Diving Into The White Space: SnapChat Podcast Communities With Jack Settleman of Snapback Sports

Wish you were one of those influencers with raving fans who binge on your every word, consume all your content, buy everything you have to sell, and demand even more. Then stay tuned while Authority Magazine columnist and buzzfeed contributor Tracy Hazzard shares strategies, tips and tactics from top videocasters, podcasters, authors and social influencers on creating that Bingeable factor. Now let's join Tracy as she explores how to rise above all noise with the Binge Factor.

Hey everyone, welcome back to the Binge Factor. I'm Tracy Hazard and I am excited to bring you someone very unusual that I met. He has an incredible show. Absolutely incredible. It is the top sports show in itunes and Apple Podcasts. Jack Settleman is a founder of Snapback Sports, the largest sports Snapchat account in the world, totaling over 500 million views year to date. Snapback Sports has created Snapback Sports Pod, which is a compelling sports culture podcast that hit number one on Apple's top charts in 2019. Jack serves as an in house podcast host and content strategy manager at Whistle and entertainment and sports media company. We're going to talk a little bit about that today. He's an experienced social community creator and has been instrumental in the launch of Whistle's other podcasts. As a recent college graduate, Settlement instills a voice that resonates with the younger target audience, hence Snapchat, and has been fundamental in launching Whistle's slate of original podcasts including Snapback Chat, where he interviews successful influencers, athletes and social media stars on their rise to fame. Jack has also had a hand in Whistle's merchandising arm with his Snapback Sports Merch consistently ranking as a best seller. I totally want to talk about sports merchandising and while prior to Whistle, Settleman worked at Action Network, a sports betting media company where he managed the company social media. Settleman is a graduate of the University of Texas at Austin and in his free time enjoys attending sporting events, raising money for nonprofit organizations such as Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer center and giving back to his fan base, often by sending followers to their first ever sports game. How cool is that? So Jack, I have to tell you, I have a Memorial Sloan Kettering connection. My husband's family is part of the reason it exists today. Really they are part of the founding money of it his family, the Howards. So does that have a personal connection for you?

Cancer affects everyone, specifically me. But over the summer we play in a charity basketball tournament, me and my co host Abe, and we raise money and the goal of the tournament is to raise, you know, hundreds of thousands of dollars. So, yes, personally, it affects me. And we chose them as kind of the charity of choice.

Well, you couldn't pick a better facility as far as I'm concerned, because, you know, we've been on the inside, gotten to go to some of the top trustee meetings and other things like that, and what they're doing there in research is incredible. So good for you to be giving back like that as well. So great. Well, let's talk about your show and let's talk about what you've created here. So you have, in a very short time period, created quite a powerful show. How did it come about? How did you decide that this is what you wanted to do?

So I started snapback sports October 2017, which was to highlight behind the scenes sporting events. I was at the University of Texas. I was like, it's cool. I go to these basketball football games. Dallas and Houston are three hours away. San Antonio is an hour and a half away. So I kept posting and just growing this community on Snapchat to where eventually I was like, people will care about my opinions. People want to hear funny, entertaining stuff. And all they really have is the ability to go on ESPN and listen to the guys in the suits, the Steve and A. Smiths, the Max Kellermans, et cetera. And I think the way we communicate nowadays to specifically the younger audience is completely different than the racial issues or the political issues that ESPN or Bleacher Report touch on. We want to be the friendly kind of startup style podcast for the younger audience. So in June, during the NBA Finals, we kick it off, we break down Raptors, warriors, and then NBA free agency. I'm a Knicks fan, so it was a huge summer of basketball for us. And then over the course of that summer, we pushed and speaking to the highly engaged audience, we call them the fam, which is family, because that's another thing with the younger audience is that connection. Social media is supposed to connect, whereas nowadays on Twitter, it's just the biggest names using it to grow their platforms. It's not actually using it to connect like it was originally built. So we take pride in that and we always answer our fans do, Monday, Mailbag, et cetera.

So you've been skilled at creating community here. Like it's obviously through your career that that's been what you've been able to do with that. And so what do you think the keys to creating a great community have been for you?

The key is time. It genuinely is like every response. This is how I always Break it down is if someone replies to me and I answer back, okay, I have them interested, I'll have them following me. If I then offer them a thoughtful, like not just a hey, but it's like, Yeah, I think LeBron James can do this. To break down the Raptors defense, if I offer them that, they're a fan for life. And If I do one a day, or in my case, 100 a day, thousand a day, then you build those communities and then you give back to those communities and then they stick with you forever.

I love that. I mean, let's not sugarcoat it. It takes time, right? It takes time and personal effort. You can't phone it in.

Yep.

So now why Snapchat?

