The Future of Podcasting: Engaging Listeners Through Trailergram

Alright. We're chatting with Robert Tuchman. He's the cofounder of Amaze Media Labs.

It's a company that does a lot of work in podcasting, production,

expansion, growth, a lot of branded podcasting work. He is also the

host of How Success Happens podcast with Entrepreneur Magazine.

And more importantly, his Amaze Media Labs has just unveiled a brand new

product that I think lots of Podcasting gonna find very intriguing that is

called Trailergram. You could check it out at trailergram.co, and we're

gonna learn more about it right now. Robert, thanks for joining us. Mathew, thanks so

much for, for having me on. It's definitely an honor.

Oh, well, it is a great pleasure to meet someone who's coming out with something

so innovative and interesting for the podcasting space. So before we

dive into Trailergram, just quickly tell us a little bit about Amaze Media Labs

and what you guys do in the podcasting space. Yeah.

Thanks for asking. You know, we really or

myself and my partners, we started this business. As you

mentioned, I host a show called

How Success Happens for Entrepreneur, and I'd have a lot

of, interviews with people who own big

companies or started companies, you know, like Warby Parker or

Lulu Lemon. And I'd always wonder why they didn't have their own podcast at

the time and went to a couple of my partners, and

we started the business to create podcasts for companies.

And, you know, we found, the right

help production people, and we really just took off. This

was, during, you know, right at COVID hitting.

And, it was a a good time for

people, looking who had money to spend at least

on events which weren't happening, and instead, they could get their message

across, through podcasting. So we we started

the business, and then the one issue he fell into

or found out about very early on was that

discoverability, even if you're doing a podcast for a Ford Motor

Company or a Pfizer, whoever it might be,

whether it's, any you know, celebrity

wise, you know, it's very difficult to

find and then really difficult to build audience. And that

kinda put us and set us on a journey, to really

feel like we needed to create a tech if we wanted to stay in

business, longer, and if we wanted to do second

seasons and 3rd seasons, we had to figure out a

way to have podcast growth.

Well and so you've come up with this platform, Trailergram. And, you

know,

various business groups or Facebook groups or, you know,

the other thing big thing is always, you know, oh, advertise on other podcasts that

are related to your space. The one thing that I've always

found tricky, and I think you guys address really nicely is how

to advertise a podcast, right, like via Google

Ads, let's say, or even Facebook ads. A lot of those a lot of those

platforms just don't feel very successful because you're

missing the most important component, which is the ability to

listen. But you guys have kinda solved that puzzle. So tell us

what Trailergram does and how podcasters would be using it.

Well, Mat you're exactly right. I mean, that

that is the issue. And when we

got into this, and I learned very quickly having my own podcast

even when I had these celebrity guests on who would post,

you know, on Instagram or wherever, no one was clicking off, you know,

or gone putting it on LinkedIn and and listening to the podcast. I

had clients that were putting it on billboards in Times

Square, literally, their their podcast. And we

realized that, very quickly that or as I

said, that, there are very few things that you could

do to to grow your audience if you're not using

Technology. And even paid media, just doing Google AdWords or

so, really, what the the the concept of Trailergram

came out of, or from, my partner,

Brett Sklar, and our engineers. Myself and

Brett had sold our last business to creative artist agencies, so we

were there. They were like a a big talent firm, and they're

very big in, representation and creating

films and movies. And we saw how movie trailers

really moved the movie business, right, and

and got people excited about going to

see a movie. And Brett's idea was,

what about trailers, basically for

podcast? Now, obviously, what we came up with

was, very Podcasting. And and with the

with the team of engineers, what really we're

doing or or what we do is

that we take a trailer. Right?

And we basically have our own DSP. And the

DSP is global. I we you know,

it's pretty much anywhere but China, but we target, you know, specific

areas. Like, it could be North America or the United States.

And all of the, partners or publishers

in our DSP or or brand friendly, you know,

websites like ESPN or WebMD.

And how it works is what we do is let's say you're reading

an article, for instance, on the New York Jets, and I only

bring that up because I'm a Jets fan and, I'm

miserable. And can see my jets thing behind me. I didn't even that's it. Oh,

no. Oh, jeez. We can, we might ruin this whole podcast.

Well, we'll commiserate about that. I'll I'll find about that. So so

let's say you're reading an article, which I read plenty of,

unfortunately, on on the Jets, what on the ESPN.

