No. 005 What Does It Mean to Be a Showrunner?

So … what exactly is a “showrunner” anyway? And what does it take to be a successful one? Jerod and Jon define the term, and explain what separates successful Showrunners from all the rest.

In this episode, Jerod and Jon discuss:

• What essential lesson about building an audience can we learn from the very first scene of House of Cards?
• Why aspiring Showrunners should think of themselves as producers, in the classic media sense of the term
• How being a Showrunner is essentially ownership of an audience experience — whether it’s a TV show, a podcast, or even a live event
• What is a Showrunner’s responsibility? (And why would someone want it?)
• The importance of long-term thinking to showrunning success
• How Jon made the transition from do-it-all podcaster to true Showrunner
• The importance of community when growing a show (especially for new Showrunners)
• What does it take to be a successful Showrunner?
• How the profitability of a podcast is about much more than money
• How to overcome “The Dip” (in more ways than one … )
• Listener question: Did our listener shoot himself in the foot by not having a keyword in his show title?

The Show Notes

• Forget Right And Wrong: ‘House Of Cards’ Is About Pragmatism And Power — Fresh Air interview with Beau Willimon
• How to Become a Digital Media Showrunner — New Rainmaker episode with Jerod and Robert Bruce

And, of course, credit to Freak Nasty for the clip of “Da Dip” that we used, from their 1997 album Controversee that was released by Hard Hood Records.

What Does It Mean to Be a Showrunner?

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You’re listening to The Showrunner, a podcast about podcasting that will teach you how to take your show from good to great. Ready?

Jerod Morris: Jon, quick question for you, do you watch House of Cards?

Jon Nastor: I watched season one and the first episode of season two.

Jerod Morris: OK, so you did watch season one, though?

Jon Nastor: Yes.

Jerod Morris: There’s a reason why I’m asking you this. I’ve watched all the way through, really enjoy the show. I was actually listening just this morning to an episode of Fresh Air and they had Beau Willimon on, who is the showrunner for House of Cards. He was sharing the story about the very first episode. If you think back to the very first episode of House of Cards, our introduction to Frank Underwood is him basically killing a dog. He strangles this dog and kills it. It certainly sets up the utter ruthlessness of Frank Underwood.

What Essential Lesson about Building an Audience Can We Learn from the Very First Scene of House of Cards?

Beau Willimon is sharing the story about how they were really nervous about whether or not they should use that scene. Well, he wasn’t nervous. Director David Fincher wasn’t nervous, but a lot of people on the team were. They said “Hey, you can’t show someone killing a dog. You’re going to lose a bunch of your audience. People aren’t going to like this.”

Willimon said that he went to David Fincher said, “Hey, do you have a problem with this?” Fincher said “Blank no.” Willimon said “OK, well blank it. Let’s just do it.” It wasn’t just a flippant response, either, his idea was, this is going to be a ruthless show, and that’s what this character is. If you weren’t going to be able to survive this dog strangling, then this show probably isn’t for you.

He termed it a ‘litmus test moment.’ Basically this moment where the audience that is watching, they can either opt out or they can opt in to the show. I thought it was really interesting. Obviously, I like the show House of Cards, but I just thought that idea was very interesting and something that’s important for people to think about.

For example, we’ve done that a little bit with The Showrunner with, “Hey, there’s all these great benefits of podcasting, but there’s also these challenges. X, Y, Z obstacles that you’re going to face along the way.” Like, “Here they are.” Don’t sugarcoat them.

There are probably some people who are like, “Well, I don’t want to deal with that, maybe podcasting isn’t for me.” But those other people who look at that litmus test, decide to opt in, those are really the people that we want to speak to. Just curious to get your idea, as we start out here in this episode, on this concept of giving your audience that ‘litmus test moment’ to opt in or opt out.

Jon Nastor: Yeah, definitely. In marketing, we often talk about finding your audience. I think it better to think about repelling the people that aren’t into you. When I started my show, Hack the Entrepreneur, it’s just a picture of me standing in the subway in Tokyo taken by my daughter with a phone. It’s not a very good picture, and it talks about me being a punk rock drummer. That right there sets the stage where lots of people instantly just, “I don’t want anything to do with a punk rock drummer.” Then other people literally go straight to the contact page and email me about how they played drums. It’s amazing.

