This is an automatically generated transcript of the PodPod episode ‘The Smart 7: The secret to short-form success’. We apologise for any errors in spelling and grammar.
Rhianna Dhillon
Hello and welcome to PodPod, the podcast all about podcasting made by podcasters. My name is Rhianna Dhillon. And I'm joined this week by Andrea Fox, broadcaster, podcaster. And live continuity announcer for ITV One. Hello, Andrea.
Andrea Fox
Hi. Lovely to chat to you Rihanna. How are you?
Rhianna
Lovely to have you back. And we also have Adam Shepherd, editor of PodPod. Hi, Adam.
Adam Shepherd
Hello Rhianna.
Rhianna
Adam, you have always got something going on. And I feel like this week is no exception. What have you been up to?
Adam
So this week was very exciting for me. I chaired our first ever live PodPod roundtable, which was an industry discussion with some of the great and the good of podcasting, including representatives from the IAB, Publicis Media, The Guardian, Acast and Fresh Air Productions.
Andrea
Just a few important names there, Adam.
Adam
Yeah, not to name-drop or anything.
Rhianna
So how, yeah, How nervous were you going into that room?
Adam
A little, to be honest, it's always it's always a little bit intimidating chairing a discussion like that, cause you get a bit of the old imposter syndrome. And kind of the feeling that oh, these are all really experienced, kind of knowledgeable people in the industry. And now I have to, you know, intelligently contribute to discussions with them, which is a little bit scary, but it was a really fun, lively conversation that we ended up having, you'll be able to read a full write up of the discussion on podpod.com in the near future. But it was a really solid conversation.
Rhianna
Give us the skinny then what exactly did you go into depth about?
Adam
So we were talking about how to build audiences and revenue within podcasting. And as part of that, we talked about a huge range of things, including the importance of TikTok for marketing strategies, talked about various kind of monetization options, including things like sponsorships and partnerships, as well as Patreon style monetization options. But one of the biggest things we talked about was the growth of daily podcasting and daily news podcasting, in particular, as a really sort of significant trend. Of course, The News Agents is something that I feel like I bring up every week on this podcast. But that is a really good example of how that genre is, is growing in kind of significance. And that that sort of format.
Rhianna
Andrea, I know that you're a huge fan of daily podcasts, and I think sometimes I might dip in and out. But tell us about kind of like the latest, the latest gossip going on with daily podcasts.
Andrea
The latest goss, I suppose when we think about like, especially news podcasts, I suppose the New York Times Daily is probably one of those first ones that I was like, Oh, wow, this is every day, I get to listen to this every day. And it was obviously such high quality. And I think in terms of podcast listeners, when we're asked what we want more of, it's often more of the same, please, more of what I like and thinking of Podmasters, for example, who make Oh God What Now, I think they have gone from making that once a week to now having a sort of offshoot where they make a different podcast every single day. And have even increased the main podcast to twice a week. So I think that goes to show how much when you have an engaged audience. It is difficult, isn't it? What they want more of is more of what you have spent hours and hours preparing. An honorary mention of course, if we think about short form, which leads on to the day's wonderful guests, that we're gonna be speaking to very shortly. But the daily podcast winner at this year's Podcast Awards, is Everyday Positivity by Kate Cocker, a podcast, which is every day, and it's two minutes long. Why didn't I think of that? Schlepping over doing my edits.
Rhianna
Such an easy win, I can't believe that. I mean, it's really interesting, isn't it? You're saying so people want more and more. But for podcasters they're trying to do it in such a kind of short turnaround with a daily podcast. I'm really interested to hear about our guests today, as you alluded to, are going to say about the turnaround for The Smart 7, because we are talking to Jamie East and Liam Thompson from The Smart 7 podcast and I think that's going to be a big takeaway. How long does it take to create a seven minute daily podcast and edit it and publish it and to do that every day? And I think also just finding the motivation to do that every day; a two minute one you know kind of does seem more manageable, seven somehow is like a step above. It seems short, but yet they've got to cram so much in.
Andrea
And keep it up to date, topical.
Rhianna
The research that goes into these podcasts astounds me. So we got to chat to Jamie East and Liam Thompson from The Smart 7 podcast. Andrea joined me as well and so did Matt Hill, regular contributor. So here you go, Jamie and Liam.
Thank you so much for joining us on PodPod. So let me ask you up top, why seven? Why smart seven? Why not any other number?
Jamie
Well, this is one of those sliding door moments that has robbed us of an hour sleep every day. For the last three years, if we'd have chosen the smart eight, yeah, we'd have had an hour longer to do one more story, which just feels like an absolute luxury at the moment. I think it was more the fact that seven in the morning was the kind of sweet spot that we wanted to hit. And then we got carried away with the seven theme.
