501. 3 Podcast Trends You Can’t Ignore in 2026

0:05 Good morning podcasters. Today is Wednesday, April 22nd, Earth Day, and today it's our news and comment edition breaking down what's shaping podcasting right now. Like podcasting's next growth challenge, a is role in discovery and new tools to level up your workflow. So if you're listening live on Clubhouse, hit the share button top right hand side of the screen and share it. However, Clubhouse lets you. And if you're catching us via podcast, YouTube, etcetera, please share this episode with a fellow podcaster. And now give us about 30 seconds and we'll get things rolling. Thanks for being here.

0:51 The Podcasting Morning Chat is powered by Ironic Media, helping podcasters launch, Polish and grow great shows, and by Content Creators Accountant, helping creators build real business behind their content. Good morning again podcasting morning chat. Thank you so much for being here. I am your host Mark Ronic and currently on stage with me. My Co hosts Jonathan Howard, Ralphie Step, Dr. Faye, Alex Baelish, Nick Nalback and we also have Nikki AKA Tide and Janaid Ahmed has also joined us on stage. Good morning to all of you and a good morning to our first members of the audience this morning, Tim and Chris. Chris, welcome back again.

1:49 Good to have you back two days in a row. Nice to see you, Tim, as always, good to see you here as well. So today we are going to dig right into the news. And before we do that, I want to remind you about next Monday, we have our obsession Worthy podcast series returning and this time hosted by the one who usually hosts it, Jonathan Howard. He was under the weather this not this past Monday, but the last time we did the Obsession Worthy podcast series and Ralph, he did the call, stepped up and took over that episode and did a great job by the way.

2:29 But our main man Jonathan is back and Jonathan, we are doing an episode of the Daily. And by the way, our audience can catch that show before we talk about it by going to podcastingmorningchat.com/OWP. And this one is on AI in Hollywood and it's talking about really what I guess really the the pros and cons of how AI is infiltrating Hollywood. But Jonathan, do you want to tell us a little bit more? What do we do with these obsession worthy podcast series and what specifically are we looking at with this particular episode of The Daily? Yeah, what we do with the Obsession Worthy podcast series is look at what different aspects of a podcast make it obsession worthy, make it something worth listening to that we could maybe steal for our own shows. And with The Daily, with this particular episode of the Daily, one of the things that it does so well is it makes complicated things feel simple because this is a very complicated topic and how, you know, AI is affecting Hollywood, how AI is going, what the future is of Hollywood with AI. So it's going to take, it's going to put a lot of questions out there, but it it makes it easy to understand and you feel smart after listening to this episode, which is why it's constantly at the top of the list. So we're going to be taking a look at that and seeing how exactly it does just that.

3:58 Awesome. Thank you, Jonathan. Again, that's podcasting morning chat.com/OWP if you want to jump ahead and listen to that episode. And a reminder, we play all sorts of clips from the episode so that you have some context about what we talk about and and the specifics of breaking down this particular episode. So join us next Monday for that. All right, let's dig in to the news. This is the place I always like to start with a little data for you. And this little blurb I'm about to read to you comes from the Podcast Business Journal. This is where I get this particular statistic I'm about to share with you.

4:45 So a helpful number to understand the amount of podcasts being created is the total number of active podcasts. These are podcasts that still are being updated and therefore actively marketing themselves. So if you're making podcasts, you might consider this number to be your competition quote, UN quote, rather than the big overall number of podcasts, which Podcast Index reports is 4.6 million. So it puts in a little more perspective. I know there's a lot of talk, a lot of people say, oh, everyone has a podcast. There are too many podcasts out there. In reality, not really so much after all, especially when you think about other forms of media like YouTube, blogs, newsletters, etcetera.

5:33 So with that, the total podcasts that have been updated in this past week, 200,230, which is up just over 8% from the previous week. And if you're interested, over the past 30 days, 370,654 podcasts updated, which is also up almost 2 percent, 1.8% from the previous month. And with that, Dr. is going to give us her top five, one of the top fives, and then she's going to share some news about the Webby Awards. The Webby just gave out all of their awards the other day and we're going to share just a few of them with you. So Dr. take it away.

6:18 Good morning. Good morning. OK, so this first one is the chart from Good Pods and this chart is only the independent podcasts. OK, so #5 is the Daily Move podcast. That's actually a podcast with two New Jersey football coaches. One is Andrew Daily and the other one is Move Scan Scanion, get it daily, daily move and they're both their names are in there. So cute. OK #4 Lullaby The Fear podcast #3 Mr. Gentleman Lifestyle podcast #2 is the stupid history minute and the number one is well, that's interesting. And I want to stop right there for a second because that is interesting.

