Erika Yocom: How Can Authors Navigate the Complex World of Audiobook and Podcast Distribution?

Welcome to Media Minds with your host, David Wolf.

On this edition of Media Minds, I'm here with my partner in crime at Autovida Studios, Erica Yokum. Erica, welcome.

Thank you. Thank you.

I know this is not your first podcast appearance on the planet, so we'll have some fun today. You know, I really just want, you know, the whole point of this series, this subseries of Media Minds, is to really share with our audience and our followers, you know, who Autovida is, the who behind the business, how we work, how we think about the this, all of this, this content world. And, you know, so I've gone through a series of conversations like this. Anyway, we started this Autovida Studios team right around 2018. It was kind of like a miraculous thing, right? All these people just kind of coming together serendipitously. I like to brag when I talk to people about who we are and what we do, how wonderful our team is. But what say you?

Well, so, you know, coming from owning my own company and working, starting out working with you as your, your virtual assistant, um, I was impressed enough to, um, I showed up at your, you know, weird timing, but I showed up at your doorstep in January of 2020 and said, um, Right. I love it so much. I wanna be your partner and let's do this and let's go crazy. And because of the team and the great fun that we were having and, and the success we were having and just working with this great group of people. For me, it was a big life-changing decision to come both feet in. Daily, I'm impressed with the depth of— I call it the depth of bench for a sports euphemism metaphor that we have people that have been doing this for ever and bring this scale of accountability and understanding of their craft and all of that and just happen to be awesome people to hang out with and talk with and laugh with. So yeah, kind of miraculous.

It is miraculous. And I think when you have that kind of culture that sort of just happens, you have to sort of pinch yourself and say, boy, this is not only beautiful for us and our experience, but it translates to the experience that we deliver to all our clients and customers, whether it's a podcast, an audiobook, or anything in between, which the world is leading us in that way. Content is becoming content, but we'll get to that in a few. So, you know, I think that, and also I have to thank you, you know, sort of coming out publicly with this interview. You know, I'm a rainmaker and I had a vision for what I wanted to do, but it was really you that created the systems that run the business. And now the people are running those systems that run the business. So it's quite spectacular because you can't do a business at any scale. And we're not huge, huge, but we're— we, you know, we've had as many as 40 podcasts in production in parallel and as much as 85 books, as many as 85 books in production at one given time. You can't do that without great systems. So you and your partner in crime, Jen Zappone, our COO, have really done a spectacular job of creating these systems so that we can serve our clients and everybody knows where we are in a process, whether it's a podcast or an audiobook. So thank you.

Yeah.

No, so I wanna move to a little bit of just sort of call it the educational part of all of this for those who have not produced an audiobook, whether it's with us or otherwise, and understanding sort of the distribution ecosystem, which is one of the things you really manage and run for us and all of our authors and publishers. Talk us through what, what do authors not know or what, what do we wanna share about the ecosystem, the structure of audio, the audiobook distribution? Over to you.

Well, okay, so like it or not, Amazon, Amazon, Audible, iTunes, they, they're the, the big 3 that, that work together. Like it or not, they're still about 85% of the market. Now Spotify is taking big swings at that and other platforms want in on that too. But really, that's where if people go looking for an audiobook, they're going to Amazon to look for it. So we really, we have to, we have to be there. They have to be there. Um, it really comes down to whether they're doing exclusive or non-exclusive. I think that's the biggest thing that, that most authors have no idea what that means.

Right.

And that means whether you're only going to sell on those big 3, or if you do non-exclusive, you can go out to all the others like Barnes Noble and Libro and all of the libraries and that type of stuff. So I usually start the distribution conversation there. What do you wanna do? Do you wanna be under contract with Amazon or do you wanna have— and I also liken it to narrow and deep or shallow and wide.

Yeah.

So you give it like a tree root, right? And if you wanna— and for, for people who are doing books, to have books, to, you know, to have that, you know, I am a published author, here is my book, or they're using it as a lead generator.

Right.

Exclusive is great. If it's somebody who wants a broader distribution, then we go with the non-exclusive. And that's probably the biggest thing that people don't understand. So walking folks through that exclusive or non-exclusive conversation is the tough. And then I tell them, you know, that this is what I do. So you go in, you set up all of the billing information and how you're going to get paid and what your tax situation is. I don't want to know any of that, but you set that all up and then I literally do everything else. I claim the title, I upload the files, I make sure the metadata comes over correctly and that everything gets past the QC and all of that type of stuff. So that's A service that, that a lot of, I guess a lot of other folks maybe don't offer is that.

