August 6, 2019 • 27 mins
This week we are re-playing an episode about podcasts! Matty answers some of the most common questions people have about podcasting and talks about his early days at Stitcher and in radio.
Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Hey, everybody. Welcome to a special edition of Access Podcast.
I am your host, Maddie Stout, and this week we're
gonna do something a little bit different. It's podcast Week
on my Heart Radio and I want to answer some
questions people have about podcasting. I get them all the time.
I think those of us that are in the business
assume everybody knows about podcasts, and not everybody does. So
(00:24):
in this episode, I hope to tell you what a
podcast is, also some ways to get started to listening
to podcasts. Some great podcast to listen to, And I've
invited producers e In and Z is gonna ask a
few questions to me about podcasting and about me and
why I'm in this world wide podcasting meets so much
to me. Z. I'm gonna turn the mic over to
(00:48):
you and I'll let you ask the questions. I am
in the hot seat this week, and I'm anxious to
see what kind of questions she put together as a
as a host. Welcome, you want you want to do
a little wanna do a little intro for yourself? Hi,
I'm Ziania Dilvis. I am a content producer here at
I Heart Media and I'm a legal midget. There you go.
(01:10):
What do you mean you're a legal midget? Are you
really that? I guess I haven't noticed. Yeah, I guess
a lot of people say that, but I'm very short.
You are short. If you want to see what Z
looks like, go to our Facebook page. We put pictures
up Halloween thing. Oh yeah, we do have we have
that up. We'll have to put something else up to anyway.
I'm happy to be on your your show today, ce,
(01:30):
So what do you want to ask me about podcasting? So,
because I know you started off in radio and you
did radio for so long, but then you made this transition.
What is your history with podcasting? So? I again started
radio when I was sixteen, and you know, kind of
worked my way through all these small markets doing country
(01:51):
and classic rock, and I ended up doing talk radio
in d C at w JFK. I was a g.
Gordon Ladies producer, and then we moved up to New
York and we have FM talk station there. Worked without
being Anthony and Donna, Mike and if you're a radio
geek you probably know some of those shows. Finally ending
up here in San Francisco, and I had an FM
talk show here at alex Radio. So I love talk radio,
(02:12):
and ten years ago I saw that radio was changing
in a lot of ways. In fact, it was so
funny yesterday I listened to an old show from ten
years ago that we did a W n W and
I and I listened to and I thought, none of
this could go on the air today. None of its content,
just content stuff, you know, we just it's too blue.
So I wanted, I wanted to do more and and
(02:34):
you know, and I've been radio my whole life, and
I really just decided I needed to learn another skill.
And there was this new startup that I didn't First
of all, I didn't really understand what a startup was.
I didn't understand the business model. I didn't understand anything
other than the fact that it involved talk radio as
far as I knew. And uh and and I got
(02:55):
to i'd be able on the ground floor or something.
So the company was called Stitcher. I there were four
of us, and I left radio, and everybody kind of
said that was crazy, you know, to leave radio, especially
a very successful show. But I thought it was the
right move at the time. And be honest with you,
it's not like I had like some epiphany and said,
oh my god, the future of everything is podcasting. I
(03:16):
wasn't sure about the medium either. I took the risk
because I liked I'd like doing talk and I felt
like this is the medium where we could do any
kind of talk radio we wanted. So I when I
got to Stitcher, I got into the world of podcasting.
And to be honest with you, ten years ago, you know,
we thought that the podcast breakout was maybe two or
three or four years away, and it didn't happen that quickly.
(03:39):
It took a while. I feel like now is the
biggest boom I've ever seen of podcasting. It is this
is the golden age for us. Right now, there's there's
money being invested in podcast companies, and the reason is
there's just good quality content out that we didn't have
ten years ago. I mean, back then, most podcasts were,
as I like to say it, you know, two guys
(03:59):
telling dick jokes for an hour and a half and
and not produced. Well. You know, the good podcasts that
we're out, we're radio shows. They were NPR shows that
were being put out as podcast I mean, there were
good podcasts back then, but it just wasn't like today,
where you have so much good content out there in
so so many ways to listen. So I guess going
(04:23):
back to basics, what is a podcast for people that
don't know, well, a podcast is simply and by the way,
if you if you if you don't know what one
is and you you found this one, congratulations you might
have found because what we do is we tweet these
out and you might be listening to it on player.
So basically, what a podcast is is recorded audio that
is sent out to various distribution platforms via an RSS feed.
(04:47):
RSS feed stands for really simple syndications, so it means
that you can syndicate your show to millions of people
and all you have to do is upload it to
a site. So a podcast, you know, can be uploaded
to one of these RSS feeder sites and then go
out to iTunes, to Stitcher, to Google Play and of
(05:07):
course I heart radio. Uh so you have many ways
that you can listen to a podcast, but at its heart,
it's recorded audio meant for on demand listening. Everybody can listen,
everybody can listen, and everybody can do one which is
good and bad you know, because yeah, I mean there
are a lot of bad podcasts out there. There's some
really good ones. But the great thing about it is
(05:30):
if you have an interest in anything, anything, there is
a podcast for you. Well, speaking of that, you ask
our guests on this on our show all the time,
like what's the last podcast? They binge? But I want
to always know what was the podcast that really made
you fall in love with podcasts? Well, I'll say the
(05:54):
first show was actually This American Life, and I listened
to it maybe on the radio a couple of times. Uh,
And then when it became a podcast that was like
every week, could not wait. In fact, I did the
content for Stitcher, so I was the one that made
sure all the feeds were updated so that feed I
would sit there and refresh it on the day it
was supposed to come in, just waiting for it to
(06:16):
come in. But as far as like pure podcast go,
I really felt I always liked the how how stuff
works podcasts when when they came out, those were podcasts
that I really enjoyed. And there were some radio folks
who went into podcasting early on. Adam Krola is one
um I really enjoyed listening to Adam. I think the
thing I enjoyed most is because I had a little
background of course, you know, Adam and I worked with
(06:39):
a lot of the same people in San Francisco and
Los Angeles and and hearing him very kind of begrudgingly
become a podcaster because he did not know he wanted
to do it, you know, it's just he got fired.
