The Binge Factor Deconstructed: A New Era Of Podcasting

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 the digital noise with the Binge Factor.

Hey everyone, welcome to the last format of the existing Binge Factor. In the last few episodes, I told you we were going to make some shifts and we finally come up with a plan and made some decisions. So if you're listening to this way in the future because you're binging on the show, this change is happening at the start of 2025.

I wanted to explain some reasons why we're making the shift. It's not the first time we pivoted the show. In fact, the show wasn't even called the Binge Factor in the early days. It was called the center of Influence. And before that it was a part of feed you'd brand. And we made it a spinoff where we had done the center of Influence and interviews and then we spun it off onto its own and then we took it from the center of Influence and moved it up to the Binge Factor, gave it its own website. So this is like the third iteration of the show and a shift. And so I think, let's see, we've probably done about.

Over 250 episodes, although we don't have all 250 available to you because if a show pod fades, we removed it. I think we delisted at least 50 shows. So we're probably at the show number will be 214, technically the feed, and we will have probably discontinued easily another 50 or 60 or so. So we probably have done 275, just under 300 episodes of the Binge Factor as it exists today. And we're going to just go for another let's go for another 300 or so. But I'm going to make a shift because I have to take a step back and not do as many shows in the same format. The interviews are wonderful. I love them. But honestly, I'm getting a little bored. And that's a really great time for you to make a shift because if you're getting bored, maybe your audience is too. And here's what I'm getting bored about. I'm getting bored about having the same conversations with Podcast Hosts that really are not coachable. So I had a really bad incident happen in the fall where I interviewed this podcast host and she was just claimed that she was open to being plussed or coached. And I gave her some advice. She was doing a very short format, like a few minutes long scripted show, and it had no energy to it. It was just awful from a show standpoint. And the reason I chose to interview her and she was kind of pushy about the interview was because she was introduced to me by somebody I had on the show who was fantastic. And the second reason was, is because I thought she was open to this coaching idea and where she was open to making some changes and shifts in her show and she was ready for it. That wasn't true because as soon as the show was over and we recorded it and I never aired this, so you guys cannot hear this, I chose not to air it and explain a little bit in a minute, although I think I have explained on a past show. But she immediately regretted it. And two days later she sent me the nastiest email, like demanding I cut it and I edit it. And I refuse to edit anything. This is kind of a part of my principles. If it happened on air, it happened on air. I'm not going to waste my time going back in and editing something that's not really specific. Look, I've had it happen where someone was not supposed to mention a client's name. Really easy for me to send a message to my team and say, hey, cut out the section where this name is mentioned. But in this one, I would have had to do like surgical removal of my advice to her and it would have been delusional of that the show's any good. Like, I mean, it's not. And so my message was only positive because she was gonna make changes. It was not a show worth sharing with you. If she was gonna refuse to make these changes, it was a show worth sharing with you. What went wrong? But that obviously she can't take the criticism. And many, many hosts cannot take a criticism about their show. I can't tell you how many egos I've come up against who think their show is so great the way it is. And you know it's not. You know, they're lying to themselves and they're lying to their guests and they're lying to me because they think I won't let them on the show. Right. Because that's not valuable. But I think it's more valuable to learn from these mistakes. So that's what we decided to do. And I say we because I decided to invite Tom into the show. So Tom Hazzard is my husband and partner, and you may have heard of me mention him many, many times over the course of the show. But Tom and I do feed you'd brand live each week, and I love the live format because it's there, it's done, and we move on. And we do have guests on the show. Not all the time, but maybe once every six weeks or so, we have one of our partners come in. So we've had Juliet Clarke and Fran Asero, Melanie Gorman. And we've had these people who are experts in being author, self publishing in YouTube, in monetization specifically. That's what Fran is. And in website and SEO, Melanie. And so when we look at all of those pieces and we have them in, they give insights to why we give the advice that we give and we can ask them questions when things are changing in the industry and that expertise isn't coming from us. So I love the format of the show. I think it really gives the nitty gritty down and dirty, what you should be doing, how you should be