Liam
Yeah. So I come from a kind of radio background, and we are addicted to alliteration. So it would have to be in the like, early eight or something if it wasn't smart, seven. So you just lean into the seven, seven things seven minutes, 7am, seven days a week...
Jamie
seven days a week was one that came later. Yeah. It just felt kind of right. We when we kind of sketched it out on the - I mean, it's gonna sound dreadfully media - when we're sketched out on the back of a beer mat in the Groucho Club.
Rhianna
Oh, my goodness.
Jamie
Yeah. Which is, I have to say is the only time that Liam and I've met in the Groucho.
Liam
True!
Jamie
Yeah, it was just sketched out very quickly, in terms of the format was, like, the seven just felt like a good number to include a story about most things that people are interested in, in the UK. So you know, a politics, a sport, a human interest, a celeb, you know, that kind of thing. And seven just felt about right. Still does to be fair. Yeah.
Rhianna
You mentioned Liam, that you're from radio. So what makes shortform daily news podcast different from just morning radio news roundups?
Liam
Part of it is that it is based on the kind of bones of radio news. So there's a familiarity to it, that the kind of radio is stubbornly, you know, lateral, we just keep broadcasting live. And that's what we do. And there's a lot of good stuff in that linear kind of feed that they do, particularly in the morning, waiting for that news bulletin to pop up at the top of the hour, when you don't have to wait for anything else, it felt like there was a good chance to kind of take that and kind of atomize it and make it available whenever you want it. So the art to it, is making it current and as on the money as possible. And that's why we get up at five every morning to make sure that the storylines are all kind of in the right place, but also having the right audio to it so that you get that sort of authentic, so when we talk about Boris, you hear Boris, you know, and that it has that sort of ring of sounding like a proper news bulletin feel to it as well.
Rhianna
I know you had to get up really early this morning to catch a flight as well. So what happens then when your morning schedule is, you know, interrupted, how are you still able to have that production meeting?
Jamie
I don't go anywhere without a Neumann mic in my bag. I literally travel the world with my Smart 7 kit, right. But I mean, we're lucky enough now to be at a stage where we've got people working on it with us. So we've got a team that work on it now. So if Liam or I, you know, we have managed like a holiday this year, both of us, which was not together. But you know, we've got a team that work on it. So then there's people that are working, you know, prepping in the evening. So that actually, we try to make the mornings as un-horrific as possible, but in the early days, they were just all horrific. Now they're less horrific, unless something happens overnight.
Rhianna
You talk about those horrific early days. What were some of the kind of big pitfalls when you were first starting out doing this?
Jamie
Well just because I'd made podcasts before, but they're not not news and not daily. And as the radio bulletin kind of style, we try and keep it as close to live as possible. So we don't record the script. Until we absolutely have to. We've got it down to a fine art. Now we can we can record and edit it in a terrifyingly short amount of time,
Rhianna
Which is?
Jamie
I think the quickest from from me starting the read to it been published about 13 minutes.
Rhianna
13!
Andrea
Wow.
Rhianna
One three.
Jamie
We have the most amazing kind of production kind of thing. The secret sauce is pretty, pretty interesting to watch. 13 minutes is our record. But you know, in the early days, we knew what we were doing in terms of the content, in terms of writing and in terms of the sound and the production. But to actually get it out of the door on time. The first episode was terrifying. It was just horrific.
Liam
Yeah, we we always before we launch anything, we always do dry runs. So you do you know the first week is getting the content right. The second week is getting it out on the time, but just the time just disappears. It just like runs out. You look up and it's oh my god, we've three minutes left before it's due to go out. And any little hiccup like that you're going oh my god. You know, I don't think anyone's waking up and grabbing their phone and going it's 6.59, where is it?
Andrea
They might be.
Liam
I think that kind of attention to detail and the kind of we really kind of, it should always be seven minutes. It certainly always has seven things but it should be out at 7am.
Jamie
And I think also, we've learned how the new cycle works more as we've developed as well, we we've, we've, you know, I've worked in news but only in TV before. And so like we were getting up with a fresh blank sheet of paper, it's like, right, what's what's on today. Whereas actually, the further you know, within six months, we'd realised that thing, you know, this follows the paper cycle. So most things are already in bed by by 8pm. So, actually, if we just kind of sketched it out the night before, and left enough wiggle room to kind of react to anything that changes, we maybe don't have to get up at four. Although then when you start going into Europe, you have to get up at four.
Liam
Yeah, we went the wrong way, we should have gone to America. And we went to Germany instead. And it was a whole other. And the difference between 4am and 5am is, oh my God, every minute, it's more painful, the further back you go kind of thing. We did about three weeks of getting up at four and then both of us kind of went, I really think they should probably be fine now.
Jamie
These guys, yeah, they can take the lead.
Rhianna
I want to get more into your German expansion later. But just quickly talk us through that production schedule for your morning bulletin.
