3 builders who never spoke to each other
Take sponsorship on your own terms or not at all
Below serious audience numbers, sponsors are not worth chasing and selling your own products to the same listeners pays better. When you do sell access to the audience, hold out for creative control rather than accepting supplied requests, and consider making your own company the sponsor so the show talks about how the business runs instead of pitching the product.
The method
- 01
Do not chase sponsors below serious download volume - sell your own products to listeners instead.
- 02
Hold out for a sponsor who hands you creative control rather than accepting the requests as they come in.
- 03
Once you have gathered an audience in a niche, sell brands access to it through sponsorships and paid placements.
- 04
Run your own podcast in which the company is the sponsor, and talk about how the business is run rather than pitching the product.
What it returned
- 30,000
Consensus at the time was that sponsors need 30,000-50,000 downloads a month to take a show seriously, and the big advertisers like MailChimp and Squarespace want 50,000 per episode.
- 2023
Rob Hope refused podcast sponsors for years, then took Lemon Squeezy for ten episodes across 2023 with full creative control agreed.
No Code Founders sells sponsored ads, NoCodeDevs sells ads and paid reviews, and Katt Risen sells sponsorships on No-Code Exits.
On Above Board they take no outside sponsors and discuss what running a self-funded software company involves rather than advertising Fathom.
Sources
- How to make money from your tiny podcastJustin Jackson · justinjackson.ca · How to make money from your tiny podcast · undated
- Discontinuing the Yo! Podcast supporters club - Rob HopeRob Hope · robhope.com · 2. Monetization vs Creativity · 2021-05-21
- No-Code: Custom GPTs, Getting Early Users, Million-Dollar Businesses - Trends.vcDru Riley · trends.vc · 💰 How to Monetize No-Code Businesses · 2023-12-27
- SaaS lessons shared on the Framework podcast - Fathom AnalyticsPaul Jarvis · usefathom.com · Fathom’s marketing strategy is a constant not a finite point · 2020-07-20
the second source
Three plays a week, for the phase you are in
No roundup of links, no news. Three tactics more than one builder arrived at separately, with the numbers each one returned and the disagreements left in.
More in partnerships
- Borrow a bigger audience for one joint project6 unconnected
- Get into the app directory of the platform you plug into5 unconnected
- Make integrations the distribution plan5 unconnected · contested
- Only take commission on what you already use5 unconnected · contested
- Pay referrers a recurring cut, and track every link4 unconnected
- List the product where buyers already shop3 unconnected · contested