And then all of a sudden, because of our

it's our DSP, and we can place this podcast trailer,

next to contextually relevant content. Let's

say the podcast is about the New York Jets. And then we

can even target specifically through machine learning and AI, you

know, the the target demographic of of our of

of the listener. And if it finds, you know, you're

a Jets fan, you're an NFL fan, you're you're obviously reading an article

about them, the trailer pops up next

to the article. And then the unique thing

about this is that what we do is,

basically, there's an opportunity. And usually, the trailers

are, you know, 30 to to 60 seconds

long. It it gets you excited just like, you know, you

go to a movie and you see a film trailer, and you're like, I wanna

go see that movie. Right? They don't show you the whole movie. And and,

basically, what happens is what's very unique about this product is

that it gives you an option to

subscribe to basically receive

push notifications about the podcast.

So the nice thing is it's a most mostly mobile,

environment. And if you are, you know, you might have

a a lunch to go to in 10 minutes, and you just

read that article or dinner, or meeting a friend, you

what you do is you subscribe. Right then and there, you can

subscribe to get push notifications. So the next day, you

receive a push notification on your phone, whether,

you know, it's, iOS or Android, and, basically,

it shows you, the podcast where you can just click

and go listen to it. At the same time now, you

don't have to subscribe to receive push

notifications. You can basically

directly, when you're reading this article,

go right to our it's

basically our web player and pops up

the web player with the podcast,

the current episode, and also past episodes,

and you can start listening to the podcast right then and

there. And I think the key and why it's been so

successful, first off, is the number one thing

I think in terms of success is that we've been able to get

price point down to an average of what people are paying

between, let's say, a nickel 15¢ per

download, which prior to this product was

unheard of in in anything you would do, and we we have another

product. But in any case, you know, that's that

was one of the the the the greatest parts about it. Secondly,

which I think is most important, and I think the most

important for our entire industry because this is the

problem within, I think, you know, and I'm a I'm a newbie. You're

you've been doing it a long time. I'm a newbie. I mean,

you go back to, like, the 2006 or 2005.

Like okay. But I realized that, you know,

everyone said there's so many of these podcast listeners. The

beautiful thing about what we're doing here is

I may never have listened to a podcast

on, you know, Apple or Spotify or any of

the other platforms, but I just read an article. I just

clicked on to something, and all of a sudden, I'm listening

to a podcast. And and that's the

beauty, I think, as a whole for the industry is just the

growth that, you know, we hope to bring because I

think it's very difficult with everything else out there, and we've talked about it,

whether it's, you know, social media and putting a link

on, LinkedIn or Instagram. No one's clicking

off. You know, I hear an ad, and I hate to say it, but,

like, you know, you hear an ad on you're listening to a Podcasting. I have

to remember that Podcasting, because I'm not I'm not clicking out of the podcast I'm

listening to. Unless it's terrible like mine, people might click

out and go listen. But, like, you know, that's the reason

Trailergram has taken off since we launched it at

Podcasting movement this past, August. You

know, it's funny you say that about the social media aspect. A lot

of people, they wanna advertise in social media. What I what I found when

working with clients was if somebody is, you know, like you

said, they've got 10 minutes before a meal, maybe they're in the bathroom, whatever they're

doing, they're spending time on one of these social platforms.

That's what they wanna be doing. They don't wanna click a link and be taken

off there. It's like, no. I'm scrolling Instagram to scroll Instagram. Like, yeah, maybe I'll

see your podcast and be like, oh, interesting. Maybe I'll think about that later. But

we we rarely ever go outside of that platform to do it. So

I I totally agree with you there. But just to kinda bring this home for

folks, this was the the concept of putting these podcast

players inside of articles is something that I don't think

enough organizations, enough even enough independent podcasters

take advantage of. When I was at the journal, it it it

took a lot of begging and pleading for us to finally get them to

agree to do this, to say, hey. You put up an article about

interest rates today. We have this interview with either

reporter or, you know, someone from the Fed or whatever. Just put it right there

in that article and, you know, now people can find similar content. And when we

did that, we would definitely see more interest, more attraction. And

so imagine you can do that,

but you're not just limited to your own publication. You could take

it to, like you said, a People Magazine, an ESPN,

an Athletic. Right? Like, all these major publishers that are putting out

content that's getting 1,000 and sometimes millions of hits.

Yeah. It's exactly right. So you basically had the idea

about, 10 years prior to us or more for

Trailergram, which I just learned, at which you are

at. Was wasn't my idea. Which is which is

wish. Which is absolutely is is correct.

And, you know, the other thing about it and and thinking about it,

when you're looking at how we do it and, you know, you

want to focus on contextually relevant content,

is the fact that you have these publisher sites that we

use. We have probably about, between

10 and 20,000 sites just in North America

that are are brand quality sites

that you you would imagine. But what we do and and the

the magic of the engineering behind TrailerGram

is really not just, hey. I'm a Jets fan.