Jamie
Okay, so we, you know, try to run like a newspaper, if you know anyone that's got an experience of working in a print newspaper, remember them, you know, know that there's usually a conference at kind of early afternoon to kind of talk about the, I guess the big things that are coming up, whether that's PMQs, or any statements that are coming out, or what's likely to come out in the states at kind of 6pm time; very kind of top level stuff. What's already out there, what film trailers are out there, is it a Love Island finale, is it... all you know, all of that kind of stuff, where Liam, myself, you know, there's many team members that are on shift that day, kind of join in the old Zoom, everyone has, it's quite relaxed, where someone presents, we've got it, we've got a great person called Lucy, who kind of brings a lot of clips. So we've got like, a load of audio to listen to and work out. Because sometimes the story is fantastic. But the audio is not great. And that's no good to us, you know.
Rhianna
So every story needs a clip.
Jamie
Every story needs a clip. Yeah, that's that's and you know, as we sometimes if the story is brilliant, but there really is no clip, we might, you know, we sometimes go and source our clips ourself or we will approach people; we're not, we don't have the resource of a Sky News or a Global or a Bauer to kind of like send a reporter down to Downing Street. But more often than not, we'd be able to get a statement from someone you know, phone Clare Nasir when there's a heatwave, you know, things like that. Someone activate Nasir! So that happens, so we do that at one o'clock, then we'll scurry away for a few hours, and come back at five with a bit more of a concrete plan where the seven items are in broad shape, in terms of what the clips are going to be, what the what the what the items are, maybe shift the order about a little bit, it depends, you know, a lot of the early, earlier part of this year through party gate and through Boris and stuff, there was so much politics to get in there that you know often took the top two stories, so we're trying to work out is the opposition shouting at Boris the lead story or is Boris shouting the opposition the lead story, it's that kind of kind of thing that Liam's got a great knack for. So that happens at 5pm. Then between five and eight, we have people that are pulling together the clips writing the scripts, as best we can, getting the Audition templates into some kind of rough format ready to go in the morning. And then in the morning, Germany, we'll talk about Germany. But luckily Germany is early. So we've already got an editor on shift like pulling it together. So by the time the UK has come, the UK team have already had a chance to go Has anything changed? Do we need to adjust anything? If not press the button. And that's when I rub the sleep from my eyes and press record.
Liam
There's quite a structure in it. So the each of the slots is kind of different. So seven, six, tend to be kind of front page, you know, broadsheet headline kind of stories, five, maybe five has been Ukraine quite a lot. Four would be kind of an interesting kind of inside page of The Times kind of story, maybe environment or something like that. Three is sport. Two then is you know, celebrity interview or an entertainment, showbiz, TV maybe. And then one would either be a trailer or an obituary or a kind of bigger story that kind of from the entertainment world so that we know roughly what we need for each of the different slots. So there's a kind of a rhythm to it. We go well, that's more of a seven than a six kind of thing. Yeah. And everybody knows Oh, yeah, obviously. What was I thinking.
Rhianna
What if you can't find...
Jamie
We've never had that. I mean, we've been one thing that we're really grateful of in doing this is that, you know, we launched this at the beginning of the pandemic. It was originally supposed to be a podcast for commuters. We launched it like two weeks into lockdown. One thing that we found is that there is always news. There really is just always news. Yeah, this is never going to stop. Yeah.
Matt
Can I ask about ad spots? You always midroll or did you entertain pre roll and what were the mistakes you learned along the way to get to where you are now?
Jamie
That's a really interesting question. So because the podcast is only seven minutes, when we first launched, there was a slight kind of push and pull with Acast, just they don't they didn't have mid roll slots for anything under 10 minutes. That was their kind of like thing. We were just kind of like, well, you need to change that. And so we actually got Acast to rewrite their, their platform to allow ads to The Smart 7, which, in turn, actually, in hindsight, they're now probably very grateful for as well. It's a tricky one, it often depends on how much we've got booked, as anyone listening in to podcast knows some weeks are better than others. Sometimes you over oversell, sometimes you undersell, and the occasions that we've got, we've got to get stuff away, we'll have post roll, we generally try and stay clear of pre rolls just because I think most people do really just want to get to the good stuff. And when you've only got seven minutes to capture someone, having a one minute kind of pre roll especially if it's from a brand is quite a tricky sell, I think. We don't do any sponsorship reads that are generally longer than a minute anyway. And minute's like really pushing it. I think for a seven minute podcast if you if you put that to an hour podcast, no one will listen to a 10 minute read, you know, so yeah. So we we generally keep it as minimal as possible. And you know, and we've done really well; we spend a lot of time we're really proud of the of the ads and the reads that we make because we we make them entertaining, we make them interesting, we make them something that the clients are like, super happy with. And actually, they, no one likes hearing those lazy-arse reads with someone clearly never having even seen this mattress is telling you to buy this mattress.
