August 27, 2025 • 46 mins
Ever wondered how an entire nation discovers a medium that's been thriving elsewhere for decades? Meet Gautam Raj Anand, widely known as "the father of podcasting in India," whose remarkable journey from bored banker to pioneering podcast innovator reveals what happens when necessity meets opportunity.
Gautam's story begins with corporate firewalls that blocked traditional entertainment but overlooked podcasts—a serendipitous oversight that led to his 14-hour-a-day listening habit. This personal discovery sparked a data-driven revelation: India possessed the perfect conditions for podcasting to flourish—high commute times, cheap data, numerous languages, and a rich oral tradition—yet remained virtually untouched by the medium. The challenge? Most Indians had never heard the term "podcast," and those who had associated it with expensive Apple products they couldn't afford.
What follows is a masterclass in problem-solving as Gautam walks us through building Hubhopper, evolving from a simple content aggregator to a comprehensive ecosystem addressing each barrier to podcast creation and consumption in India. His team had to forge partnerships with music platforms, in-cab entertainment, and news applications to create distribution channels where none existed. The results speak volumes—India has transformed from a podcast desert to the world's third-largest podcast market in less than a decade.
Particularly fascinating are the distinct differences between Western and Eastern podcast consumption patterns. While Western listeners embrace hour-long shows focusing on true crime, sports, and comedy, Indian audiences prefer shorter episodes (under 25 minutes) with religious and devotional content leading by a significant margin. These insights reveal how cultural contexts profoundly shape media consumption even within the same medium.
Whether you're a podcast creator, media entrepreneur, or simply curious about global digital trends, Gautam's perspective will transform how you think about content creation across cultural boundaries. Subscribe now and discover how sometimes all it takes is "20 seconds of insane courage" to spark a revolution that changes how an entire nation communicates.
Got a question about something you heard today? Have a great suggestion for a topic or know someone who should be a guest? Reach out to us:
askcarl@carlspeaks.ca
If you're ready to take the plunge and join the over 3 million people who have joined the podcast space, we'd love to hear your idea and help you get started! Book your Podcast Strategy Session today:
https://podcastsolutionsmadesimple.com/get-started/
Never miss an episode! Subscribe wherever you get your podcast by clicking here:
https://communicationconnectioncommunity.buzzsprout.com
Follow us on LinkedIn:
https://www.linkedin.com/company/podcast-solutions-made-simple
Follow us on Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/podcastsolutionsmadesimple/
Follow us on Facebook:
www.facebook.com/groups/podcastlaunchmadesimple
Follow us on Twitter:
https://twitter.com/carlrichards72
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Carl (00:04):
Welcome to Communication Connection Community, the
podcaster's podcast.
This podcast takes a deep diveinto modern day communication
strategies in the podcastingspace.
We chat with interesting peoplewho make the podcasting and
speaking spaces exciting andvibrant.
We also dive into thepodcasting community with news
(00:24):
updates, latest trends andtopics from this ever-evolving
space.
So strap in, it's going to beone amazing ride.
Let's dive into today's episode, Gautam Raj Anand, the father
of podcasting in India, pioneerin the medium.
(00:47):
I love it, Gautam.
Welcome to the podcast.
Gautam (00:50):
Thank you so much for having me Such a pleasure and
it's been wonderful interactingwith you pre this recording and
excited for our chat.
Carl (01:00):
I am excited as well.
I've never had a father ofpodcasting on my podcast, so I
feel like I should be rollingout a red carpet or something or
setting a special spot at thetable for you, just based on the
fact that you're here and youhave so many great things that
you've done in the podcastingspace.
Congratulations on everythingthat you've done, uh, and it's
(01:24):
been a journey, I'm sure, butlet's talk about that.
Let's talk about how you got onthis podcasting bandwagon.
What led you here, uh?
Gautam (01:32):
no, I think that's, uh, it's.
It's a really great question tostart off with and it's ironic.
I'm very lucky that uh, folksconsider me worthy of that title
, especially considering thatI'm not a father of a human
being yet myself.
Um, so it makes me blush, um,and uh, I mean this is
(01:52):
specifically for the indianmarket.
I consistently, um, you know,sort of tip my hat and you know,
bow down in front of the folksfrom, you know, the west that
started the medium and havedevoted the last 20-25 years to
it.
The medium is still a lotyounger in a market like India.
(02:13):
We've been in the space forabout 10 years.
The journey over the lastdecade has been quite exciting
because it's basically been aseries of very fortunate events.
I had a very different careertrajectory in mind, no plans
growing up to be in thepodcasting space.
(02:35):
Ironically enough, I had neverheard the word podcast Me along
with the other billion Indians,ever-growing number of us, so we
didn't grow up with thenomenclature whatsoever.
I actually wanted to be abanker and follow in my dad's
(02:59):
footsteps, and my dadessentially clearly chose the
most fun job title possiblebecause I learned very quickly
that it wasn't something that Iwould be able to survive myself.
I studied accordingly, joined,did a small stint at HSBC, then
joined Barclays, and I wasessentially working at Barclays
in my early twenties and the jobwas insanely boring.
(03:23):
I had to spend about 10 to 12hours on a daily basis just on
my own, and my job required meto do a lot of research and risk
analysis.
So it's even more boring thanit sounds.
So I needed to make my workdaya little bit more fun.
(03:43):
So I needed to make my workdaya little bit more fun.
And, to add insult to injury,what the bank had done is they
had put up firewalls so Icouldn't access any platform for
(04:04):
consumption that I wouldnormally access.
So I couldn't go to Facebook, Icouldn't go to YouTube, I
couldn't go to you even a reddit.
And uh, I serendipitously, outof desperation, uh, stumbled
upon a media format that thebank had overlooked, which was
podcasts.
Uh, as a way to listen throughthe day and not go crazy.
Um and uh, it was love at firstlisten for me.
I started, you know, veryquickly to consume copious
(04:26):
amounts of content, started toconsume a lot of
self-development, self-growthcontent, as one normally does
when they start consuming inthis format, but very quickly,
the media format began to becomevery pervasive in my life.
I started to consume not onlyat work, but organically started
to consume on my way to work,whilst at work, on my way back
(04:47):
from work.
I was living alone at the time,uh, so when I'd be cooking in
the evening, I'd be consumingpodcasts, and then at night I'd
go to bed listening to podcasts,because I'm one of those nuts
that doesn't like sleeping insilence.
So I would listen to eitherasmr or I would listen to shows
that were very long shows.
So all in all was listening toabout 14 hours a day of content
(05:13):
in a span of about two, threemonths.
And before this two, threemonth period, I'd never heard
the term and anybody that I wasasking about their experience
with podcasts had never heard ofthe term either.
So I started to find the spacereally perplexing, because it
was allowing me to consume 14hours of content a day, but,
(05:34):
ironically enough, I had moretime to do other stuff, because
it was a format that aided withmultitasking on the one side,
and I just felt like it wasgiving me back more time than it
was taking away from me.
Um, so the transaction feltvery, you know sort of fair, and
you know I really sort ofenjoyed it.
(05:54):
Uh, the deeper I was going downthis rabbit's hole.
I started to research about thespace quite organically, because
that's what I was doing atoffice anyway, and I started to
find that this space seemed tohave lower barriers of entry in
terms of language in comparisonto, let's say, the written word
on the internet, which is verygeared towards English.
(06:17):
So audio is more languageagnostic because anybody
speaking across any differentlanguage is on the same playing
field, and that works in acountry like India which has
among the largest languagediversity in the world.
It's a more literacy agnosticmedia format which basically
implied that people who weren'teducated, were semi-educated or
(06:40):
very educated could enter thisspace rather easily.
And it was capital agnosticbecause it wasn't that expensive
to start you didn't even need amic really and it wasn't that
expensive to consume either.
So it consumed less data andyou could consume in patchy
(07:01):
internet connectivity areasacross the country.
So I had all of these differentvariables floating around in my
mind and me being the guinea pigwho was finding the joy and use
case of it myself.
So I couldn't understand whythe media format wasn't a bigger
deal and I started to become alittle obsessed with trying to
(07:24):
understand why that was.
I realized that the only way toreally figure this out was to
understand it from the inside ofthe industry rather than from
the outside looking in.
So I was very lucky.
I have a very supportive family.
I took a bold move and quit thebank and set up my first office
(07:48):
uh, in a balcony, uh, at mygrandparents house very
startup-esque fashion, right, uh, where I put post-it, notes and
etc.
Etc all the natural tropes thatone normally does when they're
setting up a company and don'tknow anything about what they're
doing.
I didn't have a technologybackground and I started to
(08:08):
basically understand, uh, thisspace and speak to people
outside of the country and inallied countries, because there
was no podcasting in the indiamarket.
Uh, we hosted the first podcastevent, um, about eight years
ago, and the first podcast eventwas four people sitting around
(08:29):
a table having beer andessentially talking about
whether the podcasting movementwill ever take place in a market
like India.
And from there, to see whereit's sort of come to today,
where India is the third largestmarket for podcasts globally,
is phenomenal, because I can'timagine that so much has
(08:51):
happened.
Carl (08:52):
So I'm going to stop you.
I'm going to stop you rightthere because there's a few
things I want to unpack beforewe carry on the conversation.
Plus, I need to jump in heresomewhere.
So you're sitting around thattable with a bunch of other
people having some pints.
There's four of you podcastingis.
(09:15):
It really doesn't exist in thesense that people can consume it
, but it's.