Everyone was on Instagram, everyone was on Twitter. So I had a business my sophomore year of college. We were selling phone cases and we were advertising through social. So I learned about this whole back world that you can't Even imagine a 14 year old running the Internet. It really is crazy. You buy shout outs.

I can believe it because I live it. So I totally understand where you're coming from.

It's nuts. So after a year, we partnered with John Wall, we did Mohamed Sanua, a bunch of these pro athletes, but I was like, I don't want to pay to get shoutouts anymore. I want to be the advertising platform. And I was like, to grow on Instagram, gonna be too expensive to grow on Twitter. Too expensive. Why not Snap, It's a cool verticalized feed. This was before Instagram stories. So I really like the Snap product. It gives you that one to one interaction that you have in the messenger and it just felt like the right way to go. So I would literally take 500 bucks, I would buy shoutouts from 15 year olds while I was in college, get shouted out, would then go reach out to this same phone case company that I had. There were hundreds of them. I'd be like, for 50 bucks I'll post an ad. I would take that 50, buy another shout out to the point where it just grew so much to where it would snowball and you could grow organically. But Snap was just the platform made too much sense.

I love it. Well, there is something to being early adopter into a platform that's not utilizing something. I keep urging those that still want to be in Instagram today. I keep saying Instagram TV has five people who show up all the time and everyone else is random. If you did it consistently and constantly, which is what you did in Snapchat, you have a better shot of Being seen, heard and found.

Absolutely. And igtv, for those who don't know, I don't even know if it's public yet, but IGTV is going to turn on monetization. So that's a great opportunity. To your point of, like, go to the white space. It's going to take time, but Instagram's shown that they want to build that platform. They're pushing viewers way, way more focused onto there. So I'm in agreement with you.

Yeah, absolutely. Well, the thing is on this show that I like to identify people's binge factors, but I like to ask you whether or not you know what yours is. And if not, it'll be like psychoanalysis. Here, I'll give you my thought from a listener side. What do you think your binge factor is? Why do people come to you and when they find you, they start to binge listen, they show up every week.

So it's funny you say that because we work in a slightly different, you know, we work in a timely manner. We release every Monday and. And it's kind of irrelevant by Thursday. Monday's podcast, because we're reacting to the weekend's news. But my dad actually listens and he's kind of giving me insight. He really enjoys binge listening to them three in a row if he's on a road trip, because he likes listening to our predictions. We're always making predictions. And in the sports world, so much changes over the course of two weeks, specifically NFL playoffs, stuff like that, where he can just laugh at us and we're so wrong half the time that it just makes it entertaining. But what makes people coming week to week, in my opinion is that relatability. It is the differentiation of the suits on tv. And we've been stockpiling some cool guests, which I think is cool. Our message to the listeners is always like, we're just like you guys, we're just sports fans sitting on the couch debating with each other. So when we get a big guest, we get to ask them really fun questions. And it's just we're so appreciative of it that we're never like, oh, we're cool now. Like, we're just still sports fans who happen to be doing what we do.

For everyone who's listening. I met Jack when we did our Miami pre Super bowl event with Athlete Times Media, and he was doing some interviews there. And the word back. You may not have heard this, but you went through and interviewed a couple of our guests that were there and they had Been interviewed by a couple of other podcasters by the time you got to interview them. And their comment was your questions were not the same old, same old. And I thought, wow, that's really good. Because it's always nice as a guest to be challenged and not be asked the same questions all the time. So your perspective, I think the questions that you ask show a different level of insight from a very fan base. And that's what I think your bingeable ness is. Whether it's going back and listening to many, but going forward and making sure I don't miss any makes you just as bingeable. Right. And so I think that's really what it is, is that you have this, like overarching passion and excitement for the sport, all kinds of sports. And it's that exuberance that makes me want to come along, even though I'm like, I can sit on the other side and go, you're totally wrong there, you know, but it's in good humor. And you're right. It's like we're sitting on the couch talking trash to each other and it's kind of fun. So good for you.

I appreciate that. I mean, we always joke around, whether it's just with my. I mean, my closest friends listen, which I think is awesome. Like we have a national audience or international. We always joke about we have an 8% international audience, but it's just like debating with your friends texting, because they know Abe and I so well. And we always joke, Abe's just so heavy. Philly. But that's what sports fans are. They are biased. They just love to debate and support their own guys. And I think sometimes you have to be unbiased when you're talking sports. But sometimes, why not be a true sports fan and just love your team?

Yeah, why not? Absolutely. We all grew up with that, so I love that. So when you guys started your podcast and if you listen to it, it's not overly produced, right? You don't have this heavy production value to your show. It's good, but it feels somewhat casual. Did you do that on purpose or is just sort of the way you just went with it?