7:05 We talk about how important titles are and here's an independent podcast that's called well, that's interesting. Doesn't really give us the best idea of what this podcast is about. Obviously, I guess we could jump and make draw some conclusions here and say it's probably a podcast about interesting stuff, but that's surely not a lot to go on. I have no idea if it's. A podcast of. Interesting to me or someone else? And, and also in the description, which is where you kind of pack all those SEO words, it says a comedy sciency podcast for weird people who like learning about weird stuff, you know?

7:46 It says the, IT says it says the S word there in the description, Yeah. So there's not much SEO in that, but you know, more power to them. All right. So now you're going to give us some winners in five different categories, is that right? That's right, That's right. So let's see the winner of the best branded podcast or segment features is it is things Baker should know the King Arthur Baking podcast. All right. Congratulations to them. Congratulations. OK. The best Co host is with Jason Bateman, Sean Hayes and Will Arnett. Yeah, I've well deserved.

8:33 I think that they are a great example of great chemistry between Co hosts on a podcast. I am I that's right. They fully deserve that award. They really do. OK, so best host is good. Hang with Amy. Poehler and I think she won. I think it's your. Award. I think she won several awards, several webbies. Yeah, yeah. She's sick, she's killing it. She is killing it. OK, and let's see. Best indie podcast is Flightless Bird. Hey, OK, I don't know, Flight has heard. Me neither.

9:14 So OK, so now I want before I read this last one, I want everyone to kind of get in the mood. Let's say you're at the Oscars celebration. I mean pomp, circumstance, red carpet, tuxedos, gowns, ball gowns, sparkly everything. Huge auditorium, huge stage. The lights are on and I come on and I read best creator or influencer series. The winner is Katie Thompson with I shaved my badge for this. Wow. Now, unfortunately, Katie could not be with us to collect her award, but I will take it home and when she's back up walking again, she can come over to my house and get it.

9:58 That's got to be an exception speech. Why didn't you get her on tape? That's true. I'd love to hear that acceptance speech. Wow, that is some title that'll get your attention, that's for sure. Hey, talk about SEO, OK. Yeah, yeah. I'm actually making some notes here right now about today's show and maybe I'll add some sound effects as you were setting the mood for us there. Dr. at the end with the ambiance of the award shows, I feel like that should be added in there. So we'll see if that actually gets added in there if we're able to quickly whip something up. All right, thank you, Dr. Appreciate that. That was a fun, fun divergent from the usual. I appreciate that.

10:44 All right, cool. And the you can learn more, by the way, about all the winners, the Webby award winners at podnews.net. I think they got the exclusive full list of winners, so go check that out. I was looking for my See, there you go. I almost hit the wrong sound, Ralph, but instead I just didn't hit anything at all. So you can't play the new Jingle yet? So I was ready my friend. My finger was on the button. All right, well, there is the right button, so we will keep things moving. Ralph is on the ready for when it's inevitable that I'll hit the wrong button at some point Wednesdays especially because I have lots of buttons that I press.

11:28 So he's on the ready to play my new Jingle should I mess up. So let's get into some events coming up here. This one is right around the corner. It's Riverside's How Brands Win on YouTube, so you can join Riverside for a fire. I chat with Chris Shrimp, Managing Director of YouTube Content, Partnerships and Partner Development, as he shares how brands can approach YouTube more like a product. Drawing from more than a decade of experience with top creators and media partners, Chris will explore how creator style, content, audio, audience insight, and platform native distribution can help brands build loyal audiences, grow awareness, and Dr. measurable business results. It's a live Q&A, and it also gives you the chance to ask questions directly to Chris and hear insights from the YouTube ecosystem.

12:24 That's April 23rd and you can get that. Oh, I forgot. Oh yeah. Podcasting. Morning chat.com slash Riverside YT standing for YouTube so podcasting Morning chat.com/riverside YT now DRI know you want to talk about. I do. I want to read this next one because I signed up for it. So there is a virtual event called the Business and Podcasting Networking Event for Female Entrepreneurs, hosted by the Female Entrepreneurs Business and Podcasting Society. I didn't know they had a whole society. I need to check that out. It's designed for women who are either starting a podcast or looking to grow one as part of their business, and it focuses on real strategies, sustainable systems, monetization, video tech, and live Q&A, all in a networking format that's meant to create meaningful connections and personalized support instead of the generic advice that you usually get.

13:27 It's happening online Tuesday, April 28th from 11:00 AM to 12:00 PM. Central time. My time. That's central time. OK, I'm so excited. Or you could also go to podcastingmorningchat.com/femalepods. That's right. And that will take you right to the event information page, etcetera, and you can learn more there. Thank you, DRI. Know you have to go cook some eggs right now. So enjoy that. And I'll share with everybody the last event that we'll share today, Empowered Podcasting 3. It is happening, if you didn't know it already, August 21st through the 23rd, 2020 sixth.

