Announcer : 0:00

The Pub News Weekly Review. With Buzzsprout Podcast hosting made easy.

Sam Sethi: 0:07

I'm joined today by Chloe Straw. Chloe is the CEO of Audio UK. Chloe hello, how are you?

Chloe Straw: 0:14

Hi, sam, I'm good. Thanks for having me.

Sam Sethi: 0:16

It's our pleasure. Now look Audio UK. Let's crack through that first. What is Audio UK?

Chloe Straw: 0:22

So we've recently slightly updated our kind of mission statement and that's very much because the way that the audio industry has changed so rapidly over the last kind of 10 years. So we are an industry body and we're dedicated to advancing the audio sector. So that includes podcasts, radio, audio books, and that's by fostering innovation, innovation supporting creators and businesses and driving sustainable growth. So we've got about 130 members, we're member funded and I think we have about 50 in london, 50 out of london, across the uk, and they include businesses like sony, goldhanger, audio always, persephonica, novel, so a huge range of amazing different businesses.

Sam Sethi: 1:06

And when you say all these people are members, what is it that you are then giving them Guidance? Are you giving them regulation? What is it that Audio UK provides then?

Chloe Straw: 1:18

So we do a huge amount of different work and it represents the huge range of different members that we have. So within those lists we might have one person who is an audiobook producer, and they churn out audiobooks every single week in their home studio. And then obviously you have Goalhanger, who are absolutely massive and have five out of the top 10 Apple podcasts in the charts every week. So in the way that our members have a lot of different needs, we provide a lot of different services. So one of the biggest things that we concentrate on is growing the industry and growing, I guess, the amount of money coming into the industry for our members. Our members are largely independent, and by that I mean we don't have the BBC as a member, we don't have Global as a member, but we do have some of the kind of biggest independent podcast companies, and so I guess what we do I split into almost two sides. There's the tangible benefits and the less tangible benefits. In terms of industry growth, one of our main things this year is we're doing a huge amount of policy work, which doesn't sound that exciting but is really really important, of policy work which doesn't sound that exciting but is really really important and the main crux of that without turning this into a policy podcast is around getting audio podcasting recognised as a creative industry. So there's something at government level called the Creative Industries Council. It has a huge amount of input into where the money goes for the creative industries, representation abroad and all different levels of development around the creative industries, and as it stands there is no seat for audio in any form on the Creative Industries Council, which seems completely mad to me. And so one of the big things that I've been working on with Hannah, who's our policy and regulation lead, is lobbying around a seat on the Creative Industries Council and from that flows things like creative audio, tax relief for podcasting and audiobooks, more IP funding for development and IP export overseas. So I guess if you're one of our bigger members then you are able to directly feed into those conversations.

Chloe Straw: 3:25

I think one of the things I love about Audio UK is I keep in fairly constant contact with a lot of the founders and CEOs and MDs of our companies. So we're always very open to talking to our members about various issues and that gives them a really kind of direct avenue into those massive industry decisions. So it's very much about growing the industry Tangible benefits. We provide a lot of business support. So we've just partnered with a new insurance provider on behalf of our members called Riskbox, which is great. We have a long running partnership with Minton Co, who provide as soon as you join up at any business level, you get access to 30 free legal contract templates. We have a partnership with HR companies all of those things that you might be really focused as a business on, like what's the creative, what's an idea, but all the kind of infrastructure of running a business. We also offer that to all of our members. So, and many other things training, audio production, awards, which we're going to call the APAs from now on and, yeah, so many different things.

Sam Sethi: 4:31

Okay, so a couple of questions there. One is what's the website? So let's get that out of the way. Where would they go to find out more?

Chloe Straw: 4:38

AudioUKorguk. Our LinkedIn's a bit more exciting, but if you want to find out about joining us, then go to the website.