So we had, first of all, no clue how to podcast. I think that's the biggest part of getting into the industry. And then second part is like consistency and actually getting it done. So we wanted to make it as low lift as possible off the bat. But our biggest accomplishment to date is the 32nd intro song that everyone loves, which is just sports clips cut up and it's just like a fun little intro to the podcast. But yeah, we don't over produce anything. We don't really add interviews or sound clips because we're super reactive. And I just think it's not naturally what you do in conversation. Sometimes you will pull out a video. But I'm posting a bunch of that stuff on my Snap story. So we always relate it back to that. I'll mention, oh, I posted this on my Snap and it could be a press conference quote or it could be a highlight. So people generally have a good idea where it doesn't necessarily have to fit into the episode.

You know, you bring such a good point here, is that you're building them as fans overall to your brand. Right. If you're on Snap, if it's your website, if it's your Instagram, it doesn't matter where it is. But stake your claims, stake your home turf and don't just put everything into the show. It's okay to put other things elsewhere and invite them in to do that. When I started my first podcast, it was on really geeky. It's on 3D printing.

Yeah, we did 560 episodes, Jack.

I'm not kidding you.

Yeah, so we did a ton of it, but we didn't do video because when we started it back then livestream wasn't really thing. But we knew 3D printing is visual. Like people want to see the objects. So we would send them back to the website to look at the images or we'd send them into our Pinterest or Instagram and we would have them look at it, watch time lapse videos because we needed them to have that interaction with us. But building that community as part of that, getting them to move around your turf.

Absolutely. I think that was one of my biggest discoveries over the past 80 episodes was when I would tease out an episode on Snap. I just wanted to give pretty much the title or I wanted to give one little hint and then I would start giving away the best stuff and then we would go video when we had video and create these social assets and give it all away. The number one quote, the most interesting stuff. Because I think not everyone's necessarily going to go and sit down and listen to it, but you can feel aligned. And then for example, we have Derrick White, NBA player on Team USA this summer coming and then they're like, okay, I've heard about the pod. I wasn't interested. Wow, that's a big guess. Now I'm gonna go and listen.

And then they get hooked, right?

Exactly. And Then the binge ability helps them. But one podcast, pardon my take, I actually don't listen to it. I mean, it's the biggest sports podcast in the world. It's hyper engaged. I don't listen to it, but because of the way they cut on social, it feels like I got all the key parts. And then if they had Lamar Jackson, my favorite player, I'm going to tune in just because I'm so aware of the podcast. So I think the podcast industry, obviously everyone's worried about download numbers and getting people into that funnel, but there's so much more to build around.

Well, you know, let's talk about that. Because you're into sports merchandising. So we built our whole company that we have here potitize, and we've built everything that we've done in all of our shows and what we recommend to our clients based on this idea that you should sell your own stuff. Because that's really where the money is, that the money's not in the ad dollars. The money's not in that you'll make more money off of your own stuff. And if you analyze the big guys, that's actually what they did. And so you guys have your own merch. It's selling really well. It's doing well. Why do you think that is?

It's doing well because we're coming up with fun designs. Whistle is super helpful. We have a whole design team here. We're reacting to the key moments. We're being creative when we come up with this different type of merchandise. We're capitalizing on sports trends, and we don't push the merch as much through the podcast as we should. Because of our deal with Blue Wire, we have a revenue share, so we have ad reads all the time. But a big goal in 2020 over the next few months is to book a partner. Because I think it's either sell your own stuff like you mentioned, or have someone who believes in what you're saying because everyone just wants reach. But podcasting is still the lost art of the engaged listener. You're getting someone listen for 45 minutes. Yes. The way Apple has built their podcast listening, they can skip over any ad that's a mid roll or a pre roll. It's too easy. But you have sponsored segments, you have genuine call outs. Like if you partner with a ticket brand and you go to a game and we're talking about on the podcast, you're going to shout them out and that's going to mean so much more than just the mid Roll that can just be easily skipped over.

Yeah. You know, but we find that from our statistics that real true listeners, engaged listeners, don't skip.

Really.

They just don't bother to skip, even though they can. They just don't do it. Number one, they don't want to miss a second. They don't want to deal with it. But real heavy listeners, podfasters, binge listeners, those kind of listeners, they are too busy. They're running one after the other after the other and they're out there, you know, running at the gym, cycling, whatever they're doing and listening at the same time to take the time to sit, skip. It isn't worth it for them.

That's interesting and I think that's a great for the podcast industry and I think it's obviously a pod by pod breakdown because I would say the biggest thing for us is we have so many interchangeable partners, like, the more consistent you get. Yes. Because if you do a genuine dynamic ad read, they're gonna hang around. It's your voice.

It's your voice. Right, Right.

