How I Saved Money On My Podcast

After sharing a complete breakdown of my annual podcast earnings last week on The Bandrew Says Podcast, I went on a rampage trying to shave off as much as I could to reduce overhead costs. Below is a screenshot of the excel spreadsheet breaking down the original cost and the updated cost following the cost savings measures. I will breakdown exactly what I did.

1. Canceled Speakpipe: For years I was using speak pipe which is a voice mail service which allows people to submit audio questions. This costs $15/month or $180/year, and I was not getting much use out of it. I would get a submission every few months, so I decided to cancel this. Not only was it getting little use, but I learned of a workaround via my host which allows people to submit an audio file directly on my website without the need for a 3rd party service.

2. Canceled Google Workspace: I was using google workspace for my GeeksRising e-mail. This cost $7.75/month of $93/year. Again, I very rarely got any use out of this e-mail but figured I needed it in order to keep that branded e-mail. Then I realized that a premium encrypted e-mail service that I already pay for allows for custom domains, so I cancelled my google workspace e-mail, setup my domains in this e-mail service, and transitioned all my e-mail to this service I already paid for which saved me another $93/year.

3. Lowered Podcast Storage: For YEARS I have been using the $20/month tier at Libsyn so that I could upload over 168mb of audio per month and I could get higher quality analytics. I looked at the lower priced tier and it was $7/month but you had a hard limit of 168mb/month. In order to do this I had to adjust my mp3 audio quality down. Previously I was uploading 192kbps stereo mp3 files, but to get below the new upload limit I had to decrease to 96kbps mono mp3 files.
   
   For the spoken word information there should be ZERO change in audio quality because the stereo file has a left channel encoded at 96kbps and a right channel encoded at 96kbps, but now I just have a single center channel encoded at 96kbps, so the audio quality is identical. The only time this mono mix will become apparent is when there is music at the very end of the show. But I came to the determination that 15 seconds of stereo audio each week is not worth $160/year.

I am hoping to eventually cut back even further by lowering the podcast hosting to $5/month, and by canceling Midjourney if Adobe Photoshop AI Generative Fill ever gets good enough.

Also, I know that my website hosting is extremely high at $228/year and I could cut this down significantly by buying my own hosting and installing my own website, but I don’t have the time to do that kind of stuff anymore and the convenience of having all the backend handled makes running the show possible. So there are some services that may seem overpriced, but for the added convenience and time saved, I am paying that premium.

Through these cost saving measures I was able to decrease costs by $429/year, and increase the post tax tax home pay by over 70%! That’s how I went about saving money on my podcast.

Clip from BSP-401: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pp4eDenb2Vk
Originally Aired: 15 SEP 2024

Shut Off Your Air Conditioner for Recording

For a few weeks it was really warm and I was a bit lax with shutting off my air conditioner. Because of this there was some pretty nasty artifacting in my podcast recordings.

For every episode of The Bandrew Says Podcast, I include a noise gate on my signal chain. I don’t make it too aggressive, I only attenuate by 6-10dB when the gate closes. When I have my fans and air conditioner shut off, this is very hard to notice, it just improves the underlying noise floor. HOWEVER, when the air conditioner is on, you can hear that dreaded artifact of gates where you have this constant fluctuating noise floor. When the gate opens you hear the air con 10dB louder than you do when it closes. For some people listening in their cars or in noisy environments this will not be noticeable. But if you’re listening in a quiet environment it is absolutely maddening.

I have gone back to my old habits of shutting of my A/C and fans prior to hitting record and the podcast episodes are back to sounding pretty darn good in my opinion. So my advice to you is SHUT OFF YOUR A/C AND FANS BEFORE RECORDING!

Clip from BSP-400: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5N37hzt_2ys
Originally aired: 8 SEP 2024

How Much I Earn From Podcasting...

It has been just over one year since I made the shift from ad supported to value for value, and I figured it was a perfect time to breakdown my podcast earnings, costs, and take home pay.

Below is a screenshot of my excel spreadsheet outlining the income and all of the costs associated with the running of The Bandrew Says Podcast. Since the recording of the episode I have taken quite a few steps to decrease costs and increase take home pay which I will outline in the next blog post which you can read here.

THE BREAKDOWN: Over the prior 365 days I earned $1,496.70 in revenue from listener contributions. The cost of running the podcast was $915.84 which left an earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, and amortization of $580.86. On that income we withheld 35% taxes which was $203.30 and that left a take-home pay of $377.56 for one year of podcasting. During this year I missed quite a few episodes only uploading 40 times which means each episode earned $9.44, and assuming 5 hours of work per episode we get an hourly pay of $1.89/hour.

For many people this may not seem like a lot of money, but I am honored that people found value in my podcast and contributed enough to cover the full cost of running the show over the last year. When I shut off advertising on my YouTube channel (where I host the video podcast), I was expecting a revenue decrease, and this just goes to show that if you offer value, and your audience receives that value, they may choose to return it to your show.

