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Posted by PodcastOne Sales Staff
-- CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO THE PODCAST --
BEVERLY HILLS, CA – June 3, 2013 – PodcastOne founder and Chairman Norm Pattiz recently sat down with Michael Wolf of NextMarket Insights to talk about his founding of radio giant Westwood One, the evolution to PodcastOne and why he’s investing millions in what he calls "the future of audio media".
"As the founder of Westwood One, Norm Pattiz helped usher in the era of modern radio syndication. Now, he's bringing the knowledge and relationships he's developed over the past few decades to the podcast world," said Wolf. "I talk to Norm about his new company, as well as how things have changed (and maybe not changed) since his days with Westwood One. We also talk about how his podcast advertising business, as well as his deals to bring new shows like Steve Austin's new podcast to market."
About PodcastOne
PodcastOne is the new online destination for free discovery and enjoyment Read More-- CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO THE PODCAST --
BEVERLY HILLS, CA – June 3, 2013 – PodcastOne founder and Chairman Norm Pattiz recently sat down with Michael Wolf of NextMarket Insights to talk about his founding of radio giant Westwood One, the evolution to PodcastOne and why he’s investing millions in what he calls "the future of audio media".
"As the founder of Westwood One, Norm Pattiz helped usher in the era of modern radio syndication. Now, he's bringing the knowledge and relationships he's developed over the past few decades to the podcast world," said Wolf. "I talk to Norm about his new company, as well as how things have changed (and maybe not changed) since his days with Westwood One. We also talk about how his podcast advertising business, as well as his deals to bring new shows like Steve Austin's new podcast to market."
About PodcastOne
PodcastOne is the new online destination for free discovery and enjoyment of all the best podcasts. Launched in February, PodcastOne is already home to over 200 popular podcasts including CBS News, New York Public Radio, Adam Carolla, Dennis Miller, Ron Paul, Penn Jillette, Laura Ingraham, Maria Menounos, Tom Green, Dr. Drew, Steve Austin, Ask Women and many more.
About Launchpad Digital Media
Launchpad Digital Media (www.launchpaddigitalmedia.com) is Courtside Entertainment Groups' digital rep firm representing all PodcastOne programming as well as the many top independent podcasters.
About Courtside Entertainment Group
Courtside Entertainment Group produces and finances multi-platform, quality programming. Known for its high profile personalities Courtside is the radio home for Laura Ingraham, Bill O'Reilly, Dr. Drew Pinsky, Loveline and Ron Paul.
About NextMarket
NextMarket Insights is a new research firm focused on emerging consumer, social and crowd technologies. NextMarket Insights was founded by Michael Wolf, who served as the founding Vice President of Research for GigaOM's research service, GigaOM Pro. You can view our latest research in our research store, buy advisory time with a NextMarket analyst, subscribe for updates, or listen to NextMarket Insights conversations with market visionaries at our podcast page.
Contact:
Peter Sessa
Launchpad Digital Media
(917) 848-2353
psessa@courtsidellc.com Show Less
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Posted by PodcastOne Sales Staff
By Joey Odorisio
Norm Pattiz
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In 1976, Norm Pattiz founded radio syndication giant Westwood One, which spent 35 years as one of the largest radio programming distributors in the country. After the company merged with Dial Global in 2011, Pattiz moved on to form Courtside Entertainment. Now, Pattiz has returned to the world of media and broadcasting withPodcast One and Launchpad Digital Media. The Podcast One platform curates the best and most popular Talk podcasts on the Web, while Launchpad serves as the advertising representation for many of these podcasts. Pattiz recently spoke to FMQBabout the future of content distribution, his excitement for podcasting and the financial possibilities that lie ahead for it as a medium.
Let’s start by discussing the founding of Podcast One, which is a division of Launchpad Digital Media, which is itself Read More
By Joey Odorisio
Norm Pattiz
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In 1976, Norm Pattiz founded radio syndication giant Westwood One, which spent 35 years as one of the largest radio programming distributors in the country. After the company merged with Dial Global in 2011, Pattiz moved on to form Courtside Entertainment. Now, Pattiz has returned to the world of media and broadcasting withPodcast One and Launchpad Digital Media. The Podcast One platform curates the best and most popular Talk podcasts on the Web, while Launchpad serves as the advertising representation for many of these podcasts. Pattiz recently spoke to FMQBabout the future of content distribution, his excitement for podcasting and the financial possibilities that lie ahead for it as a medium.