14:07 It's happening once again in Charlotte, NC. And if you're a podcaster, a video creator, a content creator who wants a real connection, practical insight, and a community that helps you grow, this is where you want to be. Empowered Podcasting is built for creators at every stage, with intimate networking, actionable sessions, workshops, and meaningful conversations designed to help you elevate your craft, expand your opportunities, and build stronger relationships in this industry. If you're tired of trying to figure out all of it on your own and you want to be in the room with people who truly get it, grab your ticket now at empoweredpodcasting.com.

14:49 We would love to see you there. And if you want to be a speaker there and you see that little speaker section at the top of the page, go ahead and click that and apply today. You have until May 1st. Quick tip, smart move. Yeah. Content creators. Business. Fight and today's content creators business bite might surprise you. It's brought to you by Ralph E Step, junior of Content creatorsaccountant.com. Ralph is a licensed accountant with over 30 years of experience helping creators navigate taxes, bookkeeping, and the money side of their business with more clarity and a whole lot less stress.

15:29 He's also my accountant and I'm happy to recommend him. You can learn more at contentcreatorsaccountant.com. All right, Ralph, what are we diving into today? Well, good morning, everybody. I want to talk about Apple making a huge change in leadership. So one of the most powerful companies in the world just made a leadership change. Now, you might be thinking, how does that apply to podcasters? But I actually think it matters more than you think. Tim Cook is stepping down as the CEO of Apple after 15 years, and he's going to be moving into a role they're calling executive chairman. But here's the interesting part. The person taking over is a guy by the name of John Turnus. He is Apple's long time head of hardware engineering. Now on his face you might say, Ralph, who cares that you got an Angel guy?

16:16 But this is a big deal if you think about it like this. Tim Cook was operation and service driven. Turnus is an engineer at his core. That's what he spent his whole life doing. So let me connect some dots for creators because this isn't just a leadership story. This is a directional shift story. Here's some takeaways I have. I actually think Apple's going to become more product driven. And the reason I think that is Turnus has built his career on hardware. He's built his career on building iPhones and Macs and devices that people use everyday. So what I think this could lead to is Apple doubling down on how content is experienced, not just distributed. And for podcasters, that raises a question, what happens when the listening experience becomes more device driven? That's number one.

17:01 Number two thing. I really believe the ecosystems going to tighten. ALE already controls ALE podcasts, ALE music, ALE TV and the IO devices. Now you've got a CEO who understands how hardware and software integrate deeply O your content doesn't just live on a platform. Now it's living inside a controlled ecosystem. But let's talk about innovation, because I also think there could be a shift in innovation here. We might be seeing a shift towards the user experience. Under Cook, we saw services grow, subscription, subscription expansion. Under Termus, we might see things like a new listening experience altogether, maybe deeper device integration and possibly new formats.

17:44 Or hey, listen to this one, maybe even some new interfaces. Think about this. How podcasts are consumed could change not just where they're found. This impacts long term monetization strategy as well. Here's where I want to lean in as the content creators accountant. When leadership changes, strategy eventually changes as well. And when strategy changes, monetization follows. Here's my thought on this. If Apple leans further into premium ecosystems, those device first experiences and tighter integration, creators could find themselves more dependent on Apple's infrastructure. So here's my take. This isn't about reacting today. This doesn't actually happen till September 1st. But it is about recognizing a pattern early because when a company like Apple changes leadership, you're not seeing what's happening now, you're seeing what's coming next. And as a creator, you need to ask, am I building something portable or am I tied to 1 ecosystem? And if Apple changes the rules, what happens to my business Now? I'm going to throw a couple questions out there if anybody wants to answer them.

18:47 But do you think Apple's direction is going to change under an engineering info CEO? How dependent are you on Apple Podcast for your audience? Are you building your audience in a way you actually control? One of my pet peeves, I talk about that on the show all the time. And if podcast consumption changes at the device level, Are you ready? So leadership changes at companies like Apple don't just affect stock prices. So of course I think it's going to affect that, but they shape the future of how content is created, delivered, and monetized. So the reason I want to talk about this is today is creators who pay attention early are the ones who are going to win later. So that is my take on the new CEO at Apple. Thank you, Ralph.

19:27 Yeah, I think with usually with new CE OS, you find some new changes, new things happening and we're starting to see changes already before I guess this move officially happens with the addition of video and there's you can tell within the app they're making changes I think for the better for the user experience. We shall see. And then you asked a question about something about the platform itself of Apple Podcasts as you were wrapping up and I can't remember exactly what that. Was, yeah, Where I was going with that one is, if you think about it, how many of your audience members are on in the Apple ecosystem? And what would happen if that changed a little bit? One of the things that I've seen they've been whispering about is a new home pod that actually has a screen on it. And I think that may be why they're embracing this video technology because I think that might be from an engineering perspective.