Liam
We don't get, well, we don't get a lot of sleep, maybe that's why we don't get mattress ads.
Matt
It's quite rare, isn't it in the, in sort of news to have the presenter endorse a product.
Jamie
It's a really straightforward answer to that is because of the way that that most news podcasts are made and run, they're usually run by like, you take News UK or Wireless for example, or Global or Bauer, they're just add ons to the radio service. So it would make no sense for them to try and get, pull Rachel Jewell, who does the Times one to kind of like can you just kind of sit down and try and sell as a HelloFresh box? That's just it doesn't make any sense because they swap and change. And also commercially? That's quite a tricky chat for them to have with each with each host. Cause everybody knows, you know, the second that sponsorship reads come in? That's when that's when the deal usually changes with the with the presenters. Actually, yeah, hang on a sec…
Liam
No, no, don't worry. Don't worry about it.
Matt
What about the the engagement then, of an episode, when you look at sort of like that kind of the that midroll slot, do you see people that skip and come back? Or do they like literally drop off? Like do you get...
Liam
It holds pretty well. Yeah. And again, that's the kind of, so we back to the design and the structure and the kind of, I could probably talk for an hour about formats and the importance of of knowing what the format of your podcast is and how the structure should work. But we designed it with a midroll in mind. And again, that's back to that kind of radio bulletins often have a bullseye spot or a break spot in the middle. And that's the kind of you know, we write forward sells in, you know, you've got sports and entertainment on the way which are good kind of hooks through. And again, the style of you know, we write the reads meticulously, we produce them meticulously so that they should feel like part of the experience as opposed to the guy from Cillit Bang shouting about you know, cleaning your carpet or whatever. There's a feel to it that should be consistent to the overall sound.
Andrea
What was it that made you think it's short form; short form's what we're, what we're going for.
Jamie
So at the time, before we did it, I was producing a lot of stuff for Netflix, podcasts. I'd done, I got a series called Previously On, which was like a catch up kind of thing about what was going on in Game of Thrones and Succession and all those kinds of shows, and it was all fine and doing well. And I built a relationship with the platforms through that. So I had contacts at Apple and Spotify and Audible and all those kind of guys. And it was just genuinely a sense. They tipped me off, really, I was like, you know, there is no such thing as a free lunch. You know, I kind of what are you guys looking for? What is the next big thing? They were like, we're looking for short and daily. So it's like, Okay, fine. Then Liam and I sat down a few weeks later and said, Well, I know that we've got to do short and daily. So it wasn't that tricky to come up with The Smart 7, we're with with our both of our backgrounds and having that kind of, I guess a slight open open door is like, right, if we come up with something compelling and short and daily, then there's nothing and at the time, there was very little else out there. Like I mean, maybe two? I mean, there's obviously The Daily but in the UK, maybe the Guardian were doing theirs? I can't even remember what it's called now. No offence, The Guardian. Don't think they'll, don't think they'll care.
Matt
Today in Focus.
Jamie
That's the one and then I get mixed up with the Times one, the Times News Briefing. Oh no, The Story of Our Times is the daily one from the Times as well, isn't it? Yeah. Which is longer form, which is about 15 minutes long. So actually, it wasn't, it wasn't a huge leap to come up with The Smart 7. And because of the my style, my presenting style and my taste, you know, kind of visual the visuals that we'd done with like Holy Moly, and Previously On stuff, marrying Liam and I's kind of like aesthetics and kind of principles, The Smart 7, there was very little, there was very little conversation really about how, it pretty form formed itself pretty quickly, I'd say in like, maybe a week, two weeks, we kind of had the whole thing nailed.
Rhianna
What was your sort of editorial approach in terms of, you know, if you were leaning any particular way?
Liam
So we try and pitch it as as straight down the middle as as possible. But arguably, we lean a little more to the left than to the right. But it's, we pitch it as sort of factual and straight. Really, also, we've, you know, I've got 12 seconds to explain to you exactly what happened in Ukraine overnight, because we've got a clip of audio and we've got, you know, that so, the, the compactness of the space itself, means you have to write really lean, you know, so we try to write that it's so it's both lean, and also, you know, factually rich. So that means, you know, names and positions, and all of those kinds of things are in there. So you come away feeling that you've learned something from it kind of thing. So there's not a lot of space in there for tone or attitude. And we had a bit of fun, back in the Matt Hancock days.
Jamie
They're a gift.
Rhianna
Never heard gift and Matt Hancock in the same sentence, but yeah.
Jamie
We just used, I mean, I'm not a news reader, I'm not kind of, I'm never going to be a Sky News newsreader, I've just, I just haven't got it in me to be that impartial. And there's only so there's only so much you can you can kind of like, hide in your, you know, they say, say it with a smile, you know, there's there's the opposite as well, when you're talking about certain things that are happening. So we kind of lean into that. But I think when Gavin Williamson was the minister of pantos for a while...