Some podcasts are just inserting pre recorded stuff. That stuff, I don't know, they don't.

Want to listen to that as much. I agree with you there. Yeah, they don't want to listen to that, but they also don't want to if it's so programmatic, like radio is right, then they know when the spot's coming. They can more easily skip it when they don't. And you're more of a. Every episode you have is a different length, so you've got all these different lengths going on. So they don't know when to skip. They don't want to miss something. And so that's your benefit too, if you're that kind of podcaster.

Totally agree. Yeah, we're always getting messaged afterwards like, hey, where did you actually read your ad reads? Because like you said, we could do 30, we could do an hour 10, and it's like a mid rolls at 15 today, a mid rolls at 40 tomorrow. Like you never really know.

Well, and on our system, like you insert them in after the fact so people never know. You create the spot like randomly later if you want to. So you can always move it around. So yeah, I think that's. No, I think that's the great part though. But people want more of you and I think that's why your merch is selling. Right. They want more of what your ideas are. They want to share your philosophy with their friends and their buddies and things like that. So it creates this great gifting idea, and that's where the merch starts selling. So now you guys have been doing this for a while. I'm sure things have gone really, really wrong. And some things have gone really, really right. Love to hear a couple of stories.

Well, obviously the first episode or two or three that we recorded were terrible. They were, they were. The audio didn't work. It took us. We were trying to shoot for Game 1 of the NBA Finals. And if, you know the NBA Finals, it's a two week thing. I think we got our first official episode out at, like, game four or five. Didn't quite make one, so it didn't really go well. And then, oh, my God, the mic issues. Like, the importance of perfect audio and podcasting is very high because that's why you're listening to a podcast. And Abe and I, for, like, I swear, for 50 episodes, every time there would be a problem, it would be his mic, it would be my mic, it would be my headphones. His. It was just never right. We're now at a place where we finally feel comfortable. Like, Abe couldn't figure out this is how new we were to the podcasting space. He was like, do I click? Do I set my setting as on the microphone? And I'm like, yes, that's how it's gonna work. Like, it seems so basic now that we're six months into this, but you really just don't. It's such a new experience.

So just for everyone listening out there, I just did this because the minute Jack says that, it creates this anxiety, I actually just flipped up my settings to make sure it was on my microphone.

Exactly.

Because it still happens to us all the time. And you're like, there's always this moment in it where I'll go, oh, my God, did I forget to check the settings? And I'll double check it right then and there.

We have not, knock on wood at a wood table. We have not had a podcast episode where, like, we didn't have audio, which is the luckiest thing ever.

You are extremely lucky because it has happened to all of us.

Exactly. I'm sure it's literally happened to every single person. We even have, like, when we do in person now we have these new. I don't even know the terminology, but they're the handheld mics. They're not plugged into the computer and they have a recorder. And my first three times doing it with that, I'm just, like, nauseous. Like, is it plugged in? Is it actually gonna pick up the sound. How are the sound? The wavelengths, like, it's a lot in audio.

I also take the recording on my phone and I drop it down just to make sure.

Yeah.

So. Well, Jack, that's the funny story is that I. I don't know if you saw them at the event, but we had our hands free ones.

Yeah.

That record within the microphone. And I did a three hour event where I interviewed for three hours straight. We call it a podcast blitz. And I had Tom design it with lights on the top so I would know when it stopped recording.

Okay.

Because I lost an amazing interview with Gary Vee, which was only a three minute interview. And he was just like, I asked great questions, he gave great answers. And when I went to pick up that recording device, it ran out of battery. And unless you had earphones plugged into it, you'd never know it. That's why those devices freak me out too, because you never know when it's gonna run out and you won't get something. And so I pissed as I was about losing the recording, Tom invented something to replace it. But I was doing it on. Luckily, I'm short. So as I'm holding up the microphone, the lights are casting on the underneath and the chin of the person that I'm interviewing because he's much taller than me. And all of a sudden the light starts flashing and I was like, oh my God, it worked. I know it's going to run out. So I finished my question with them and I replaced the battery. It was that awesome.

It's a weird feeling, but it's amazing feeling.

Yeah.

I needed that visual feedb for myself to know it was still recording. Right. Like you need that.

Yeah, those were the bads. But there are some goods. The good, obviously. Two weeks after we release our first episode, I run a little quick giveaway. Like I said, always giving back. And the giveaways normally are to entice people to help us out as well. It's a fair trade off. So we're like, we'll give away five Raptors championship T shirts. All you got to do, go subscribe to the podcast, leave a rating, give it a listen, let us know what you think. So we end up with. Now we're up to 5.8 thousand ratings on iTunes, which ranks in the top ten. And during that giveaway, during that week, we were climbing the charts and we got all the way up to number one for sports, number 12 for all shows. I mean, we're passing our idols, Stephen A. Smith, we're passing Woj NBA, the barstool guys. And it was really a crazy experience just to see us up there. I mean, that's obviously our highlight. But number two is just been able to speak to all these different athletes and hear their story, get it out there. Because we've talked to undrafted players, which I think is a perfect fit for our podcast. It's kind of like we're not drafted by anyone. Blue Wire took a chance on us, and we've kind of built everything from scratch. So I think that's truly what's been amazing.