Here's a Jets podcast. I mean, that that's a pretty good

sign that they might be interested. But we even go further in terms

of, you know, the the engineering capabilities and

the machine learning, that, you know, goes

on beyond just, you know, putting contextually relevant content

next to these articles. And and then also getting

the data. Where did the majority of people come from?

Where of listeners who actually then listen to the podcast. And then we

could even tell once they've listened, we found, you know,

especially these chronological shows work extremely

well. You know, we tested 1 or we did one where

60% of the people who, put in to receive

push notifications for this, chronological It was

a crime, show.

60% of the people who who, put in to receive push

notifications for this show actually ended up then

listening to all 8 episodes. So it works extremely

well. Obviously, it works for just general Podcasting that are

weeklies or monthlies, but chronological, it

we've noticed, you know, a really amazing effect.

That's that's incredible. And so, you know, the other thing about this that's so

nice is that it's just so easy to do. Anybody can do this. You don't

have to be, you know, you don't have to have a degree in marketing. You

don't have to have a background in media buying. You can literally just go to

the website, sign up, and start making some decisions,

test a few things out. What would you say is the,

you know, number one thing that a podcaster hearing this and wants to use

it? What should they prepare? What should they plan? Like, how do they

best capitalize on your platform if they're gonna start using it?

Good question. I would say the best thing you could

do is test, just like you said. I

would test it out. Now a lot of you know, we we sell it

by trailer place. Right? So, basically,

for $500, you know, you get

15,000 trailer plays. For a

$1,000, you get 50,000, and it goes up upwards of, you

know, some people spending a lot more than that, 15,000,

some of these different, companies. The beauty about it

is the 500 and 1,000 are are really just it it it's

test for a lot of people who wanna be like, how does this work? Because

as we talk, there's a lot of stuff out there, and people are telling you

how to grow your audience and and what you can do

because even I could do this, and that's what makes this great

because this is it's a platform. So, basically, most

of the people who are uploading their Podcasting, basically

or uploading their trailers. Sorry. It it's it's

super simple. In fact, if you go to

Trailergram.co now, you could even

go play around with the back end to show how easy it is. You

upload your artwork, which is basically your, you

know, your, podcast art. You upload an MP

3 of your trailer, and then you put

in the text, basically, like, the podcast title, the subtext,

the headline. You know, you you can even add

short keyword kinda descriptions of the podcast.

Once you have that all plugged in, which is

very Samson, as I said, even I can do it, and I am

the furthest thing from anyone who is tech savvy.

But once you do that, the next step is then we

use Apple's categories, right, to to figure

out how you are going to target your audience. So you

upload your trailer, you put in your target,

we give you up to 3 different targets that, you know, all

based off of Apple's, you know, targeting.

And then what you do is you basically

put this in. It's, you can pay by Stripe.

It's it's as I said, I would recommend the

500. Just test it. See how it works. And and

then all of a sudden, in 20 you'll get an email from us.

We make sure we check the content. It sounds right. You know,

we we make sure it's proper. You'll get a email from us,

and within 24 to 48 hours, your

podcast trailer is playing next to

contextually relevant content like you mentioned. Like, if it's,

something about interest rates, it's next to a story about interest

rates in the Wall Street Journal or wherever it might be. It it just makes

sense. And then in addition, you know, the machine learning and AI,

we find out where these people are coming from. And what you can

do, and you'll see is you'll see a huge push

in the amount of downloads you get. And then the cool thing

is, lastly, after you do all that,

we start sending out these push notifications to people's phones

because a lot of people, like we talked about,

they, oh, they download you know, they they subscribe for push

notifications, but then they're going, you know, to

wherever it is. And then you'll find a lot of people start listening

once the push notifications go out to your podcast. And

and and we keep sending push notifications as new episodes go

out, and it tends to work really well for the

podcaster who is looking to grow audience. But I

will say, listen. It's incredible

the what it comes to and what the download ends up

being, you know, between, I would say, on average, on the 200 campaigns we've

run since September, between 5 and and 15¢.