Well, and, and if anyone is brave enough to have tried this as an independent author, you, you really, you know, it, it, it's kind of a maze getting out there and trying to figure it all out on the fly.

Yeah.

So one of the things we try to do is strip away that piece of the technology, if you like, or the, the logistics of getting your book up for sale on the platforms where you wanna be. It's not easy if you've never done it before. And so that's something you've mastered over the years. And now we share that mastery with everybody we work with.

And, and it changes on a daily basis because, you know, I mean, because, you know, Amazon could decide and they just did, they changed their whole thing. And I, I've just had, you know, authors saying, well, what does this mean for me? And what I've been saying is, let's just, it just happened. It's kind of like an Apple update, you know, David, when I say to you, don't update quite yet. And let it percolate for a couple of months and let them get the bugs out. So Amazon just made this another big shift. And that's what I've been telling authors. Let's just see how this plays out. There will be pushback. Let's look at it in like October and see what's going on. But you know, it's a, it's a, it's an always changing landscape of what's going on out there as people, the big, the big ones are figuring out ways to get in more, more of that market share and get in there and.

Yeah.

and get more business in there? 'Cause audiobooks are growing like crazy and everybody wants a piece of that growth.

Yeah, it continues to grow. I think the current number's about $8 to $11 billion worldwide and it's projected to grow to about $30 billion. Of course, that's all in including, you know, the consumer side. We're on the production side, which is probably 1% of that number or something, you know, alongside a bunch of other production companies that do what we do. On the podcast side of the business, this is slightly different. But again, functionally, you're the sort of the nerve, the mastermind behind Getting everybody out and into distribution in the podcast ecosystem. Let's touch that a little bit and talk about how that works.

Oh, sure. So, well, Jen has actually taken over quite a bit of the podcast. But yeah, so when we get a podcaster all set up and from— I'm sure you and Sean talked about this, it's, you know, we got to get that intro and outro going. We got to get— so the systems that we have in place are we have A document where we work together. It's a live document where the— we have show notes and show titles and delivery dates and all those types of things. That's the information we need to make sure that the machine keeps rolling forward and we get those podcast episodes out there. We try to keep— we try to have, you know, like 4 in the can. Things happen. It doesn't always— you know, we don't always have 4 in the can, but that's what we like to be so that we can get further out. And, um, that we're not chasing any deadlines and things like that. But yeah, we, we, we are on— let's see, we work with 3 different platforms for distribution right now.

That's right. That's right.

Um, because it depends on what the podcaster is looking for. Um, and one, one of our podcasters came to us and said, we're already on this, but we want you to do the distribution. So I'm, you know, we're working with with their distribution platform.

Yeah.

Great.

Yeah.

You know, I'm all for it.

Yeah. Yeah. So flexibility. I mean, there's several platforms that do what they do and people find their way into the one that seems to fit for them. And then maybe they change, maybe they don't. So, you know, we're agnostic in terms of that. Although we have certain ones that, you know, we specify if it's a monetization strategy, often we're with one. And if it's simply audio, others have video with audio. There's, So this all sort of is a good pivot to like the podcast world. As I look at our business and look at the entirety of the business, the, the, the content production world is just so quickly changing. Some of it's about AI, but some of it's also about attention span, consumer behavior. What are your thoughts about how things have changed since we've started in 2020?

Well, so on the podcast side, I would say that the attention thing The attention span thing is definitely a challenge because I think most people are— we've gotten— we're back down to, back to the Vine world where, you know, it was 6 seconds and now it's, you know, Reels and things like that where people are looking for short bites of information. If they are interested, they'll continue on longer. But I think it's important that they, that they get hooked in the first little bit so that they'll stay for the rest. Kind of thing. And I think that, um, I also have— I've always said to podcasters, people want to write novels in their show, their show notes. And most folks, if they— when they find you and they're listening to you and they like you, they're just going to listen to the next one and the next one and the next one. They might look at the notes, maybe if you said a name, right?

A name of a book or something. That's my behavior totally. I really don't read the show notes unless I—

nobody reads the show notes.

I need a reference or there's a link that I need to click, you know?