Let's talk about the relationship with Blue Wire. Like, what are the benefits to being a part of a network in that sense? And how did that come about for you? Because lots of people are saying, like, I really want to be that. I want to be in that. Because there's power to that.

Absolutely. So the benefits to the network is support. Because when I was getting. Insisting the support I needed, every time there's a problem, I would text Kevin, the CEO, and he was that hands on, helping us out with audio, ordered us mics, told us how to build on social, really just mentoring us and tutoring us in the industry. And then obviously, on the ad revenue side, they're bringing us in partners, which I think actually makes you feel more established when you say, oh, this sponsored by Untucked. And this is sponsored by. That's some free publicity for Untucked, of course.

There you go.

Exactly. And then on the other side, I also work for Whistle, who has great relationships with a bunch of talent agencies, and they've helped source guests for the show. So it's kind of a combination, the best of both worlds. And it's just really all about support and building yourselves up. Because anyone can technically record a podcast by themselves. There's no doubt about that. But to really build, I think it's helpful to have people on your side.

Yeah, that is great. And you have people to go to to say, are we doing what we need to do? Do we need to do things differently? You've got people to bounce that off because so many podcasters are independent and they feel isolated in that.

Exactly.

Now do you spend a lot of time checking out your stats?

So when we first launched, I was obsessive. I mean, it was scary. Like, first of all, it only refresh every hour, so it was not enough.

For the, like, the intensity.

I refresh every 10 minutes and nothing would happen. I was obsessive. Now we're at a very comfortable point understanding how many downloads are going to come in per episode. I thought we were going to have a higher NFL listenership. We actually, it's been proven now because we haven't even done a full season of the sports year, but we've gone through NBA Finals back to full NFL, back to NBA now. And NBA fans are just highly engaged. They want to hear about the drama of the league, the excitement of the league. The NFL can get monotonous. I mean, you can only have the conversation of, okay, this team's playing well, this guy's the mvp, whatever. So many times the NBA is. It's a soap opera constantly.

So there are a lot of divas over in the NBA.

Exactly. And I know now, generally the amount of listeners, I get excited if there's more, I get upset if there's less. But now it's not as obsessive. It's a check once a day, once every two days.

That's good because here I talk about it, especially in the. When you start out, I call them vanity metrics. Right? Like, we just want our ego boosted by the metrics of what's going on. But it's not always a sign of a really great show. Because if I have 10,000 listeners, but they're binge listeners who buy stuff who, like, are engaged, that's okay. I'm happy with that. That makes for a great show either way. Or I can have hundreds of thousands of listeners, but they're kind of casual about it.

To your point, when we first launched, the listenership was off the charts because people were coming to check it out. They liked the NBA Finals. It's a hot topic. And now, after we've dropped off our peak numbers to our more consistent base, I think that's what's so cool, is like, no matter what episode we put out, no matter who we're talking about, who we're talking to, these amount of people are coming back to listen twice a week. That has been, like, just amazing.

Yeah, absolutely. Well, let's talk about some of those things. So let's go over our five pieces of advice. Some of the best ways you found to book great guests.

The best way to book a great guest is, first of all, reach out. Like, don't be afraid. Cold call. I mean, I don't think you can.

Cold call, but cold email, cold message.

Cold email, DMs, I mean, whistle. It's great because we have a verified account and that gets us more access. But we've used our own Snapback Pod account and gotten even better, bigger replies from bigger athletes, which has a way less following and Isn't verified. So cold. Email cold DM comments and always target the person with something that they're going to relate. Don't have the same standard message. Actually be like, hey, we saw you were talking about this. We want to give you this platform. Hey, we're the startup podcast. We're the undrafted podcast. You're an undrafted superstar. Come share your story with us. Make it personalized and make it short. I think the longer you go, these people are busy. They're very busy, and they get turned away from very long messages. Hey, want to come on our podcast? We like what you do. What do you think?

Yeah. Oh, thank you for saying make it short. Love that. Yeah, that's great. Now, what about some of the ways you've done to increase listeners ongoing? You talked about having that. The contest going early on, but what do you do ongoing to increase your listenership?