I think it’s very key. The way we’re doing it with this show is that we’re not trying to make it seem easy. We’re not trying to make it seem like a lottery you can win and just make a whole bunch of money from podcasting really simply, because it’s not like that. We’re doing the same thing where there are people that, right at the beginning, will either be really into us or really not into us. I think that’s what you need to build an audience that will really stand behind you and really be a true audience, not just a whole bunch of people kind of listening to you.

Jerod Morris: Yeah, absolutely. Fortunately, you don’t have to kill a dog to do it. You do want to figure out what the proper litmus test is for your audience.

Jon Nastor: There are ways to do that exactly, yeah. I really do think it is about trying to repel people, not trying to attract people. Because the people left standing that haven’t been repelled are really, really attracted to you.

Jerod Morris: Yeah. Great point. That’s not the topic for today’s show — I was listening to it this morning while I was taking a shower, and it was very interesting. So I wanted to get your thoughts on it. Let’s get to the topic for this episode of The Showrunner.

The topic for this episode of The Showrunner is actually what is a showrunner. We’re going to get kind of meta here. The whole reason why I listened to that interview with Beau Willimon is because, in the title of Fresh Air, it said House of Cards showrunner Beau Willimon. I’ve become conditioned to see that term and have a reaction to it, to spot it out there in the wild.

One of the reasons why I wanted to do this topic today is there was another example of seeing it out in the wild that happened yesterday. I was having a Twitter conversation with Jenise Henrikson, who works for Search Engine Journal. She helps to put on their events that they’ve been doing, this series of live content events that they’ve been doing around the country, and she referred to herself as a showrunner. I loved it. I loved just seeing it out there.

It wasn’t in reference to someone who runs a TV show, which is where we often here the term, and it wasn’t a reference to someone who’s running a podcast like we talk about it on this show. But she still viewed herself as a showrunner. It made me think of this bigger picture idea of what a showrunner is.

I’ve obviously got my thoughts about it and had the good fortune to talk about it on the New Rainmaker podcast a couple of weeks ago with Robert Bruce, but we haven’t really talked about it here. I want to just spend this episode talking about what a showrunner is. What does that mean? Why did we name this show that? What big picture idea are we trying to get across?

Why Aspiring Showrunners Should Think of Themselves as Producers, in the Classic Media Sense of the Term

Jon Nastor: I honestly see showrunner as being a producer of a show, or of an experience, as you want to call it — whether that’s a TV show or whether that’s a podcast — that I don’t do all parts of my show. Some people do. But to me, that’s being more of a podcaster and just doing all of it. I don’t.

I’m more of the producer, where, yes, I do the interviews, but I got somebody to do the intro music. I got somebody to do the outro music. I got somebody to do voiceovers for me. I have somebody who edits the show. I have somebody who helps me pick music that should go into transition pieces — because people are better at these things than I am.

I’m OK with that because it’s my show. I am the showrunner of the show, but I don’t have to be the person behind holding the camera. I don’t have to be the person necessarily directing. I don’t have to be the person acting in front of the screen always.

To me, really what I see it as is taking myself more seriously, and my position in it. Basically, being almost a CEO of a business of a podcast. I don’t have to do everything. I shouldn’t try. Because if I do, I’m going to do things worse. You wouldn’t want to see me designing artwork for my show because it would have been terrible. I know I have to do those things.

My editing was no good. My editing is so much better now that I’ve got somebody else to do it with my vision as a showrunner of what I think the experience should be. Then I get a professional to do that. To me, that’s what I see a showrunner as, as really being able to step back, have the big vision, and then put things and people into place — get those visions across in the proper way to my audience.

How Being a Showrunner Is Essentially Ownership of an Audience Experience — Whether It’s a TV Show, a Podcast, or Even a Live Event

Jerod Morris: Yeah. I think that’s a great way to describe it. This idea of a producer who executes this vision, and it’s not all you. When I look at it, I really think — and the experience yesterday of seeing Jenise say that really crystallized that for me — it’s the person with ownership of an audience experience.

Whether you’re creating a podcast or a TV show or a live event, you’re trying to craft a particular type of experience for an audience. The showrunner is the person who has ownership of that. There’s a lot of responsibility and a lot of rewards that go with that, but it’s your vision. Usually, obviously, if it’s big enough in scale, it’s not going to be something that you can do all your own.