He got fired. So this was just another and it
came out exactly and a friend said, start a podcast,
which is something I've suggested to many radio folks, and
there's a lot of folks who start the podcast after
(07:00):
they lose their gigs in radio. And then he turns
it into one of the biggest podcast empires in the world,
you know, literally from his garage and that's where it started,
in his garage with his friend who pushed him, pushed
him into it, and the whole time, if you listen
to the first episodes, Adam is I'm not sure about
it at all. Yeah, that was in two thousand nine.
(07:21):
Had that started? Since you are the podcast king, can
you give us a little history lesson on podcasting, Well,
podcasting was started in two thousand four, That's that's the
date most people agree on. And it was Adam Curry
who if you don't know, if you're my age. You
know who Adam Curry is because he was on MTV.
(07:42):
He was he was a DJ, and a lot of
people were like, Adam Curry started podcasting. Yeah, he and
another guy I think Dave Dave Winner is his name,
invented it. That they're they're credited with that. And then
the term came around in two thousand four from an
article in The Guardian calling it podcasting. But when it
really really really happened two thousand five, Apple added podcast
(08:02):
to the iTunes store. And that's also the time around
the time when the first iPods came out. So I
was actually at the launch of iPod and didn't know it.
I was I was just moved to San Francisco and
my friend was like, Hey, I'm gonna take you to
the thing at Steve Jobs and I really didn't even
know what I was doing. And it was actually the
launch of iTunes, and I just remember sitting there. I
(08:24):
went to meet Seal. Seal was at the event. I
was like, I'm gonna good Seal. I could care less
about the event. And after the event, people were like,
what do you think of this new iTunes And I'm like,
nobody's gonna pay for this. We're just gonna pay for music.
This is stupid. I got Napster Man. Yeah, and I
got my first iPod. It was you know, this big brick. Yeah,
that's awesome. I didn't know about that at all that
(08:45):
you were at the event. I was at the event. Yeah,
it's like awful circle now it is crazy. Yeah. Yeah,
and you know, and and I'll admit, you know, podcasting
for me is something that it seemed like a means
to an end, and now I look at more as
the beginning of a new medium for for broadcasting. And
(09:05):
it's where you know, I push a lot of you know,
we're pushing a lot of our radio stations to to
do more with podcasting because, uh, everybody likes on demand,
and if you like on demand, then you like podcasting
because it is that is what it is. It's Netflix
for audio, absolutely, And it's also it's nice because well,
as a millennial, I feel like my generation is really
(09:28):
visual people. So if we read an article, we're always
looking for the video component of it. But I've realized
more and more that not just my friends, but people
my age, they listen to podcasts more than they go
on YouTube, you know, like because if you're commuting or
in the car, in the bus, maybe the video won't work.
So you're like, oh, you can always have something to
(09:49):
listen to. And my friends of A and I have
tried to talk about this, but we don't really get
why that is, Like, why do you think podcasting has
hooked millennial? Well, little little number for your thirty three
percent of all podcasts listening happens with millennials only of
it happens with jen X, which is my generations. You
would think that would be the opposite, At least I
would have thought, because usually when you think of a
(10:10):
podcast listener, it's it's a middle aged white dude with
a beard. But that is not the case. A lot
of millennials are listening, and I think a couple of reasons.
Like you said, when you're on you know, especially in
the cities, when you're in public transit, if you look around,
everyone has headphones on, everyone is consuming audio exactly, everybody's
consuming audio. So that that's one reason, I think, and
(10:32):
not the reason is it is a retreat. A podcast
is a retreat from all the other ship that's going
on in the world. So when you're listening to the podcast,
you're in it. You're in it. It's like it's you know,
a lot of folks don't read books anymore, but it's
the same mind. It works the same muscle in your head,
almost like an audiobook essentially, it does, you know, and
(10:52):
and and I think that when you're constantly looking at
screens and looking at video and and and and up there,
it's a job. Certainly. I of like, my phone is
the job, and I'm I'm you know, I am anchored
to it. And when I'm listening to a podcast, I
tend to not do all that other stuff, you know.
I might like maybe look through a news feed or something,
(11:13):
but for the most part, I try to just kind
of chill, relax and listen to the podcast. So I
think that's it. I think a lot of the students
that that I teach like podcasting to do it as well,
because it is such a free medium for them and
it is something new, you know, where every all of
you guys do video. You just mentioned you teach students
(11:34):
at the Academy of our university, our university, and you
teach a podcasting class, not just a radio class. So
for your students or for anybody listening, that have always
had an interest in podcasting. What do you think what
is the way to start one? Well, I'll say this,
the first way to start one is to have, first
of all, listen to podcasts. I can't tell you how
(11:55):
many people tell me I want to start a podcast,
and like what's your favorite podcast? And they have Yeah,
they have no answer. It's like, well, that's the first thing.
Know the medium that you want to be in, and
know it well, and and listen to a variety of
shows so that you have some ideas of like there's
these kind of shows, and these kind of shows, and
these kind of shows. There's interview shows, and there's storytelling
shows and journalism shows. Second of all, have an original idea,
(12:17):
don't you? And your thoughts are not interesting to very
many people. Honestly, you could. You could be very funny
and very interesting, but nobody is going to say I'm
gonna listen to that podcast because it's got Jimmy's thoughts
and feelings and Jimmy's talking about you know, things that
Jimmy sees in the news. I don't know who Jimmy is.
(12:37):
Those podcasts work if you're a celebrity, because I'm I
love Anna ferris All. What is Anna ferris All? I
heard love her. She's so funny. I would listen to
our podcast exactly. But nobody knows who you are. So
have an interesting idea. Try to have a unique as
we say in the marketing business, the USP, a unique
selling proposition um, and then produce it well. The problem
(13:00):
with a lot of podcasts is that they're poorly produced.
You know, it's so easy right now to go buy
a really good USB microphone, hook it into your computer
and use Audacity, which is free or audition is what
I suggest, and and do a quality recording, then add music,
and then edit, edit, edit, edit. Nobody wants to hear
all the ums and os and And that's the one
(13:21):
thing lazy students tell me all the time, which is
I want to hear my oms and oz because it
makes me sound more real. Nobody wants to hear that.