It's not like it's a vibrant,it's not even a market right,
and you're basically paving theway, or starting to lay the
groundwork, for where things aregoing to where they are today.
We'll get to that momentarily.
(09:36):
What was it about the mediumthat really excited you, that
got you thinking that okay, yes,this is something that can
explode, even though it hadn'texploded yet in India?
What was it about it that madeyou go?
This is going to be hot.
Somebody just needs to hit thego button.
Gautam (09:59):
It was just copious amounts of data.
So on the one side, we sawbasically that it was more
language literacy and capitalagnostic, which is what we've
discussed.
But then I also saw variablesthat made podcasting do well in
the globe.
So where, where all?
So what all made podcasting dowell?
Um, wherever commuting time washigh, podcasting did well.
(10:20):
Um, and this was across theworld.
And then you correlated it to,uh, the average amount of time
people were commuting in india,and it was the second highest on
earth.
Um, so I said, okay, cool,check there.
Then the second uh variable waswhenever people spent a large
amount of time at home,podcasting did well.
So then I went back and saw,okay, where is india on this
(10:42):
chart?
And it basically said india'sthe third highest in terms of
amount of time that people spendon average at home.
So I said, okay, that'sphenomenal.
Wherever large amount oflanguages are spoken, podcasting
does well.
Wherever data is cheap,podcasting does well.
I was literally looking at allof these different things, and
then I was looking at the factthat India's got the cheapest
data on earth.
India has a very large numberof languages, and so it was just
(11:11):
a melting pot of variables onone side with a media format
that had not taken off yet, um,and a rich oral history in terms
of like consumption, because wenormally have consumed stories
as well as consumed, um, youknow, religious, etc.
As a large populace in oralformat.
So you already have a preexisting behavior pattern.
You just have not had apenetration of this new
(11:34):
nomenclature which is called apodcast, right?
So, interestingly enough, Ifelt in my bones that it was
just a matter of time before itwould, it would take off, and I
knew that it was just a matterof time before it would take off
, and I knew that there werejust a couple of things that
were stopping it from doing so.
Carl (11:51):
What were those things that were stopping it from
taking off?
What was the barrier?
Gautam (11:56):
So first one is the name .
So the word podcast is aderivative of the word iPod and
broadcast right Merged together.
Carl (12:04):
Yeah.
Gautam (12:05):
Now in India for the Merged together, yeah, right Now
in India for the West.
That's phenomenal becauseeverybody correlates iPod with
Apple products and everybodyuses Apple products, so it feels
ubiquitous and feels wonderful.
In the India market, apple'spenetration was like 3% and
people correlated Apple withexpensive things and people
(12:28):
correlated apple with expensivethings.
So anything that came as aderivative of the word apple, or
their podcasts or ipods, feltlike it was meant for a very
specific demographic of society.
So people automaticallybelieved that it wasn't a media
format for them.
It was meant for the verywealthy.
Uh.
So there was that one problemstatement, which was with the
nomenclature.
(12:48):
So you had people consumingnon-music audio content, but
they would refuse to call it apodcast.
Then the second thing, uh,which was a major problem
statement, was nobody understoodhow the technology worked.
Syndicated feeds, rss's, whatare pod catchers?
Um, how does this entire storyplay out?
(13:09):
Nobody had any idea.
So even if people had intent tobe storytellers and not be
visual storytellers, they didn'tknow how to satiate that intent
.
So either they would let go ofthat intent or they would, you
know, begrudgingly becomeyoutube creators.
Carl (13:24):
So problems like this, essentially major issues but
you're all consuming content 14hours a day.
Um, so it's clear that it wasthere.
It was.
It was clear that it existed,but what I'm hearing, though, is
there wasn't anybody taking thenext step and creating content.
(13:48):
Is that what I'm?
What I'm hearing, though, isthere wasn't anybody taking the
next step and creating content.
Is that what I'm understandingthere?
Gautam (14:00):
were a lot of consumers of the box or something like
that I forget exactly whichpodcatcher I downloaded, uh,
specifically a podcatcher meantfor the android devices.
Um, and I was listening towesternized content okay so I
wasn't listening to indianizedcontent at the time, or eastern
(14:22):
content.
Um, and there were a few folksthat had repurposed radio
content and made it into apodcast, but they just put it
out into the ether and theydidn't know what they were doing
with it.
Right, to be really honest.
So, um, to be really honest, atthis point spotify hadn't
gotten into podcasting yet.
So, um, we like, believed andthis is what a naive, I would
(14:47):
say, founder does when they'rejust starting out is you come up
with the easiest solution tothe problem statement and you're
like this is the, this is thesolution.
So we believe that the problemwas that the aggregation of
content was not being doneappropriately.
So, initially, initially, waswas actually a podcatcher.
So we launched and you stillsee the remnants of Hubhoppers
(15:10):
podcatcher on our application aswell as on our website.
So we basically spoke to allpeople that were creating an
audio content and folks that hadcreated content across the
region, both India as well asthe Asian market, and we started
(15:30):
to get them and gather theirRSSs and create an experience
where people could come andconsume content that was
familiar to them.
And it was broken up bylanguage and broken up by genre
and broken up by category, andit was the first time that it
had been done.
So we felt very, you know,wonderful about this major feat
that we'd done.
In our minds it was a majorfeat and, interestingly enough,
(15:54):
what happened was, carl, thatconsumption from us launching
immediately spiked.
So we started to see a lot ofpeople coming and consuming
podcasts and we were extremelyhappy because we believed that
our thesis was correct.
On the back of this, we believethat, okay, we identified the
problem appropriately because onmonth on month on month, we
(16:15):
just started to see more andmore and more and more people
coming and consuming, and wewere the only platform that had
podcast content at the time.
But, interestingly enough, whatstarted to happen was about six
months into this journey.
Seven months into this journey,a very troubling data point
reared its ugly head, which isthat consumption kept increasing
, but the creators and thecontent for from this market
(16:37):
wasn't increasing at all, andthis just went completely
against the rules of demand andsupply, as per me and my entire
team.
So we were completely perplexed.
We were like, okay, there'sfinally demand for this media
format, indians are consumingthis and allied countries are
consuming via Hubh opper, butwhy isn't there more content
(17:00):
coming and why aren't creatorsreaching out to us?
Where, where are the creators?
Where's the supply if there'snow demand?
So, um, we had another meet,meet up with creators and we
spoke to a bunch of creatorsthat, because now podcasting
started to, you know, like,become a little bit of a murmur,
like people are talking about alittle bit, uh, and we
basically learned at this pointthat we had identified a problem
(17:23):
, but not the problem, and wedidn't identify that the real
cancer was the fact that peoplefound the creation process very
fragmented, very hurdle riddenand very technical.
And suddenly it was like a ahamoment for us, because we were
like that's why, like, peoplearen't coming in droves, so
(17:44):
somebody, somebody needs to bethe, you know, a funnel of
creators into the podverse.
And if we're not going to do it, we didn't know who was going
to do it at the time, becausethere was no pod tech in the
India market.
There continues to not be toomuch pod tech in India market or
in surrounding markets.
(18:04):
Be too much pod tech in Indiamarket or in surrounding markets
.
So we started to build ahosting platform, little by
little, bit by bit, anddistribution platform, but with
the localized lengths.
So we started to basically takeinto account what these
creators found very scary.
Like, for example, creatorsdidn't like the fragmented
(18:25):
nature of podcasting in the west.
In the west, uh, becausepodcasting has been around since
like like 2005, 2006, it's verynormalized for people to use
four or five different platforms.
Yeah, like, people are okayusing Audacity and then using
like or Riverside or Zoom, andthen like editing on podcastle
(18:51):
or you know, xyz a tool, thengoing to a Lipsyn or hosting
provider of their choice, thengoing to a Pod track at some
point, then going to a Podcon atsome point.
Podcasting was new enough forindia.
Now, if you told people, okay,but to become a podcaster now
you have to use six tools, itwas never going to work okay.
(19:12):
So we had to figure out how tobuild all of that under one roof
.
Make it localized, make itreally easy, have integrations
with platforms like canva sothat people could make cover art
right off the bat within theplatform itself, they could
record in the platform itself,they could edit in the platform
itself.
You know there was a communitythat they could interact with
(19:33):
via the platform and yeah so,and then there was the entire
ListenSide experience.
So, little by little by little,we started to build out all of
the ability for you to record,edit, distribute, analyze,
create your teams etc.
And then listen.
But there was still one majorproblem statement, which is that
(19:54):
when creators were creating, apodcast is only as good as if
people are being able to hear it.
So, unfortunately, the onlyplatforms that were ingesting
podcasts at the time wereplatforms like TuneIn no
consumption in India.
Tunein doesn't exist in India.
(20:15):
Stitcher doesn't exist in India.
Apple podcast hardly exists inIndia.
Spotify was just coming into thefray, so creators were putting
their content out, but then like, where would it be consumed?
Which became another problemstatement for us.
So we had to go and take a lotof platforms live with podcasts.
So we had to actually takemusic streaming platforms,
(20:38):
in-cab entertainment, in-flightentertainment, news applications
, the flipboards of our world.
We had to actually take themlive with podcasts through APIs.
So now what was happening wasby doing so, we were finally
being able to also get thecreator to be able to launch
their podcast and, whendistributed, reach audiences
(20:59):
that were very pertinent to them.
And that's when the podcastingwave took off.
And then, luckily, spotify etc.
Etc.