So everyone thinks you get the big guest, and that's gonna drive because they're gonna repost your Instagram story. It actually, I don't know if it'll drive three listeners. Like, it really isn't. Unless you get Lebron James or Obama, nothing's really making your podcast blow up. They need to come for you. And so I think what we do is we have that rapport. Abe and I have been friends since we were eight. We have that relationship. But also introducing creative new segments into the podcast, changing it up, then sharing out on social. So we just started a ranked segment, and we're not ranking the top five basketball players of all time. We're ranking the top five jerseys of all time. Last week, we ranked the top five touchdown celebrations of all time. It takes people back, and it's just a creative way to be. Like, all right, I want to get in. And then they hear our analysis on teams and games and stuff, and they stick around. But I think it's just always changing up, testing new things. You get, like you said, you have the power. Listeners, they're coming no matter what. So how do you get more people in? You test and you try, and you kind of just figure it out. You make it up and see what works.

So I just want to stop you right there before we go on to the other three. But this is why you guys, you're starting to hear that casualness and that sort of like you're buddies, right? We get to be friends with Jack and Abe, too. Like, that's kind of the level of what you're doing there, which invites that camaraderie and invites those listeners in. When I Said your bingeable secret is, I feel a part of your community from day one because you don't go and explain backstories. You don't spend all your time on. You guys. You guys are jumping in like, it's mid conversation between the two of you, and I want to catch up. I want to be a part of.

The fun half the time. When we start the podcast, so Ava and I are always. We're texting throughout the day, figuring out our plan, and then when we go to record on Sunday night, we'll be talking. Okay, you're taking this viewpoint and on this topic, like, what are your thoughts? And we'll talk for 12, 15 minutes, and we'll be like, what? Like, can we just start and just, like, hit record. We're always having the conversation before. We just want to hit record. So, yes, to your point, it really is.

My very first editor said, I feel like I should just turn the recording on way before you do it, because I record with my husband.

Exactly.

So it's like always mid conversation, always mid thought.

Yeah.

So great. Well, that's why it works. So this is part of why people come back and listen again and again. So now you guys have a little bit of production help, and she said, you made it simpler. So what do you do to produce it in a professional way?

Our producer, Charlie, is a godsend. I love him so much, but he just. We always are communicating. We're marking our time codes. We are making sure, you know, if there's a pause or there's a little mess up, that's part of the business, that's part of the game. Mark it down, make sure it's communicated to him. Any additions? We did just add a sound bite to our ranked segment. Just communicating that. Taking any advice from fans, hey, your audio is a little off in this last episode because we've gotten that a bunch. Like I said, I know.

I was listening to one where you could barely hear Abe, and I was like, oh, no, he must have his mic off.

Yeah. So that's just another example of, like, listening to your feedback. A lot of these bigger podcasts, maybe if someone's mic is fully off, they'll find out. But if someone's like, hey, at minute 12, like, your audio really was messed up for a minute, they would never see that. They're getting too many comments, too many engagements. We see everything. So any response of like, hey, we'll go check it out, make sure that doesn't persist in the future.

I love it. So you're involved in the process. Now, this is something that I think is so important that you raised up so many people, like, leave it to their producer or just forget about it and don't try it at all. But if you're involved in the process making notes, someone can do a fabulous job editing your show. They can't think like you. They will never think like you. And if you want to cut something or you want to fix something, they won't know it. They can cut out ums and ahs and fix sound levels, but they cannot fix the quality of what you say in the show if you don't take your time to put the input in.

Absolutely. I do pretty much the production outside of the raising the levels and the actual cutting, but I'm very much in that process. We have an open communication channel with Charlie at all times. I don't think he sleeps. So we're like, hey, Charlie, did you get the episode? He's like, yeah, I'm almost done cutting it at like 3:30 in the morning. It's just crazy. But we really do, like, it's all about communication. Because like you said, he's not. He wasn't there. So he doesn't understand maybe what happened or what we are trying to communicate fully.

He's not a mind reader.

Exactly. It's very complicated even for someone else to write the titles and descriptions, because I write those out, because I want to make sure the message that we want to communicate is very clear. I know people who will just give the episode and be like, all right, go listen. Cut everything out that you think should be cut and then title it. And I'm like, that's not the best way to go about it.

Not if you're building the audience and not if you're trying to maintain the voice that you're maintaining. Right. And that's really the critical part. So good for you.

You encourage engagement through contests, through other things. What are some other ways that you encourage engagement in your community?

Monday mailbag is a big one. I think we've seen people. People just want to hear themselves be shouted out. They want to hear. They actually. They care less about their name being dropped in the podcast than having our thoughts on their question. So, like, one guy asked, why don't you guys ever talk about Supercross? We literally have never crossed that bridge before. Abe and I admittedly know nothing about it, but we will bring it up on the podcast and be like, we hear you. And to be honest, we're not going to cover Supercross. But at least now he Understands he gets an answer of what is going on and makes him feel a part of the show. So I think the mailbag's a big part answering people on social media because we'll post graphics on our social that are not related to the podcast at all. And they just build out our thoughts in general. They know our opinions on certain players and teams, et cetera. And I think engaging with them on social, it doesn't always have to be podcast related.