In fact, how many ms and ohs do you have
to edit out of my show every week? A lot?
A lot. I'm an omana guy, which is fine, but
you need to edit that stuff out. And then the
other thing is to do it, do it, do it,
do it, do it, do it every day. If you
(13:44):
do it, once a week. Do it, do it once
a week. Stay consistent. Don't get into the habit of
putting one off for a week. That's really bad for
your listeners. And you have to be patient too. You're
not going to build an audience up right away. Like
we have podcasts. We have twenty six podcasts here in
San Francisco, and we are still the audiences are growing
because it's new for most of our listeners and it's
(14:04):
new for the host as well. So we have to
constantly like be patient. You know, this is a new
medium and it is growing and it is expanding, but
it doesn't happen overnight for any show, for any show.
We're trying to grow this show right now, and and
it's and some days I look at the numbers and
I go, what are we doing wrong? So we're doing
anything wrong, it's just it's just not happened yet. And
(14:25):
that's the thing that happens with most shows. There will
be an episode, somebody will share it, other people will
get into it, and then that's what it starts. And
then they go back and listen to what episodes, and
all of a sudden, you've went from a few hundred
people listening to an episode to a few thousand. It
happens that fast, but you have to be patient. I
like that, and I mean going back to producing it. Well,
I think a lot of my generation, and I mean
(14:47):
I think podcast listeners are more are they hear better
quality now? They don't just like put something on it
like okay, it's whatever. Because I can't tell you how
many times I've started a new podcast and I've heard
lytches in the audio and stuff that they haven't fixed,
and I'm like, oh, I don't want to listen to
this anymore because I want to feel like they care
about the podcast enough to put it out and make
(15:07):
me want to care about it. Yeah. I mean this
is there is a lot of money being put into
podcasting right now, so there was a lot of high
quality podcast so if you expect to uh compete with them,
you have to be high quality. That don't get me wrong.
If you're just doing a podcast that about your passion,
you know, your passion is is Purple Teddy Bears and
you just want to talk about purple Teddy Bears and
(15:29):
find other people that like Purple Teddy Bears, you know,
that's that's a very niche thing. And you you know,
that's the different story. But even that, do the best
you can. Yeah, that's what it is, Do the best
you can. What are your three favorite podcast at the moment? Okay,
the first one I want to start with is one
(15:50):
that almost every guest that has been on this show,
all five of them have said when we've asked them,
what what was the last podcast you binged? And it
was s Town now as Town came together a result
of a message from an Alabama resident uh to a
producer for Cereal. Also, those are all the same guys
serial of This American Life. They all came out of
(16:11):
the same camp. And this guy despises his town and
wants to do something about it and wants to investigate
this wealthy family who's been bragging about getting away with murder.
That's what you think you're getting into when you start
the podcast. Where it goes from There is not anything
where it starts. Um, this is just a beautifully well
done podcast. It's well done because you care about the
(16:35):
people in it. They tell a really good story and
and it's always it's always I almost I almost get
choked up thinking about it because it is It is
an emotional journey. And when we do good podcasts, we
create empathy, and we paint pictures and we take you somewhere.
(16:56):
And this is what this podcast does. Yeah. I remember
when s Town came out. I sat on my couch,
I listened to all of the episodes at once. I
don't think I've ever cried over a podcast as much
as said, like you talking about it now makes me
think of the episodes and his voice and everything, and
it makes me choked up. And it was beautiful. Here's
a little taste, but I suggest go back listen to
(17:18):
the first one. But here you go, something's happened. Something
has absolutely happened in this town. There's just too much
little crap for something not to have happened. And I'm
about had enough ship Town and things that goes on gorgeous.
(17:48):
I mean, his voice gets me every time. Yeah, yeah,
go listen to that. That like, finish this one, then
go listen to that. Okay, I got another podcast for you,
a little more on the fun side. This is one
that's been around for a long time. It's WTF with
Mark Maron. Now. Mark Marin was as a comedian and actor.
Uh and not a lot of people know if you
(18:10):
didn't listen to Air America. He was the host of
the morning show on Air America. Now Are America Blew Up?
And Mark started this podcast again about the same time
ten years ago when we were starting Stitcher. So I
remember Mark came in and I did a podcast kind
of like this one for Stitcher, and and we did
an interview. And the one thing that Mark did that
(18:30):
I think a lot of podcasters have learned from him
is Mark will go on every podcast he can. When,
especially when he was starting, he'd go on any podcast
he could as a guest because he's a great guest,
and then he would people would say he's very funny. Oh,
I'm gonna go listen to his podcast. So there's another
tip for you podcasters. Go on as many shows as
you can so people find out about your podcast. Um.
(18:50):
Mark is a great interviewer and I love I think
Howard Stern is the best interviewer in the world. If
you don't think that's the truth, and I don't know
what's wrong with you, but Mark's really up there too.
He he might be a close second. And he gets interviews.
And the thing is this is a podcast, and he
gets interviews with everybody, including President Barack Obama while he
(19:11):
was president. I have to listen to that. Check it
out here this well, you used to live around here?
I did. Yeah, I was explaining to folks, pass it in,
these are my old haunts. Man. And and you how
close is that in your memory? Does it come right back? Absolutely? Yeah,
through somewhat of a haze. I mean it was college.
So how old are you like twenty right, and you
(19:32):
went right down the street. I've been down and it's
how far away from you are you from that guy? Now?
I mean, do you can you lock into that? Can
you find that in yourself? Truth? I'm an entrepreneur. I
am fascinated by, you know, business building. We talked to
Andy Holloway from Fantasy Footballer's last week and he you
know the same thing. I think a lot of folks.
(19:52):
You know, if you didn't listen last week, it's a
really good interview. But you know, a podcast is a startup.
It's a startup. It's a business. You know, if you
want to make money. It is. So Alex starts with
his pitch, how he pitched investors. It is and because
of him, I started a little company. I was like,
oh my God, I have an idea for I have
a brain of content company. I was like, oh, let's
start that. Um. The rest of the seasons are great.