Also started creating ingestingpodcasts in a very large way
and then a lot of otherplatforms came about.
But we were very lucky becausewe were the only gateway to
reach all of these payloadgrounds for consumption where
there was no other way to reachthese platforms where audiences
(21:22):
were captive.
Carl (21:24):
You were literally trailblazing, that you literally
had to not just solve oneproblem.
You're like, as you're goingalong you're thinking, okay,
well, that's problem solved.
Oh wait a minute.
It's like you're not justbuilding a house, you have to
clear, cut the land.
You know there are all kinds ofthings that you had to do to
get to where it is today.
(21:45):
You couldn't just do one or twothings, you had to literally do
it.
It was like literally startingfrom scratch, even though it
existed.
Gautam (21:54):
No, I mean, I confess that I represent a team all of
whom are smarter than me and allof whom are better than me, so
they were the guys doing a lotof this stuff.
But, uh, I I actually think itwas because it was so
purpose-driven, right, becausesomebody had to do it.
We were doing it and we lovedit.
(22:17):
Because when we went to musicplatforms for the first time in
india and these are musicplatforms, mind you, because of
the population of india, theyare large in terms of their
numbers, like large, large, veryattractive for a western
audience or western creator tothink about like 50 million
monthly active users, 70 millionmonthly active users when we
(22:38):
try to pitch distributingpodcasts into them the first
couple of meetings that we had,we were actually laughed out of
the room because we wereactually told on our face, we
were told, uh, that this iscontent that's meant for, like,
westernized countries.
This is not meant for the indiamarket.
It's literally words from a ceoof a music platform to us and
(23:01):
told us this type of contentwould never work in india.
And our argument was youprobably already listened to
non-music audio content in yourown home or probably when you're
driving back home.
Why is it that when the wordand nomenclature of podcasting
gets introduced into theconversation, suddenly
everything becomes a problem?
So it was really fun, butluckily I am very grateful and
(23:27):
glad to see how the communitiesbanded together and how the
podcasting market has reallysort of taken force and route in
India.
It's interesting because whilstit follows a lot of similar
patterns to Western consumptionand creation, there are also a
lot of differences, and now wecan see that.
You know, when you see likemillions of streams on a monthly
basis, you can actually telllike, oh damn, this is a
(23:49):
difference and this is adifference.
Carl (23:51):
So what are some of those differences between the two
markets?
I know off mic we've talkedabout that, but what are the
differences between the Westernmarket and what's going on in
India?
Gautam (24:02):
Yeah, uh, okay.
So, and when I say india, I'mI'm basically also speaking
about the larger subcontinent.
So, like the behavior patternwill be very similar for folks
in Sri lanka, folks inBangladesh, folks in Pakistan
folks, and you know so, alliedmarkets, even places as far as
Indonesia.
(24:22):
Um, consumption time is shorterin the west.
It's quite common for people tohave two, two hour long
podcasts, um, one and a halfhour long podcast, one hour long
podcast.
And this trails back to thefact that you are, folk in the
west, had our talk radio, soanybody could start a radio show
(24:44):
on a radio channel, and so youhad students and colleges etc
with radio shows.
We uh didn't.
Uh, the radio in itself was afairly controlled industry, so
you'd only have like 10, 12radio channels of maybe 15 radio
channels across the country, ordominant ones, it wow at the
(25:04):
best.
So that means that all content,both music and non-music, was
shoved into those 15 channels inthe hour, in the day.
That would basically progress.
So programming that wouldhappen for these radio channels
was, you know, very cut to cut,right, not a moment to spare,
not a second to lose, right.
So, um, automatically, you knowour not attention span, but our
(25:30):
ability to consume audiocontent was a lot shorter, so
we'd consume interspersed um.
So generally, if you're creatingpodcast content like true, like
og podcast content that'slonger than 20-25 minutes unless
there's a very large reasoningfor why people should listen in
(25:51):
for longer normally you'll tendto see your listen through rates
drop in a market like India,whereas in the west that's not
the case.
Number two is if you are like,for example, looking at genres
in the west that work in genresin the east that work genres,
there are differences.
So in the east you look at uh,devotion and religious content
(26:16):
that leads the chart by a mileum, after which there's a long
gap and then there'sself-development, self-growth
content, then after that there'strue crime and then after that
there's self-development,self-growth content, then after
that there's true crime and thenafter that there's romantic
stories and storytelling andnon-controversial eroticism.
In the West it's a little bitdifferent, as far as I
(26:40):
understand it.
Carl (26:41):
Yeah, in the West here I'm pretty sure that true crime, if
it's not at the top, it's thetop two or three categories I
think you have sports, comedyand true crime, I think, are the
top three, and news fits inthere somewhere too, Shows
related to news.
Those are the top three, andspirituality is further down the
(27:02):
list.
It's much further down the listactually.
I don't know how much furtherdown the list, but it's further
down the list actually.
I.
I don't know how much furtherdown the list, but it's further
down the list.
So it sounds like there's somesome very clear differences.
How is the I mean we're eightyears ago again those four
people sitting around the table.
How many people are sittingaround the table now?
I mean, how many?
What's the content creationworld like now in india?
(27:24):
It sounds like it's exploded.
Gautam (27:26):
Yeah, it definitely has.
As I said, India is the thirdlargest, arguably because these
numbers are always up and down,but the third largest market for
podcast consumption on theplanet today.
You're looking at for platformslike Amazon Music, India being
the second largest platform forconsumption globally.
(27:48):
Um, you're looking at um.
If you're looking at, I wouldsay, the mass exodus of creators
coming into podcasting ingeneral, you're seeing, um,
probably one of the largest likemass migrations towards
podcasting.
Uh, over the last uh, althoughalbeit it's a little mix between
(28:11):
a vodcast and a podcast, andnow you're seeing a fusion of
those two words and YouTubepodcasts and, like RSS driven
podcasts.
So can touch upon that alsobeing the future, where you're
going to see lines blurring moreand more and more full circle
to how podcasting used to be,which was video and audio back
in the day.
Carl (28:31):
Is the term podcast more mainstream in India now, or is
it called something else?
I mean, we're calling it apodcast, but or is that still
that, thinking that it's?
If it's a podcast, it's relatedto Apple, or is it?
Is it just a mainstream termnow?
Gautam (28:47):
Completely mainstream.
It's completely mainstream.
But the only difference betweenthe West and the East over here
is that in the West people willunderstand the word podcast and
understand that a podcast isnormally casted and broadcasted
and will normally have asyndicated feed that's attached
to it.
Now in India just true to form,um, everything's a podcast.
(29:10):
So it's like either we don'tadopt it or we everybody adopts
it.
So now, instagram, likeconversations, have become
podcasts.
Youtube videos have becomepodcasts.
Podcasts are podcasts.
So now everything's a podcast.
Uh, so it's an umbrella termand it's being used to define a
lot of different things.
So there's confusion on theother spectrum for the word now.
(29:33):
But in a good, I'm happier withthis problem than the problem
eight years ago, much happier.
Carl (29:40):
Yeah, it's definitely.
I feel what you're saying thereand I do want to talk about
your insights, for what the youknow where the the future of
podcasting in your estimation isheaded.
But there is that confusion ofyou know podcast and everything
falls under that.
Now, if you're doing a showlive on YouTube, it's called a
podcast, versus if you're doinga recorded show, audio only,
(30:04):
it's also called a podcast andit's you know, I think it's.
There's a good and a bad thing.
I think with that it's alsocalled a podcast, and I think
there's a good and a bad thing.
I think with that It'd be likecalling a spoon a fork in my
brain, but they're two differentthings.
So when you put them together,it's actually called a spork,
believe it or not.
But to muddy the waters.
And it makes it challenging forpeople like us who are assisting
(30:28):
people with their content,editing and the backend work,
because when people come to usand say I'd like to start a
podcast, my brain automaticallygoes to audio right, because I
spent 25 years in radio.
It's like, oh, you want tostart a podcast and it'll be
audio right, and they go no, Iwant video and I want it to be
live.
And I'm like wait a minute,that's not a podcast, that's
something completely different.
But let's talk about that alittle bit.
(30:50):
Let's unbundle that and talkabout where you're seeing the,
based on trends and what'shappening, but where you're
seeing the future for thismedium which is, you know, here.
It's been around 25 years and Ialways wonder what's going to
be next.
But where do you see it going?
Gautam (31:08):
globally, or even in your own market.
I don't think there's anyfighting, uh, the fact that
people are using podcast as anumbrella term.
Uh, to be really honest, uh, Ithink you're.
You're obviously currentlyseeing like, like with
everything.
Right now it's a woke term and,with it being an invoke term,
(31:29):
you're seeing a larger number ofcreators pouring into it, but
you'll see people pod fading andyou'll see us averaging out to
a higher amount of peopleentering the space, but entering
the space both in video andaudio.
However, what I do believe isright now you're seeing a lot of
people um, creatingcannibalized content.
(31:50):
So what I mean by that is youwill see people that are
releasing the exact same stuffon like video and audio.
Um, and I'm just doing itbecause they're trying to throw
whatever you know and everythingat the wall and just figure out
what sticks.
I believe what will happen inthe future is it'll become a
little bit more nuanced andpeople will start to treat it
(32:11):
more like a funnel.
So they'll treat video and thevideo podcast element of it, um,
for what video is great atwhich is grabbing people's
attention?
It's much better as a top offunnel medium.
You know, um, I'll use thingslike shorts.
