have is a drop down and whatever preset name you have in there, you can't like type it out usually. That is right. Yeah. So for example, if you are a Buzz Sprout user, you need to go into your podcast settings and find where it says who's the host of the podcast and then add that little pipe or a little dash and put a title with your name.

56:38 I may try that. I might try that and just see what happens. I've been putting the guest's name, the host name, and again we're talking about the one who's with Lipson, one of my clients who's with Lipson. So I put her name in the author and then comma and then I put the guest name in the author. So do you change that every for every episode then? Yes. Interesting. OK. That's an interesting strategy. Do you feel like, do you have enough data or enough insight to say whether or not you feel that's been helping with discoverability? You may not, but I'm just curious. I do not try so many different things and I don't know which one is actually that's that's not a good.

57:19 Don't follow me. Don't, don't, don't do that. Well, I think actually a lot of people do. Go ahead, Alex, it. Actually is kind of a brilliant idea when you think about it. When we were talking about what Ralph was saying about the content creator segment, hearing these ads over and over again, if you are whatever your tag line is, podcast expert, if you're hearing that all the time, that's what you're going to search for. So it does make sense. It's just a little bit different than what we're used to doing. Not too long ago, we were talking about YouTube and how to craft the right titles so you can get searches. So it's an evolution of of what people are thinking of. And with AI, that's what it's looking for. It's looking for those keywords.

58:02 It makes perfect sense. Yeah. Thank you, Alex. Appreciate that. Did anyone else want to comment? Mark, I just want to interject something. This is why it's so very important when you're naming your show to think about that. I'll give you an example of that. When I created the Content Creators accountant, it was intentional because I wanted people to say, well, he's the Content Creators accountant. So when you're setting up your show name, don't just pick something random. Think about what you're trying to drive, what that that reinforcement you're trying to do. Thank you, Ralph. Sid, did you want to chime in as well? I've been doing a little bit of this. I've talked about all the keyword research that I did inside the podcast players, and we did give the podcast a new tag line this year.

58:46 Your inside look at the people, products and ideas shaping the future of workplace design. Workplace design is the really key, a big keyword in the podcasting that I researched. So it's in the description, it's the very first line in the description. It's on the website in multiple different places. I say it twice in the show very intentionally, once at the beginning and once at the end so that it goes into the transcript so that it gets picked up by Google's SEO, especially the workplace design aspect of. So we were very intentional with this. I believe that we are getting discovered more, which is leading to more downloads and more success of the show. So I didn't put it behind my name.

59:27 That's really interesting to think about putting something beside your name, but we also put it in the footer inside a bus route. So everywhere that we could put appropriate keywords, we had a couple of different paragraphs that we wrote and everywhere we could put that, we did put it in order to help boost the discovery of the show. Because independent podcasters, that's one of the biggest challenges that we have, is discovery of our show. Thank you, Sid. And one thing that I that just stands out to me. First, thank you for sharing your, your strategy with us. And 2nd, if workplace design is the real strong keyword that you've discovered through your research, I would consider leading with workplace design in that tagline as opposed to leaving it at the very end of the tagline. Because look, yes, it's there, and that will help with the algorithm.

1:00:18 But what helps the most with the algorithm is how our audience interacts with our content. And if they're not seeing that workplace design until the very end of that tagline, first of all, it could be cut off in certain views, right? So leading with that in the tagline only helps reinforce that for your audience and may encourage them to press play quicker. That point is well taken and something that we will look at. We're gonna analyze this on a quarterly basis and something that we'll look at when we do our analytics and dive into how our SEO and podcast SEO is performing. So great point and something I will look into for sure. Yeah, absolutely. And I say that because that is from years of trying to and still working on mastering a hook in a video, right?

1:01:05 Starting with the most important words at the front of the hook as opposed to a big build up and then hitting those keywords at the very end. That can be challenging and could be an ineffective hook because you need those keywords to capture people's attention. OK, we are way overtime this morning. So thank you for sticking around with us the entire duration if you have, we appreciate you. We are back tomorrow. We are opening the mailbag tomorrow morning, one of our favorite segments on the podcasting morning chat. So come join us tomorrow. We will be answering listener questions and if you have a question, bring it tomorrow and we'll answer yours too.

1:01:45 So until then, make it a great day everybody, take care.