Let’s start by discussing the founding of Podcast One, which is a division of Launchpad Digital Media, which is itself a division of Courtside Entertainment, correct?
Yes, I formed Courtside when I left Westwood One. When Westwood One merged intoDial Global, some of the talent I had originally signed, such as Bill O’Reilly and Dr. Drew and a few other people, asked me if I was going to be doing anything new. They asked if I would syndicate them through Courtside, which was really just a mail drop for me to have an office for all the other things I do. But all of a sudden it was a business opportunity to syndicate some shows and get involved in the production of other things, so I did it for fun. I never had any visions of going out and building “Westwood Two” or anything like that. The idea of getting back into this business, or any business, with both feet was just not on my radar. But in doing a few syndicated radio shows, I could bring in handful of people who I knew and had confidence in.
One of the things I always made time for was entrepreneurs and players in the digital space who were looking for ways to grow their business or for financing. In our explanation of what Courtside was, we said it was a boutique radio production and distribution and firm that produced, distributed and financed new projects, and since I put ‘financed’ in there, everybody would come and see me. A lot of people invest in start up technology companies with the idea that if they invest in ten of them, and one or two are successful, they’re ahead of the game. That’s not me. If I’m going to invest in something, I’d prefer it to be something I know about so I can be strategic as well as financial. I have to see the light at the end of the tunnel.
The one time I wound up being excited was when Kit Gray came to me. Kit is now my partner in Launchpad, which is the rep firm for all the things we do digitally, primarily the podcasts that live on our destination website Podcast One. Launchpad sells our own programming, as well as the programming that we just represent. It’s the place where we monetize what we’re doing.
Kit had a pretty good background in network sales and digital sales for a lot of players in the business and he had started his own podcast representation firm. He was a fan of Adam Carolla, and had gone to him, and started selling Carolla and his network’s inventory, then started adding more and more. Kit was a one man band, but was still generating low seven figures. I took a look at his business and thought that it was a good fit.
How does your time at Westwood One inform your new business?
We wanted to move into the digital space and I’ve always looked for an opportunity to do something that was like Westwood One, but in the digital space. That’s why the name is Podcast One; because it’s really kind of the same thing. When I started Westwood One 35 years ago, there really wasn’t a big advertising market for syndicated radio programs or even network radio programs. We had to go out and tell a story to national advertisers about why this was a good medium for them. I think we’re going do the same thing with podcasting. It has already been around for a bit, and a lot of people have tried to make a go at it, but haven’t been particularly successful because they’ve either been too small to have any kind of critical mass, or too large to pay much attention to it.
Big companies put junior people on [podcasting ad sales] and said, “Go out and see if you can sell it.” So it never got much of their attention and was never a big piece of what they were doing, and they sort of lost interest. The people that were generating whatever revenue there was were the podcasters themselves, who, with almost no exception, didn’t have the critical mass to go in and get an advertiser to take them seriously.
I thought, “Why don’t we curate a list of the top 200 podcasts and organize the business?” So that advertisers can look to one place where all of the major podcasts live and they can buy through a single source, rather than having to talk to over 200 different sales reps. It also give consumers the ability to go to a place where most of the most popular podcasts live, without having to sort through a couple hundred thousand that are on iTunes.
We distribute our programs through iTunes, and everybody can get us wherever they want. But from a marketing standpoint, having Podcast One creates a destination for consumers to easily find because we’re going to promote the hell out of it, and it gives a place for advertisers’ one stop shopping. Also, the big advantage over what I did 35 years ago with Westwood One is that I’m not encumbered by having to get radio station Program Directors or station group owners to agree to carry the program. We can go straight to consumers; which means we’re not limited by the formatics or the politics of the radio industry.
Would you say that podcasting is the evolution of the Talk format as well as syndication?