Sam Sethi: 4:45

And the other one is I don't know if you saw, but in this week's news, india has announced a $1 billion investment into its local creator economy. So it sounds very similar to what you were just describing with what Audio UK would want from the UK government. So in Mumbai, neil Mohan, the CEO of YouTube, basically spoke, and then the Indian government minister has announced that they're putting in $1 billion not rupees, thankfully and the goal is to enable creators to scale their productions, upgrade tech and tap into the global markets. That sounds exactly what you were just describing for what Audio UK wants the UK government to do.

Chloe Straw: 5:26

Yeah, I mean, that's very much what we need to happen, I think, if I have a fascinating spreadsheet which looks at kind of the different benefits that other creative industries get. So film, tv, gaming, animation, theatre they get a huge amount of government support, where historically, we got a bit of money into training, but that stopped in 2018. 2018. We're actually partnering with the BBC on training. We're relaunching AudioTrain, which will be great, but I feel like the government should be putting money into training for audio as well.

Chloe Straw: 5:56

Absolutely, we put in a proposal for the spring spending review around a fund for IP development and export. So, obviously, as we all know, one of the things that we want to do is make sure that UK podcasting is successful internationally and we're able to tap into those international markets as well, and that's another of our key focuses is how do we bring in more international investment? The kind of IP fund focuses on that at a local level as well as at a global level. And also, the audio tax relief is very much around. So many of our member companies use UK teams to make podcasts for the US and if we had a tax relief, you know it would just supercharge that. So, yeah, we just want to grow the industry, bring in more money. We'd love a billion dollars for the podcast.

Sam Sethi: 6:46

Wouldn't we just yes.

Chloe Straw: 6:48

Maybe a bit less than that at the moment. But you know anything, I'd take anything right now, and then we'll work up to a billion.

Sam Sethi: 6:54

We'll see if Rachel's got a few shekel behind her couch. You know she might find some. Now, this event that you've got coming up it's on the 23rd of April. Tell me more about it.

Chloe Straw: 7:04

So that's another real focus for us this year actually. So, aside from policy events so on, we obviously work with a lot of the biggest and finest production businesses, production houses and networks in the UK. As I've mentioned, that's one of the things I absolutely love about Audio UK. It's the ability to bring all these incredible businesses together, and one thing that we do is we have a podcast leaders lunch. So it's for Audio UK member companies. They don't necessarily have to be the biggest. Obviously the biggest come along, but it's the CEOs and the MDs and the co-founders of those businesses who come along, and something that I love about the industry is that they're obviously all competitors, but they're also very happy to share insights, which I love because I love partnerships. I think good things happen out of partnerships, and so we run these leaders lunches every quarter or so. We obviously put on lunch, get everyone who we can together to come along and discuss opportunities and challenges within the industry.

Chloe Straw: 8:07

And one of the biggest challenges and opportunities that came up was around advertising in podcasting in the UK, and I mean you know this as well, if not better, than I do. You know podcasting in the UK, in terms of ad spend, still has a long way to go in terms of being recognised as a really good place to put your money. As a really good place to put your money. We all know that it's a great place. We know that the statistics are good. We know that audience engagement is good. We know that the kind of return on investment is good. The kind of structure and convincing the ad agencies and the media buyers of that still needs a lot more work, and I spend a lot of time with statistics because I love data and so we know the obvious comparison is the US and the UK, both primarily English speaking countries, and I think my most recent calculation is if you look at the podcast ad spend per person in the UK, it's 1.2 pounds per person and if you look at it in the US, it's $7 per person. So it's not just that the US is bigger because population size it's bigger per person, and so one of the priorities that came out of those lunches was around how do we convince advertisers that podcasting is a good place to put their money? We know it, but there's obviously a bit of a disconnect there. Know it, but there's obviously a bit of a disconnect there, and obviously there's great work being done already by ACAST, by Megaphone Goalhanger, do their own outreach around that. A lot of the businesses that we work with do outreach around that, but I think it's really powerful to bring all of these businesses together and get the brands and advertisers together to hear from such an incredible bunch of businesses At the same time as we'd come up with that.