I'll use things like reels, uhto to uh create, you know uh
(32:34):
lead capture magnets for mypodcast.
My call to action will be thelong form, um.
And the long form should be umin in in audio, in my opinion,
because that actually is for anentirely different like purpose,
where it's going to be more ofa connection driver, an
(32:56):
engagement driver, a retentiondriver, a loyalty driver.
So it's fine, you may not haveeverybody converting from the
reels that you're taking out, ofthe short form that you're
taking out in immersive content,into the community that you're
pulling in the podcast format,but the people that are coming
to the podcast are more serious.
(33:17):
Your relationship with themwill become better.
They can become patrons for you.
They can become you know sortof.
They can become you know sortof folks that you convert to
private podcast subscribers.
(33:49):
And then I believe the funnelwill end with people that are
smart who will actually utilizethe call to action leading to
something like a community, sothat they don't have further
leakage from their podcast uhinto nothingness.
Uh, because a lot of peoplehave to reacquire listeners each
time.
They're getting people tolisten in to every episode.
Uh, the call to action shouldbe a newsletter or the call to
action should be a community orsome avenue where I can collect
all of the people at the bottomof my funnel and this is the
best of the best you know and Iwould treat them appropriately.
(34:15):
I would give them access toextra episodes.
I would give them access toAMAs.
I would give them access topotential merch.
You know the works and theirfeedback.
I would hold over every othertype of feedback because their
feedback will be then utilizedfor how I serve the rest of my
family and upwards.
(34:35):
So that's what I believe thecontent structure will change
into.
So, instead of just creating areplica in audio video format,
the way that's currentlyhappening, you're going to start
to see shorter at the top,immersively in video.
Then you're going to havelonger form in like audio or
audiogram video and then you'regoing to have the bottom move to
(34:57):
a community or a newsletter orsomething that builds a
relationship for a long time,could potentially lead to
clientele etc.
Etc.
Whatever it may be.
Carl (35:06):
And I think we're seeing that trend now.
I think we're seeing the savvypodcasters out there who get it.
They realize that it's not justabout the show, it's not just
about the long form content,it's also not just about
creating some reels and such.
It's about okay, what'shappening after the show?
People love that content, theylove to know that, okay, Carl's
(35:29):
a great Gautam's, a great guy,but what's he doing after the
show?
What's the community?
Or when's the meetup?
Or what's happening in the?
I quite often will use this termwhen I'm chatting with
potential clients about wantingto level up their show or
wanting to monetize.
I'll say, well, create somegreen room content.
(35:50):
It doesn't have to be part ofthe show, it can be.
Okay, we're going to give you alook behind the scenes.
Or there's six questions or sixtopics we didn't cover today.
We're going to talk about themin the green room.
So that's as you mentioned,that's that bonus content.
And then, as you said, there'sthe merch.
That's all of those things thatpeople eat that up.
People love that stuff.
(36:12):
They love it 100%.
Gautam (36:16):
And they are power users , man, they are power listeners
and they'll stick with youthrough thick and thin.
Carl (36:24):
I believe and there's certainly a lot of thickness
there with the industry.
I've heard some negative thingsabout the industry, about the
podcasting space, a lot ofpeople thinking that it's going
to fade away, and I'm thinking Idon't think so.
I think that it's.
I feel like we're just gettingstarted, even though we've been
around podcasting has beenaround for 25 years.
(36:44):
I feel like this next phase,whatever it's going to be as
you've explained it, it'll bemore like a funnel and that, I
think, will be exciting, becauseit's not just something that is
niche is the wrong word.
It's not just something thatonly certain people will consume
.
It'll be one of those thingsthat people who used to listen
(37:05):
to radio, for example.
Radio is going through a toughtime.
I don't know what it's likewhere you are, but certainly
here in the West radio is havinga tough time.
So a lot of those people whowere creating content for radio
they're going to be looking atpodcasts now and how you bring
that content forward andcontinue to grow your your
(37:25):
following and elevate yourcredibility in that sense too.
Gautam (37:28):
I completely agree, and there's another I like
completely align with you onthat and I also do, like I'm
sure you echo this sentiment aswell, because there's a lot of
fear around AI, yes, and what AIis going to do for the
podcasting space.
And the best example that Igive I would say again and again
(37:51):
is that whenever there's newand emerging technology that
comes out, there's always panicthat is followed with it.
This is not the first time.
I think, anecdotally, there wasa lot of panic that took place
right after the invention of thecalculator, because a lot of
people believed that they weregonna be out of jobs and, you
(38:13):
know, the economy would never bethe same.
But, at the end of the day, acalculator is only as good as
what you put into it, so it'sonly as good as its input.
Number one and number two is itdidn't make mathematicians
useless, it just made themquicker and more efficient.
So, if you look at AI from thelens of it as an efficiency
(38:35):
builder and something that canmake you, you know, fulfill the
more mundane tasks more swiftlyso that you can focus on the
core and what's important, um,which is the connection, uh, and
the content, I believe that aiis going to be a massive boon
(38:55):
for the podcasting space,because not everybody knows how
to write a very well-craftedsection in their show notes or
knows how to you know, likehighlight the best quotes or etc
.
Etc.
But I definitely don't believethat like completely ai driven
content.
Because people turn to podcastsfor what they turn to podcasts,
(39:17):
not because of the like thesame reasons that people turn to
video, they turn to podcastsfor the connection.
So if you remove the, theconnection and the sort of the
emotional back and forth betweenthe host and the listener,
you're, in essence, removing thevery reason why people turn to
the medium to begin with.
(39:38):
Um, so I don't believe thatlike that's going to be a major
thing for anybody to worry about.
However, if somebody is aprofessional show note creator,
that's somebody who I believemay need to, you know, either
leverage AI to do it at scale orthink about a couple of other
(40:00):
things.
Carl (40:01):
We're even seeing, as I said, in our agency, we're even
seeing certain tasks become alittle bit shorter, which is
great, because now we can openup the, you know, add more
clients to our roster, becauseit doesn't take hours upon hours
to do transcription.
It can go into an AI tool andget to about 92 to 94% and still
(40:26):
be scanned and have it done ina very short period of time,
versus having somebody listen tothe audio, write down a few
words.
Listen to the audio, write downa few words, which is the old
way that you had to transcribeeverything and and that was a
job at one point and people weregot really good at it.
Before I turn you loose, though, I just want to move the needle
forward, because I know there'sa.
(40:47):
There's one more thing I wantto give you the opportunity to
do Just give a quick overview ofum, of what you're doing at
Hubhopper.
I know you've touched on it acouple of times, but just very
quickly.
A little bit about Hubhopperand what people can expect when
they're going to check it out,because we'll make sure the link
is in the show notes.
Gautam (41:07):
Oh no, you so much.
So Hubhopper is a hosting anddistribution platform, uh, that
allows you to basically manageevery aspect of your show, uh,
so you can uh you can havemultiple people with multiple
different roles, um, you knowparticipate on the same
(41:27):
dashboard.
You can manage multiple showsfrom one dashboard itself.
You can distribute to all thedifferent platforms of
consumption.
You can even create and edit onthe platform itself.
You can create your embedplayers, you can create your pod
sites, you can create yoursocial collateral um right
(41:49):
within the tool itself, um, andyou can actually listen to your
podcast within Hubhopper itselffor the first time.
We try to make it as simple andeasy for anybody, and one of the
things that we do is we giveaccess to um certain platforms
that would otherwise, you know,not be available to creators,
(42:12):
and these are platforms wherecompetition will be a lot lower
because they're not too manypodcasts in them, but the amount
of listeners that exist withinthem are very high.
So if your show sparks a flameor a tinder with these folks, I
know that creators areconstantly chasing and trying to
(42:32):
find where to get their uhorganic listenership to go, go
up from um.
So you know that's a pain pointthat we, you know, try to uh
solve for uh in the organization.
Um, uh, so, yeah, that's,that's that's a little bit on us
at Hubhopper.
Um, always love to get feedbackon what we're building out
(42:54):
there.
Uh, very design focused as anorganization.
Uh, so would love anysuggestions and, uh, thank you
so much for letting me uh givean introduction man into
Hubhopper.
Carl (43:06):
I will definitely make sure that, uh, and I'm glad you
shared that.
Gautam (43:31):
I will definitely make sure that gets shared.
I'm glad you shared that.
I will definitely make surethat gets shared in the show
notes so people can check it out, and all your contact
information as well, so peoplecan connect with you.
It's been a fantasticconversation.
You are a very phenomenalindividual.
I'm glad we met.
I'm glad we chatted today.
Gautam Raj Anand has been myguest today.
Before I let you go thoughGautam, I'll give you the final
thought.
Yeah, so I would say that thereare a lot of people we see this
.
Actually there are a lot ofpeople that are considering
starting a podcast, but they areprocrastinating the start of it
for a various set of reasons.
We've actually boiled it downto about four or five reasons.
(43:52):
Uh, I would actually, you know,uh, request folks to follow the
five second rule, um, or the 20second rule, rather.
I mean, sometimes all you needis 20 seconds of insane courage
is what I keep telling myselfwhen I'm standing at a
crossroads and I want to dosomething, because you never
know what you essentially speakabout could do for somebody in
(44:16):
their lives.
We've seen some incrediblestories coming out of teachers
that randomly putting up, let'ssay, curriculum based content
and students that don't haveaccess to great quality
education that don't have accessto great quality education,
education being able to use thatas a revision material.