20:20 That person might be thinking, hey, what if we put a screen on those home pods where people can consume a video in a small form factor? So that might be something we see because everybody says, well, that you carry your phone with you all the time, But what if there's some new devices we haven't even thought about? I mean, think about when Steve Jobs walked out and introduced the iPhone, how revolutionary that was. Maybe this guy's got some ideas about some revolutions that he's going to make as well. I just think we all need to be aware of that. And it's easy to to put that in as like, oh, that's just ACEO business story. But if you are really dependent on Apple, which a lot of podcasters are, a lot of their audience comes from Apple Podcast, I think you just need to be aware of some changes here. Yeah, thank you, Ralph. And yeah, I mean, look, I just pulled up my Spotify for Creators Analytics section here, cuz that's where we host our show.

21:10 And yeah, Apple Podcasts listening. That comes from 40% of our audience right now. And I see this trend with a lot of my clients as well. The clients that I produce that I consult in podcasting, I see that Apple tends to be the more used application to consume a podcast. So yeah, I mean that changes, any changes, especially if it's for the worse, if the consumers don't enjoy it, that could have a very big effect on us. But at the same time, I would say, OK, so these we know that podcast listeners tend to be very loyal. So if I believe if something happens with the Apple Podcast platform, I think that they're just going to go elsewhere and find it, find us on another platform.

22:00 It doesn't mean everybody will, but I do think that the loyal audience will find you and will follow you wherever you are. And it's important for you to communicate that, you know, especially if you start to hear, you know, people are abandoning the Apple podcast. If that starts to happen, you want to make sure you're very commutative about where else they can find you. Cool. Thank you. Ralph and I see there. Yeah. Janae, go ahead. And I Oh, I see also Alex wanted to chime in. Go ahead, Janae. Good morning. Yeah, Congrats to Apple for making this change and announcing it out of time. But here's what I want to echo. Apple's been a company that's been working in the way that none other company operates in that situation, meaning that all of the things that we're we've seen changes coming down the Pike are not specifically because a certain CEO, a certain person took in charge. It's, it was already embedded in the DNA of where Apple was going to be going.

23:02 So to expect them to change or have specific changes happen with the product line and everything we do a specific person is an interesting take because that's how other companies operate. But that's not been the case for Apple. Because when Steve Jobs came in back in 99, came back in 99.7 to Apple, what he installed was a system that Apple was the actual product that he built out. Meaning all of the things that are connected to Apple are designed in a way to, you know, peak away. 7B really continue now to to say that a Apple home pod with a screen is a new product is a cool way because it would be a new product for Apple. But we've already seen products like that other companies have deployed, for example, the Echo Show and the Google screen and whatnot.

24:04 So it'll be really interesting to see where this all heads out to. So cool, thanks. Yeah. Thank you, Janae. And yeah, I think I saw Jonathan put in the chat that the iPhone 18 will probably be coming out in September. And my guess is the new CEO isn't really going to have a lot to do with that, right, Because it's in development probably as we speak. So yeah, I mean, he might get some credit for it because he'll be the face introducing it. But really I think that's kind of the under the old leadership. So it's the future devices, the future applications by Apple that will be really curious to see after the 18.

24:45 So yeah. And who's who just came off my Dr. Was that you? No. OK. Alex, did you want to chime in? Yeah, I mean, but Junaid, you know, going to what Junaid said, I think you're right that everything has been in the works for a while. But it is going to be interesting to see if the way he puts his stamp on the company since he is more engineer focused. I mean, Apple's, Apple's always biggest, well, one of the biggest criticisms is it doesn't change and it hasn't been as innovative as it could be. And it'll be neat to see if they end up either doing another device or something else.

25:27 I'm really, I mean, I may eat my words on this, but it's going to take a lot for people to get away from Apple. Yeah, podcast a lot. Because I bet you and I know I'm going on a limb and I'm in a bunch of experts here. Most people don't even know that there's other platforms to get podcasting on. They either go on YouTube or they go on to Apple Podcasts. And I know I'm in the minority in this room, but that's I think what most people think. And I know saying most, but the numbers show it too. So it's going to take a lot of bad press or problems for the people to switch, except for obviously Dr. And Nick, because they're the only two that use, you know, that's.

26:13 Right. They're the only two in the entire world that are using. No. OK, Dr. go ahead. I know you wanted to chime in. Yeah, I don't think my right microphone is working. It's not, but we can hear. You OK? Well. Didn't you start off the story Ralph, by saying that he is actually coming from like he was head of hardware or OK, so he may have a lot more to do with the new phone coming out than we are talking about right now? Yeah, absolutely, Dr. And that's the whole point. He's coming from a place where he was the chief of all of that. And I that's my whole point is I think what you're going to see is a pivot towards more hardware based Apple, less software based Apple. But that's been his baby, that's been his child. That's what he's been bringing to light. And I think that's why I feel like this is a big story, because I think you're going to see more changes, more pivots in the hardware arena.