Chloe Straw: 9:54

I know Meera Kumar quite well, who's obviously a fantastic producer, and she brought a similar idea to me, and the beauty of Meera is, if it had been left to me because I have 40,000 things to do at any one point it probably would have stayed. Oh, that's a good idea, shouldn't we do that Whilst I answer all my emails, and she came to me with the idea and has been really instrumental in just driving it forward, which is fantastic. We also have Martin who runs Podmasters helping out and a few other people. So, yeah, I think the main point of it is around demystifying advertising, and I think the reason we wanted to is around demystifying advertising. And I think the reason we wanted to do it is because in advertising there's so many different stakeholders, isn't there? There's kind of the platforms, the production houses, the agencies, the media buyers so many different things and I think again, one of the strengths of Audio UK and one of the things that I love about it is the ability to hear straight from the horse's mouth. So we are bringing these brands and advertisers together with the production houses and the networks who sell their content, make their content, distribute their content, and we want to talk to them about why it's so brilliant and just do a really good job of showing them why podcasting should be on their buying plan for the next year.

Chloe Straw: 11:15

I think it's a difficult task. We are different from the US in how we're set up. I was reading a really interesting report recently and one of the points around it is that podcasting still sits under audio in terms of ad buying, and I think, if you look at America, podcasting is sort of its own branch of buying, and I think that's something that's really interesting for us to look at. For me, this is a really good first step in tackling and you know, it's not just us doing it, a lot of people are doing it, and it's not just us doing it, a lot of people are doing it but if we all tackle the need for more money to come into podcast advertising and sponsorships. I think it can only be a good thing.

Sam Sethi: 12:00

I think, given what you said, I heartily agree that the differences between the US and UK markets. There's a couple of things in my head. One is I think Rocky Thomas from Soundstack had said it when she was presenting over in Venice recently we don't make podcasting buying for media companies easy. We don't talk their language, so somehow we've got to translate Swahili into their language and they've got to translate whatever they do into ours. So there's an education element, and so I think your event will be good as a first step in that. I also think and I don't say it lightly I think there is a laziness within the industry, not so much the podcasting, but I think in the media industry buying. It's like let's not rock the boat, let's do what we do. It's easy. So there's an element of that. And then I think there is also one thing I think the podcasting industry can do, which is to provide better metrics back to the advertisers.

Sam Sethi: 12:52

I think TV and radio don't do a good job. Things like Raja, I think, are weird and I think some of the measurement systems. It's like one person in Scarborough heard your station, so a million people were listening to you today. It's like that's not true. You can't just extrapolate right, but that's what the industry does and everyone takes that number as a given. But I think within podcasting we can do a better job and I'm currently working with a bunch of geeks on something called performance data, which is first party data back Now companies like YouTube, spotify, apple have that first party data. How long did Chloe listen to this podcast? Did she hear the ad? When did she drop off? All those things can be given back to advertisers. That radio and TV cannot do.

Sam Sethi: 13:35

And I think that's the sort of messaging I would hope is getting back to those media buyers. Actually, the old adage of I spend my marketing, I just don't know which half is effective and which is not. I think with podcasting I think we can address that, but that was the promise of digital online anyway. Now this event if anyone wants to come along, I'm assuming it's invite only, so how would they come along?

Chloe Straw: 13:59

Yeah, so we have made it just for brands and advertisers because we need to provide that value for the businesses who are presenting. So if you would like to come along, then you can drop Katie, who does our marketing, an email. So she is. It's got to be an easier way to do this, but again there's not. Perhaps you could put a link in the transcript way to do this, but again there's not. Perhaps you could put a link in the transcript.

Sam Sethi: 14:30

Uh, k-a-t-i-e bannum which is dot b-a-n-h-a-m at audio ukorguk we'll put it in the show notes for you as well. Now, outside of talking to government and trying to change policy and running events, what else does audio uk do?