And the teacher never believedthat when they were creating the
(44:37):
podcast, that that would be theend result of their podcast.
They just created it becausethey didn't want to keep
repeating the same thing totheir students.
So you never know where yourcontent is going to go, where
your voice is going to go, andwhose life it's going to change
and what it's going to do.
So I would say start your voicedoes matter, and thank you so
(44:57):
much man.
Carl (44:59):
Thank you, Gautam Raj Anand.
Thank you so much for being myguest today.
Gautam (45:03):
No, thank you, man.
Appreciate the time and it'sbeen an honor.
Thank you,If you like what you heard today
, leave us a comment and areview, and be sure to share it
with your friends.
Carl (45:13):
If you don't like what you heard, please share it with
(45:40):
your enemies.
Oh, and if you have asuggestion of someone who you
think would make an amazingguest on the show, let us know
about it.
Drop us an email.
askcarl@ carlspeaks.
ca.
Don't forget to follow us onLinkedIn and Twitter as well.
You'll find all those links inthe Thanks for listening to the
podcast.
We'll catch you next time.
Welcome to Communication Connection Community, the
podcaster's podcast.
This podcast takes a deep diveinto modern day communication
strategies in the podcastingspace.
We chat with interesting peoplewho make the podcasting and
speaking spaces exciting andvibrant.
We also dive into thepodcasting community with news
(00:24):
updates, latest trends andtopics from this ever-evolving
space.
So strap in, it's going to beone amazing ride.
Let's dive into today's episode, Gautam Raj Anand, the father
of podcasting in India, pioneerin the medium.
(00:47):
I love it, Gautam.
Welcome to the podcast.
Gautam (00:50):
Thank you so much for having me Such a pleasure and
it's been wonderful interactingwith you pre this recording and
excited for our chat.
Carl (01:00):
I am excited as well.
I've never had a father ofpodcasting on my podcast, so I
feel like I should be rollingout a red carpet or something or
setting a special spot at thetable for you, just based on the
fact that you're here and youhave so many great things that
you've done in the podcastingspace.
Congratulations on everythingthat you've done, uh, and it's
(01:24):
been a journey, I'm sure, butlet's talk about that.
Let's talk about how you got onthis podcasting bandwagon.
What led you here, uh?
Gautam (01:32):
no, I think that's, uh, it's.
It's a really great question tostart off with and it's ironic.
I'm very lucky that uh, folksconsider me worthy of that title
, especially considering thatI'm not a father of a human
being yet myself.
Um, so it makes me blush, um,and uh, I mean this is
(01:52):
specifically for the indianmarket.
I consistently, um, you know,sort of tip my hat and you know,
bow down in front of the folksfrom, you know, the west that
started the medium and havedevoted the last 20-25 years to
it.
The medium is still a lotyounger in a market like India.
(02:13):
We've been in the space forabout 10 years.
The journey over the lastdecade has been quite exciting
because it's basically been aseries of very fortunate events.
I had a very different careertrajectory in mind, no plans
growing up to be in thepodcasting space.
(02:35):
Ironically enough, I had neverheard the word podcast Me along
with the other billion Indians,ever-growing number of us, so we
didn't grow up with thenomenclature whatsoever.
I actually wanted to be abanker and follow in my dad's
(02:59):
footsteps, and my dadessentially clearly chose the
most fun job title possiblebecause I learned very quickly
that it wasn't something that Iwould be able to survive myself.
I studied accordingly, joined,did a small stint at HSBC, then
joined Barclays, and I wasessentially working at Barclays
in my early twenties and the jobwas insanely boring.
(03:23):
I had to spend about 10 to 12hours on a daily basis just on
my own, and my job required meto do a lot of research and risk
analysis.
So it's even more boring thanit sounds.
So I needed to make my workdaya little bit more fun.
(03:43):
So I needed to make my workdaya little bit more fun.
And, to add insult to injury,what the bank had done is they
had put up firewalls so Icouldn't access any platform for
(04:04):
consumption that I wouldnormally access.
So I couldn't go to Facebook, Icouldn't go to YouTube, I
couldn't go to you even a reddit.
And uh, I serendipitously, outof desperation, uh, stumbled
upon a media format that thebank had overlooked, which was
podcasts.
Uh, as a way to listen throughthe day and not go crazy.
Um and uh, it was love at firstlisten for me.
I started, you know, veryquickly to consume copious
(04:26):
amounts of content, started toconsume a lot of
self-development, self-growthcontent, as one normally does
when they start consuming inthis format, but very quickly,
the media format began to becomevery pervasive in my life.
I started to consume not onlyat work, but organically started
to consume on my way to work,whilst at work, on my way back
(04:47):
from work.
I was living alone at the time,uh, so when I'd be cooking in
the evening, I'd be consumingpodcasts, and then at night I'd
go to bed listening to podcasts,because I'm one of those nuts
that doesn't like sleeping insilence.
So I would listen to eitherasmr or I would listen to shows
that were very long shows.
So all in all was listening toabout 14 hours a day of content
(05:13):
in a span of about two, threemonths.
And before this two, threemonth period, I'd never heard
the term and anybody that I wasasking about their experience
with podcasts had never heard ofthe term either.
So I started to find the spacereally perplexing, because it
was allowing me to consume 14hours of content a day, but,
(05:34):
ironically enough, I had moretime to do other stuff, because
it was a format that aided withmultitasking on the one side,
and I just felt like it wasgiving me back more time than it
was taking away from me.
Um, so the transaction feltvery, you know sort of fair, and
you know I really sort ofenjoyed it.
(05:54):
Uh, the deeper I was going downthis rabbit's hole.
I started to research about thespace quite organically, because
that's what I was doing atoffice anyway, and I started to
find that this space seemed tohave lower barriers of entry in
terms of language in comparisonto, let's say, the written word
on the internet, which is verygeared towards English.
(06:17):
So audio is more languageagnostic because anybody
speaking across any differentlanguage is on the same playing
field, and that works in acountry like India which has
among the largest languagediversity in the world.
It's a more literacy agnosticmedia format which basically
implied that people who weren'teducated, were semi-educated or
(06:40):
very educated could enter thisspace rather easily.
And it was capital agnosticbecause it wasn't that expensive
to start you didn't even need amic really and it wasn't that
expensive to consume either.
So it consumed less data andyou could consume in patchy
(07:01):
internet connectivity areasacross the country.
So I had all of these differentvariables floating around in my
mind and me being the guinea pigwho was finding the joy and use
case of it myself.
So I couldn't understand whythe media format wasn't a bigger
deal and I started to become alittle obsessed with trying to
(07:24):
understand why that was.
I realized that the only way toreally figure this out was to
understand it from the inside ofthe industry rather than from
the outside looking in.
So I was very lucky.
I have a very supportive family.
I took a bold move and quit thebank and set up my first office
(07:48):
uh, in a balcony, uh, at mygrandparents house very
startup-esque fashion, right, uh, where I put post-it, notes and
etc.
Etc all the natural tropes thatone normally does when they're
setting up a company and don'tknow anything about what they're
doing.
I didn't have a technologybackground and I started to
(08:08):
basically understand, uh, thisspace and speak to people
outside of the country and inallied countries, because there
was no podcasting in the indiamarket.
Uh, we hosted the first podcastevent, um, about eight years
ago, and the first podcast eventwas four people sitting around
(08:29):
a table having beer andessentially talking about
whether the podcasting movementwill ever take place in a market
like India.
And from there, to see whereit's sort of come to today,
where India is the third largestmarket for podcasts globally,
is phenomenal, because I can'timagine that so much has
(08:51):
happened.
Carl (08:52):
So I'm going to stop you.
I'm going to stop you rightthere because there's a few
things I want to unpack beforewe carry on the conversation.
Plus, I need to jump in heresomewhere.
So you're sitting around thattable with a bunch of other
people having some pints.
There's four of you podcastingis.
(09:15):
It really doesn't exist in thesense that people can consume it
, but it's.
It's not like it's a vibrant,it's not even a market right,
and you're basically paving theway, or starting to lay the
groundwork, for where things aregoing to where they are today.
We'll get to that momentarily.
(09:36):
What was it about the mediumthat really excited you, that
got you thinking that okay, yes,this is something that can
explode, even though it hadn'texploded yet in India?
What was it about it that madeyou go?
This is going to be hot.
Somebody just needs to hit thego button.
Gautam (09:59):
It was just copious amounts of data.
So on the one side, we sawbasically that it was more
language literacy and capitalagnostic, which is what we've
discussed.
But then I also saw variablesthat made podcasting do well in
the globe.
So where, where all?
So what all made podcasting dowell?
Um, wherever commuting time washigh, podcasting did well.
(10:20):
Um, and this was across theworld.
And then you correlated it to,uh, the average amount of time
people were commuting in india,and it was the second highest on
earth.
Um, so I said, okay, cool,check there.
Then the second uh variable waswhenever people spent a large
amount of time at home,podcasting did well.
So then I went back and saw,okay, where is india on this
(10:42):
chart?
And it basically said india'sthe third highest in terms of
amount of time that people spendon average at home.
So I said, okay, that'sphenomenal.
Wherever large amount oflanguages are spoken, podcasting
does well.
Wherever data is cheap,podcasting does well.
I was literally looking at allof these different things, and
then I was looking at the factthat India's got the cheapest
data on earth.
India has a very large numberof languages, and so it was just
(11:11):
a melting pot of variables onone side with a media format
that had not taken off yet, um,and a rich oral history in terms
of like consumption, because wenormally have consumed stories
as well as consumed, um, youknow, religious, etc.