Clip from BSP-400: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5N37hzt_2ys
Originally Aired 8 SEP 2024

Who Benefits from 3-Minute YouTube Shorts?

Back in 2021 YouTube launched “Shorts”, a new feed on the website that consists of sub-60 second videos that have a vertical video format. Since the launch of this new format, YouTube has seemingly pushed this type of content heavily both to viewers and to creators. Now they are extending the maximum length of Shorts from 60-seconds to 3 minutes.

In order to have a short that is longer than 60 seconds, you need to ensure that you have still use a vertical aspect ratio or a square aspect ratio. If your video is sub 3-minutes and it is in a horizontal aspect ratio, it will be published as a regular video and will not be captured by the Shorts Feed.

Why Do I Think They’re Doing This?

I think it’s as simple as: the content creators on YouTube have been asking for longer upload lengths because currently YouTube has the shortest limit at 60-seconds. Instagram allows reels to be up to 90-seconds, and TikTok now allows videos to be up to 60-minutes. So this allows video producers to make a single 90-second video for all 3 platforms without the need to find a way to shave off an additional 30 seconds from their instagram reel.

Who Will Benefit From This?

I think the primary beneficiary will long form video creators on YouTube who have struggled to find ways to make valuable content that fits within that 59 second time constraint. With the additional two minutes it will be much easier to develop a fully executed video idea that offers value to the viewers.

The reason I think this will benefit us is because YouTube has been pushing Shorts heavily for the last 3 years. I have received notifications in YouTube Studio stating something along the lines of: [We’ve noticed creators who publish shorts are growing faster]. So with the extended time limit for short creators like myself will now have easier access to this feed, and HOPEFULLY access to those potential growth opportunities.

But Now YouTube Confuses Me.

Prior to 2021 YouTube was simple. You just had videos and that was it. If your video needed to be 30 seconds, 90 seconds, 5 minutes, 30 minutes, or 12 hours you knew what to do; upload your video and it would be distributed to your audience. But following the introduction of shorts it became a question of: “Do I produce my long form videos, or do I produce short form videos? Does publishing short form videos hurt or harm my channel? Do people want short form or long form? What is the meaning of life, the universe, and everything?” See…Confusing.

Well now it’s more confusing. When you make a 2 minute 59 second video you need to ask yourself: “Do I want this to be on the regular feed or on the shorts feed? Which audience will like this better? Which feed will benefit the channel more? Do I even know what each feed is doing or am I just guessing completely and wishing for the best?”

So in my eyes the Shorts feed is no longer made up of short form content, it really is just vertical video that is automatically fed to the viewer.

Conclusion

Even though I find that this confuses YouTube, I am excited to try this because I have struggled to make valuable shorts even though YouTube has clearly communicated how important shorts are. However, there is one question that remains unasked: Do the viewers of shorts content on YouTube even want longer videos?

Additional reading/viewing

• YouTube Blog Post: https://blog.youtube/news-and-events/tall-updates-coming-to-shorts/

• Creator Insider Announcement: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZmVHABqRwHw

• vidIQ Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xCDfxk7J01w

YouTube Adding Demonetization Timestamps

For years one of the biggest issues on YouTube was the unclear reasons for demonetization or limited monetization (yellow icon). In June of 2024, YouTube creators posted on twitter that there would be an update which would share timestamps on where a video violated policy which led to a demonetization.

At the time of this announcement it was only available to creators who use the Self Certification workflow.

This is a big upgrade for YouTube because one of the biggest issues with demonetization is that YouTubers never knew what they did to receive the demonetization; they would just guess, edit something out, reupload, and try again. This will remove that guess work and allow you to know exactly what caused the demonetization so that you can correct it and upload a new version of the video if you want.

Creator Insider News: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EZQsuA7vGpY

Clip from BSP-390: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTTE0d_De1o
Originally Aired 2 JUN 2024

Should You Use Shotgun Microphones Indoors?

I have frequently heard the advice: “You should not use Shotgun microphones indoors, and should instead use Small Diaphragm Condensers”, but I had never put the idea to the test, so I wanted to provide those sound tests so you can hear the potential issues that may arise from using a shotgun mic indoors.

1. Does a Shotgun Microphone reject more reverb?

   • I can’t say 100% the time yes because it depends on placement of the mic in relation to reflective surfaces. But I noticed that in a decent positioning near a desk and computer monitor, it DID pick up slightly less reverb compared to a cardioid small diaphragm condenser.

2. Does it reach out and grab the reflections off of surfaces?

   • No. Not in my test. When I pointed both mics directly at the desk and spoke towards the desk, I heard no significant difference in the amount of reflections picked up off the desk. The shotgun mic did sound tonally much worse though.

3. Does off axis coloration of shotgun mics ruin your recording?

   • Sort of, yeah. The off axis coloration of shotgun microphones is horrible compared to the cardioid small diaphragm condenser that I compared it to. When I went off axis on the Shotgun mic, we lost all the detail and top end information and it sounded dull and lifeless. The SDC was much more forgiving as you moved off axis where it did not exhibit that same loss of high frequency information.