Absolutely! I made a couple speeches lately, at a new media seminar in Los Angeles, and the keynote speech at Convergence in Silicon Valley, which included a lot of radio broadcasters. I said radio needs to be redefined, because if you continue to think of radio the way that most of the big radio companies think of it, as a bricks and mortar business, when there’s a station and a transmitter and a dial position; that’s a formula whose best days are behind it. Radio’s not going to go away, but the golden days of radio when it was a business that was growing and growing and tapped into the local nature of the audience, and connected more with its audience than with other forms of broadcasting…those days are pretty much over. Now people can consume audio product on their iPhones, cell phones, computers, iPads and who knows what’s gonna be around a year from now. So rather than get hung up on the technology, I’m doing what we did at Westwood One: be on the content side, and be familiar enough with all of the forms of distribution of that content that we can make our programming available on all of it.
I had a meeting with the folks from iBiquity, who are very nice people. They brought me an iBiquity receiver, and I looked at it and thought, “HD Radio started almost a decade ago. What do I need this for?” I pulled out my iPhone and said, “I can get just about anything I want right here.” Every new car has a connecter plug in the dashboard to my iPhone, and there are enough players out there that are creating digital solutions for the dashboard. Certain carmakers are offering it on their new cars. So I looked at what they were doing and thought, “There is a technology solution to a problem that has moved far beyond the distribution method.” Because technology is moving fast, you have to adapt to the technology. But the programming is the programming. Content is content. And that’s why I thought this was a tremendous opportunity: Westwood One to Podcast One. It’s audio content on demand available whenever the consumer wants to consume it.
Have you conducted ant research regarding the demand for podcasts?
We went out and made a deal with Edison Research to do some studies for us, because we go into advertiser’s offices and get asked, “How do we know when people download these podcasts that they ever listen to them?” Edison did a very large study of podcast consumers, and it turns out that 85 percent of podcast consumers listen to those podcasts within a couple of days, and 60 percent consume the podcast at the time they actually download it. That’s big. It’s not surprising, because to consume a podcast you have to make a positive action. Its’ not like you turn on the radio and listen to whatever’s on. For example, I may want to listen to the Afterbuzz TV podcast because tonight Game Of Thrones is on and I know that Afterbuzz is going to do a review. So people download it then or shortly afterwards. It’s the same thing whether it’s Adam Carolla, Dr. Drew, Ron Paul, Laura Ingram,Freakonomics or any other podcasts that live on our site.
How has Podcast One impacted these pre-existing podcasts that are now under your umbrella?
When Kit walked in the door, he was representing podcasts that had about 40 million downloads per month. Then we hooked up and he had somebody with a history of having done this before in a medium that is not all that different. That act of Kit and I partnering and forming Launchpad has moved us in four months to about 110 million downloads per month.
People are really flocking, we’ve been able to get the best podcasts and consumers are following it. We’ve gotten so many responses to the launch of Podcast One from podcasters that we’re going to form a second level of Podcast One. We might call it “Podcast One Underground,” where we’re gonna take anybody who wants to put their podcast up. We’ve gotten a few hundred requests from podcasters who want to be on our site… and we’re gonna take ‘em all! Podcast One as it exists today will be page one, and Podcast One Underground will be page two. We don’t really care if they’ve only gotten 600 downloads, we’re gonna put it up there, give them the opportunity to be heard, and let consumers decide if there’s anything in there that has the kind of appeal that we can move to the front page and sell to an advertiser. At the same time we’ll be helping podcasters out with their costs and moving them in a position where they can start generating revenue.
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You mentioned Carolla and Dr. Drew and a few others, but who else is under the Podcast One umbrella? I know you’re working with some of my favorites, such as Nerdist and Marc Maron’s WTF as well.
We have some people who we represent who have their own sites and choose not to be on any other site. You mentioned Marc Maron, and we represent him for advertising, but if you want Marc Maron, you get him through his own site or on iTunes. A lot of these guys are very entrepreneurial; especially in the comedy space. They’re stand up comedians, who tour and run their own shows. They’ve had their own experiences with radio and television, some of it not too good maybe, and they want to be the master of their fate and the captain of their own ship. Those are the kinds of people we want to be involved with. The vast majority Kit has relationships with and that we’ve brought on since then agree with that philosophy. There are others who are happy to have us sell their inventory but would just as soon have the audience access them through their own websites, and we’re ok with that.