Chloe Straw: 14:43

so, yeah, I must give a big shout out to the apas, which are our annual awards ceremony. Katie messaged me beforehand was like make sure you mention the apas, chloe, so they're at the bfi in november. I think it's november. Actually, I don't want to give, I'll get the date wrong, which is classically me. So I was going to give you an exclusive date reveal somewhere in november.

Sam Sethi: 15:04

It's around. Then We'll let you know.

Chloe Straw: 15:06

On a Wednesday towards the end. I should have briefed myself a bit better on that. Apologies about that. So we do that.

Chloe Straw: 15:12

As you say, we do a lot of events. So I would absolutely say please join Audio UK If you are not sure if you're eligible to be a member. We're broadening the membership more and more. As I say, our key driver is very much about growing this industry, about bringing more money into it for our businesses. We all do it for the love, but you need to earn the money to keep going as well. But we are primarily member funded and so the more people that join, the merrier. We have a join us button on our website and as part of that, everything that I've spoken about, we are doing an increasing amount of events because we find that members get a huge amount of benefit from that.

Chloe Straw: 15:55

So we recently ran an event with PACT, who are the TV and film equivalent of us, which was a TV versus podcasting networking event. Obviously, as we all know, podcasting is not just audio, it's every single different IP extension you could possibly know about. And what was really nice about that event was we brought PAT members together with Audio UK members. They were able to network. We had a presentation from Karina at Buzz16 and from Tony Pastor at Goalhanger and it was just a great time for, you know, people might have a podcast idea but they don't know how to exploit the TV IP extension, or people in TV might want to learn more about podcasting. So we're trying to do more and more of those events that grow people's businesses and more of those events that grow people's businesses, grow their opportunities.

Chloe Straw: 16:46

I'm a huge collaborator. We are relaunching our audio train platform this year, which is very much about providing open access training to the whole podcast, audio radio, audiobook industry. It's in the early stages but will very much be around a kind of series of training videos from industry experts. So if you want to know how to story edit, you want to know how to monetize your podcast, you want to know how to market your podcast, you want to know about audio drama, there should be a video for everything. So I'm very excited about that and we also are generally at most of the events we get around quite a lot. So the uni pod fest is coming up on the 4th of april see you yeah, great.

Chloe Straw: 17:30

And bernard, uh, ashton pong, who is the vice chair and obviously founder of unedited, he and I are doing a workshop and so, yeah, we'll see you there and I'm really excited about the podcast show. Um, I do love the podcast show. It's an opportunity to see all your work, friends, and it's increasingly international, which is important for us. So we've announced our first panel there, which is called 2025 to 2035 predictions for the future of podcasting.

Sam Sethi: 17:59

Seat one, row one, I'll be there.

Chloe Straw: 18:00

I know I mean it's a little bit tongue inin-cheek, but I'm looking forward to it.

Sam Sethi: 18:04

Mystic Chloe. That's the new title.

Chloe Straw: 18:07

I want the audience to put their predictions in, but I'm chairing that and then there's going to be Megan Bradshaw from Amazon Music, Tiffany Ashtay from Acast and Jessica Cordova Kramer from Lemonada Media. So I think incredible amount of knowledge there. And we've already made the joke that we're going to have a swear jar if anyone says video, because obviously there's so much out there, like every time on LinkedIn, I'm so happy to read about it, but it's like is video the future of podcasting? And we think we know that video has got a part in it now. So our promise to you on that panel is, if we say video, we have to put a pound in the jar.

Sam Sethi: 18:46

I tell you, the drinks that evening are going to be amazing.

Chloe Straw: 18:49

And we've also got a couple more that I'm really excited about, but I can't announce yet, so hopefully they should come and yeah, all the other things. But, as I say, we're real focused on pushing really hard to grow this industry that we love, whether that's through bringing more money in from advertising, through getting a seat on the Creative Industries Council, we're just sort of hammering away at the moment.

Sam Sethi: 19:15

Hopefully, more people will hear this and join. More people will also ping you to come along to your event. Yes, and we will all see you, hopefully at the London Podcast Show. Chloe Straw, thank you so much.

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Chloe Straw: 19:35

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