As a large populace in oralformat.
So you already have a preexisting behavior pattern.
You just have not had apenetration of this new
(11:34):
nomenclature which is called apodcast, right?
So, interestingly enough, Ifelt in my bones that it was
just a matter of time before itwould, it would take off, and I
knew that it was just a matterof time before it would take off
, and I knew that there werejust a couple of things that
were stopping it from doing so.
Carl (11:51):
What were those things that were stopping it from
taking off?
What was the barrier?
Gautam (11:56):
So first one is the name .
So the word podcast is aderivative of the word iPod and
broadcast right Merged together.
Carl (12:04):
Yeah.
Gautam (12:05):
Now in India for the Merged together, yeah, right Now
in India for the West.
That's phenomenal becauseeverybody correlates iPod with
Apple products and everybodyuses Apple products, so it feels
ubiquitous and feels wonderful.
In the India market, apple'spenetration was like 3% and
people correlated Apple withexpensive things and people
(12:28):
correlated apple with expensivethings.
So anything that came as aderivative of the word apple, or
their podcasts or ipods, feltlike it was meant for a very
specific demographic of society.
So people automaticallybelieved that it wasn't a media
format for them.
It was meant for the verywealthy.
Uh.
So there was that one problemstatement, which was with the
nomenclature.
(12:48):
So you had people consumingnon-music audio content, but
they would refuse to call it apodcast.
Then the second thing, uh,which was a major problem
statement, was nobody understoodhow the technology worked.
Syndicated feeds, rss's, whatare pod catchers?
Um, how does this entire storyplay out?
(13:09):
Nobody had any idea.
So even if people had intent tobe storytellers and not be
visual storytellers, they didn'tknow how to satiate that intent
.
So either they would let go ofthat intent or they would, you
know, begrudgingly becomeyoutube creators.
Carl (13:24):
So problems like this, essentially major issues but
you're all consuming content 14hours a day.
Um, so it's clear that it wasthere.
It was.
It was clear that it existed,but what I'm hearing, though, is
there wasn't anybody taking thenext step and creating content.
(13:48):
Is that what I'm?
What I'm hearing, though, isthere wasn't anybody taking the
next step and creating content.
Is that what I'm understandingthere?
Gautam (14:00):
were a lot of consumers of the box or something like
that I forget exactly whichpodcatcher I downloaded, uh,
specifically a podcatcher meantfor the android devices.
Um, and I was listening towesternized content okay so I
wasn't listening to indianizedcontent at the time, or eastern
(14:22):
content.
Um, and there were a few folksthat had repurposed radio
content and made it into apodcast, but they just put it
out into the ether and theydidn't know what they were doing
with it.
Right, to be really honest.
So, um, to be really honest, atthis point spotify hadn't
gotten into podcasting yet.
So, um, we like, believed andthis is what a naive, I would
(14:47):
say, founder does when they'rejust starting out is you come up
with the easiest solution tothe problem statement and you're
like this is the, this is thesolution.
So we believe that the problemwas that the aggregation of
content was not being doneappropriately.
So, initially, initially, waswas actually a podcatcher.
So we launched and you stillsee the remnants of Hubhoppers
(15:10):
podcatcher on our application aswell as on our website.
So we basically spoke to allpeople that were creating an
audio content and folks that hadcreated content across the
region, both India as well asthe Asian market, and we started
(15:30):
to get them and gather theirRSSs and create an experience
where people could come andconsume content that was
familiar to them.
And it was broken up bylanguage and broken up by genre
and broken up by category, andit was the first time that it
had been done.
So we felt very, you know,wonderful about this major feat
that we'd done.
In our minds it was a majorfeat and, interestingly enough,
(15:54):
what happened was, carl, thatconsumption from us launching
immediately spiked.
So we started to see a lot ofpeople coming and consuming
podcasts and we were extremelyhappy because we believed that
our thesis was correct.
On the back of this, we believethat, okay, we identified the
problem appropriately because onmonth on month on month, we
(16:15):
just started to see more andmore and more and more people
coming and consuming, and wewere the only platform that had
podcast content at the time.
But, interestingly enough, whatstarted to happen was about six
months into this journey.
Seven months into this journey,a very troubling data point
reared its ugly head, which isthat consumption kept increasing
, but the creators and thecontent for from this market
(16:37):
wasn't increasing at all, andthis just went completely
against the rules of demand andsupply, as per me and my entire
team.
So we were completely perplexed.
We were like, okay, there'sfinally demand for this media
format, indians are consumingthis and allied countries are
consuming via Hubh opper, butwhy isn't there more content
(17:00):
coming and why aren't creatorsreaching out to us?
Where, where are the creators?
Where's the supply if there'snow demand?
So, um, we had another meet,meet up with creators and we
spoke to a bunch of creatorsthat, because now podcasting
started to, you know, like,become a little bit of a murmur,
like people are talking about alittle bit, uh, and we
basically learned at this pointthat we had identified a problem
(17:23):
, but not the problem, and wedidn't identify that the real
cancer was the fact that peoplefound the creation process very
fragmented, very hurdle riddenand very technical.
And suddenly it was like a ahamoment for us, because we were
like that's why, like, peoplearen't coming in droves, so
(17:44):
somebody, somebody needs to bethe, you know, a funnel of
creators into the podverse.
And if we're not going to do it, we didn't know who was going
to do it at the time, becausethere was no pod tech in the
India market.
There continues to not be toomuch pod tech in India market or
in surrounding markets.
(18:04):
Be too much pod tech in Indiamarket or in surrounding markets
.
So we started to build ahosting platform, little by
little, bit by bit, anddistribution platform, but with
the localized lengths.
So we started to basically takeinto account what these
creators found very scary.
Like, for example, creatorsdidn't like the fragmented
(18:25):
nature of podcasting in the west.
In the west, uh, becausepodcasting has been around since
like like 2005, 2006, it's verynormalized for people to use
four or five different platforms.
Yeah, like, people are okayusing Audacity and then using
like or Riverside or Zoom, andthen like editing on podcastle
(18:51):
or you know, xyz a tool, thengoing to a Lipsyn or hosting
provider of their choice, thengoing to a Pod track at some
point, then going to a Podcon atsome point.
Podcasting was new enough forindia.
Now, if you told people, okay,but to become a podcaster now
you have to use six tools, itwas never going to work okay.
(19:12):
So we had to figure out how tobuild all of that under one roof
.
Make it localized, make itreally easy, have integrations
with platforms like canva sothat people could make cover art
right off the bat within theplatform itself, they could
record in the platform itself,they could edit in the platform
itself.
You know there was a communitythat they could interact with
(19:33):
via the platform and yeah so,and then there was the entire
ListenSide experience.
So, little by little by little,we started to build out all of
the ability for you to record,edit, distribute, analyze,
create your teams etc.
And then listen.
But there was still one majorproblem statement, which is that
(19:54):
when creators were creating, apodcast is only as good as if
people are being able to hear it.
So, unfortunately, the onlyplatforms that were ingesting
podcasts at the time wereplatforms like TuneIn no
consumption in India.
Tunein doesn't exist in India.
(20:15):
Stitcher doesn't exist in India.
Apple podcast hardly exists inIndia.
Spotify was just coming into thefray, so creators were putting
their content out, but then like, where would it be consumed?
Which became another problemstatement for us.
So we had to go and take a lotof platforms live with podcasts.
So we had to actually takemusic streaming platforms,
(20:38):
in-cab entertainment, in-flightentertainment, news applications
, the flipboards of our world.
We had to actually take themlive with podcasts through APIs.
So now what was happening wasby doing so, we were finally
being able to also get thecreator to be able to launch
their podcast and, whendistributed, reach audiences
(20:59):
that were very pertinent to them.
And that's when the podcastingwave took off.
And then, luckily, spotify etc.
Etc.
Also started creating ingestingpodcasts in a very large way
and then a lot of otherplatforms came about.
But we were very lucky becausewe were the only gateway to
reach all of these payloadgrounds for consumption where
there was no other way to reachthese platforms where audiences
(21:22):
were captive.
Carl (21:24):
You were literally trailblazing, that you literally
had to not just solve oneproblem.
You're like, as you're goingalong you're thinking, okay,
well, that's problem solved.
Oh wait a minute.
It's like you're not justbuilding a house, you have to
clear, cut the land.
You know there are all kinds ofthings that you had to do to
get to where it is today.
(21:45):
You couldn't just do one or twothings, you had to literally do
it.
It was like literally startingfrom scratch, even though it
existed.
Gautam (21:54):
No, I mean, I confess that I represent a team all of
whom are smarter than me and allof whom are better than me, so
they were the guys doing a lotof this stuff.
But, uh, I I actually think itwas because it was so
purpose-driven, right, becausesomebody had to do it.
We were doing it and we lovedit.
(22:17):
Because when we went to musicplatforms for the first time in
india and these are musicplatforms, mind you, because of
the population of india, theyare large in terms of their
numbers, like large, large, veryattractive for a western
audience or western creator tothink about like 50 million
monthly active users, 70 millionmonthly active users when we
(22:38):
try to pitch distributingpodcasts into them the first
couple of meetings that we had,we were actually laughed out of
the room because we wereactually told on our face, we
were told, uh, that this iscontent that's meant for, like,
westernized countries.
This is not meant for the indiamarket.