Hopefully you’ll help those shows get more advertisers than just Stamps.com. Tell me more about your relationship with Edison Research.
One of the reasons we brought in Edison Research was to create metrics that are more in keeping with what traditional radio and TV media buyers use. Now what we have to do is take these downloads and quantify what they mean. Just like the study on when podcasts are consumed, we’re now doing the work to determine who these downloads represent. Are they mostly P1s? Demos, psychographics and so forth…we’re gonna invest a lot of money in doing that. No one has really done that to the extent that we will, because we know the growth of the business is going to depend on bringing in traditional advertisers: automotive, packaged goods, beers…the big national advertisers. Some of them have tried it and we need them to embrace it the way they embraced syndicated radio back when we started Westwood One.
We’re looking for different revenue streams but we’re primarily focused on advertising because that’s an area we know quite well. We know the players and we think we’re going to be bringing something to them that has great value and has not been presented in the way we will present it.
Is there any other technology or other avenues Podcast One is looking to expand into?
A lot of people ask if our podcasts are video podcasts. We can do video, but we think there’s a greater demand from consumers for audio than video. It is cool for me to watch Loveline, because we stream it every night, but the bulk of the audience listens toLoveline. It’s a radio show. We put cameras in there and we can stream it, but the audience is either listening to it over a radio station or online.
We also like spoken word podcasting specifically because there are no [music] rights issues. When you look at a company like Pandora and all the similar companies out there, they’ve got rights issues that are just killing them, sitting on them like a 10 ton block of granite. We don’t have any of those in our podcasts, so it gives us a much better opportunity to do deals that are lucrative for the publishers and producers of podcasts and we’ve still got plenty of resources to go out and market these things.
I am really personally very excited about this. I don’t need to do this. I’m fortunate that at this stage in my life I’ve been able to do some really interesting things: working for two Presidents (Clinton and Bush) at the Broadcasting Board of Governors was really exciting, and being a Regent at the University of California and Chairman of the Nuclear Weapons Lab. I never would’ve believed that I would have the opportunity to be involved in these kinds of fascinating things. So business for me had become sort of an afterthought. But Podcast One and all the things that’ll come with it have really gotten my early-days-at-Westwood One juices flowing again. This is cool. We’re not the first mover, but the first movers often times aren’t successful. We’re doing something very different that has great chances for success and that excites me.
[eQB Content By Joey Odorisio] Show Less
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Posted by PodcastOne Sales Staff
Courtesy of the Los Angeles TimesThe man who made a fortune bringing the Super Bowl, Bill O'Reilly and Grateful Dead concerts to listeners nationwide via their local radio stations has returned to programming. But now he's bypassing conventional radio.
Norman J. Pattiz, who created and turned Westwood One into one of the biggest and most recognizable radio networks in the country, is this week launching PodcastOne.com, a one-stop site that offers shows from hundreds of online broadcasters for listeners to browse and download.
"You can't look at radio as a bricks-and-mortar operation, and consumed on a radio over a certain frequency," Pattiz said. "That's a recipe for disaster. So much of radio is being consumed online, and on the Internet."
Podcasts are shows available online that listeners can hear on their computers or download to their smartphones, iPods, tablets or other devices. Unlike conv Read MoreCourtesy of the Los Angeles TimesThe man who made a fortune bringing the Super Bowl, Bill O'Reilly and Grateful Dead concerts to listeners nationwide via their local radio stations has returned to programming. But now he's bypassing conventional radio.
Norman J. Pattiz, who created and turned Westwood One into one of the biggest and most recognizable radio networks in the country, is this week launching PodcastOne.com, a one-stop site that offers shows from hundreds of online broadcasters for listeners to browse and download.
"You can't look at radio as a bricks-and-mortar operation, and consumed on a radio over a certain frequency," Pattiz said. "That's a recipe for disaster. So much of radio is being consumed online, and on the Internet."
Podcasts are shows available online that listeners can hear on their computers or download to their smartphones, iPods, tablets or other devices. Unlike conventional radio, a podcast can be saved, stopped, replayed and consumed at the listener's leisure.