Liam
That was Oliver Dowden.
Jamie
That was Oliver Dowden.
Liam
Oh no he isn't.
Jamie
So we used to every time he mentioned the word Oliver Dowden, we had a little Punch and Judy 'oh no he isn't!' in the background, and, you know, little things like that, that actually, you know, because we're independent we can get away with and I don't think... we are pretty balanced in who we take the mickey out of. But it's that's just how it is, you know, that more often than not, it's the it's the right that get the mickey taken out of them more because they've, they've kind of asked for it a bit more lately, you know, and I'm sure, in a few years time, if we're three years into a Labour Government, the same would be said for them as well. It's just that they're at the top of the tree and get a shoeing, you know, from everybody and if you're talking about Matt Hancock and his downfall, you cannot cannot do that story, that that story, you know, when the day after him getting caught with his hands on her backside. It was just how can anyone report that without just chuckling away and just kind of going, what a berk.
Andrea
Feeling a bit sick?
Jamie
So you know, our listeners like The Smart 7 because it does carry a bit of that attitude, does carry bit of that personality. And it's not the Times, and it's not the Guardian, and it's not the New York Times. It's it's read by someone with an East Midlands accent, who's you can tell it's just taking the piss a little bit.
Andrea
Why Germany as well? So you've got the Northern Ireland edition.
Rhianna
Which is brilliant.
Liam
Well, technically the Ireland, Ireland edition.
Andrea
Sorry, Ireland edition, following up your expanding into Europe?
Liam
Yeah. So this is part of the kind of, so part of the idea was that actually well, and that comes back to the kind of formatting so we we built a format and you kind of go, again, from my kind of radio background you go well actually, generally formats, once you have something established as a format, you can actually go and test that work in different markets. And the Irish thing started as it was a really sort of easy thing to do. We looked at the Irish Apple charts, there really wasn't much like Irish content in the Apple news charts. And we kind of went well actually, we could make an Irish edition. And we had, we occasionally swapped presenters on the other editions, we started with a guy and then switched to a girl called Ciara Revins, who works for a radio station in Cork. And she's a great reader. So there are probably two or three different stories in the Ireland edition. But actually, there's even the way that she reads it versus Jamie's read. And they're just a slight contextualization of UK Prime Minister and little things like that seem to make it work quite well. And so we're kind of going well, actually, maybe this could go further. And, again, we spoke to Acast and Acast gave us a kind of list of these are markets where we think this would work. So you know, there's useful insight like, we don't feel like France would be a market that this might work in, but Germany or Spain might be markets that are worth looking at,
Rhianna
Do you know why not, sorry?
Jamie
As Liam just explained, the beauty of doing the Irish edition was that there were so many kind of, in inverted commas, 'global stories' that would would carry across across the water. So you know, without setting up a whole brand new team and having someone you know, running a whole team over there coming up with seven new stories every day, actually, the Irish tradition, three new stores. And that's actually something that we can soak up ourselves or have someone on a bureau in there to do. And Germany was seen as one of the examples of a territory that also are interested in what Boris is up to, and Biden's up to. And they've got similar taste in like, they're very big on Premier League and football as well. They've got the Bundesliga, but they they're really interested in Premier League as well. And also films, you know, pretty universal in terms of trailers and stuff. So whereas France is very, as we all know, from French radio, you know, the remit that the French radio is very different from anywhere else. And it sounds daft to say it, but they're very French. And, I guess, less warm to kind of stories that the UK edition would have published. If we class the UK as the hero edition, so to speak, it's how much of that can we share without having to double up or triple up on resource to create it. And Germany was, was a really good entry point to test that out and to see how that was going. And it's been, it's been a good experience.
Matt
Would you ever consider franchising? So not doing it from the same studio? But like working with a production company somewhere else in the world, who would, who would do it. Take the format, take the sound design, but run it themselves?
Jamie
If you'd have asked me a year ago, and I said absolutely not. If you asked me now, it's absolutely. Someone please take the template!
Liam
I think with Germany. So Germany is a joint venture. So we are working with a production company in Germany, a podcast production company, and a guy called Martin Liss, who also has a radio background, and I knew through radio stuff. So you know, and I think we went through various versions of it with sort of, do we know anyone who speaks German? Through to do we do we franchise this and find a company that takes it entirely and I think both of us were a little bit, we don't really want to let go of this or, you know...
Andrea
Still feeling like it's your baby and you don't want to let go.
Liam
If we turn up and they're serving the wrong kind of Big Macs, it's just not, you know, just doesn't feel right.
Jamie
Just done a, a big job for at the time working with the guy who commercialised the franchise for Who Wants to Be a Millionaire for Celador. And which is probably the ultimate example of creating that Brand Book and maintaining authority over that brand book, but actually outsourcing the legwork of that. And that's something that I really admired. And he and I spoke to him at great length about how he did that. And it's a it's a great model, and it's something that we wouldn't be adverse to, because I think, you know, I think both Liam and I would admit, Germany has been a lot harder than we thought it would be, you know, I mean, it's, again, sound stupid to say this, but it's in German, it's really difficult.