4. Does speaking off axis cause phasing issues on a shotgun mic?

   • Kind of! I was surprised to find that it can encounter some phasing issues where you get some comb-filtering type artifacts and some sounds sounding like they’re cancelled out and hollow. My very basic understanding of this is due to the voice entering the different slots of the interference tube causing that phase cancellation.

5. Do shotgun mics exhibit phase issues due the reflections.

   • They can. When I tested the SDC and Shotgun directly next to my desk, my voice bouncing around the room did start to impact the shotgun a lot more than the SDC. I started to notice some of those phase artifacts and comb filtering. Admittedly both mics sounded AWFUL in this situation, but I didn’t notice the same issues on the SDC.

CONCLUSION

Now that I understand and have heard the issues used to justify the advice “use an SDC indoors instead of a shotgun mic” I partially agree with the advice. If you’re constantly moving your shotgun mic around to follow talent and you may end up with your mic near walls or desks or other surfaces that reflect sound waves around, I completely agree with the advice. However, if you have a static microphone setup, if you have a decently treated room, and you don’t have the mic next to reflective surfaces, I think that a shotgun microphone could still offer some benefit in reverb rejection compared to the SDC.

When it comes down to it your room and the mic placement is one of the biggest factors in how good the recording will sound. If you have some treatment in your room, can overhead boom, and get the mic closer to your mouth 12-inches or so, you should be able to get great sound with an SDC or a Shotgun mic. If you have an SDC mic, use it. If you have a shotgun mic, use it. In both situations you’ll just need to be careful about mic technique and mic placement, just more so with the shotgun mic. .

Clip from BSP-403: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-60QAwupyA
Originally aired: 29 SEP 2024

Try a No Spend Month

Clip from BSP-402: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHPcF6nWDKI
Originally aired: 22 SEP 2024

AI Content is Ruining YouTube

Over the last 12 months or so I have noticed an influx of AI generated content and Faceless Channels, and I believe it has had a serious negative impact on the viewing experience on YouTube. The main area of YouTube that I think is negatively impacted by this content are the search results. There are plenty of times when I will search specific topics and sort by newest upload and the primary results I get are AI generated listicles.

I’m not discussing content created by someone who uses AI tools to assist in generating videos, I am talking about people who seek the highest CPM or highest affiliate marketing categories, and just use AI to create countless videos in these topics to try and get massive views and affiliate link sales with LOW EFFORT content that they do not actually care about.

There are also an increasing number of commentary channels that seem to be using A.I. to generate the content, or at the very least generate the voice.

I think this is negatively impacting YouTube for multiple reasons:

1. In many cases the people inputting prompts to the AI (or hiring people on fiver to produce the content) have no knowledge in the subject matter so they are unable to fact check or verify that information is correct. This means that they are going to be putting out inaccurate information.

2. The thing that has made YouTube special is the fact that any random person who is passionate about topic X, Y, or Z can make a video talking about it and sharing that passion. When those people are drowned out by the floor of inauthentic, unpassionate, soulless AI/Faceless content, the “soul” of YouTube dies. I know that sounds dramatic, but the passionate people who make content are pushed off the platform, the platform ceases to be interesting and loses the main draw.

That’s my take on why AI content and Faceless Channels are ruining YouTube. If you have any experience with this, feel free to share your thoughts in the comment.s

Clip from BSP-388: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jz4hpFUO2jU
Originally aired: 12 MAY 2024

Uploading Video Podcasts to Spotify

If you run a podcast that is distributed via RSS and it is on Spotify, you may be wondering “how do I upload my video podcast to Spotify”?. The below tutorial assumes you have already submitted your audio RSS to Spotify for podcasters. It’s pretty simply.

1. Go to podcasters.spotify.com and login to your account.

2. Select “Episodes” from the menu so you can view all your podcast episodes.

3. Locate the episode you want to upload video for.

4. On the right hand side of the screen there should be three dots. When you click that you get a drop down that gives you the option to “Upload a Video”

5. Select the video file that you want to upload.

6. Fill in all the requested information and answer the questions about content that’s in the episode.

7. I have noticed that the spotify video upload is very slow, but once it’s uploaded and processed, you’re done.

Hopefully this helps you get your video podcast up and running on Spotify.

Clip from BSP-402: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHPcF6nWDKI
Originally aired: 22 SEP 2024

Get a Good Night Sleep

This is the WEEKLY RECOMENDATION. For years I have tried to keep a consistent sleep schedule. This means that even during the weekends my alarm goes off at 5:30 and I do my best to get up at that time. Recently I decided to make a minor change to this schedule and shut off all my alarms on Sunday.

I did this prior to recording episode 401 of the BSP and I got a solid 8 hours of sleep and I have to tell you it was incredible. So I am recommending that you do your best to get a solid 8-hours of sleep because it feels fantastic and makes the rest of the day seem a bit easier.

Clip from BSP-401: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pp4eDenb2Vk
Originally Aired: 15 SEP 2024