Pattiz said PodcastOne gives him "the opportunity to put out content to a mass audience, without the constraints of having to convince a program director or a station group."
Many of the programs are archived versions of the hosts' radio shows, or extra content beyond those programs. Or, more often, the podcasts are hosted by radio refugees — onetime hosts who grew too pricey for downsizing networks, or who got squeezed out by radio-station format changes.
One of the most popular podcasters is Adam Carolla, who started podcasting when he lost his morning show in February 2009, when talk station KLSX-FM (97.1) switched to pop music. At the beginning, his program was downloaded about 100,000 times per night; now he averages about 350,000.
The goal of PodcastOne is to make the site convenient for listeners by providing them archives of shows they like and a menu of those they may not know. A Carolla fan could listen to his show, but also check out the archive of classic episodes of Loveline, the sex and relationship advice show on KROQ-FM (106.7) that Carolla hosted for many years with Dr. Drew Pinsky. Or someone who likes conservative talker Laura Ingraham can browse shows from similarly minded hosts.
Podcasts are available numerous places — iTunes, TuneIn.com, Podcast.com or even the hosts' own websites. But unlike aggregators that might offer thousands of shows, Pattiz said, PodcastOne curates its collection to about 200 — "the best of the best," he said — which the company then promotes to listeners and advertisers alike. In addition, the site offers exclusive content and has a feature — like Pandora and other music services — that suggests other shows that a user might like based on previous downloads.
The advantage for the podcasters who team up with PodcastOne, rather than go solo or host their programs elsewhere, is that they can draw on the company's ad sales, promotion, audience research and technical expertise.
"What nobody's done is organize [podcasts] and give them the kind of attention they need to make them a real significant opportunity for advertisers," Pattiz said.
Pattiz said his business will make podcasts more attractive to advertisers, maybe more attractive than radio. Traditionally, radio ads are sold based on an estimated number of listeners. With podcasts, there's less estimating — because the number of downloads is a fixed figure.
 To make that advertiser pitch more appealing, PodcastOne partnered with Edison Research, the New Jersey-based media survey and polling firm, to gather intelligence they can use to persuade advertisers.
So far, Pattiz said, they've discovered that 85% of people who download listen to that show within 48 hours, and 60% do so immediately. In 2012, Edison found, 29% of Americans 12 and older had listened to an audio podcast, up from 23% in 2010 and 13% in 2007. Half those listeners were ages 12 to 34, and 38% said they used an iPod, smartphone or other device to listen to digital audio in their cars at least once a week.
Another plus for the business: Pattiz said they're offering only spoken-word programs, not music, so they don't face the same royalty payments that have hobbled online radio outfits offering music, such as Pandora or Grooveshark.
Right now the service features hosts as varied as former congressman and presidential candidate Ron Paul, to adult entertainers Jayden Jaymes and Jayden Cole, to quirky comedian Tom Green.
As the site grows, it will add more content, Pattiz said.
"This requires a sizable investment. I'm uncomfortable doing it with other people's money," Pattiz said. So he's investing "several million" of his own dollars. "For right now, I'm daddy."
But the entrepreneur stresses that his motivation is not entirely financial.
"I don't need to do this," he said, adding that he could have spent his retirement on other interests, such as his beloved Lakers, whom he's watched courtside for 28 years. "The thing that motivates me is doing something nobody prior has been able to successfully pull off."
Pattiz, now 70, founded Westwood One in 1976. The syndication company became a radio network in its own right, buying up the Mutual Broadcasting System and the NBC Radio Network, and distributing NFL football, the Super Bowl and the NCAA Basketball Tournament, among other programming.
Over its history, Westwood One was among the nation's largest providers of traffic information, and delivered news, sports, music, talk and entertainment programs to more than 5,000 radio stations. Pattiz retired from the board of directors in 2010.
"This was like starting Westwood One all over again," he said. "This is an old dog that needs to understand new tricks."