remarketing. And it's much broader than just the podcasts. Right. Like, it's much broader than saying, here's how you record and here's how you use mics. Although we do cover that too. Right. So I love the show. It's weekly, it's live, and then after we're done, anyone can ask us questions who joins us on Zoom. And we make that available to anyone who gets the newsletter from podcasters united.org not from potatoes, because we only have one newsletter that when we work with the Podcasters United organization to provide that free to everyone. And so I love that format. I think it's really great. It's got lots of great advice, but we are missing the stories about the shows, but we're also missing the structure of the shows, why things are working. And so understanding the concepts of the advice that we're giving in feature brand and what that ends up looking like when it's done badly or when it's done really well. And we don't get to really do that. I'm gonna call it case study kind of model looking at the architecture and the systems of a show. And so we'd love to do that. Tom does it all the time. He does free appraisals, free audits, if you wanna think of it from a critical standpoint. We stopped calling it an audit because it was p up against everyone's ego. But that's truly what it is. Because if it's not working for you, you need to improve it. And if it is working for you, you should double down and do more of it. So it's giving you where your opportunities are, where an appraisal is. Just saying here's the value of what you've created so far and if it's low, you're SOL good luck with that. And that's not what we really do. In that Tom really goes into the things that you can improve and make a difference on that are valuable and worth your time and energy. I've always loved them. I love listening to it. When he does them for clients. He gets all excited about their show. He gets deep dive into it. But one of the things that he doesn't really have time to do is to then listen to the show, understand the why get into a little bit more of the details to it. That's my favorite part about the binge factor. It's my favorite part about getting to know why someone started a show and what their desired outcome is and what's really working to get them there. Like that's the binge factor, right? That's their bingeable factor and it's really what's working for them. And so I love that piece of it and I want to keep doing that. But I don't want to hear and I don't want to talk to people who are not open to making a shift. That doesn't mean we can't learn from those people. Right. Because that's the biggest opportunity for you to change your show. You are putting in the work. You are listening to me. You're going to feed your brand and listening to us over there. Right? You're listening to this because you want to make improvements in your show. And the best way for us to make improvements is learn from other people's failures, from other people's opportunities that they're not taking advantage of that we could and understanding what really is working today again and again and not that one time advice, Tom. And I hate that the stuff that is like been there, done it to kind of teach it and tell you my way and it doesn't work. It has to work again and again for as many people as possible. Now sometimes it only works in one niche and not another. I love when we can identify something like that because it really is so useful because it's so much easier for me to know this won't work for me or this should work for me. And so I love those pieces of it. So we started to think about how we could structure a show that would do all of that. And here's what I did, because I am the queen of AI at our company and I'm always working on AI and really working to have it. There's a brainstorming feature in Gemini that I've been playing with for a while and Gemini is Google's version of it. It's integrated with Workspace. If you have one of those workspace accounts. I believe almost any account can use Gemini at this point, day and age. Like there's some kind of version of it that's free that you can use and then there are others that are paid. We have both. So some of these features may not be available to you, but I use the Brainstormer feature and really it's nothing but having a conversation like you could do this in ChatGPT. I've just discovered that ChatGPT is not quite as good at carrying the conversation through and progressing on it in a compounding way and already understanding all my history. And so that's what Google Gemini has really done for us. Is that because I'm always in there asking questions, I'm always working on my binge factor titles or my feature brand titles. It has a greater repository of knowledge about what my show is about, deeper than it just going out and scanning the titles, which is what ChatGPT does. So most of them will just, you give them a webpage, they go and they study your blog role and then they give findings back. Right. And so I went into it and I asked the AI, I asked Gemini to help me rebrand the show, to help me come up with some new titles. And I told it just what I've told you about what I'm interested in, about what I wanted to have more of, about where it's been. Right? I minded it where it's been. All the shows and episodes and things that we've done and that we're moving more away