27:04 Yeah, that introduction is going to be, you know, when they have the big stage, the big premiere of the unveiling, it's going to be especially interesting because this is his baby. You know, this, he's introducing his baby to the world. So there's some underlying emotion stuff there that is going on that's going to be interesting to watch, even though I'm not an Apple person. Well, yes, go ahead. Sorry, what I was going to say is that because the new CE OS coming on, I think Dr. is jumping over to Apple. I see that in the near future happening, it won't. Happen. But the other, but the other thing that I want to hand, but here's the other thing that I want to highlight. OK, so Apple has been a hardware company through and through from the beginning, right?

27:58 They never really focus on software. And what they were doing was they were partnering up with other companies to do the software bit, right? They had Adobe dude print, they had Microsoft, but those companies backstabbed them over the long run. And that's why we see the software move and why Apple decided to build their own software and now building their own hardware. And I, I really, it really annoys me when people say that there's no innovations happening at over at Apple because the most innovations are the ones that you do not see, right? That's what's innovative, because if you're making people jump up into hoops and do things, that's not really innovation at all.

28:40 But anyways, we can talk about this for hours. Thank you, Janae. Now I think you made some great points there. I appreciate you bringing that up. OK, So what I'm going to do, I'm going to jump the line of our order, not that you knew our order, but some of us here knows the order of things. But I want to get to an AI story and Nick, as one of our AI residents here at the Podcasting Morning that we're going to dig into this story together. I want to get his take on it. And 1st, I want to quickly remind you that we have, well, actually, this isn't a reminder because this is probably the first official time you're hearing it. The Podcasting Morning show will officially change its name on May the 4th, appropriately, May the Fourth be with you.

29:28 As a Star Wars fan, I love that we're choosing that day to make the change and we're also going to make another change that day, not just to the name. We are going to officially move the time to 8:00 AM Eastern Time. It's time for a bunch of us who are getting up way too early to actually get a little bit more sleep and feel a little more refreshed. Not just for this show, but for the remainder of our day. I won't be cooking. My eggs in the middle of the show. That's true. The egg cooking is going to change. That's right. For us, it'll change. That's kind of crazy. And I do think that this leads to bigger opportunities for us.

30:09 I think it's going to give us more guest opportunities, right? We get turned down all the time because of 7:00 AM or at least turn down to come at that time, and then I'll end up having to do it record it separately at another time. I think that the 8:00 AM time will open the door to more guests based on previous conversation. I also think that it's potentially going to be better for us with discoverability being on at a later time. If you haven't noticed, this room starts to fill up on Clubhouse and it does on our video streams as well. Come like 7:30 to 7:45. So I really believe that this is going to be better for us in multiple ways, and I'm excited to explore it. We'll definitely experiment with it. In other words, we'll keep an eye on it and see if it does actually improve things, and if it does, great. If it doesn't, we may make another switch at some point. But as of now, May the 4th, we are moving the time to 8:00 AM Eastern.

31:10 And may the fourth be with you. May the fourth be with you. All right, so this AI story I wanted to get to this is Speaking of discoverability. This is 1 quite interesting. The headline AI Search is picking podcast winners and it's not playing fair. A new Podglomerate piece looked at what 7 AI tools say when asked who the important and most cited voices in podcasting are, and the results say a lot about how discoverability is shifting. The big take away is that AI tools are already shaping who gets surfaced, trusted, and remembered. But they're also repeating web bias, rewarding big digital footprints, and sometimes getting basic facts flat out wrong.

32:00 So like I said, they tested out these seven tools. They did this back in February using 2 prompts, one about top podcast leaders and one about the most cited podcasters in current LLMS like ChatGPT, Claude, etcetera, to see how podcasting is being represented inside AI powered research tools. The article argues that being mentioned in AI results is becoming its own kind of credibility signal, because those answers can influence who gets booked, hired, pitched, or partnered with next. The name that appeared most often tended to have I'm sorry. The names that appeared most often tended to have a large web footprints with transcripts, social content, media coverage, and broad text presence all likely helping them show up more often in AI responses. Some names that popped up across multiple tools Ariel Nessenblatt.

32:58 Lauren Passell. Lex Friedman. Joe Rogan showing how certain people are becoming repeated reference points across AI systems. The article says the outputs skewed heavily toward white American English speaking men, especially from long form interview shows in tech, science, philosophy and business, while many other genres and communities were barely represented. And I'll say this about this. I mean, there are, there are probably lots of reasons for this and statistically speaking and maybe unfortunately, the American English speaking white male happens to be the more common podcaster that we see right now.

33:39 So that does fall in line with the statistics. And I really wish we could get some of these other communities more involved in the podcasting space. So hopefully that will change over time. One of the clearest takeaways for creators is that transcripts matter. Conglomerate explicitly says transcripts are one of the most important assets for AI visibility because LLMS rely heavily on text. So yes, I know that Apple and Spotify are now doing it for us and some other platforms as well. But I advise you to keep doing it for yourself too.