(20:15):
They talked about different kinds of people in startup faces,
but that first season is brilliant. That's going on my list,
so check it out. Are you meeting someone with money?
This is my wife, nazanin early one morning a couple
of months ago, stopping me as I was on my
way out the door to do something I'd never done before.
Meet a guy who works at a venture capital firm
(20:37):
and try to get him to give me money to
invest in my business, a podcast business. There you go.
There's there's my starting point. But here's what I'm going
to tell you. If you have an interest, go to
I Heart Radio or your podcast provider, and there's curated lists.
Go look at those lists. Those lists are done by
(20:57):
people who want you to find certain parts. They want
you to find good ones because I want you to
keep listening to podcasts at the end of the day.
That's one of the other things I love about this
business is we all support each other. We just want
people to listen to podcasts. That's why no matter what
company you work I work for I Heart Radio, but
we're on iTunes, We're on Stitcher, we're on Google Play.
You know. We just want people to listen to podcasts. Um,
(21:18):
So go to those curated lists and see and see
what's what's on there, what's recommended, find something that you like.
If you have a local radio station that you love,
go check out their website, see if they have a podcast.
If they have a podcast, go check it out and
see and see what it's like. You know, it's a
lot of fun. Yeah. I actually have two of my
own okay suggests, actually three, Okay, so my first one
(21:38):
is pod Save America, which is by Crocket Media, and
it's four guys from that used to work for the
Obama administration. There were speech writers and like spokespeople for
him and for someone that maybe not isn't like fully
into politics, but I want to know about what's going
on in politics, especially now. This is the greatest one.
(21:59):
They add much to it. They bring in um, congressmen
and people running for office and just tell you how
to get involved. And I think, um, what you if
you're not agreeing with the current administration, or even if
you are, this is such a great podcast to just
dive into and get involved and do something to help
your country. I see you and every other UH person
(22:22):
that works in our department tweeting about this show, and
I've not listened to it, so I'm exus to hear
his taste of it. This morning. Donald Trump's former campaign
chairman Paul Manafort and his partner and former Trump advisor
Rick Gates were each indicted on one count of conspiracy
against the United States, one kund of conspiracy to under
money one kind of acting is an unregistered agent of
a foreign principle, two counts of making false statements, and
(22:44):
four counts of failing to report foreign bank accounts. Manafort
turned himself into. Forgot is also one count of but
what about the uranium? Alright, So that's pots of American.
My next one is called ear Hustle and there by Radiotopia.
It's actually super interesting. I heard about it through a
friend and it's with two inmates from the San Quentin
(23:07):
State Prison and um barrier artists. Her name is Nigel Poor.
So the two guys are Irlan and Antoine and they're
serving like thirty years to life for fifteen years, and
everything is done in the prison. They only have a
few hours of the day. They have a media lab,
they sound designed, they edit. Everything has to be done
in the prison. And not only that they have before
(23:29):
they put out the episode, it has to be approved
by the information officer at the prison. And your hustle
in prison talk means eavesdropping. And so it's just all
these different fun um interviews and what prison life is like,
what having a cellmate is like, or getting a date
to get out of prison, and everybody always they always say,
(23:50):
like people think that they know because of TV shows
what it's like to be in prison, and you never do.
So this is really great if you ever wanted to know.
I'm fascinated. There's only three ways off the Shoe debrief Parole,
our pine box me I accepted the fact that I
was going to get out of there in a pine box.
(24:14):
We're going to be hearing a lot about the shoe
on this episode, so maybe we should first explain what
the shoe is. The shoe is an acronym that stands
for the security housing unit. It's the whole, the box,
the dungeon, and in some states it's called solitary confinement.
All right, And my last one is another shout out
to a show that we do in San Francisco. Oh yeah, heart.
(24:35):
So it's Two Girls One podcast with Carolyn mccartell and
Sandy Stack, and it is single Life over thirty five
for women over thirty five. And I'm not in that
age range, but it's so relatable. They are hilarious. I
come in and I listened to it. If there's a
new episode and they're super unfiltered, and if you just
want a good laugh, listen to Two Girls One podcast.
(24:57):
But I know that there are people that get that
have been on Tender and things happen. Dude, my friend
got married from from Tinder, which didn't Tinder used to
be only like it was an unspoken rule that Tinder
was only for hookups, right, and now people are getting married.
It's like match dot com. What's next, plenty of fish?
Who knows. I'm sure it's out there. I'm sure it's
and they have a kid now, my friend, Um, so
(25:18):
it can't. There are exceptions to every rule that shows
good for guys too. I listen, I laughed. I listened
every of course, I listen. I love it. I listened
every week. Well those are good, So those are starts
for you folks that are new to podcasting, and like
I said, the best way is to just go and look.
Go find some podcasts and listen to them and and
and find something good that you like and then share
(25:39):
it with people. That's the other thing, you know, and
this this business is new and we need people to
tell people about podcasting. So if you love podcasting, go
out and share it. Share this podcast. That would be fantastic.
We'd really like that. Also, go on our iTunes page
and rate and review. That's also a big way to
help out your favorite podcast. Um can also follow us
(26:00):
go on Facebook Access Podcast and on Twitter at access
podcast one. Still waiting so waiting to get the real
Access podcast but whatever, follow us there. So I hope
you'll enjoyed listening to our special podcast week edition of
(26:22):
Access Podcast. If this is the first time you've listened
to this podcast, go back and listen to some past episodes.
We've got some great guests that we've had on over
the past. We've been doing the show for almost two months,
so go check them out. Access Podcast is produced by
z engineers David Williams and Horse Swang. Artwork by Dalon Runberg.
Music im post by Casey Franco special thanks to the
podcast guru god of I Heart Radio, Chris Peterson, Don Parker,
(26:45):
and Katie Willcox at I Heeart Radio, San Francisco. You
can follow us on Facebook Access Podcasts, follow me at
Maddie Stout m A T T Y s t a
U d T on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, and you
can download the iHeart Radio app if you have it already,
go to the podcast section, listen, share and tell your friends.