from interview based and more into a review style podcast, if you want to think of it. And it threw out a bunch of ideas and a couple of them I just chuckled at and just totally loved. My favorite was Podcast Autopsy. That was my absolute favorite. It just made me laugh. I like made me think of all these really great ideas because I told it that I wanted to include where we couldn't do this when I was interviewing hosts. I wanted to include shows that had pod faded, had died, like that's how I described them. They were no Longer publishing, they died. And so because of it, it came up with this idea of a podcast autopsy. And so we started to play on it, and Gemini and I had a conversation about, like, how could we play on that? What was an environment in which you would do an autopsy do? We call it the podcast. And so we started a play on it, but it went a little too deep into, like, the medical world. And so I was afraid that everyone was gonna think that we were like the podcast clinic, and it was all about only shows that were medically based or health and wellness based. And I don't wanna be that for everyone. So I was gonna abandon it. But it said something when it was giving me some different things about, like, the labs and stuff like that. And it got me thinking, and I was trying to rack my brain how you've got something that's like, right on the tip of your tongue, right on the tip of your brain, right? And you're trying to think of it, and you're like, I feel like there's something that related to entertainment and podcast autopsy. And so I said, what don't you call it an autopsy theater when you have observers, right? And that's what all of you listeners are, the observers watching us dissect this body of work. And it said, yes, absolutely. And it gave me the whole history of autopsy theater and how it worked and how it was a learning lab and all of those things, which is exactly what we want here. And so I started to realize it. But at the end of it, it did something really interesting. It thanked me, Gemini thanked me for reminding it about the autopsy theater. And it filed it away as a really cool concept. So we had a collaboration, a mindshare of it. So then I abandoned. I said, well, okay, I don't want to be too clinically focused. What else can I do? And we started to explore things like doing it unplugged, which is a little musical based and more audio based, but it really went too far into something that was raw and authentic and like all of those ideas, which isn't really what we want to do. We want to do much more of a more structured analysis of everything. So we started to come up with other ideas. And so the new format and da, da, da. The new format of the binge factor is the binge factor deconstructed. And that's what we're working on. We're working on this construction and architecture and formatting ideas, this blueprint that you're going to create from what you understand and start to learn. About what's working and what's that's not in other people's shows. That's what we want you to take away and build your own blueprint, the binge factor blueprint for yourself. So that's what we want you to take away and do. We're going to deconstruct everything in the process. And so that's going to be the new branding. And wait till you see it. It's going to be a lot of fun. I'm not going to show it here. You're going to have to tune in, subscribe, stay tuned in and join us on the first episode where we air this in the new year. Now it becomes my second big problem to rebranding the show was how are we gonna get people to agree to let us do it? And so it's one thing when the show's all pod faded and everything. And so we had to decide, do we need permission, do we need permission to critique your show? And so we are doing our final consults with the lawyers, but honestly we don't. Cause you've put it out in the public domain. Your show is out there. If I wanna criticize it, if I wanna review it, if I wanna buy something in a store and unbox it, if I wanna take the time to consume and listen to your show and then construct it and figure out what's working and what's not, I have a full right to do that. That is a part of the way the educational process in the Internet. Now, I'm not making money, remember? So there's no money being made off of my unboxing of your show. There's nothing being made here. Might happen on YouTube, I don't know. We don't have monetization set up on YouTube at this time. I hope we do in the future because I'd love for it to create a revenue stream for Podcasters United and be able to donate those funds to them. But again, I'm not making money off of my review of your show. So there's nothing it for me to make this be more nefarious. There's only in it for me, for me to make it a great learning experience for all of you listeners who tune in and honestly, for those show hosts who actually want to make some improvements, who want to stop wasting their time with a show that's never going to work or double down and put their energy into the things that really are working and turn that into something new. So we're not going to ask for permission and we're not going to apologize and we're not going to edit anything. We're going to air it. And if you don't like it, you don't like it too bad because any publicity is good publicity. I hope you're going to think about it.