You may need to have talent who can perform on the show, or people that you’re interviewing or, like you said, people who do the design, people who do the editing. People who can help fill in the gaps where you don’t have strengths that still allow you to create that great experience for an audience without your weaknesses pulling things down.

That bigger picture idea — as this podcast evolves, as the course evolves — this is really how we want the people who take this seriously to start to view themselves. It’s not just as a podcaster. Not just someone who’s creating a piece of audio content, but someone who’s creating an audience experience over time.

Just like Vince Gilligan did for Breaking Bad, and like Beau Willimon is for House of Cards, and like Jenise and the Search Engine Journal folks are with their events. Like we’re doing here — that audience experience over time. That idea of the showrunner really encompasses the bigger picture of that. Both in terms of vision, in terms of responsibilities, and in terms of how you should see yourself.

What Is a Showrunner’s Responsibility? (And Why Would Someone Want It?)

Jerod Morris: Why would someone want to become a showrunner, Jon? As opposed to just doing everything on your own and keeping it a little smaller in scale, why would someone want the added responsibility then of being a showrunner?

Jon Nastor: Because, ultimately, the reach is bigger. The final product is better. You actually create an audience, an audience experience, and a show out of it — not just a podcast that might not get heard by very many people. It’s a tough question actually.

I know that that’s how I did it. I don’t even know if I was completely conscious of the fact that I was doing it. The most basic things like naming my show, I didn’t name my show. I had people that I was talking to and bouncing ideas off of. I didn’t come up with all the questions that people seem to really like in my interviews. I bounced ideas off people.

Dan Harmon, I just love his writing on Community, the Harmontown podcast, brilliant writer, and he’s created a show. But he also brings in a ton of other writers — because why wouldn’t you? Why would he just be like, “No, I’m the only one who can do this.” Just because I’m the one asking the questions, why would I think that I know the best questions to always ask. To me, by bringing in outside information and bringing in more people and more information just in general, it allowed me to make a way better show and a way better experience.

I think it’s absolutely key to the success of my show that I’ve had because I’ve freed up. I didn’t want to just hold onto it and be, “It’s all mine. I have to do it all myself.” I brought in so many more brilliant people and smart people that could help me and bounce ideas off. It made a better experience for my audience, an audience I actually didn’t even have at the time. It allowed me to build and build and build and build a bigger and bigger and bigger audience. I guess that’s why I think it’s so imperative to do it in that way and to treat it like you’re a showrunner and you’re the producer of this show. You’re not the sole person responsible for every single tiny aspect of it.

Jerod Morris: Yeah. Your responsibility is in making sure that overall vision gets executed and that the overall experience for the audience is what you want it to be but, more importantly, what the audience needs it to be. That’s how you use content to build a brand and to build a business.

I do want to be careful here with this conversation not to make it seem overwhelming. We’re not saying that when you go out to start a podcast as a showrunner that you have to have all of these elements in place. Especially at first, you may by doing a lot of this stuff. It’s probably good to do a lot of the editing and these things so that you can learn them. It’s more that long-term vision.

The Importance of Long-Term Thinking to Showrunning Success

Jerod Morris: We talked in the last episode about what makes podcasts fail, and a lot of times, it’s being a little bit too short term in thinking. Inherent in the idea of a showrunner is long-term thinking and allowing a story, allowing an experience, to evolve over time. For that to really be a vision on a grand enough scale to build a brand and build a business that will make it worthwhile, it’s going to be important not to see everything as being something that you have to do.

Like you said, looking to evolve it, bring in other perspectives and create a team, and do all of these things that truly create the rich experience that will make it — ‘worthwhile’ is not quite the right word — but that will help you execute that vision that you have in your head. It’s difficult to get something that’s in your head, get it out there, really have it be worthwhile to a grand audience. When you think of yourself as a showrunner, then it really helps you get a few steps forward toward executing that.

Talking about executing leads us into the next question, which is, what does it take to be a successful showrunner? We’ve talked about what it is and why it’s important, but what does it actually take to do it right, do you think?

Jon Nastor: Can we just back up one second?

Jerod Morris: Yeah, sure.

How Jon Made the Transition from Do-It-All Podcaster to True Showrunner

Jon Nastor: Because the way you said that we don’t want it to seem like an overwhelming task, it’s interesting when you say it like that because I’ve never thought of it. The reason why I did it the way I did it as a showrunner, now the name is for it, is because it was easier. It was easier because I didn’t have all the answers to all the questions.