It's literally words from a ceoof a music platform to us and
(23:01):
told us this type of contentwould never work in india.
And our argument was youprobably already listened to
non-music audio content in yourown home or probably when you're
driving back home.
Why is it that when the wordand nomenclature of podcasting
gets introduced into theconversation, suddenly
everything becomes a problem?
So it was really fun, butluckily I am very grateful and
(23:27):
glad to see how the communitiesbanded together and how the
podcasting market has reallysort of taken force and route in
India.
It's interesting because whilstit follows a lot of similar
patterns to Western consumptionand creation, there are also a
lot of differences, and now wecan see that.
You know, when you see likemillions of streams on a monthly
basis, you can actually telllike, oh damn, this is a
(23:49):
difference and this is adifference.
Carl (23:51):
So what are some of those differences between the two
markets?
I know off mic we've talkedabout that, but what are the
differences between the Westernmarket and what's going on in
India?
Gautam (24:02):
Yeah, uh, okay.
So, and when I say india, I'mI'm basically also speaking
about the larger subcontinent.
So, like the behavior patternwill be very similar for folks
in Sri lanka, folks inBangladesh, folks in Pakistan
folks, and you know so, alliedmarkets, even places as far as
Indonesia.
(24:22):
Um, consumption time is shorterin the west.
It's quite common for people tohave two, two hour long
podcasts, um, one and a halfhour long podcast, one hour long
podcast.
And this trails back to thefact that you are, folk in the
west, had our talk radio, soanybody could start a radio show
(24:44):
on a radio channel, and so youhad students and colleges etc
with radio shows.
We uh didn't.
Uh, the radio in itself was afairly controlled industry, so
you'd only have like 10, 12radio channels of maybe 15 radio
channels across the country, ordominant ones, it wow at the
(25:04):
best.
So that means that all content,both music and non-music, was
shoved into those 15 channels inthe hour, in the day.
That would basically progress.
So programming that wouldhappen for these radio channels
was, you know, very cut to cut,right, not a moment to spare,
not a second to lose, right.
So, um, automatically, you knowour not attention span, but our
(25:30):
ability to consume audiocontent was a lot shorter, so
we'd consume interspersed um.
So generally, if you're creatingpodcast content like true, like
og podcast content that'slonger than 20-25 minutes unless
there's a very large reasoningfor why people should listen in
(25:51):
for longer normally you'll tendto see your listen through rates
drop in a market like India,whereas in the west that's not
the case.
Number two is if you are like,for example, looking at genres
in the west that work in genresin the east that work genres,
there are differences.
So in the east you look at uh,devotion and religious content
(26:16):
that leads the chart by a mileum, after which there's a long
gap and then there'sself-development, self-growth
content, then after that there'strue crime and then after that
there's self-development,self-growth content, then after
that there's true crime and thenafter that there's romantic
stories and storytelling andnon-controversial eroticism.
In the West it's a little bitdifferent, as far as I
(26:40):
understand it.
Carl (26:41):
Yeah, in the West here I'm pretty sure that true crime, if
it's not at the top, it's thetop two or three categories I
think you have sports, comedyand true crime, I think, are the
top three, and news fits inthere somewhere too, Shows
related to news.
Those are the top three, andspirituality is further down the
(27:02):
list.
It's much further down the listactually.
I don't know how much furtherdown the list, but it's further
down the list actually.
I.
I don't know how much furtherdown the list, but it's further
down the list.
So it sounds like there's somesome very clear differences.
How is the I mean we're eightyears ago again those four
people sitting around the table.
How many people are sittingaround the table now?
I mean, how many?
What's the content creationworld like now in india?
(27:24):
It sounds like it's exploded.
Gautam (27:26):
Yeah, it definitely has.
As I said, India is the thirdlargest, arguably because these
numbers are always up and down,but the third largest market for
podcast consumption on theplanet today.
You're looking at for platformslike Amazon Music, India being
the second largest platform forconsumption globally.
(27:48):
Um, you're looking at um.
If you're looking at, I wouldsay, the mass exodus of creators
coming into podcasting ingeneral, you're seeing, um,
probably one of the largest likemass migrations towards
podcasting.
Uh, over the last uh, althoughalbeit it's a little mix between
(28:11):
a vodcast and a podcast, andnow you're seeing a fusion of
those two words and YouTubepodcasts and, like RSS driven
podcasts.
So can touch upon that alsobeing the future, where you're
going to see lines blurring moreand more and more full circle
to how podcasting used to be,which was video and audio back
in the day.
Carl (28:31):
Is the term podcast more mainstream in India now, or is
it called something else?
I mean, we're calling it apodcast, but or is that still
that, thinking that it's?
If it's a podcast, it's relatedto Apple, or is it?
Is it just a mainstream termnow?
Gautam (28:47):
Completely mainstream.
It's completely mainstream.
But the only difference betweenthe West and the East over here
is that in the West people willunderstand the word podcast and
understand that a podcast isnormally casted and broadcasted
and will normally have asyndicated feed that's attached
to it.
Now in India just true to form,um, everything's a podcast.
(29:10):
So it's like either we don'tadopt it or we everybody adopts
it.
So now, instagram, likeconversations, have become
podcasts.
Youtube videos have becomepodcasts.
Podcasts are podcasts.
So now everything's a podcast.
Uh, so it's an umbrella termand it's being used to define a
lot of different things.
So there's confusion on theother spectrum for the word now.
(29:33):
But in a good, I'm happier withthis problem than the problem
eight years ago, much happier.
Carl (29:40):
Yeah, it's definitely.
I feel what you're saying thereand I do want to talk about
your insights, for what the youknow where the the future of
podcasting in your estimation isheaded.
But there is that confusion ofyou know podcast and everything
falls under that.
Now, if you're doing a showlive on YouTube, it's called a
podcast, versus if you're doinga recorded show, audio only,
(30:04):
it's also called a podcast andit's you know, I think it's.
There's a good and a bad thing.
I think with that it's alsocalled a podcast, and I think
there's a good and a bad thing.
I think with that It'd be likecalling a spoon a fork in my
brain, but they're two differentthings.
So when you put them together,it's actually called a spork,
believe it or not.
But to muddy the waters.
And it makes it challenging forpeople like us who are assisting
(30:28):
people with their content,editing and the backend work,
because when people come to usand say I'd like to start a
podcast, my brain automaticallygoes to audio right, because I
spent 25 years in radio.
It's like, oh, you want tostart a podcast and it'll be
audio right, and they go no, Iwant video and I want it to be
live.
And I'm like wait a minute,that's not a podcast, that's
something completely different.
But let's talk about that alittle bit.
(30:50):
Let's unbundle that and talkabout where you're seeing the,
based on trends and what'shappening, but where you're
seeing the future for thismedium which is, you know, here.
It's been around 25 years and Ialways wonder what's going to
be next.
But where do you see it going?
Gautam (31:08):
globally, or even in your own market.
I don't think there's anyfighting, uh, the fact that
people are using podcast as anumbrella term.
Uh, to be really honest, uh, Ithink you're.
You're obviously currentlyseeing like, like with
everything.
Right now it's a woke term and,with it being an invoke term,
(31:29):
you're seeing a larger number ofcreators pouring into it, but
you'll see people pod fading andyou'll see us averaging out to
a higher amount of peopleentering the space, but entering
the space both in video andaudio.
However, what I do believe isright now you're seeing a lot of
people um, creatingcannibalized content.
(31:50):
So what I mean by that is youwill see people that are
releasing the exact same stuffon like video and audio.
Um, and I'm just doing itbecause they're trying to throw
whatever you know and everythingat the wall and just figure out
what sticks.
I believe what will happen inthe future is it'll become a
little bit more nuanced andpeople will start to treat it
(32:11):
more like a funnel.
So they'll treat video and thevideo podcast element of it, um,
for what video is great atwhich is grabbing people's
attention?
It's much better as a top offunnel medium.
You know, um, I'll use thingslike shorts.
I'll use things like reels, uhto to uh create, you know uh
(32:34):
lead capture magnets for mypodcast.
My call to action will be thelong form, um.
And the long form should be umin in in audio, in my opinion,
because that actually is for anentirely different like purpose,
where it's going to be more ofa connection driver, an
(32:56):
engagement driver, a retentiondriver, a loyalty driver.
So it's fine, you may not haveeverybody converting from the
reels that you're taking out, ofthe short form that you're
taking out in immersive content,into the community that you're
pulling in the podcast format,but the people that are coming
to the podcast are more serious.
(33:17):
Your relationship with themwill become better.
They can become patrons for you.
They can become you know sortof.
They can become you know sortof folks that you convert to
private podcast subscribers.
(33:49):
And then I believe the funnelwill end with people that are
smart who will actually utilizethe call to action leading to
something like a community, sothat they don't have further
leakage from their podcast uhinto nothingness.
Uh, because a lot of peoplehave to reacquire listeners each
time.
They're getting people tolisten in to every episode.
Uh, the call to action shouldbe a newsletter or the call to
action should be a community orsome avenue where I can collect
all of the people at the bottomof my funnel and this is the
best of the best you know and Iwould treat them appropriately.
(34:15):
I would give them access toextra episodes.
I would give them access toAMAs.
I would give them access topotential merch.
You know the works and theirfeedback.
I would hold over every othertype of feedback because their
feedback will be then utilizedfor how I serve the rest of my
family and upwards.
(34:35):
So that's what I believe thecontent structure will change
into.