Andrea
It's in French, It's in German,
Jamie
And Liam and I don't speak German. So even it's, you know, what, in some ways, it's been remarkable to realise that you can edit an audio version of a German version of The Smart 7 intuitively, just by tone of voice, it's, so all the script's in German, the clips are in German. And yet, all our editors are English, and none of them speak German.
Rhianna
So is that a sort of universal tone of news reading, is that something that you look at?
Jamie
Some of it is that, but it's also to do with the production, the way that we've got the, the way that we have our conveyor belt, the sausage and how the sausage is made. It's, it's no one needs to know how the sausage is made.
Matt
I did just have one last thing on that actually, just on the format itself, then so you built it, and you're 800 episodes in and there are now obviously, a lot of copycats out there that are making things which are similar, because they've seen you working and doing it, how do you keep true to the format you've created, but also keep ahead of the competition?
Jamie
I mean, stay true to it's really easy, because we've got it down to such a fine art that to deviate from the path would, the wheels would fall off, you know...
Andrea
Have you tried to do that?
Jamie
Not really, I hate it you know, I always hark back to the six chair challenge on X Factor, it was the it was the moment of ruin for one of the world's biggest franchises.
Rhianna
Remind us?
Jamie
Well, they they started mucking around with the format. They brought in a six chair challenge, which was a completely unnecessary tinkering with with a pretty simple basic talent show format, that was making a lot of people a lot of money and they chose to change it just for the sake of changing it. They weren't in any danger of like audience at that point. They're in danger of audience because of that, and I think that there's a lot to be said for actually do you just want to go and do another one that's slightly different. Because don't tinker with this too much because it works and, you know, we we don't get anyone really complaining, you know? I just get people, we get more and more people listening to it.
Liam
Well, we do all the time. And the interesting thing about bringing other people onto the team that, you know, when it was just Jamie and I, sitting at our respective kitchen tables at 5am, typing into Google Documents. Maybe at that point, you could have drifted off a bit, but actually bringing other people into the team. And we've added in another morning editor, so I'm not up every morning now, we've, we've added in writers into the into the evenings. And actually that process of kind of explaining what we do and how we do it, and building that editorial book has been really useful for us as well to keep on track, you know, and I think if you listened back to an early episode, we keep saying we should go back and remake the first episode. Because it still gets listened to almost every day and then you listen, we listen to it and go, Oh, my God. Okay, but..
Jamie
I'll do that this weekend.
Andrea
People listening to the news 800 days ago, it's really interesting to me. Why?
Jamie
I think it's purely a usability thing on the on the on the platform. So if you go to Apple Music or Spotify, you can select newest or oldest, I think some people just have it as a default.
Andrea
They're not like oh, it's a time capsule, I'm gonna look band and
Liam
It because it is should in theory, be you know, the polar opposite of a longtail podcasts like it is, you know, it's a it's a carton of milk. And as long as the milkman keeps coming, it's fine. But you know that they've actually, we've probably refined it more we've, the other additions have been useful as well, in terms of the number of clips that we have, the duration of clips that we have, like we are super tight on clips now and that we might have run a 20, 25 second clip before and we would look in horror now. It's longer than 12 seconds? The the art of just getting right to the core of the thing has really become more polished over time.
Rhianna
I think I want to go back to your audience because you kind of have different ways of reaching non podcast listeners. Tell us about tell us about your skill on Alexa, Amazon's Alexa. And what a skill is, as well.
Jamie
I mean, before I did broadcasting, but presenting anything I built stuff, I built websites, that's what I did. So I know code, that's how I created Holy Moly, just underneath my desk at Sky, which did really well, you know, all of these kinds of things. So...
Rhianna
You're really throwing me off. Yeah, I used to read Holy Moly all the time. It's so funny. Yeah. As soon as I saw those words, in my head, you could just see the image.
Jamie
Yeah, again, great brand.
Rhianna
Yeah, really good brand.
Jamie
So I think understanding how to make stuff is really, really important, especially in podcasting. You know, if you know how to edit, if you know how to, if you know how to kind of like how RSS feeds work and all that kind of thing, even if you don't actually have to do it yourself, it just speeds up the process. Because you you understand when people are explaining to you a bit better. So with the Alexa skill, it was, I think, A) it's a lot simpler now. So Acast have now baked it into their back end. So you can literally push a button and it creates an Alexa skill for you. That was not the case in 2020. So I had to just learn how to write it, how to build it. And it was just it was delving into Amazon's API and just just literally physically writing the code to do it. And it was just, when you when we were launching stuff, whenever I launch stuff or whenever we launch stuff, it's like, you know, for an extra hour to an extra couple of hours. And to give people an extra two or three ways of accessing this in any way they want, is just it's a no brainer, but it's like well, why wouldn't you have an Alexa skill? It's the same you know, and we we have a slightly more content contentious relationship with with YouTube as a YouTube platform for what we do but but it's kind of like well, Alexa and smart speakers were obviously going to become the kitchen table radio, they're the replacement for the digital radio. They just are and to be to be first there is was really important. So when people plug in their Alexa, they go oh, play me The Smart 7, and The Smart 7 pops up. It's like oh, great, perfect. Don't even have to think about it.