Thanks by m HM
Hey, everybody. Welcome to a special edition of Access Podcast.
I am your host, Maddie Stout, and this week we're
gonna do something a little bit different. It's podcast Week
on my Heart Radio and I want to answer some
questions people have about podcasting. I get them all the time.
I think those of us that are in the business
assume everybody knows about podcasts, and not everybody does. So
(00:24):
in this episode, I hope to tell you what a
podcast is, also some ways to get started to listening
to podcasts. Some great podcast to listen to, And I've
invited producers e In and Z is gonna ask a
few questions to me about podcasting and about me and
why I'm in this world wide podcasting meets so much
to me. Z. I'm gonna turn the mic over to
(00:48):
you and I'll let you ask the questions. I am
in the hot seat this week, and I'm anxious to
see what kind of questions she put together as a
as a host. Welcome, you want you want to do
a little wanna do a little intro for yourself? Hi,
I'm Ziania Dilvis. I am a content producer here at
I Heart Media and I'm a legal midget. There you go.
(01:10):
What do you mean you're a legal midget? Are you
really that? I guess I haven't noticed. Yeah, I guess
a lot of people say that, but I'm very short.
You are short. If you want to see what Z
looks like, go to our Facebook page. We put pictures
up Halloween thing. Oh yeah, we do have we have
that up. We'll have to put something else up to anyway.
I'm happy to be on your your show today, ce,
(01:30):
So what do you want to ask me about podcasting? So,
because I know you started off in radio and you
did radio for so long, but then you made this transition.
What is your history with podcasting? So? I again started
radio when I was sixteen, and you know, kind of
worked my way through all these small markets doing country
(01:51):
and classic rock, and I ended up doing talk radio
in d C at w JFK. I was a g.
Gordon Ladies producer, and then we moved up to New
York and we have FM talk station there. Worked without
being Anthony and Donna, Mike and if you're a radio
geek you probably know some of those shows. Finally ending
up here in San Francisco, and I had an FM
talk show here at alex Radio. So I love talk radio,
(02:12):
and ten years ago I saw that radio was changing
in a lot of ways. In fact, it was so
funny yesterday I listened to an old show from ten
years ago that we did a W n W and
I and I listened to and I thought, none of
this could go on the air today. None of its content,
just content stuff, you know, we just it's too blue.
So I wanted, I wanted to do more and and
(02:34):
you know, and I've been radio my whole life, and
I really just decided I needed to learn another skill.
And there was this new startup that I didn't First
of all, I didn't really understand what a startup was.
I didn't understand the business model. I didn't understand anything
other than the fact that it involved talk radio as
far as I knew. And uh and and I got
(02:55):
to i'd be able on the ground floor or something.
So the company was called Stitcher. I there were four
of us, and I left radio, and everybody kind of
said that was crazy, you know, to leave radio, especially
a very successful show. But I thought it was the
right move at the time. And be honest with you,
it's not like I had like some epiphany and said,
oh my god, the future of everything is podcasting. I
(03:16):
wasn't sure about the medium either. I took the risk
because I liked I'd like doing talk and I felt
like this is the medium where we could do any
kind of talk radio we wanted. So I when I
got to Stitcher, I got into the world of podcasting.
And to be honest with you, ten years ago, you know,
we thought that the podcast breakout was maybe two or
three or four years away, and it didn't happen that quickly.
(03:39):
It took a while. I feel like now is the
biggest boom I've ever seen of podcasting. It is this
is the golden age for us. Right now, there's there's
money being invested in podcast companies, and the reason is
there's just good quality content out that we didn't have
ten years ago. I mean, back then, most podcasts were,
as I like to say it, you know, two guys
(03:59):
telling dick jokes for an hour and a half and
and not produced. Well. You know, the good podcasts that
we're out, we're radio shows. They were NPR shows that
were being put out as podcast I mean, there were
good podcasts back then, but it just wasn't like today,
where you have so much good content out there in
so so many ways to listen. So I guess going
(04:23):
back to basics, what is a podcast for people that
don't know, well, a podcast is simply and by the way,
if you if you if you don't know what one
is and you you found this one, congratulations you might
have found because what we do is we tweet these
out and you might be listening to it on player.
So basically, what a podcast is is recorded audio that
is sent out to various distribution platforms via an RSS feed.
(04:47):
RSS feed stands for really simple syndications, so it means
that you can syndicate your show to millions of people
and all you have to do is upload it to
a site. So a podcast, you know, can be uploaded
to one of these RSS feeder sites and then go
out to iTunes, to Stitcher, to Google Play and of
(05:07):
course I heart radio. Uh so you have many ways
that you can listen to a podcast, but at its heart,
it's recorded audio meant for on demand listening. Everybody can listen,
everybody can listen, and everybody can do one which is
good and bad you know, because yeah, I mean there
are a lot of bad podcasts out there. There's some
really good ones. But the great thing about it is
(05:30):
if you have an interest in anything, anything, there is
a podcast for you. Well, speaking of that, you ask
our guests on this on our show all the time,
like what's the last podcast? They binge? But I want
to always know what was the podcast that really made
you fall in love with podcasts? Well, I'll say the
(05:54):
first show was actually This American Life, and I listened
to it maybe on the radio a couple of times. Uh,
And then when it became a podcast that was like
every week, could not wait. In fact, I did the
content for Stitcher, so I was the one that made
sure all the feeds were updated so that feed I
would sit there and refresh it on the day it
was supposed to come in, just waiting for it to
(06:16):
come in. But as far as like pure podcast go,
I really felt I always liked the how how stuff
works podcasts when when they came out, those were podcasts
that I really enjoyed. And there were some radio folks
who went into podcasting early on. Adam Krola is one
um I really enjoyed listening to Adam. I think the
thing I enjoyed most is because I had a little
background of course, you know, Adam and I worked with
(06:39):
a lot of the same people in San Francisco and
Los Angeles and and hearing him very kind of begrudgingly
become a podcaster because he did not know he wanted
to do it, you know, it's just he got fired.