And, of course, it depends on your content and quality. And the

retention is okay. Like, it's not this there's no

super you know, it's not a something that

can just all of a sudden turn your show into, best hit. But

I we can certainly when you look at the case studies on the website and

you see how many downloads you're getting for the price and you can figure it

out when it comes to pennies, it's pretty amazing to get people

who actually then go and listen to the podcast. And you you

mentioned the measurability. So and correct me if I'm wrong. The way I understand it

just for folks listening, so you're uploading an MP 3. So when that

MP 3 plays, you're not gonna see that trailer play necessarily

in your podcast host dashboard. However,

when it comes to the future episodes that people are subscribed to now,

those are coming from your host, so you will see those downloads. Right? You will

be able to track that the way you would track play in Podcasting,

Google Podcasts. Right? All all the other places where people normally subscribe to

your show. That's exactly right. So, basically, you will not

see, the trailer plays. We we do have, though,

you will have access to. It will show you, or

we will show you, on our board. You're you're

measuring that. We're measuring that. But the

measurement of the actual listens, as long as, of course,

they're IB compliant. And again, everything for us,

we're monitored or, you know, IB CloudFlare will

show up as you just said. Mostly

right now, mobile downloads, you know, in terms of

whether it's coming from, you know, Chrome or or or,

wherever it might be. You know? So so that is is

how it works. But you will see them, you know, in your what

whatever hosting platform you use, you will see the increase

in in downloads, and that's where you have the

access to that. We don't have the access to know

exactly, how many downloads you got. We just

know from our clients that, you know, they'll

they'll tell us, and and we are working on a a prefix attribution

right now and hopefully in the next six weeks, we'll have that. So it just

says trailergram. But as of right now and

as of today, you will see the downloads, but they will

come up in, like, you know, Chrome or Mozilla or whatever it might it

might Tech. Whatever whatever browser people are using. So right once again, folks,

that is Trailergram.co. Cannot stress, checking it on enough. Of course, we'll

have a link to it here in the show notes below. Robert,

before we let you go, a couple of questions we're asking everybody here on the

show. I mean, I know you are making big strides in

the in the place of podcast discoverability. But, you know, is there any

other spots in podcasting where you'd like to see some other

types of improvements on the recording side, distribution, even on the listening

side? You know, that that that's a great question

because really, for us, I was what I

love about podcasting and and, you know, I went to

school a long time ago, and I wanted to,

be a sports reporter on WFAN,

and, it's a radio station in the New York area for those

across the country. Now there's you know, and at the time, there weren't

many. Now there's there's tons of them. And

what I just realized, what I loved about TrailerGram

and this product was that and and why I think this

was by far just the biggest need was

I could have incredible content. This show is incredible.

You you know, it could be well, except when, you know, when you have other

guests on, not me. But, so basically,

like, if no one can discover it or find it, you

can't build it. And people have created incredible content.

And that's what we're trying to do is trying to, like, even the playing field.

But I would say, we've been so focused on audience

development and really on on this part of the

business. The only other aspect I would say

is, you know, in terms of actual

Podcasting, and especially in the business wherein where it's b to b,

and making sure, like, these podcasts are authentic. You know,

there's more authenticity, you know, because you get a lot of people nowadays who

wanna create podcasts, and they have a company, and it's not

an advertisement. You know, podcasting's about conversations and

empathy and authenticity. And I think that's really

what a lot of folks are learning now, and brands

are learning, and companies where, hey, we can do this,

and it's gonna be better for you and your product, because

people, you know, they're tired of getting sold sold to. This

is more authentic. I wanna hear the CEO speak. I wanna hear, you know, in

a real way, in a real conversation. But there's,

for me, I'm a newbie, you know. And sometimes that's a good thing,

because in my last business, I was in it for 25 plus years and

probably missed so many things that people came in. You know? Like, I

remember Jeff Fluhr, who started StubHub, and I had my own business, and we were

gonna partner. And nah, said no. You know? Like,

I I missed it. I was too into it. So the interesting thing and

the biggest thing is jumping into this business 4 plus years

ago, I saw it was all audience. It was all

discoverability and audience. And, you know, that's

why that's our primary focus. Alright.

I I see that you're using a Audio Technica AT 2020

USB microphone here. You know, one of the things that we do on the show

is not just talk about software, but we love talking about hardware and taking tours