Right, exactly. Exactly. And we, and we found this out during COVID is that podcasters, we used to say to people Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, that's the best time to do podcasts, right? And then COVID hit and we realized 11:30 on a Sunday night, people were going crazy for podcasts because people realized that, oh, I can listen to this anywhere, anytime. And so really it's when do you want your podcast to go out?

Exactly.

When does your audience going to be looking for that. And that's, you know, that's why, um, all the platforms we work with have, um, analytics. And we can look at that and see when, when are— we can see those, what time of the day are people listening to it, what time, you know, what day of the week are they, are they most listening, and maybe adjust if, if need be. But yeah, yeah, yeah, knowing and paying attention to that is important.

Yeah.

I think that the shorter, the shorter thing has For better or worse, that's where people are.

Yeah. And, and in the business development side, I'm starting to rethink how, you know, how we package all of that for our clients and for future clients. You know, there's long form and there's short form and then, you know, there's all and everything in between. Sometimes the short form— Sean and I talked about this as well— the short form can inform the long form, but also the long form can inform the short form. And there's just this— it's content is content and it almost bleeds into the audiobook podcast conversation, but we'll leave that aside for the moment. And also the videos thing, which you— I don't think you mentioned it. So the video, they say for discovery, but, you know, it doesn't really matter much. People are consuming where they want to consume in the moment. And if they happen to be on YouTube and they want to see talking heads, they'll do that. They just want to walk, they'll turn off the video.

Yeah. So, you know, I've lived with 2 from the next generation, right? I mean, or even— I don't even know. You know, my 20-something, right? They actually listen to YouTube. They're not watching the videos most of the time. They're listening to what's going on. And so it's having the audio there while they're doing something else. You know, my son's writing or they're playing video games or something, but they're listening to their favorite people, um, which I found very interesting. So audio is still, I think, the biggest thing, right? Because we can— I can drive a car and listen to, to, to something, and I can, you know, and I can be doing housework and not be sitting in front of a screen.

Yeah.

And, and still hear. So yes, video is strong. Yes. And SEO and all that type of stuff. Of course, Google is big on video because Google owns YouTube, so they're, they're big on that. But I think a lot of folks, again, even it re— it it ratified it for people during COVID that I could be listening to this anywhere. I could be do— I could anytime.

Yeah.

And I have that freedom to do that and, and not be stuck in front of a screen.

Yeah. The guy called the captive, captive audience, captive to a screen, you know? If you prefer not to be that, then yeah, you can be anywhere anytime. Yeah. All right. So, so that's— I wanted to cover that video audio question 'cause it seems to come up for people a lot. The other thing that the evolution of the podcast industry is the analytics and data. You sort of telegraphed that a little bit earlier. It hasn't happened yet in a way that a podcaster can truly create a lead generating pipeline from their listeners because they don't grab the email when someone listens. But there, but there is technology that's starting to bubble up that is beginning to look at that and finding ways, you know, it's going to be kind of Frankenstein-ing it together, I think, for a while. But imagine a world where you can listen or watch a podcast and that listener is actually captured if they wanna be. Maybe they do, maybe they don't. I don't know how that works. But you know, right now you've gotta call to action. You gotta tell people to go somewhere or show 'em a QR code or give 'em a link so that they, that you can capture 'em that way. And so in that sense, it is an opt-in sort of situation.

Right.

But I think, I think more and more podcasters, particularly on the business side, that are looking to build a pipeline and the top of their funnel would like the podcast to more directly fill that top of the funnel. How do we do that with technology? How do we do that with behavior? You know, that's a question that I'm asking a lot, you know, as I'm trying to look around the corner a little bit. Let's see, what else should we cover? So one of the things about us, you know, at Autovita, and I know you and I are in lockstep about this, is we're— we've never considered ourselves a commodity sort of delivery system or company. We're bespoke. You know, we're much more— we have a high-touch, engaged, team. And as much as, you know, for me as the founder and the entrepreneur wanting to scale, you know, bespoke doesn't scale so easily. So, you know, is it from an entrepreneurial perspective for me and the development of the business, it's been a little bit of a tug of war between how do we do this at scale, how do we continue to deliver very high quality? Of course, Mark Shipman comes to mind on our— he's the director of audiobook production for us and he's He's very, very conscious of the quality of the audio and the experience of the author, right?