He got fired. So this was just another and it
came out exactly and a friend said, start a podcast,
which is something I've suggested to many radio folks, and
there's a lot of folks who start the podcast after
(07:00):
they lose their gigs in radio. And then he turns
it into one of the biggest podcast empires in the world,
you know, literally from his garage and that's where it started,
in his garage with his friend who pushed him, pushed
him into it, and the whole time, if you listen
to the first episodes, Adam is I'm not sure about
it at all. Yeah, that was in two thousand nine.
(07:21):
Had that started? Since you are the podcast king, can
you give us a little history lesson on podcasting, Well,
podcasting was started in two thousand four, That's that's the
date most people agree on. And it was Adam Curry
who if you don't know, if you're my age. You
know who Adam Curry is because he was on MTV.
(07:42):
He was he was a DJ, and a lot of
people were like, Adam Curry started podcasting. Yeah, he and
another guy I think Dave Dave Winner is his name,
invented it. That they're they're credited with that. And then
the term came around in two thousand four from an
article in The Guardian calling it podcasting. But when it
really really really happened two thousand five, Apple added podcast
(08:02):
to the iTunes store. And that's also the time around
the time when the first iPods came out. So I
was actually at the launch of iPod and didn't know it.
I was I was just moved to San Francisco and
my friend was like, Hey, I'm gonna take you to
the thing at Steve Jobs and I really didn't even
know what I was doing. And it was actually the
launch of iTunes, and I just remember sitting there. I
(08:24):
went to meet Seal. Seal was at the event. I
was like, I'm gonna good Seal. I could care less
about the event. And after the event, people were like,
what do you think of this new iTunes And I'm like,
nobody's gonna pay for this. We're just gonna pay for music.
This is stupid. I got Napster Man. Yeah, and I
got my first iPod. It was you know, this big brick. Yeah,
that's awesome. I didn't know about that at all that
(08:45):
you were at the event. I was at the event. Yeah,
it's like awful circle now it is crazy. Yeah. Yeah,
and you know, and and I'll admit, you know, podcasting
for me is something that it seemed like a means
to an end, and now I look at more as
the beginning of a new medium for for broadcasting. And
(09:05):
it's where you know, I push a lot of you know,
we're pushing a lot of our radio stations to to
do more with podcasting because, uh, everybody likes on demand,
and if you like on demand, then you like podcasting
because it is that is what it is. It's Netflix
for audio, absolutely, And it's also it's nice because well,
as a millennial, I feel like my generation is really
(09:28):
visual people. So if we read an article, we're always
looking for the video component of it. But I've realized
more and more that not just my friends, but people
my age, they listen to podcasts more than they go
on YouTube, you know, like because if you're commuting or
in the car, in the bus, maybe the video won't work.
So you're like, oh, you can always have something to
(09:49):
listen to. And my friends of A and I have
tried to talk about this, but we don't really get
why that is, Like, why do you think podcasting has
hooked millennial? Well, little little number for your thirty three
percent of all podcasts listening happens with millennials only of
it happens with jen X, which is my generations. You
would think that would be the opposite, At least I
would have thought, because usually when you think of a
(10:10):
podcast listener, it's it's a middle aged white dude with
a beard. But that is not the case. A lot
of millennials are listening, and I think a couple of reasons.
Like you said, when you're on you know, especially in
the cities, when you're in public transit, if you look around,
everyone has headphones on, everyone is consuming audio exactly, everybody's
consuming audio. So that that's one reason, I think, and
(10:32):
not the reason is it is a retreat. A podcast
is a retreat from all the other ship that's going
on in the world. So when you're listening to the podcast,
you're in it. You're in it. It's like it's you know,
a lot of folks don't read books anymore, but it's
the same mind. It works the same muscle in your head,
almost like an audiobook essentially, it does, you know, and
(10:52):
and and I think that when you're constantly looking at
screens and looking at video and and and and up there,
it's a job. Certainly. I of like, my phone is
the job, and I'm I'm you know, I am anchored
to it. And when I'm listening to a podcast, I
tend to not do all that other stuff, you know.
I might like maybe look through a news feed or something,
(11:13):
but for the most part, I try to just kind
of chill, relax and listen to the podcast. So I
think that's it. I think a lot of the students
that that I teach like podcasting to do it as well,
because it is such a free medium for them and
it is something new, you know, where every all of
you guys do video. You just mentioned you teach students
(11:34):
at the Academy of our university, our university, and you
teach a podcasting class, not just a radio class. So
for your students or for anybody listening, that have always
had an interest in podcasting. What do you think what
is the way to start one? Well, I'll say this,
the first way to start one is to have, first
of all, listen to podcasts. I can't tell you how
(11:55):
many people tell me I want to start a podcast,
and like what's your favorite podcast? And they have Yeah,
they have no answer. It's like, well, that's the first thing.
Know the medium that you want to be in, and
know it well, and and listen to a variety of
shows so that you have some ideas of like there's
these kind of shows, and these kind of shows, and
these kind of shows. There's interview shows, and there's storytelling
shows and journalism shows. Second of all, have an original idea,
(12:17):
don't you? And your thoughts are not interesting to very
many people. Honestly, you could. You could be very funny
and very interesting, but nobody is going to say I'm
gonna listen to that podcast because it's got Jimmy's thoughts
and feelings and Jimmy's talking about you know, things that
Jimmy sees in the news. I don't know who Jimmy is.
(12:37):
Those podcasts work if you're a celebrity, because I'm I
love Anna ferris All. What is Anna ferris All? I
heard love her. She's so funny. I would listen to
our podcast exactly. But nobody knows who you are. So
have an interesting idea. Try to have a unique as
we say in the marketing business, the USP, a unique
selling proposition um, and then produce it well. The problem
(13:00):
with a lot of podcasts is that they're poorly produced.
You know, it's so easy right now to go buy
a really good USB microphone, hook it into your computer
and use Audacity, which is free or audition is what
I suggest, and and do a quality recording, then add music,
and then edit, edit, edit, edit. Nobody wants to hear
all the ums and os and And that's the one
(13:21):
thing lazy students tell me all the time, which is
I want to hear my oms and oz because it
makes me sound more real. Nobody wants to hear that.
In fact, how many ms and ohs do you have
to edit out of my show every week? A lot?
