The Hiatus is Over!

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Well, hello there.

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Welcome back to the Podcast Accelerator.

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I'm your host, Mark Asquith, and it has been a while, but never fear.

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The Podcast Accelerator returns to help you with your podcast audience growth, but

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this is a bit of a welcome back episode.

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It's a bonus episode.

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Just talking back through, I think, why I went through the hiatus, what

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I've been working on in the meantime, when the show's gonna be coming back

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properly, you know, any changes to the format, any changes to the release

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schedule, and so on and so forth.

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But of course, the thing that I need to do first is to thank you.

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The ever-present listener, because you've stuck with me.

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You've stuck around.

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I get people asking me, when's the accelerator coming back,

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Marco, when are you coming back?

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When are you coming back?

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And it's taken a while to get back into the head space, which

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I'll talk about in a little while.

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But the podcasting industry has changed.

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It's changing.

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Ever, ever, ever...

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it just, you know, seems ever faster.

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It's just continuing to evolve and evolve so very quickly and I've been in this

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industry now for, well, a long, long time.

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I, I got into this in the first instance in 2012, and, and since then I, I've

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pretty much been here continually.

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I've seen a lot of change.

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I've seen it go from an industry that wasn't really an industry.

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There were a few players, there were a few podcasters, there were a few

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companies, and just seen it turn into this genuine media industry

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where there are so many divisions.

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There are so many different people wanting different things from the

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industry all under this term podcasting.

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It just isn't the same anymore.

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There's nothing wrong with that.

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It's growing up, it's going through it's teenage years, it's, it's finding

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its feet, it's finding its own voice.

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Excuse the pun, but it's figuring out what it wants to be.

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And we see divisions, we see unification, we see all sorts of different things

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cropping up from people trying to put up walled gardens to initiatives

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like the Podcasting 2.0 initiative and the PSP that are trying to keep

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podcasting as open as possible.

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And the good thing about it is that there is space for everyone, and

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that's the main reason why I love this.

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It's the main reason why I got into podcasting all those.

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Years ago.

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So let me dig into, into why I took the hiatus.

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I'm gonna, like I said, later in this session, I'm gonna talk about what's next.

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I'm gonna talk about the format, when I'm gonna get back to content and so on

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and so forth, some release schedules.

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But I just want to go back and just revisit that hiatus.

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So last year when I took that hiatus, it was around March time, and at that point

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I'd been creating content podcasts in particular that educate other podcasters.

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I've been doing educational shows like this one for a long, long

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time, over a thousand episodes.

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And that is tough to keep up and experimented with all sorts of different

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formats because if I'm gonna help you with your podcast, I need to know I

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need, what's it like to run a daily show?

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What's it like to run a long form show?

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What's it like to run a short form show?

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And I'd done a lot, you know, I'd done a heck of a lot, and I was

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finding that I was a bit burnt out.

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I was.

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I was at risk of repeating and I don't think there's anything wrong with

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that cuz because I think when you're educating, there's always a great

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opportunity to, to re revisit and to reiterate and to re reframe and to

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refactor education and information.

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All the best teachers, in my view, do that.

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They teach things in various different ways because we all learn differently.

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But I was, honestly, I was just burnt out on it.

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There was a lot going on.

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Weed actually, as Captivate would become part of the fantastic team at Global,

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which has gone really, really well.

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I love being part of Global and Captivate.

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If you've been following Captivate, You'll know that we've carried on.

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You know, we've done some great, great work, which I've put some

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links to actually in the show notes for this episode because we've got

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some amazing releases that we've put out, and we've got more that

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are coming over the next few weeks.

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We've got a big release the week commencing the 15th of

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May this year, which is gonna be an absolute game changer.

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So I'm really looking forward to sharing that with you.

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But we've done a lot of stuff.

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We integrated with Globals DAX platform.

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We've put out the episode planning and research links with Captivate out

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we've done AMIE (audio mastering & insertion engine) version 2.0.

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We'd released a lot and it was, it was just a time, that was it.

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It required a lot of focus as a business owner.

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So yeah, I'm a content creator, of course, and I'm also the co-founder

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and MD of Captivate and going from the CEO of a startup to being part of

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a much bigger business and becoming the managing director and, and, and.

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Still running the show at Captivate.

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It required a lot of attention.

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I had to do great work for you, the podcaster, but also great

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work internally for global.