Now, what about the best way to monetize? What are you guys thinking? What have you found has been best for you?

The best way to monetize, I think, as I mentioned earlier, is to really bring on a partner. And it's because I'm really good at building communities. But also what I pride myself on is storytelling. And I think with my Snapchat platform, with our Snapback pod, Instagram, with our personal brands and then with the podcast, we have the ability to full tell storytelling. I'm at the Knicks game last night. If someone wants to sponsor us going to the game and communicating their message in a fun, unique way. And then we come talk about on the podcast because we break down the game and then we post a graphic with their sponsorship on. It's really full circle. And that's what my audience has always been in love with. They don't necessarily want the one off ads. They want brands who believe in us, the fam, and they want to connect with that brand. And the more we push them, the more success we've had. So it's finding those partners who understand the podcast isn't necessarily the end game. And it doesn't matter if we get 1,000 listens or 100,000 listens. It's how dedicated that audience is to go and convert.

I love that. So you've gotten some great things. You get to go games, you've gotten some cool things. What other authority raising things? I mean, you went from your couch watching it to being one of the top commentators on it right now. What has that bought you? What has that gotten you?

There's been a few things, but I'll start with I was down in Miami for Super bowl, staying with my friend, and there was a day radio rose on Wednesday. All the big radio guys, the media giants are there and I try and get in and they're like, you need a credential. And I'm like, there's no way I can get a credential.

Like, would you like to look at my Apple podcasts?

Yeah, exactly. No one cares. No one cares. So I Text my friend, he texts a friend, and somehow I get on Radio Row and I'm just like sitting there and these people, they're interviewing hundreds of guests over the course of three days. And I'm like, Abe, like, Abe's at work and he calls in to Radio Row because he wasn't in Miami with me. And we do a podcast live from Radio Row. And like, that was just a really cool moment. But the coolest was actually last night. The Knicks brought me out to do some work to promote their pregame tours that they're offering. And I happened to see the best Knicks game of the year. And if you know the Knicks, there's not many great Knicks games. But last night we won. It was an amazing game. Beat the Rockets, but it was just really cool. I mean, I always stay humble. People are like, no way. Like, you're a big dog now. I'm like, no, I'm not. Like, I'm just going to root for the Knicks and I just happen to have a following where I can promote and it's a nice trade off. So the way I always look at it is people are like, so what do you want to do? And I'm like, honestly, this is what I want to do. If I were to go work in investment banking, you gave me $10 million and I could retire at age 35, I would then take that money and go to Knicks games and go to the super bowl and talk to professional athletes because I think it's cool to hear the stories. And I get to do that right now.

So without the 10 million. But yeah, let's bring that on anyway.

Less money, but I get to do it while I'm young and it's more fun that way. So the podcast is just open doors, it opens conversations. You can drop the tidbit that we're ranked number one and people, they will listen. The NFL, not so much, but other people will.

You'd be surprised. We. We actually just got invited back for next year to do the next pre super bowl in a bigger way because before got around to how great it was. So we'll have you back in there for sure and we'll see.

It's funny you say that because I thought just this idea of we're regular everyday guys is you guys gave me the custom. I don't even know what it's called.

Mic block. It's right here. It's a custom mic block.

Yeah, yeah, the custom mic. But I thought that was the coolest thing of all time.

So to everyone else, these are 3D printed. They fit any microphone that's an HDR or that style microphone, Right? The dynamic cardio style microphones, they fit those. And so, yeah, when we did ours, we created custom mic flags for every single person who was there because we wanted you to feel professional. We wanted you to feel like you weren't just dropped into this thing and it was all about the event itself. We wanted to make sure you took ownership back of your show because that's why people are listening. That's why they're there. You are the celebrity. Well, I'm glad you felt that way. Thank you. Jack.

Before we go, the last thing I really wanted to talk with you about was, like, you saw that radio, bro. You saw what happens as you get partners in and you start to. How do you keep that young energy, that exuberance that you've got going for you and not get into this, like, old radio model? This old. How do you not let that influence you?