So anyway, we're going to come out there and so we put together a list of shows that we feel have good lessons in them. And that's how we've done it is we've decided that each month we have a set of lessons that we really want to cover. And so we're bringing together shows from that and we are bringing together shows with different types of. Of production levels so that you also have a good experience of that because some of you don't use producers, some of you do, some of you are in networks and some of you aren't. And so we definitely are going to do that. And at the time of this airing, at the time as we're developing this blog Talk radio is basically going belly up. They're going out of business. And so those will be some of the shows because it's a great opportunity for those shows to consider moving away from the things that blog talk radio, I'm gonna say messed up. Because BlogTalk radio shows are for the most part have some terrible features to them that is all BlogTalk Radio's fault. There's no shock to Tom and I that they failed. So those will be some of the first shows that we feature. They happen to be on BlogTalk Radio and are shifting over to something else. Hopefully we give them some great advice in the process. There'll be some of those. There'll always be at least one pod faded show a month. And then I'm not gonna totally give up the interviews, but it's gonna have to be someone so exceptional that when I listened to it and gave you their binge factor. Cause I'm still gon drop in and give you their binge factor. Even though Tom will do most of the technical review because it's this. I mean, he is just so knowledgeable in it. He is just a genius at that. So I want him to give you that. And I'm still gonna pop in, listen to the show, give them my bingeable feature, the binge factor for that particular show. And if someone really impresses us, then we're gonna invite them on. So we'll have a bonus episode. We'll have at least 12 a year, but we might have more. It depends on how many impressive people we come across of someone who impressed us enough to get interviewed and find out the real behind what they've done and how they've done it and why they've done it. Right. Like that's what we really want to deep dive into. So you will still get some interviews now and again. So if you would like your show deconstructed here on the binge factor and you'd like to be a part of this, all you have to do is reach out to us, go to podcastersunited.org send us a message, subscribe to the newsletter so you're sure to get it and understand what's in it and see who's been featured because they'll be tagged in and they'll be shown in the newsletter along with whatever our feed your brand topics are gonna be. You'll have both of them. So yeah, reach out to us or tag us in social media and send us a message there. Make sure you tell us that you're really open, coachable. That's what we wanna hear. We're not gonna cover anyone who thinks they've got the podcast. That's the next best thing since sliced bread. We don't want that anymore. We want shows that all of you can learn from, that all of you can build your binge factor blueprint from. So I can't wait to bring you this new year of new season. I'm re energized if you can't tell, right? So I went from being slightly bored and uninspired to going, I have too many shows to plan. That's a great place for all of you podcasters in there to keep yourself motivated because right now podcasting is the best, most influential place that you can get your message out to the world. Every other platform is seeing a downgrade in traffic. Tom and I did a whole episode on feeder brand about it. You're welcome to check that out but. But every other brand, all advertising models are down in viewership and click through in conversion rate. Everything is down across the Internet, everywhere and across all forms of media except podcasting. That's really impressive. And then video casting, if you want to look at it from that way, YouTube and video casting is up in length of time spent with people they already like mass amounts of views and all of that is not growing out there but length of view. More time to spent in channel with people is happening. And so when you build this great long tail content, you have the best opportunity to sustain an audience, grow your channel, grow your podcast and get your real message out to the world and make influence and connections. So I want that for you in 2025. In the next year, whenever you come and listen to the show, this is what I want for you. So stay tuned to the Binge Factor Deconstructed and its new version coming up so that you could build your Binge Factor blueprint for your podcast.

Thanks everyone. It's been an absolute pleasure being the host of the Binge Factor and I looked Forward to another 250 plus episodes with you.

You've been listening to the Binge Factor Podcast. For more information on podcasting and videocasting success tips and tactics, please go to thebingefactor.com and be sure to listen to our other show for podcasters called Feed you'd brand. If you'd like to be interviewed on this show as well as featured in Tracy's column, please go to thebingefactor.com guest and apply.

Sam.