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We had to do great work together and we do, and we did.

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So I needed to focus on that, but I also wanted to do two other things.

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You see, when I was younger, a lot, lot younger.

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Sounds like a Beatles song in there when I was younger.

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So much younger than today.

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It was really a lot, lot younger.

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I said to myself that I want to get to a point in my life where when I've

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got a little one, when I've got a kid, when I've got a child, I wanna

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be able to focus my entire attention on being the best dad possible.

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And as you might know, just a couple of months after the Captivate

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became part of Global, I had my first child, my little girl.

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She's beautiful.

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I love her to pieces.

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She's doing so well.

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And thank you to all the listeners that have asked.

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It's, do you know what it means so much?

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Um, yeah, that just blows me away that people actually ask

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people that listen to the show.

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Thank you so much for that.

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And what I wanted to do was put all of my effort into being

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the best person for Captivate.

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But also when you're running a podcast like the Podcast Accelerator, it takes

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time over and above the working hours.

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There are only so many hours you can work in a day, and what I'd

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have to do is work on an evening to do the podcast accelerator.

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And there's nothing wrong with that.

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Really enjoyed doing it.

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But when I had my little girl and, and, and Sam and I had our little

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girl, It was, I couldn't do that.

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I didn't want to do that.

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I wanted to be there for bathtime.

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I wanted to be there for bedtime.

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I wanted to be there for breakfast, and I wanted to be there as much as I can.

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And I can, and I can do that.

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And I'm very fortunate enough to have spent a year finding that

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balance with Sam and our little girl.

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And it, it, it, it's, it works.

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It's great.

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Now she's a little bit older.

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Now she's got her own activities that she do.

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You know, she's, she, she has an hour doing player days, she has

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an hour doing various thing, you know, activities like kids do.

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And so I get a little bit of time, you know, one day a week I get an hour or

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two back where I can do this again.

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So when, when you combine all of these things, you know, moving from

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being a startup to working within global, being a little bit burnt

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out on creating all of that content, and then of course, Becoming a dad.

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It was just the right time to take a hiatus, but also I

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had to get my head straight.

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I had to figure out, you know, I've been this outspoken, really generous and

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genuine, transparent, open educator in the podcasting space for such a long time.

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I've traveled the world and I've created so much content

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and met so many amazing people.

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What does the next 10 years of this look like for me?

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Because the industry has changed and that's why.

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I did another couple of things.

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I experimented with hobby podcasts.

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I got the love of the craft back because.

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It's difficult.

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We all know how difficult it is to carry on podcasting.

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We do.

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We know that we see Pod Fair all the time, and what I wanted to do was to

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create content that I love, content for me, which is why I focused on Spark of

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Rebellion, my Star Wars podcast, Gaz and I attended Star Wars celebration

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and done another couple of things.

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I interviewed the Fantastic Charles Soule, the author, fantastic author of all the

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Star Wars comics that you might read, and a lot of the High Republic work as well.

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We just had it for fun.

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We built the NERD Podcasts Network, which we're launching a couple of shows, and

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I've got a, a passion project that I've been wanting to do for years called,

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It's How Old, which is celebrating pop culture's biggest birthdays.

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It's a seasonal podcast that looks back and says, how the heck, is Superman.

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The Movie from 1978, how is it 45 years old?

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And we retrospectively looked at it, how is Man of Steel 10

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years old and so on and so forth.

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Just loved doing it.

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And it's launching very, very shortly.

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I'm just putting the finishing touches on that one.

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We have done so much to get, for me to get the love of, of not just talking

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about podcasting, but being a podcaster that doesn't talk about podcasting,

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getting the love of it back whilst also, of course running Captivate.

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So that's why I took the hiatus and I needed it.

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And you know, I'm gonna tell you a bit of a secret.

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I've made a complete plan to close this entire podcast, down the podcast

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accelerator, and even recorded a goodbye episode, but I didn't publish it.

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I left it, and over the last couple of months, I've got the taste back for it.

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I've got the desire, the burnout's gone, the willingness to create

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educational content for podcasters is back and I've learned a lot.

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It's been a big year, so I'm excited.

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Alright.

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I am super excited not only to see all the listeners and to speak to you and to

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chat to you on Twitter as always, and to just, you know, look at how I can help

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you, but also to get back out to events.

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We went to PodFest.

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Kieran and I, we spoke out at PodFest over in Orlando with

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our great, great friend, Mr.