So, instead of just creating areplica in audio video format,
the way that's currentlyhappening, you're going to start
to see shorter at the top,immersively in video.
Then you're going to havelonger form in like audio or
audiogram video and then you'regoing to have the bottom move to
(34:57):
a community or a newsletter orsomething that builds a
relationship for a long time,could potentially lead to
clientele etc.
Etc.
Whatever it may be.
Carl (35:06):
And I think we're seeing that trend now.
I think we're seeing the savvypodcasters out there who get it.
They realize that it's not justabout the show, it's not just
about the long form content,it's also not just about
creating some reels and such.
It's about okay, what'shappening after the show?
People love that content, theylove to know that, okay, Carl's
(35:29):
a great Gautam's, a great guy,but what's he doing after the
show?
What's the community?
Or when's the meetup?
Or what's happening in the?
I quite often will use this termwhen I'm chatting with
potential clients about wantingto level up their show or
wanting to monetize.
I'll say, well, create somegreen room content.
(35:50):
It doesn't have to be part ofthe show, it can be.
Okay, we're going to give you alook behind the scenes.
Or there's six questions or sixtopics we didn't cover today.
We're going to talk about themin the green room.
So that's as you mentioned,that's that bonus content.
And then, as you said, there'sthe merch.
That's all of those things thatpeople eat that up.
People love that stuff.
(36:12):
They love it 100%.
Gautam (36:16):
And they are power users , man, they are power listeners
and they'll stick with youthrough thick and thin.
Carl (36:24):
I believe and there's certainly a lot of thickness
there with the industry.
I've heard some negative thingsabout the industry, about the
podcasting space, a lot ofpeople thinking that it's going
to fade away, and I'm thinking Idon't think so.
I think that it's.
I feel like we're just gettingstarted, even though we've been
around podcasting has beenaround for 25 years.
(36:44):
I feel like this next phase,whatever it's going to be as
you've explained it, it'll bemore like a funnel and that, I
think, will be exciting, becauseit's not just something that is
niche is the wrong word.
It's not just something thatonly certain people will consume
.
It'll be one of those thingsthat people who used to listen
(37:05):
to radio, for example.
Radio is going through a toughtime.
I don't know what it's likewhere you are, but certainly
here in the West radio is havinga tough time.
So a lot of those people whowere creating content for radio
they're going to be looking atpodcasts now and how you bring
that content forward andcontinue to grow your your
(37:25):
following and elevate yourcredibility in that sense too.
Gautam (37:28):
I completely agree, and there's another I like
completely align with you onthat and I also do, like I'm
sure you echo this sentiment aswell, because there's a lot of
fear around AI, yes, and what AIis going to do for the
podcasting space.
And the best example that Igive I would say again and again
(37:51):
is that whenever there's newand emerging technology that
comes out, there's always panicthat is followed with it.
This is not the first time.
I think, anecdotally, there wasa lot of panic that took place
right after the invention of thecalculator, because a lot of
people believed that they weregonna be out of jobs and, you
(38:13):
know, the economy would never bethe same.
But, at the end of the day, acalculator is only as good as
what you put into it, so it'sonly as good as its input.
Number one and number two is itdidn't make mathematicians
useless, it just made themquicker and more efficient.
So, if you look at AI from thelens of it as an efficiency
(38:35):
builder and something that canmake you, you know, fulfill the
more mundane tasks more swiftlyso that you can focus on the
core and what's important, um,which is the connection, uh, and
the content, I believe that aiis going to be a massive boon
(38:55):
for the podcasting space,because not everybody knows how
to write a very well-craftedsection in their show notes or
knows how to you know, likehighlight the best quotes or etc
.
Etc.
But I definitely don't believethat like completely ai driven
content.
Because people turn to podcastsfor what they turn to podcasts,
(39:17):
not because of the like thesame reasons that people turn to
video, they turn to podcastsfor the connection.
So if you remove the, theconnection and the sort of the
emotional back and forth betweenthe host and the listener,
you're, in essence, removing thevery reason why people turn to
the medium to begin with.
(39:38):
Um, so I don't believe thatlike that's going to be a major
thing for anybody to worry about.
However, if somebody is aprofessional show note creator,
that's somebody who I believemay need to, you know, either
leverage AI to do it at scale orthink about a couple of other
(40:00):
things.
Carl (40:01):
We're even seeing, as I said, in our agency, we're even
seeing certain tasks become alittle bit shorter, which is
great, because now we can openup the, you know, add more
clients to our roster, becauseit doesn't take hours upon hours
to do transcription.
It can go into an AI tool andget to about 92 to 94% and still
(40:26):
be scanned and have it done ina very short period of time,
versus having somebody listen tothe audio, write down a few
words.
Listen to the audio, write downa few words, which is the old
way that you had to transcribeeverything and and that was a
job at one point and people weregot really good at it.
Before I turn you loose, though, I just want to move the needle
forward, because I know there'sa.
(40:47):
There's one more thing I wantto give you the opportunity to
do Just give a quick overview ofum, of what you're doing at
Hubhopper.
I know you've touched on it acouple of times, but just very
quickly.
A little bit about Hubhopperand what people can expect when
they're going to check it out,because we'll make sure the link
is in the show notes.
Gautam (41:07):
Oh no, you so much.
So Hubhopper is a hosting anddistribution platform, uh, that
allows you to basically manageevery aspect of your show, uh,
so you can uh you can havemultiple people with multiple
different roles, um, you knowparticipate on the same
(41:27):
dashboard.
You can manage multiple showsfrom one dashboard itself.
You can distribute to all thedifferent platforms of
consumption.
You can even create and edit onthe platform itself.
You can create your embedplayers, you can create your pod
sites, you can create yoursocial collateral um right
(41:49):
within the tool itself, um, andyou can actually listen to your
podcast within Hubhopper itselffor the first time.
We try to make it as simple andeasy for anybody, and one of the
things that we do is we giveaccess to um certain platforms
that would otherwise, you know,not be available to creators,
(42:12):
and these are platforms wherecompetition will be a lot lower
because they're not too manypodcasts in them, but the amount
of listeners that exist withinthem are very high.
So if your show sparks a flameor a tinder with these folks, I
know that creators areconstantly chasing and trying to
(42:32):
find where to get their uhorganic listenership to go, go
up from um.
So you know that's a pain pointthat we, you know, try to uh
solve for uh in the organization.
Um, uh, so, yeah, that's,that's that's a little bit on us
at Hubhopper.
Um, always love to get feedbackon what we're building out
(42:54):
there.
Uh, very design focused as anorganization.
Uh, so would love anysuggestions and, uh, thank you
so much for letting me uh givean introduction man into
Hubhopper.
Carl (43:06):
I will definitely make sure that, uh, and I'm glad you
shared that.
Gautam (43:31):
I will definitely make sure that gets shared.
I'm glad you shared that.
I will definitely make surethat gets shared in the show
notes so people can check it out, and all your contact
information as well, so peoplecan connect with you.
It's been a fantasticconversation.
You are a very phenomenalindividual.
I'm glad we met.
I'm glad we chatted today.
Gautam Raj Anand has been myguest today.
Before I let you go thoughGautam, I'll give you the final
thought.
Yeah, so I would say that thereare a lot of people we see this
.
Actually there are a lot ofpeople that are considering
starting a podcast, but they areprocrastinating the start of it
for a various set of reasons.
We've actually boiled it downto about four or five reasons.
(43:52):
Uh, I would actually, you know,uh, request folks to follow the
five second rule, um, or the 20second rule, rather.
I mean, sometimes all you needis 20 seconds of insane courage
is what I keep telling myselfwhen I'm standing at a
crossroads and I want to dosomething, because you never
know what you essentially speakabout could do for somebody in
(44:16):
their lives.
We've seen some incrediblestories coming out of teachers
that randomly putting up, let'ssay, curriculum based content
and students that don't haveaccess to great quality
education that don't have accessto great quality education,
education being able to use thatas a revision material.
And the teacher never believedthat when they were creating the
(44:37):
podcast, that that would be theend result of their podcast.
They just created it becausethey didn't want to keep
repeating the same thing totheir students.
So you never know where yourcontent is going to go, where
your voice is going to go, andwhose life it's going to change
and what it's going to do.
So I would say start your voicedoes matter, and thank you so
(44:57):
much man.
Carl (44:59):
Thank you, Gautam Raj Anand.
Thank you so much for being myguest today.
Gautam (45:03):
No, thank you, man.
Appreciate the time and it'sbeen an honor.
Thank you,If you like what you heard today
, leave us a comment and areview, and be sure to share it
with your friends.
Carl (45:13):
If you don't like what you heard, please share it with
(45:40):
your enemies.
Oh, and if you have asuggestion of someone who you
think would make an amazingguest on the show, let us know
about it.
Drop us an email.
askcarl@ carlspeaks.
ca.
Don't forget to follow us onLinkedIn and Twitter as well.
You'll find all those links inthe Thanks for listening to the
podcast.
We'll catch you next time.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
CrimeLess: Hillbilly Heist
It’s 1996 in rural North Carolina, and an oddball crew makes history when they pull off America’s third largest cash heist. But it’s all downhill from there. Join host Johnny Knoxville as he unspools a wild and woolly tale about a group of regular ‘ol folks who risked it all for a chance at a better life. CrimeLess: Hillbilly Heist answers the question: what would you do with 17.3 million dollars? The answer includes diamond rings, mansions, velvet Elvis paintings, plus a run for the border, murder-for-hire-plots, and FBI busts.