34:20 Putting it on your website, attaching it to other areas, other forms of media that you put out there, making sure that it's coming from you and your website especially, I think can go a really long way for you, especially with not just AI searches, but SEO searches as well. I'm going to go to Ralph first because he's got his hand up, and then I'm going to check in with Nick to get his thoughts on all of this. Yeah, and I think one of the key takeaways to this is make sure you're mentioning your name, your superpowers, the things you're known for in your shows, because that's going to end up in the transcript. And it might sound redundant, but I can tell you personally, I do that with my Daily Show. And now when you do any AI searches, my name, my genre comes up as one of the quoted people. So it does work, but you've got to be consistent and intentional in planting that information in your show so it ends up in the transcript.

35:14 And a lot of us feel uncomfortable doing that. We feel uncomfortable talking about ourselves or our superpowers. But that is what AI is picking up. I'll tell you a funny story. I actually had, I was working on a script the other day and AI actually came back to me and said, but Ralph, that contradicts what you said on February the 12th. And I was like, what? That's what AI actually said to me. O it's listening, it's paying attention, which means we have to be intentional in what we're putting into our show so that it ends U in the transcript. Hello AI, my name is Mark Ronik. I am the CEO of Ironic Media and I help podcasters podcast better. I produce podcasts and I also coach podcasters as a 20 plus year podcaster myself. There we go.

35:59 So now I should be here in all the different. But that's very valuable, Mark. And a lot of people don't think about that because you think, well, my audience already knows me. Well, first of all, maybe your audience doesn't know you because they're new to you. So what might seem sort of icky, it's not a icky thing, it's actually a really valuable thing. Thank you, Ralph and Nick, I want to come to you your thoughts on all of this. So after reading through the article, like the answers that it spit out make sense to me because you have to remember like AI isn't its own source of truth necessarily, especially when it's doing search engine related type stuff like it's going, it's relying on services like Google to gather its information.

36:42 So when someone like Lex Friedman is showing up in 90% of the Google search results when you type podcasts or podcasting, it shouldn't be a surprise that an LLM is going to pick up Lex Friedman as one of the most excited podcasters in the podcasting industry. I mean, it's the same thing as Google SEO. Like the more places you show up online, more people are going to find you. It's just we now have AI to give you a definitive answer instead of you having to go pick through a bunch of different websites and articles and things like that. That was my first initial take away. Like it wasn't the results to me weren't mind boggling or surprising or like, oh, they're AI is trying to hide independent podcasters. It's just presenting the information as it sees it. Yep.

37:27 Yeah, absolutely. And I think it does mean that even the smaller fish in these ponds, I think that we still, again, I think putting as much text material based on our podcast, putting that out there on the Internet as much as possible, I think can increase those chances. But again, yeah, it is going to still be just like an in other areas, still going to be hard to compete with some of the big names for sure. But I also think there's some value in positioning ourselves as best we can. Alex, did you want to chime in? And then we'll hear from Dr. This makes me mad. Not the AI part. It just comes down to one thing, folks, be creative.

38:09 That's it. You know, Ralph made a good point. You're always selling ABC and there's a lot of ways to be selling without selling. And you got to figure out a new way to market yourself. And yes, you could do it like what you just did, Mark, which is just blatantly say this is what I do and all this other stuff. But there are other ways that are non intrusive that still get your point across. And we as podcasters or content creators have to come up and still show up and say the things that we need to say, but try to not always be as repetitive. I know some people will say, oh, being repetitive is good. Yeah. But at the same time, be a little bit more creative.

38:52 We've got a whole bunch of different genres on here from, you know, all different types of things. Find a way that works for you, but then also twist it a little. And I think that's the take away I get from it. AI is never going to go away. So why don't you work with it in that sense? Yep. Thank you, Alex. Appreciate that take. Let me go to Dr. and then I'm going to give Nick the final word on this story and we'll move on to the next one. Go ahead, Dr. OK. So this is kind of a more of a fundamental question. Does it matter where in the transcript as to if you show up on AI? For instance, if my business client my business coach client does a mid role, will that be picked up?

39:38 On if it's in the transcripts. OK, and also this actually should not be all that hard to because your intro, I mean, my my clients intro is, you know, this is where, you know, if you're thinking of going from the, you know, cubicle to the C-Suite, this is, you know, so the intro to her show is very on point as to. What the show is about, who it's for and who she is and what she does. So that might be a good kind of thing to remember for your intros. Absolutely. Yeah. Thank you, Dr. Appreciate that. And I'm going to give Nick the final word because Nick apparently has a spicy take on this discussion.

40:24 Go for it, Nick. Not. Necessarily on the discussion just on this article, because I feel like the article was very anti AI in the way that it was like the answers it gave are unfair. And in my opinion the prompts they ran the kind of quote UN quote research that they did was crap. They left very the prompts were specific for what they were asking, but very broad in terms of how AI operates. Like just saying, give me the most named podcasts in the industry or the most well known names named podcast in the industry. It's got the entire catalog of podcast to go off of. There's nothing specific about that. And that's not how people search generally speaking. And that's definitely not how AI is going to serve up answers to you either because AI is constantly learning about you. Like ChatGPT knows that Mark runs Ironic Media and hosts the podcast in morning chat and teaches podcasting. I bet if Mark went into ChatGPT right now and said, hey, give me some podcast suggestions and that's all he said, ChatGPT isn't going to serve up Lex Friedman and all these other Joe Rogan.