I listened to a ton of business podcasts. I knew where I needed to fit into the market, but I wasn’t confident enough that I could do that all on my own. I just started talking to people around me that also listened to podcasts in that market and that also I trust and are smart. It’s a value to just asking those people and being willing to just listen to their answers. I really think that it’s actually a lot easier, because it’s not just all you.

Jerod Morris: Yeah.

Jon Nastor: You know what I mean? I think that’s honestly why a showrunner with a television show would obviously not try and do it all themselves, because they couldn’t. Nobody can. I don’t think that it should be made to think that it’s a bigger task. It’s actually easier. You’re just opening up a way to get this vision you have, or what you want your audience to experience, and then getting help from a community of people that will help you do that.

Jerod Morris: Yeah.

Jon Nastor: I just wanted to clarify that because that’s really the reason why I did it was because I don’t think that I could have done it myself.

Jerod Morris: That’s a great point.

Jon Nastor: I tried to make it easier.

The Importance of Community When Growing a Show (Especially for New Showrunners)

Jerod Morris: Yeah, that’s a great point. I’m glad you backed it up because I agree with what you’re saying. I think what I was trying to point out is more, people who might be thinking, “Well crap, I don’t have the resources to get an editing team, and pay for a logo, and do all these things.” I’m thinking about it more from a resource perspective.

People don’t have the backing at Rainmaker.FM like we have to help us with the editing and the production side of it. I like what you said right there, which is that it’s more about a team feeling and creating a community where you can get help with ideas and that kind of thing — which doesn’t necessarily cost anything. It’s about time and humility.

Jon Nastor: Right. Like a logo. I didn’t have Rainmaker when I started, either. I also edited my first 35 episodes myself because I didn’t have a sponsor at that time. My logo was $50. I knew where to go and what to do. I knew what I wanted. I just couldn’t do it myself, but it only cost me $50.

Jerod Morris: Yeah.

Jon Nastor: Then the editing was done myself, and it took a long time. I wasn’t that good at it — but I was good enough. I took the time because I knew it had to be of a certain level of quality, but I couldn’t step it up to where a professional could now do it. I still was good enough, and I did want to be hands-on to that part because it was my vision that I wanted to take forward.

It’s also having this community around, which I had to a certain degree. It was the reason why you and I decided that, in the initial launch of the course, we want to include a community for people so that you do have people to bounce ideas off of and to get a wider perspective on what it is you’re doing and this show that you’re trying to create — because not everybody has that already. If we can put that together for people and help them have that community around them, then they can become a showrunner, just like that. That resource is there for them, which I think is a super, super, super powerful thing.

What Does It Take to Be a Successful Showrunner?

Jerod Morris: Yeah, absolutely. What, then, does it take, do you think, to become a successful showrunner?

Jon Nastor: It takes authenticity and finding your voice.

Jerod Morris: Yeah.

Jon Nastor: Having that unique placement in the market, which is why I tell you to devour as many podcasts as you can for the month or two leading up to creating the idea of your show. Devour podcasts as much as you can in the market you want to hit because every market out there still has giant wide gaps in it in the podcasting space. Not of shows that exist, because there’s obviously thousands, but most of them never get found. I’m only worried about maybe the top 20 or the top 50. Find gaps in those. Find out where you can uniquely hit that market. I think that’s key.

Jerod Morris: Yeah, and I agree with you completely. You want to be authentic. You need to have a voice. You’ve got to have that USP that separates what you’re doing. To add to that, you want to make sure that what you’re doing is useful. That requires understanding what audience you’re going for, understanding what that audience needs, what can help them. Then making sure that your content does that, and then sustainability, which I think is one that people sometimes overlook when it comes to being a successful showrunner.

You know, the first season of Breaking Bad was great, but Vince Gilligan isn’t a legendary showrunner if Breaking Bad ends after one season. The shows that truly leave an impact, and that are remarkable, are the ones that sustain. They don’t have to sustain forever, but they’ve certainly got to be there long enough to leave an imprint.

Also part of that is being reliable, being there when people expect you.

How the Profitability of a Podcast Is about Much More Than Money

Jerod Morris: I think one that maybe people are hesitant to touch, and sometimes that we’re even hesitant to talk about when it comes to creating content for an audience, is profitability. That’s important for a couple reasons.