A lot. I'm an omana guy, which is fine, but
you need to edit that stuff out. And then the
other thing is to do it, do it, do it,
do it, do it, do it every day. If you
(13:44):
do it, once a week. Do it, do it once
a week. Stay consistent. Don't get into the habit of
putting one off for a week. That's really bad for
your listeners. And you have to be patient too. You're
not going to build an audience up right away. Like
we have podcasts. We have twenty six podcasts here in
San Francisco, and we are still the audiences are growing
because it's new for most of our listeners and it's
(14:04):
new for the host as well. So we have to
constantly like be patient. You know, this is a new
medium and it is growing and it is expanding, but
it doesn't happen overnight for any show, for any show.
We're trying to grow this show right now, and and
it's and some days I look at the numbers and
I go, what are we doing wrong? So we're doing
anything wrong, it's just it's just not happened yet. And
(14:25):
that's the thing that happens with most shows. There will
be an episode, somebody will share it, other people will
get into it, and then that's what it starts. And
then they go back and listen to what episodes, and
all of a sudden, you've went from a few hundred
people listening to an episode to a few thousand. It
happens that fast, but you have to be patient. I
like that, and I mean going back to producing it. Well,
I think a lot of my generation, and I mean
(14:47):
I think podcast listeners are more are they hear better
quality now? They don't just like put something on it
like okay, it's whatever. Because I can't tell you how
many times I've started a new podcast and I've heard
lytches in the audio and stuff that they haven't fixed,
and I'm like, oh, I don't want to listen to
this anymore because I want to feel like they care
about the podcast enough to put it out and make
(15:07):
me want to care about it. Yeah. I mean this
is there is a lot of money being put into
podcasting right now, so there was a lot of high
quality podcast so if you expect to uh compete with them,
you have to be high quality. That don't get me wrong.
If you're just doing a podcast that about your passion,
you know, your passion is is Purple Teddy Bears and
you just want to talk about purple Teddy Bears and
(15:29):
find other people that like Purple Teddy Bears, you know,
that's that's a very niche thing. And you you know,
that's the different story. But even that, do the best
you can. Yeah, that's what it is, Do the best
you can. What are your three favorite podcast at the moment? Okay,
the first one I want to start with is one
(15:50):
that almost every guest that has been on this show,
all five of them have said when we've asked them,
what what was the last podcast you binged? And it
was s Town now as Town came together a result
of a message from an Alabama resident uh to a
producer for Cereal. Also, those are all the same guys
serial of This American Life. They all came out of
(16:11):
the same camp. And this guy despises his town and
wants to do something about it and wants to investigate
this wealthy family who's been bragging about getting away with murder.
That's what you think you're getting into when you start
the podcast. Where it goes from There is not anything
where it starts. Um, this is just a beautifully well
done podcast. It's well done because you care about the
(16:35):
people in it. They tell a really good story and
and it's always it's always I almost I almost get
choked up thinking about it because it is It is
an emotional journey. And when we do good podcasts, we
create empathy, and we paint pictures and we take you somewhere.
(16:56):
And this is what this podcast does. Yeah. I remember
when s Town came out. I sat on my couch,
I listened to all of the episodes at once. I
don't think I've ever cried over a podcast as much
as said, like you talking about it now makes me
think of the episodes and his voice and everything, and
it makes me choked up. And it was beautiful. Here's
a little taste, but I suggest go back listen to
(17:18):
the first one. But here you go, something's happened. Something
has absolutely happened in this town. There's just too much
little crap for something not to have happened. And I'm
about had enough ship Town and things that goes on gorgeous.
(17:48):
I mean, his voice gets me every time. Yeah, yeah,
go listen to that. That like, finish this one, then
go listen to that. Okay, I got another podcast for you,
a little more on the fun side. This is one
that's been around for a long time. It's WTF with
Mark Maron. Now. Mark Marin was as a comedian and actor.
Uh and not a lot of people know if you
(18:10):
didn't listen to Air America. He was the host of
the morning show on Air America. Now Are America Blew Up?
And Mark started this podcast again about the same time
ten years ago when we were starting Stitcher. So I
remember Mark came in and I did a podcast kind
of like this one for Stitcher, and and we did
an interview. And the one thing that Mark did that
(18:30):
I think a lot of podcasters have learned from him
is Mark will go on every podcast he can. When,
especially when he was starting, he'd go on any podcast
he could as a guest because he's a great guest,
and then he would people would say he's very funny. Oh,
I'm gonna go listen to his podcast. So there's another
tip for you podcasters. Go on as many shows as
you can so people find out about your podcast. Um.
(18:50):
Mark is a great interviewer and I love I think
Howard Stern is the best interviewer in the world. If
you don't think that's the truth, and I don't know
what's wrong with you, but Mark's really up there too.
He he might be a close second. And he gets interviews.
And the thing is this is a podcast, and he
gets interviews with everybody, including President Barack Obama while he
(19:11):
was president. I have to listen to that. Check it
out here this well, you used to live around here?
I did. Yeah, I was explaining to folks, pass it in,
these are my old haunts. Man. And and you how
close is that in your memory? Does it come right back? Absolutely? Yeah,
through somewhat of a haze. I mean it was college.
So how old are you like twenty right, and you
(19:32):
went right down the street. I've been down and it's
how far away from you are you from that guy? Now?
I mean, do you can you lock into that? Can
you find that in yourself? Truth? I'm an entrepreneur. I
am fascinated by, you know, business building. We talked to
Andy Holloway from Fantasy Footballer's last week and he you
know the same thing. I think a lot of folks.
(19:52):
You know, if you didn't listen last week, it's a
really good interview. But you know, a podcast is a startup.
It's a startup. It's a business. You know, if you
want to make money. It is. So Alex starts with
his pitch, how he pitched investors. It is and because
of him, I started a little company. I was like,
oh my God, I have an idea for I have
a brain of content company. I was like, oh, let's
start that. Um. The rest of the seasons are great.
(20:15):
They talked about different kinds of people in startup faces,
but that first season is brilliant. That's going on my list,
so check it out. Are you meeting someone with money?