41:35 ChatGPT is going to be like, oh, wait, Mark is a podcast coach. He's a podcast professional. Let's see if we can find podcast related stuff or stuff that Mark is interested in based on what I know about him. And that's what it's going to serve up. OK, let's let's experiment. So what should I ask ChatGPT? Right now I'm logged into my account. What should I ask it Nick to see if it does that? Let's just, I mean, just be super broad with it. Be like, give me some podcast. I'm going on a road trip. Give me some podcast suggestions. OK, for my road trip, all right, I wrote. Give me some podcast suggestions for my road trip. Now, of course, ChatGPT is going to think I'm going on a road trip and it'll probably start for the next day telling me. About that plan your whole road trip. So now, so see, Nick, I think already you could, this could be going against you because now what it's asking me is what I'm in the mood for, right?

42:30 It's asking what specific types of podcasts do I want to listen to? True. Crime. OK, maybe, maybe reframe it a little bit, say based on what you know about me. What you know about me? Suggest some podcasts. All right, let's see what it says here. We're a little live experiment with ChatGPT to see and Nick while we're waiting for it to respond. Do you think though? Do you still agree that putting out your own transcripts is going to help you in some regard with searches both on AI and SEO? Yeah, I mean, it should go without saying, like the more text you have on the page, the more AI can learn about you and your show and what the episodes are about.

43:15 And it's just going to, it's going to be more information for it to go off of if you just have a title for your podcast episode. And that's the only thing AI CS is probably going to skip over it because it can't validate information. It can't ensure that what it's providing is accurate. And the same goes for Google. That's why SEO became so tricky and so convoluted was because people just put a bunch of keywords in the titles of all their articles at the beginning. And Google was like, Oh my gosh, it says that Nick Nelbach is the best podcaster in the world because this article says Nick Nelbach is the best podcaster in the world. And then Google was like, wait a minute, we should probably do some verification and we should do some checks before we just start serving that up to people that are searching for the best podcaster in the world.

43:58 And that's where it it became more intense to start ranking because they're looking at a lot more factors and they're seeing other, other sources saying that Nick is the best podcaster in the world. Or is it just one random crap website that says that? And AI is going to do the same thing, right? So. Let's see what your result is, and then I have one last thing to wrap up with. OK, cool. My results do not mention anything about Mark Ronic podcasting, morning chat or anything else related to me. It's given me a bunch of it did give me pod news. It gave me podcast answer Man profit podcast, but it did not give anything about me. And it also gave me some Marvel podcasts and Star Wars podcasts as well.

44:39 So it it is thinking about me and and giving me that. So then I actually pushed it further and says how about podcasts about podcasting? And PMC is not listed whatsoever here, but maybe that's because it knows that, right? Like it knows that's my own show and it's not suggesting it. Yeah. And more, more, what I wanted to see with like this experiment is that it is, it's serving up shows based on your interests because it knows who you are. It's not necessarily going to serve up, serve up podcasting, morning chat necessarily, but it's serving up shows about you. So that that's why I had an issue.

45:20 Can I interject something there? Yeah, because Nick, I did the same experiment to Mark did. And what came back was based on everything I know about you, your mix of accounting expertise, coaching focus, faith driven content, and creator accounting positioning. You don't need generic podcast recommendations. You need shows that sharpen your business coaching framework, audience building and monetization, faith and purpose alignment, and high level thinking for creators and entrepreneurs. Here's a curated list that fits you, not just top charts. And it went with The Game with Alex Hormuzi is the first one. And then the second one was the Andy Stanley Leadership Podcast. So it did exactly what we thought it would do actually. I love that because that to me the article poses it in such a general broad like that the AI knows nothing about you kind of stance and that's not the case. Like everybody that if you everybody listening to right now, you go do that.

46:14 I bet we all get served up different podcasts. Yeah, I got packed one. To me, yes, their experiment was showing the same podcasts across all these different platforms, but it's going off a basis of I don't know anything about this person, I just have the Internet to feed me. Basically one of the most talked about podcasts. It's not catered or curated in any way. And that's not how the vast majority of users are going to be able to use AI or how they're going to use AI. That's why I had a problem with the article in the experiment themselves. Well, that makes sense and I appreciate you sharing that perspective as well. I think that's important. By the way, I just went flat out. I just said to it who are the top people that talk about and or teach about podcasts?