Number one, first, it’s take a bigger picture of profitability. I’m not just talking about monetary profitability, but that is important. If you’re out there creating a podcast and it’s just a constant drain on your time and your resources, you may not be able to sustain it. That removes one of those elements of success. You’ve got to have resources coming in to compensate for the resources going out that allow you to keep doing it.

But it’s also defining what that profitability is. There’s going to be that monetary, that resource part of it, but also is it profitable for you internally? To create something that’s authentic, useful, and sustainable — whether its podcasting or any type of media — you’ve really got to put a lot of yourself into it. A lot of your time. A lot of your heart. A lot of your energy.

If you’re not getting that back — and it’s whatever that means to you. Maybe you’re someone who’s motivated by page views. Maybe you’re somebody who’s motivated by a single person who consumes a piece of your content and it helps them improve something and they email you, and that fills you back up. Whatever that is, you’ve got to have a net gain there to really keep it going.

Understanding that, understanding what that profitability needs to be for you is very important to keep you going. In those rougher moments when you face those obstacles like we’ve talked about, what gets you back to the microphone.

All four of those things together are what allow you, over time, to create the kind of content, the kind of media property that will make a big impact on, not just an audience, but on you, too. I think that’s extremely important for your long-term success as a showrunner.

Do you have anything to add to that, Jon, before we move on to our listener question of the week?

How to Overcome ‘The Dip’ (in More Ways Than One … )

Jon Nastor: No, but I would definitely just really hit home the sustainability and consistency because I was just looking through my download records, and after my first eight weeks when everything was going great, and then a couple weeks after where it still went really great, it drops off. You hit this huge massive dip that went on longer than I thought it did before I started to jump up the downloads again. I think if I would have paid attention more to it and been like, “Whoa this is so long.”

But I just kept consistently putting out three times a week like I said I would and doing the best that I could. Then I got through that dip. That’s really, really key because that’s where most shows just stop, because they think that they’re never going to get through that dip.

As Seth Godin says, “The longer and harder that dip is, the more rewarding it is on the other side.” Now I’ve hit the other side, and it’s amazingly rewarding. If I would’ve in any way thought about it too much during it, I would have definitely not been consistent. It wouldn’t have been sustainable, and I would’ve stopped. That’s really something. Know that is coming and you have to work through it, but the rewards on the other side are plentiful.

Jerod Morris: Hey, can I admit something to you that’s kind of embarrassing?

Jon Nastor: Yes.

Jerod Morris: Will you promise that it doesn’t go anywhere but just between us?

Jon Nastor: OK, perfect.

Jerod Morris: On that last episode that we did, you talked about the dip with Seth Godin. You know how I’ve been trying to incorporate music into the editing of this show. It was all I could do, every time I’d listen back to the episode and heard you say ‘the dip,’ remember that song? I don’t even remember who it was by, but “When I dip, you dip, we dip.” You remember that song?

Jon Nastor: Oh wow, yeah.

Jerod Morris: All I could think about was that song. I couldn’t get it out of my head. I even went so far as downloading the mp3 and putting it in the episode to hear how it would sound. Because, I don’t know why, I just have this urge to put it in the episode, but ultimately, I took it out and left it. I felt the need to let you know that. I just wanted you to know that eventually good judgment won out. I didn’t put it in there. But every time you say that, I cannot get that song out of my head.

Jon Nastor: Now two episodes in a row I’ve mentioned the dip. I guess it’s impactful to me right now because I was going through, creating videos for the course, and I had to go through my stats and show some stuff. I had not looked at it that closely. If I might have, I might have not been sustainable and consistent and just given up. I didn’t and luckily, because I know what’s on the other side now.

Jerod Morris: Well, just know that every time you do that, there’s a cost. It’s me spending the rest of the day singing, “When I dip, you dip, we dip” to myself, so …

Jon Nastor: Every episode now, every episode, it’s coming up.

Jerod Morris: Thank you. Alright. Let’s move on to this week’s question from our audience.

Listener Question: Did Our Listener Shoot Himself in the Foot by Not Having a Keyword in His Show Title?

Jon Nastor: Excellent. This question came via Facebook to me from somebody named Joel Hiscutt. He said, “Jonny, how important is it to have a keyword in the title of my show? My show is about travel, but I went with the title ‘Look Like a Local.’ I really like the title of the show. I think it perfectly describes what I’m trying to do, but did I shoot myself in the foot by not having the word ‘travel’ in the title?” That is a good question.