Rhianna
So for those of us who are still hanging on to our digital radios, so that's that is a skill, when you say play this, that's a skill.
Jamie
It's they're not quite built for, you know, podcasts are like an add on service to a skill, so it's like an Alexa skill or an Apple skill or whatever is where you go, Hey, Alexa, I'm not going to do it casue everyone's phones will go off. You know, what's the weather gonna be like? Or, can you give me a recipe for beef or something like that. But you can also say, you know, you can also sync it up to your Spotify, you can sync it up to your Apple, to your Audible account, all that kind of stuff and just say play me some One Direction. But you can also say, What's the news today? And it will I think it currently just reads out some RSS feed of BBC or something like that. But you can say, you can get them to say, Alexa set up my skill as The Smart 7 so that when they say what's the morning news, it will just automatically play The Smart 7. And you know, it's it's not a huge driver of of audience but it's there and it is important to be there, you know, it just is.
Andrea
Moving into different territories with the news franchise, you've got Sweat 7 as well; any other sevens on the horizon?
Jamie
The Heat 7. Which is a joint venture that we've done with Bauer to do with...
Rhianna
With Heat Magazine.
Jamie
With Heat Magazine.
Rhianna
This is just torsos of the week, I presume.
Jamie
In audible format.
Andrea
ASMR, just things running down the torso.
Rhianna
So tell us about the Heat 7.
Jamie
Well, it's something, you know, obviously my background as a disgraceful kind of gossip hound. I know Lucie Cave really well, have done for many, many years, we share the same agent. And we've always kept in touch and always wanted to work together. She was a huge early fan of The Smart 7, loved it. And this is. So this is a conversation that we've been having with Bauer for nearly three years now. We're just like, we want to do this, we want to do this like, but as anybody that has worked, trying to do a JV with a company like Bauer, a big corporation, they're not the easiest things to get away, there's a lot of stakeholders. People leave jobs, you know, all of that kind of stuff. But the want was both there, you know, they loved what we were doing. We've clearly got experience in gossip, Lucie's presenting it. It sounds great. And it's, again, weirdly, gossip are hugely and celebrity entertainment news hugely underserved in the daily news market. So to us, it was kind of like, not only is it something that we know we'd be the best at doing, like hands down, it was also something that no one else was doing either. So it's like great. I mean, it's just it was just a sitting duck.
Liam
I think there's more stuff and the The Sweat 7 was actually was my partner's idea. She was talking about what something had to do with workouts. And there's a lot of apps for workouts, but there's not really anything like a guided kind of podcast. So that actually does pretty well. It just ticks away and so we publish three episodes a week of it. We think that's got potential to travel beyond audio as well. And then I think there's more in that kind of wellness space. And we have a in the sort of theoretical lab, I have a sleep podcast in the lab as well, which we're kind of working on today.
Jamie
We've piloted it and we're working on it, yeah.
Rhianna
Is it sending people off, or...
Jamie
If we could patent a podcast that actually guaranteed to send people to sleep in seven minutes, we would be speaking to you from the moon.
Liam
I definitely think there's potential in it because there's something in the sort of white noise meditation sleep space that we think there's something in it.We have a sort of theoretical lab where we have stuff going on.
Jamie
FunKids are gonna launch a sleep meditation app. It's gonna happen.
Rhianna
That was Jamie East. And Liam Thompson, I loved that conversation. And the thing that really stood out for me was when Jamie was saying 13 minutes was the quickest they've ever turned around a podcast. And that was from the beginning of the read to publication. I couldn't get over that. Bearing in mind how long it takes us just to get through an intro.
Andrea
I know, it's amazing, that dedication as well, getting up that early, making sure on top of everything topical, how like slick that whole operation has to be. And it's every single day, you don't go into this thinking. You have to be so prepared for that dedication when it comes to podcast making. I really, really Yeah, hold my hands up to them and their alarm clocks.
Rhianna
Adam for you, I think with freelancing, that ability to take your work wherever you go can be a blessing and a curse. Right? I mean, I've we've done podcasts where I've been in Madrid or you know, you've been somewhere and sometimes that's incredible. And sometimes it feels like you're not getting a break because you're just having, you are able to work wherever. Yeah. How do you think that plays into these daily podcasts then, do you think that it is a bit of a double edged sword?