This is my wife, nazanin early one morning a couple
of months ago, stopping me as I was on my
way out the door to do something I'd never done before.
Meet a guy who works at a venture capital firm
(20:37):
and try to get him to give me money to
invest in my business, a podcast business. There you go.
There's there's my starting point. But here's what I'm going
to tell you. If you have an interest, go to
I Heart Radio or your podcast provider, and there's curated lists.
Go look at those lists. Those lists are done by
(20:57):
people who want you to find certain parts. They want
you to find good ones because I want you to
keep listening to podcasts at the end of the day.
That's one of the other things I love about this
business is we all support each other. We just want
people to listen to podcasts. That's why no matter what
company you work I work for I Heart Radio, but
we're on iTunes, We're on Stitcher, we're on Google Play.
You know. We just want people to listen to podcasts. Um,
(21:18):
So go to those curated lists and see and see
what's what's on there, what's recommended, find something that you like.
If you have a local radio station that you love,
go check out their website, see if they have a podcast.
If they have a podcast, go check it out and
see and see what it's like. You know, it's a
lot of fun. Yeah. I actually have two of my
own okay suggests, actually three, Okay, so my first one
(21:38):
is pod Save America, which is by Crocket Media, and
it's four guys from that used to work for the
Obama administration. There were speech writers and like spokespeople for
him and for someone that maybe not isn't like fully
into politics, but I want to know about what's going
on in politics, especially now. This is the greatest one.
(21:59):
They add much to it. They bring in um, congressmen
and people running for office and just tell you how
to get involved. And I think, um, what you if
you're not agreeing with the current administration, or even if
you are, this is such a great podcast to just
dive into and get involved and do something to help
your country. I see you and every other UH person
(22:22):
that works in our department tweeting about this show, and
I've not listened to it, so I'm exus to hear
his taste of it. This morning. Donald Trump's former campaign
chairman Paul Manafort and his partner and former Trump advisor
Rick Gates were each indicted on one count of conspiracy
against the United States, one kund of conspiracy to under
money one kind of acting is an unregistered agent of
a foreign principle, two counts of making false statements, and
(22:44):
four counts of failing to report foreign bank accounts. Manafort
turned himself into. Forgot is also one count of but
what about the uranium? Alright, So that's pots of American.
My next one is called ear Hustle and there by Radiotopia.
It's actually super interesting. I heard about it through a
friend and it's with two inmates from the San Quentin
(23:07):
State Prison and um barrier artists. Her name is Nigel Poor.
So the two guys are Irlan and Antoine and they're
serving like thirty years to life for fifteen years, and
everything is done in the prison. They only have a
few hours of the day. They have a media lab,
they sound designed, they edit. Everything has to be done
in the prison. And not only that they have before
(23:29):
they put out the episode, it has to be approved
by the information officer at the prison. And your hustle
in prison talk means eavesdropping. And so it's just all
these different fun um interviews and what prison life is like,
what having a cellmate is like, or getting a date
to get out of prison, and everybody always they always say,
(23:50):
like people think that they know because of TV shows
what it's like to be in prison, and you never do.
So this is really great if you ever wanted to know.
I'm fascinated. There's only three ways off the Shoe debrief Parole,
our pine box me I accepted the fact that I
was going to get out of there in a pine box.
(24:14):
We're going to be hearing a lot about the shoe
on this episode, so maybe we should first explain what
the shoe is. The shoe is an acronym that stands
for the security housing unit. It's the whole, the box,
the dungeon, and in some states it's called solitary confinement.
All right, And my last one is another shout out
to a show that we do in San Francisco. Oh yeah, heart.
(24:35):
So it's Two Girls One podcast with Carolyn mccartell and
Sandy Stack, and it is single Life over thirty five
for women over thirty five. And I'm not in that
age range, but it's so relatable. They are hilarious. I
come in and I listened to it. If there's a
new episode and they're super unfiltered, and if you just
want a good laugh, listen to Two Girls One podcast.
(24:57):
But I know that there are people that get that
have been on Tender and things happen. Dude, my friend
got married from from Tinder, which didn't Tinder used to
be only like it was an unspoken rule that Tinder
was only for hookups, right, and now people are getting married.
It's like match dot com. What's next, plenty of fish?
Who knows. I'm sure it's out there. I'm sure it's
and they have a kid now, my friend, Um, so
(25:18):
it can't. There are exceptions to every rule that shows
good for guys too. I listen, I laughed. I listened
every of course, I listen. I love it. I listened
every week. Well those are good, So those are starts
for you folks that are new to podcasting, and like
I said, the best way is to just go and look.
Go find some podcasts and listen to them and and
and find something good that you like and then share
(25:39):
it with people. That's the other thing, you know, and
this this business is new and we need people to
tell people about podcasting. So if you love podcasting, go
out and share it. Share this podcast. That would be fantastic.
We'd really like that. Also, go on our iTunes page
and rate and review. That's also a big way to
help out your favorite podcast. Um can also follow us
(26:00):
go on Facebook Access Podcast and on Twitter at access
podcast one. Still waiting so waiting to get the real
Access podcast but whatever, follow us there. So I hope
you'll enjoyed listening to our special podcast week edition of
(26:22):
Access Podcast. If this is the first time you've listened
to this podcast, go back and listen to some past episodes.
We've got some great guests that we've had on over
the past. We've been doing the show for almost two months,
so go check them out. Access Podcast is produced by
z engineers David Williams and Horse Swang. Artwork by Dalon Runberg.
Music im post by Casey Franco special thanks to the
podcast guru god of I Heart Radio, Chris Peterson, Don Parker,
(26:45):
and Katie Willcox at I Heeart Radio, San Francisco. You
can follow us on Facebook Access Podcasts, follow me at
Maddie Stout m A T T Y s t a
U d T on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, and you
can download the iHeart Radio app if you have it already,
go to the podcast section, listen, share and tell your friends.
Thanks by m HM
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations.
The Nikki Glaser Podcast
Every week comedian and infamous roaster Nikki Glaser provides a fun, fast-paced, and brutally honest look into current pop-culture and her own personal life.
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.