46:59 And as far as my name goes, I am not listed in there by from Chat GPTI. But what I did do is, and I'm not going to get into it all right now because it's quite a long answer actually, I told it to not sugar sugarcoat this answer. And to be honest, I asked why aren't I listed among that group? And it says honestly, because you're not widely positioned that way in the broader market. So this is actually going to be interesting for me to dig into because like I said, it is long and I'm not going to sit here and read all of it why as to why, But I am going to read into this and see. Maybe it's going to give me some insight on what I need to be doing better to get more visibility.

47:44 We'll see. So who was? That oh, go ahead, put your name. Oh. Go ahead. That was J Go ahead and Nick. The last thing that I wanted to add to this because we were talking about getting the transcripts on the website and that improving visibility and it is true, it will and it will provide better visibility for your specific episodes. I think AI is going to have a harder time combining all of the transcripts for all of your episodes and being like, this is what the show was about unless specifically asked to do so. But where I think a lot of podcasters, creators can take advantage of the current SEOAISEO kind of space is what a lot of SEO people are doing right now. A lot of business owners and agency owners and things like that are doing on their websites and that's creating just stand alone landing pages on their websites, hatering to that type of content that someone's going to search. So Mark, for you on PMCI would say create a landing page that talks about empowered podcasts or your coaching experience. Let's go there.

48:46 Just a page talking about your coaching experience, how long you've been doing it, what your background is, the types of shows you've worked with and keen on keywords like podcast coaching or podcast production agencies, things like that. And this is just going to be a page that has a URL. It's not something that your website necessarily. Like if you go to the home page of Ironic Media, you're not going to click on a link that takes you to that page. But if someone goes in the search results, in the search podcast production agencies, you could show up there and they're going to click and land on that specific page that then takes them everywhere else on your page. But it's not like it's a stand alone landing page.

49:28 And the reason I say this is so my brother works in SEO like that is his job. He does SEO for fashion brands and he's done experiments like this where he set up dozens of landing pages about his company, like SEO brands for fashion agencies, SEO brands for fashion in North Carolina, SEO agencies for whatever, clothing brands, whatever. And he was starting to show up in all of these places, and AI was starting to pick him up because he's got these pages saying that he does SEO for fashion brands. And all it is is a single page. I guess he's covering a broad range of keywords. So he's got multiple single pages that link and point to his page, but it's allowing AI to see information based on what someone's actually searching for. And when he ran this test, he set up his own separate AI and he said that I own a fashion company. This is what I do.

50:25 Like he gave himself a persona and then he said, I'm looking for SEO agencies to help me grow my brand. That's all he said. And the AI saw, OK, he, he works for a fashion brand. We need to find SEO agencies related to fashion brands. And it served up his answers or served up his pages every single time. So he's able to game the system a little bit based on what he knows about his audience and what AI likely knows about his audience. So that's how we have to be thinking. AI can be serving your audience directly to you and you have to have something on your website that says, hey, this is me and this is what I do so that AI can draw that connection and say, OK, yeah, this is the website or this is the person that I need to provide to the user.

51:07 This is really long winded. Yeah, it's long winded, but hopefully. Yeah, it's long winded and it's actually, I think really helpful. You just gave a recipe for any of us to really apply to try to get better searchability, discoverability. So yeah, thank you for that, Nick. And I know Janae is chomping at the bit. Go ahead, Janae. Yeah, excellent tips, Nick. Those are really amazing. And if you go back into as you, if you go back into how websites have been building and the advice that a lot of businesses would get was, hey, you need to have blog posts. You need to have case studies. You need to have textual stuff on your website so that Google can index you so that Google can, you know, serve up your pages. And Mark, when I went to ironicmedia.com, I don't see any of that.

51:56 I mean, I see about page and I see some case studies, but there are again, links to the products and clients that you have. What you need is actual case studies. You know what's what chat or sorry, the bots can go and read as textual content. That's something that you would want on ironic media. Again, that would include the about page, the services you're offering, how many experience you have, Blockbuster on your experience, those kind of things that are also going to help massively as you put those things together. Thanks. Yeah, thank you. Thanks for all the tips and advice, gang. I appreciate that. And Nick, you are off stage. I had to move you off because you didn't unmute and I think you were going from your car to your office. So I just wanted to eliminate the distractions and thank you again for that breakdown.

52:46 Unfortunately, we're running out of time here to keep going with some stories that we had planned for you. I'll let you know. We'll either save them for next Wednesday or we might even bring up a couple tomorrow on tomorrow's show because there are all sorts of tech updates to share with you, new tools, both hardware and software that I think is worth a discussion. So come join us tomorrow because it actually fits appropriately with our theme for tomorrow because Thursdays we like to talk a little when we can. We like to talk a little more tech and tools. So that could be very appropriate. So come join us tomorrow as we discuss that. And a reminder, we do it every morning live, 7:00 AM Eastern.

53:26 You can learn where to catch us all the different ways you can catch us at Podcasting Morning chat.com/join us. So until tomorrow, make it a great day everybody take care.