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Chris Krimitsos so's the team, uh, Podcast Movement.

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We've got the podcast show in London, which we're speaking

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at an exhibiting at as always.

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So I'm really excited to just see you guys in person after Covid after

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this content hiatus from me and.

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It is just, it's just good to be back.

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But what I also wanna do is, is, is is before I tell you about some of the, the

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format changes and some of the little tweaks that I'm making, I want to just

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give a big shout out to the Captivate team because one final reason that I stepped

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back a little bit from the Limelight was to let those talented souls shine.

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We've got Garry, we've got Sarah, we've got Ben, we've got Danny, we've got

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Judy, we've got Kieran, we've got Pierre.

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We've got some amazing Captivate team members that wouldn't ordinarily

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have been able to get to conferences because people wanted me, the

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person that creates the content.

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So I stepped back and let them get in front of the camera, let them get

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on the stage, let them be on podcast.

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And you know what?

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They're absolutely fantastic.

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There's more talent there than I will ever, ever have, and I'm super,

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super proud of you, the Captivate team, and super proud of all.

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Your view, the Captivate users and the podcast Accelerator listeners and the,

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and the people that consume all of our content for embracing that team.

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So very, very much.

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We've created a lot of new content through Captivate and I've done none of it.

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I've been working behind the scenes on product and they are so talented.

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So go and check some of that out over on YouTube cuz they have done

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excellent work over on the written blog.

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Captivating Insider, the podcast there is so much great content that the

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team has created and you'll see them at podcast movement again this year.

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So when is the podcast coming back?

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This is a bonus episode, just kind of talking through a couple of things.

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The podcast will be back on Thursday, the 18th of May, but in

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the meantime, I'm gonna release a little bit of runup content,

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more bonus episodes like this one.

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I'm gonna put a couple of these out just to build up to

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that Thursday the 18th of May.

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Look out for that cuz I'm excited about them.

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I'm gonna mix things up a little bit.

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I'm speaking.

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Of mixing things up.

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If you have your calendar in front of you, you'll note that

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the 18th May is indeed a Thursday.

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I'm gonna be releasing brand new episodes, not on Monday anymore, but Thursday at

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midday UK time, which is around 7:00 AM Eastern, depending on daylight savings.

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That's on a Thursday at 12:00 PM UK time, and I'm gonna be putting out early access

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to those episodes a couple of days early.

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Four.

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People who support the podcast and I'll talk to you about that separately.

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Dun dun.

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What else is changing?

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Well, Format is gonna be tweaked.

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Give us a slightly Yes.

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I'm gonna be educating, yes, I'm gonna be talking like I do.

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Yes.

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I'm gonna be giving you the skinny on all things podcast growth, education,

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monetization, you know the drill.

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I've been around long enough doing this.

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I'm gonna be doing more of that, but I'm also gonna be interviewing some people.

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I'm also gonna be giving you some industry insights.

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I'm also gonna be bringing people on from around the industry to help me

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to educate and maybe some friends.

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That aren't in the industry.

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Just to help me to educate you on the things that you need to grow your

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audience, because one of the big things that I learned as a podcaster very, very

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early on is that the way that I could succeed with the Podcast Accelerator and

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all of the things that I do in podcasting was to bring the experience that I had

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outside of podcasting into the industry.

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So the brand, the marketing, the product work that I do, the building

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of businesses that I've done, the way that I do public speaking, all

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of that informs how I build podcasts.

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And I couldn't do any of it without the outside experience.

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So I'm gonna, I'm gonna be bringing a little bit more of that to the table.

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So listen, we're back.

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Thank you to you, the ever present fans.

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I love you dearly.

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And I, it the, the message that I've had talking about Michael,

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when are you coming back asking me, Marco, when are you coming back?

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It excites me and I'm so grateful for you.

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You know, I can't believe that I get to do this as a job.

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You, I'm thankful to you.

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I'm thankful to the Captivate team, to the wider global team.

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I'm grateful to my friends in the industry, right across the industry from

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the news outlets like Sam Sethi and James Cridland and everyone over there, right

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through to the other hosting companies that we know and love, right through

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to some of the other tech providers, the other fantastic creators, some

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of the influencers that are really.

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Providing great thought leadership in the space, and just everyone in

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the industry is always so welcoming.

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So thank you to everyone and welcome back to the Podcast Accelerator.