Yes. Oh my gosh. Yes. Yeah, by the time it comes to me for distribution, I usually get an earful of, Mark is the best thing since sliced bread and rolled toilet paper. I had the best time. He's so wonderful. I hear that about Alan. I hear that about Chip. You know, I love hearing that about our producers. But I do, I do. I hear that a lot. So, Yes, we really strive for the experience. I think that, and I'm a big proponent of this with Autovida, all right? I don't want to be a push button, you know, buy a podcast and then you get whatever comes out the other end. Our whole philosophy has been that, you know, I want to be, if you've heard me say this a million times, I don't want to be Walmart. I want to be Nordstrom's. I want to be that extra layer, level, however you wanna say it, of quality so that when people see it, they go, wow, that's a really good podcast. That sounds really great. They look great. However, of the audiobook, wow. You know, Mark strives to have every audiobook be like as if the author is sitting next to you on the couch telling you the story.

That's right. The intimacy of audio. That's right.

Right. So, you know, that quality of it and, and, and that's what we wanna be. I, that's what I wanna be. That, and I want that white glove treatment of, Uh, all of our, all of our clients, all of our customers, all of our authors.

Yeah.

Podcasters. So that, so that I continue hearing that, wow, I had such a great experience. Mark pulled something outta me I didn't know was there.

Right.

You know, wow, it was really stressful, but he made it great. And, and, you know, that type of thing. And, you know, Chip was so patient with me. He walked me through. You just had the experience with Alan of, you know, I've done 4 or 5 books with Alan. I'll only work with Alan. You know, uh, that's what we want. That's the quality that we're striving to have, right? You know, that, that people are going out of their way to tell us how great the experience was.

I recently heard someone say quality is a business strategy. So, you know, and so that's where we, that's where we sit. That's where we want to continue to sit. And I think that's, you know, that's kind of— let's put an underline and a pin on that one because, because, you know, it would be easy to try to get bigger and grow and all of those things. But But being present for the people that are working with us in the moment and delivering that experiential thing, particularly really both sides of the business. But an audiobook, it's a very intense, focused, can be exhausting kind of experience reading your own material into a mic. In the case of, you know, about 70% of our business, folks who are watching, is author narrated, remotely recorded with a producer there in a remote studio like the one we're using today on Riverside. That experience is as important as the actual product that comes out, and the quality needs to be there for all of it. So, you know, that's great stuff. Any final words you want to leave our watchers, our viewers and listeners with as we part ways for this edition?

Well, I can honestly say that if you've thought about doing an audiobook or you've thought about doing a podcast, but it seems like this big thing or you have, you know, a million questions, we're an excellent place to start. I have said this to, to every audiobook person that I have worked with, and, and we do this with podcasters all the time, but I've said, consider us a resource. If you have questions 6 months from now, you know somebody in the biz, call, you know, send me an email and say, hey, what do you think of this that's going on? And I can give you my honest assessment.

Yes.

Because we're building that relationship. Because I know, especially with authors, there might be 3 or 4 books, and I want that, you know, of course the salesperson in me wants to say, hey, we're here for you then. But more importantly, I want them to think, oh, I know a great place, I had a great experience, I want to go ask them questions. There's a lot of information. There's, there's a lot of information. Consider us a resource and reach out and ask us questions. I'm— I love telling people what we do, and I love explaining to people what this— what I know about the distribution systems and things like that, because knowledge is power. If an audio— if an author has questions and they talk to me and they feel more comfortable about moving forward with what they're doing, Then I've done my job, right? They're they're comfortable. They're they've got the warm fuzzies of of knowing that they have somebody that they can ask questions of. So yeah, yeah, yeah.

Really being there for the re as a resource for everyone, all content creators helping them connect their voice to the world. So yeah, there it is.

Yeah, I'm happy to answer questions and and let's see let's see where it goes.

Yeah, you can find us at audavita.com triple w dot audavita dot com. And yeah, talk to Erika, talk to me, and we're happy to help and we're here for you. Till next time, thank you for joining us on Media Minds. We'll talk to you again. Thanks, Erika, our CEO, by the way. Erika Yokum.

Thank you.

Bye-bye.

You've been listening to Media Minds with your host, David Wolf. Media Minds is produced by Autovida Studios, a premier production company Producing audiobooks and podcasts for clients worldwide. Be sure to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. To learn more about the team at Autovita Studios, visit autovita.com.