Adam
I think it must be, because particularly with something topical. I mean, we were talking earlier about Everyday Positivity. And that's something that you can just...
Andrea
You can bank them, can't you?
Adam
Yeah, and you can go with whatever's off, you know, off the top of your head if you are kind of travelling or on holiday or whatever. It's not as onerous presumably as something that you have actually put research into and all that kind of stuff and yeah, like committing to a daily show, means that yeah, it's, It's a constant presence. You don't have the free time to just fully distance yourself from the podcast because it is every day. And yeah, as you said, I the dedication that those guys have to have to do it day in and day out, I am just in absolute awe of.
Rhianna
It's working for them though, right? Like it's yeah, it's huge this podcast, and it's obviously something incredibly positive. So I don't wanna like, I'm wary of us being like, Oh, poor them, they're obviously, they're getting a huge amount out of this.
Andrea
Backing up what Adam was saying there, as a radio presenter, at least you sometimes get holiday where someone else can cover your show, but again, as a voiceover, there's times where I've not taken my mic away and had to buy it, but actually having to think when I'm on holiday, I'm still going to have to do this daily podcast. Yeah, massive dedication. But also, Rhianna. I know you agree with me on this; let's not be too poor me on this. They absolutely got a little bit of an in on where the industry was going in terms of podcasting, like short form, daily, that's the future and they jumped on it, ran with it. And it's been super successful, and they've managed to launch in Germany.
Rhianna
So is this a good thing or a bad thing? Because from this interview, it's sort of sounds like that's something that possibly they are regretting, because again, because of the the time that just like that hour time difference does kind of have a huge impact on them.
Andrea
Yeah, they'll probably be looking at the latitudes and longitudes and being like, well, let's not launch here, because we're already getting up early enough. Maybe let's let's move, thinking about the world clock a bit further out. So we get a lie-in.
Adam
Just on the on the subject of their sort of success, I think it's also really interesting them launching The Heat 7 and how they're translating that kind of format into other areas. It does make you wonder, how how scalable that format is, you know, are we going to see kind of more vertical-specific shows, you know, the, the tech seven, the science seven, the travel seven?
Andrea
I think that's a really good point, Adam, because we've mentioned this on the podcast before, we don't have infinite amounts of time. So when you do love a podcast, knowing that you'll be able to catch up on it, maybe whilst you are walking to the train station, walking to your car, making your breakfast in the morning is quite helpful, especially like you say, in podcasting, the more niche you can get the better. So seven minutes on tech, seven minutes on sports, seven minutes on on showbiz, as they've already launched into with the heat seven. And I guess with showbiz as well, it must be slightly less pressure in terms of news, because showbiz is kind of around a, it's not quite so, you don't have to be so much finger on the pulse. But I suppose if the Kardashians do something, and you don't mention it on a showbiz podcast, then it's probably going to stand out like a sore thumb. So once again, it does have to be that like that topical stuff is so difficult to do, and they are doing it so well.
Rhianna
They've also got The Sweat 7. So this is the exercise podcast.
Andrea
Big fan here.
Rhianna
Which is not a daily is it, what was it like three times a week or something? So again, it's like they're able to expand still. And it doesn't have to be a daily podcast, but it's still going to have the feel of that new, urgent, you must do this today sort of thing, which I think is a really clever way of them not exhausting themselves or growing themselves down, but yet still providing really necessary content for so many different audiences. That's what I can't quite get over is how many people they can reach out to just by slightly widening the net, and suddenly bringing in thousands more listeners.
Andrea
Yeah, I can totally agree. Totally agree.
Rhianna
I was also interested in what you're saying, Andrea, cause obviously you come from radio, as do I, and there is definitely a radio influence to these dailies. Right?
Andrea
Yeah, especially with Jamie and Liam's experience in radio, they're used to that constant, you know, radio is never off, like a podcast can be done and posted. But radio is 24 hours a day, seven days a week, throughout the whole year. And you've got to constantly be thinking about it. So I think that's definitely lead into their thinking on this topical content, they're probably quite prepared for that. Because you're used to preparing for that constant. And same with TV like it's linear media, it's always there. So I think bringing that sort of knowledge into the podcasting world, which is traditionally not so linear, is really, really interesting.
Rhianna
So as we said at the top, you can find out more about day podcasts in the roundtable discussion that Adam hosted. It's on podpod.com You can sign up to our daily email bulletins, do follow us on social at podpodofficial. And subscribe, of course, to make sure that you never miss an episode of PodPod. Thank you so much to Andrea and Adam for coming on the podcast today and of course to Matt Hill for joining on the interview. And of course our brilliant interviewees, Liam and Jamie from The Smart 7 podcast. PodPod is produced by Emma Corsham for Haymarket Business Media and I'm your host Rhianna Dhillon. I'll see you next week. Bye.