I was, like, upset with what was happening on radio. Like, everyone's dressed in a suit. Everyone's just like. So I even got to the point. So after we record the podcast with Abe, because we wanted to do one on Radio Row, we thought it would be fun. I look around and I just see setups with radio, radio, radio, old gray hair, radio, radio, radio. So what I did, I pulled out my GoPro and I started to try to get video content. I would walk up to athletes, ask them a question, give them a minute to respond, and I got some very cool pieces of content doing that. So it's always just about being creative and just zigging while others are zagging. But in terms of me, it's like I'll never fall into that trap. Even if I go on to greater and greater heights, it's like I'm just going to be who I am, which is I like sports, I like to talk about them, and I like to give back, Whether it's actually through charity and giving back to Sloan, or it's just giving back to my fans with T shirts. Because I think I come from a very privileged situation where I attended Ravens games growing up, Orioles games. I went to college. It was an amazing experience. I didn't know really about all this world, which was these people have never seen a football game before. I mean, one of our partners, Tick Pick, they gave us tickets, courtside tickets to a Warriors Hawks game in Atlanta. I post on my Snapchat story. I'm like, can anyone get to Atlanta tonight? I want to give these away. I'M in New York. I can't make it. Two kids, one guy takes his brother who had down syndrome, they drive two and a half hours to the game. They see their first basketball game courtside, warrior talks, and I'm like, that's all I want to do, like, make cool moments for other people, because I've gotten to see them. They support me, which got me to Super Bowl. I support them, which gets them those opportunities. So it's always gonna be the one to one connection.

I think that's what sport's about. I think that's what your angle is, really. Because when I look back and someone was asking me what my favorite super bowl moment was, when we were at the event, we did a networking event, and we went around the circle and everybody said who they were, and they were saying, what's your favorite super bowl moment? And I was like, you know, I can't even think of, like, too much details in the game because I'm not a super fan.

Yeah.

But my favorite moment was the fact that that was the one time where my sister and my mom would just be out of the room. Like, they didn't want to have anything to do with it. It was like my dad's space. And so if I hung out in there, then I got time with my dad. Like, that was my favorite super bowl moment. And everyone there was like, aw. But I think that's the true connection, Right. That we each have is it's that moment side of it. It's not really the score, you know, it's not really as much the players. It's what that makes us feel like.

Absolutely. The way I always describe or make an analogy for sports is like, if I go into my office right now and we sit in a meeting, we have a great meeting and we come out of it, I'm slapping people on the butt, kissing them on the head. I'm probably gonna get fired. In the sports world, it's so emotional and so powerful that that's what you do. You have business people who every day wear suit and then they go roof with their team on Sunday. They wear face paint. They're going crazy. Like, it really just breaks down all of those walls, which is what makes it so authentic. And I think that's the key of podcasting. It's the same. It's just being authentic.

Well, yeah. I mean, hey, if all of us can take that passion and that excitement for what we do and make it our business, wouldn't that be a fantastic world? And that's what you've done here, Jack. Super proud of you guys. You have a great show. Snapback Sports Mondays and Thursdays they come out. You can listen on your favorite player anywhere, so be sure to tune in. Tax Settlement. Thank you for joining me today. I really appreciate it.

Thank you so much for having me. This was enjoyable.

I told you it was going to be great, didn't I, Jack? Settlement, the Snap exports pod. I mean, it just has so much fun going on in it. And that's what I want to remind you all. You do not have to have the highest production value going for you. You don't have to have all these bells and whistles. A lot of you are really overthinking your show. They set out to do a simple show because they knew they needed it to come out quickly because it had timely information in it. So they set out to not overcomplicate the recording process for themselves. They set out a mission for the show to create a community and they did it. They engage with it. They spend time there. They're personal about it. They are always thinking about their listener experience and they're always thinking about having fun while they're doing it. That's what makes a bingeable show. Jack has really done something where he's created this white space, of course, by being through Snapchat, which is incredible and lots of you need to go out there and look for your white space. Look for the place you can play, but making sure that your listeners are there. It wouldn't make a whole lot of sense if I had a show on top Real Estate Investing for Millionaires and be doing Snapchat. Right? So being thinking about where your listener core listeners are, where they care about it, where you want to start engaging with them, that's the energy you want to put into it. Don't try and be everything to everywhere and every channel and everyone out there. Go for the people you're trying to reach the most. That's what they've done here. They've created a great community. A lot of fun going on. So be sure to check out Snapback Sports every Monday and Thursday, as I mentioned. And everyone come back and listen to the Binge Factor because I'm trying to bring you incredibly diverse shows and hosts who started their podcast for different reasons, who have created bingeable factors that they didn't even imagine they might do because they didn't set out. It's not always intentional. Sometimes it's just a byproduct. It's a side effect of the energy that they put into their show, and that's really what it is here for Jack and Snapback Sports. They put this passion and energy into their show, and the net results are something that is bingeable and people want to come back and make sure they don't miss any episode. So thanks everyone for listening. I'm Tracy Hazzard on the Binge Factor, and I'll be back next week with another bingeable podcast host.

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