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terrestrial stream, and guess what? That
hasn’t been very successful compared to
the pureplay streamers.
With podcasting, broadcasters get
another crack at a digital product. I’d
love to see more original content, more
innovation. There are passionate and
articulate people at every station in
America who aren’t even on the air. Why
not lend them production facilities and
expertise and let them tell the stories
that make them light up? Audiences
might, too.Mark Asquith: Embracing experimental
formats within podcasting. Radio has
the data on what their audience wants,
so rather than replicating that, why not
take what the audience wants and push
the boundaries a little? I’d be delighted
to see radio taking a few risks in this
space and putting its considerable audio
heritage to great use to drive what’s
possible with audio forward.Dave Beasing: That’s easy — providing
relevant local on-demand audio content.
But to be honest, whether “radio” does
that won’t matter. It will happen, and it
will compete for audience. As a contentcreator rather than an owner of trans-
mitters, which companies deliver pod-
casts isn’t my concern. Listeners don’t
care either. It all comes out of the same
speakers.Rob Greenlee: Taking current radio tal-
ent and recruiting new podcast talent
to drive local audience to radio station
podcasts/streaming, and eventually
de-emphasize the radio side in market-
ing and just push digital in the
market, as everyone knows the radio
side is there already.Matt Cundill: Radio needs to change the
way it thinks about podcast. It is not a
competing monster that is going to eat
all your ad money. It is an on-demand
audio platform. Live and on-demand are
different media approaches to the end
user. It should be looked upon as a mar-
keting opportunity for your brands and
personalities first.
Radio also needs to understand that
it is hard to create a good podcast. Even
harder to create a great one. It takes me
between six and eight hours a week (and
a team of two) to make a 30- to 45-min-
ute podcast episode about radio. Rewardproducers and talent who create pod-
casts for you. (Think revenue-sharing.)
Don’t make it part of the talent’s job
description and think you have checked
the podcast box off your to-do list.Radio Ink: Can podcasting really
become a strong revenue generator for
radio? If so, what do you see as the best
model?
Tom Webster: Possibly, but not as
another way to consume existing broad-
cast content. That’s incremental revenue
at best and a value-add to a spot buy
at worst. Local radio stations broker a
relationship between the citizens of that
community and the local businesses
that serve them — I think there are mar-
velous opportunities to create native,
branded content that is not an adver-
tisement for those businesses, but truly
serves a community purpose. Radio has
the production assets and the creativity
to do this.
What I hope we don’t see is radio
using podcasts as another place to dump
broadcast ads. When you listen to a
podcast, your headspace is very differ-
ent than when you listen to, say, a local
radio station in your car. Nothing will
pull you out of that headspace quicker
than a screaming local car commercial.
I hope radio doesn’t turn their podcasts
into a wasteland of remnant advertising.Elsie Escobar: It can, but it needs to be
positioned correctly with proper expec-
tations.
Again, it’s not radio. It’s a marathon,
not a sprint. One way in which podcast-
ing can yield faster results would be to
have podcasts as part of the marketing
and brand department instead of busi-
ness operations.
Netflix has been doing a fantastic job
in creating relevant, unique podcasts
that are set up to highlight and expand
on their core business — getting people
to sign up for their service. They offer
insider companion podcasts for their
content and also go behind the scenes
at Netflix, the company. They are not
directly making money with those
shows, they are using those shows to
develop deeper relationships with their
most powerful and sticky content as well
as cultivating brand loyalty.Rob Greenlee, VP/Content & Partnerships, Libsyn