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Posted by PodcastOne Sales Staff
PODCAST ONE
BRINGS ALL THE BEST PODCASTS
TOGETHER IN ONE PLACE
-- Adam Carolla, Dr. Drew, CBS News, Tom Green, Dennis Miller, Ron Paul, Laura Ingraham,
Penn Jillette, Maria Menounos and More Are All On Board as
PodcastOne.com Takes Off From Launchpad Digital Media. –
BEVERLY HILLS, CA – February 27, 2013 – Launchpad Digital Media announced today the debut of PodcastOne.com, a single online destination to discover, download and enjoy the most popular podcasts. PodcastOne.com provides a customizable environment where users can access their favorite podcasts for free while discovering new favorites based on their activity. One of the biggest podcasting ventures to date, PodcastOne.com is already home to more than 200 major podcasts including those from some of the biggest names in news and entertainment, such as, Adam Carolla, CBS News, Dr. Drew, Tom Green, Dennis Miller, Ron Paul, Laura Ingraham, Penn Read More PODCAST ONE
BRINGS ALL THE BEST PODCASTS
TOGETHER IN ONE PLACE
-- Adam Carolla, Dr. Drew, CBS News, Tom Green, Dennis Miller, Ron Paul, Laura Ingraham,
Penn Jillette, Maria Menounos and More Are All On Board as
PodcastOne.com Takes Off From Launchpad Digital Media. –
BEVERLY HILLS, CA – February 27, 2013 – Launchpad Digital Media announced today the debut of PodcastOne.com, a single online destination to discover, download and enjoy the most popular podcasts. PodcastOne.com provides a customizable environment where users can access their favorite podcasts for free while discovering new favorites based on their activity. One of the biggest podcasting ventures to date, PodcastOne.com is already home to more than 200 major podcasts including those from some of the biggest names in news and entertainment, such as, Adam Carolla, CBS News, Dr. Drew, Tom Green, Dennis Miller, Ron Paul, Laura Ingraham, Penn Jillette, Maria Menounos and more.
Behind PodcastOne.com is Westwood One founder Norm Pattiz, “What others have done with music, we are doing with the spoken word,” commented Pattiz, chairman of Launchpad Digital Media and Courtside Entertainment Group. “Podcast One is only the best quality podcasts from comedy and entertainment to news and politics, on a platform that grows with users for a better experience each time they use it.”
Kit Gray, president, Launchpad Digital Media added, “We believe people have the right to high quality entertainment for free, on their time. Because their time isn’t free. It’s valuable. Podcast One helps people spend less of it looking for great media and more time finding and enjoying it – whenever they want, wherever they want.”
Users go to PodcastOne.com, pick their favorite podcasts and add them to their listen list. Podcast One suggests new shows based on what they already enjoy. The list is continuously updated with the freshest episodes and users can listen online or download and take their favorite shows with them. Podcast One is the easiest way to discover, download and subscribe to great podcasts for free. The website is constantly evolving with new features and functionality being added as more users experience the product.
Pattiz continued, “From the time I started Westwood One, when it came to the talk format listeners were pretty much confined to what happened to be on in their area whenever they had a chance to listen. With Podcast One all that has changed. You decide what you want to hear when you want to hear it, and discover other great shows you would have never been exposed to otherwise.”
Nox Solutions designed and developed the PodcastOne.com website. “We are thrilled to work on this project with Norm Pattiz, who is a true visionary,” said Payam Zarabi, CEO of Nox Solutions. “This beta version of the experience is meant to simply showcase the proof of concept. We have many great features in the works which we will be unveiling in the weeks and months ahead.”
About Launchpad Digital Media
Launchpad Digital Media (www.launchpaddigitalmedia.com), a division of Courtside Entertainment Group, is one of the largest players in on-demand media. Lead by digital, online and podcast sales pioneer Kit Gray, Launchpad’s podcast platform includes some of the biggest names in on-demand entertainment including Adam Carolla, CBS News, Afterbuzz TV with Maria Menounos, Dennis Miller, Jay Mohr, Laura Ingraham, Dr. Drew, Tom Green, Mark & Lynda, Brian & Jill, Penn Jillette, Rooster Teeth and the Toad Hop Network just to mention a few.
Contact:
Peter Sessa
Launchpad Digital Media
(917) 848-2353
psessa@courtsidellc.com Show Less
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