of other people's studio. Is there a piece of technology

that you're looking for, whether it's for your studio

or maybe something that you would offer to your clients to to get their hands

on? Yeah. You know, I think as as video becomes

more important, I've noticed this, especially with clients

who are doing branded Podcasting don't have a specific

camera I would I would recommend, but, especially,

as more and more of the Podcasting we do I mean I mean,

99% of them are are done via Riverside

or, you know, any any type of platform that

we're using that's virtual. Having the

right camera, I have learned, it can be

make all the difference. Just like you said, having the right

audio and and you're pretty good by picking up that you

knew that, I know you know your products because I didn't even know

the the numbers. Riverside does help you cheat a little bit. It does show,

just show me what you're using. So but yeah. I get to. I

was like, that is good because there's a lot of letters and

numbers, and I don't even know. But, yes, I think in that

case, like, the importance nowadays and has technology

just moves faster and faster from what I

was using. I I think back, you know, to when I was doing this you

know, I started doing most of my, interviews for how

success happens in person. And,

once these, you know, the riversides of the world and and you

realized you could tape, I the quality is it's

it's almost better, and sometimes, in some cases, it is than

being right there in person. And I find that I'm still able

to get that same connection. I don't know if you find that, you know, with

the person. Obviously, there's always, you know, being there, being in

person, you know, and we have clients. I want I wanna be in the

studio and bring people in, but the thing I love about

this, the virtual world, is if you do have a good camera, you do have

a good mic, you have good sound quality, number 1. I can

interview, you know, you know, you're in New Jersey now. I'm in I'm in New

York. That's not too far. But we've done podcasts. I've

done podcasts. I'm interviewing people. It's the next day in Australia. You know,

it's amazing. That's been pretty cool to see in the last couple

years. Yeah. I definitely, you know, discovered that during

COVID that, you know, we could always interview folks audio wise, but then, really,

once video became so important for us to connect to folks

and the way it has changed the game and it you're right. It's

not the same as being in person, but it's nice to be able to see

a person, see the visual cues, read their body language, you

know, see if they're really paying attention or if they're off, you know, googling something

else or, you know, watching Netflix on the side. So, having good video

definitely makes makes a big difference. And, you know, what we've been saying for the

last few episodes, I I recently just started using my iPhone, the

continuity camera, and Yeah. I I don't think I'm ever going back. And, I mean,

until I go pay for, like, a, you know, $1500 mirrorless camera, this

is a I'm gonna stick with this for a while. Alright. Last Hey. My kid

my kid's trying to get me to buy that. That is not happening for her.

So Last thing we, we wanna ask everybody is

outside of your own show, and I would say, I guess, your client show, is

there a favorite podcast that you are listening to? You know, that one that as

soon as it comes out, you are going to listen to it.

Yes. There's a guy,

and it's a podcast on the Jets. It's

called, turn on yeah. It's, it's it's on

Patreon. It's Badlands. Joe Caparosa is the

one of the hosts with Connor Connor Roger Connor Hughes,

Connor one of I forget his name, but he's they are great.

I don't know if it's you. There's 2 1 there's 1 Conor that

basically, is a Jets reporter. Right.

And Connor, this Connor actually, he is

on s and y postgame. I love

their podcast. As a die hard Jet fan,

and you will know this, it is therapy. After

listening to or, sorry, watching,

the Jets lose, you know, in spectacular fashion, or

just be miserable, or this is therapy

for me, and it is the minute it comes out,

I basically you know, Patreon alerts me. I go on

there. I click, and I as long as I don't have anything

doing, I listen, or I save it for, like, oh,

this is like you know, I don't wanna show you how sad my life is,

but, like, this is my Friday night. Like, this is gonna be fun. Like

but they've been extremely helpful. That by far,

their their platform, and they have a few different shows now and

people, but, Joe and Connor,

are are absolutely fantastic. Excellent.

Well, I I'll have to check it out. I honestly, my feeling is when the

Jets games are over, I don't wanna see from them again, and then Sunday rolls

around. I'm like, oh, I'm so excited, and that's that's, you know, that's our

life. No. I tend to I tend to listen when, you

know, it it it's it the problem is

with the shows they come out with that are, like, prepping for the game when,

you know, like, it's early in the season and they're still, like, you know,

in it, Yeah. There's hope. I love those. Late in

the season, it takes it does take me a few days to then

go listen and go that route. So in any

case, you know, it's, it's definitely a podcast worth worth checking

out. They do a great job. They put a lot of time and effort into

it. I've I've learned from being in the podcast business how

much time and effort. You know this from developing

Podcasting. You know, how hard it is, but but they do a good

job. And and I would recommend it for you if, if you could

handle it, but it seems like you have a better strategy by just turning it

all tuning it all out. Yeah. That that that doesn't work

better. Well, it has been a joy and a pleasure. We've been chatting with Robert

Tuchman. He's the cofounder of Amaze Media Labs. You can check out their work at

amazemedialabs.com. They are the creators of Trailergram,

trailergram.co. I'll have a link to it again. That's a place where you can upload

your trailer and have your show appear on countless articles

across the web from big name publishers and and grow your audience.

He's also the host of How Success Happens with Entrepreneur Magazine. You should check it

out. And as we've learned, he is also a lifelong miserable

Jets fan like myself. Robert, It has been a pleasure. Thanks for

joining me today. Thanks, Mat. Thanks for having me on your

show.