Jerod Morris: That is a good question.

Jon Nastor: I would love to hear what Jerod has to say about it.

Jerod Morris: Well, I don’t think you necessarily shot yourself in the foot by not having the word ‘travel’ in the title. I do think — and I base this on experience — you certainly could have improved your potential discovery by having it in the title. I think I’ve used this example before, but when I launched The Assembly Call, I thought that was a really, really clever name because the arena that Indiana plays in is called Assembly Hall. So that’s where the name Assembly Call came from. It’s a play on Assembly Hall, and then it’s a call because originally we did the show via Blog Talk Radio and then turned it into a podcast. I was like, “Oh, this is so clever, people are going to love it,” and people did love it.

But one day I went into iTunes and I was searching for ‘Indiana basketball podcasts’ — there aren’t that many of them, so it would have shown up — and I couldn’t find it anywhere. I’m thinking, “Where is my show?” And I realized that just having The Assembly Call as the title, and then not having a very good description, iTunes had no idea what this was about. I simply went in, and I changed it to The Assembly Call IU Postgame Show and Podcast, and then made sure that I used ‘Indiana basketball’ in the description.

Magically, not really magically, but all of a sudden, it appears. I think there’s definitely something to having a clever, catchy title. I think Look Like a Local is really good, and I think that’ll certainly help. But we’ve also got to understand how powerful iTunes search is. You want to feed it the information that it needs to know what your show is about.

Like we were talking about, before we started the show that — as we’re recording this, I don’t know if this will change by the time this episode airs — but the title of The Showrunner on iTunes is simply ‘The Showrunner.’ We want to change that to something like The Showrunner a Podcast about Podcasting, or something, just to give iTunes a little bit of a better description for what this is about so that if people search for ‘podcasts about podcasting,’ we won’t get overlooked. People will be able to find it.

Jon Nastor: Yes. I absolutely 100 percent stand behind iTunes SEO, search engine optimization. iTunes is the biggest search engine for podcasts in the world by far — 90 percent or more of your downloads will come through that, so make sure.

But then there’s something simpler. When Joel asked me this, my answer was like yours, which was “No, but … ” The ‘but’ is, be conscious next time you’re looking through your podcast app, or whatever app you use on your phone, and you’re looking for a new podcast and you’re swiping by shows, think of how quickly you’re going by those shows. To me, it’s way more important to be clear than it is to be clever.

Be clever during your show if you want, do all that, but make it very, very clear. When somebody’s swiping by really fast, you have a split second to tell them and to catch their eye about what your show is about and why it would help them in some way. I think Look Like a Local is a great tagline, but not necessarily a great title because it doesn’t do that for them. Although I get that he wants to interview people locally, so you can get a feel for the place before you go there and you can look like a local, but that takes way too long to get that through your head. To me, it’s way too clever and not clear enough.

My answer to him was, maybe make a tagline that is super, super clear and actually mentions travel, which then, of course, has the flipside benefit, like you said, which is the SEO. When people are searching ‘travel,’ then you’ll actually pop up. As you swipe by, which most people are doing it on their phones now not on their desktop computers, you have to be able to clearly state what it is you uniquely say and what you will do for the person if they decide to click and subscribe to your show. That’s imperative to the success of being found amongst the millions and millions and millions of people on iTunes every single day.

Jerod Morris: Yep. I agree. Joel, thank you very much for your question. If you would like to ask us a question that we can address here on The Showrunner podcast, there are two ways that you can do it. The number one way, and the preferred way, which will get looked at first, is to leave your question as a review of The Showrunner on iTunes. We’d appreciate it if you would drop us a rating while you’re there, too. You can leave it there. We’ll check those every time we sit down to record to give those questions priority.

If you’d rather not do it that way, then you can send us a tweet as well, @ShowrunnerFM, with your question. We will gather those up there as well. Those are the ways to do it. We’ve gotten a good response from this so far, so we will continue to do these questions. Plus, I like them. I have fun. It’s always interesting to see what people are asking because, obviously, we want to answer the questions that are in your minds. That’s the best way for us to do it.

With that said, we do want to make mention here as we close out that when this episode comes out, we will be right in the middle of the pilot launch of The Showrunner Podcasting Course, which, Jon, you and I are very excited about, we’ve been hard at work on, and we’re so excited to get out there to everybody.

As you listen to this, if you are interested in getting a road map, getting a step-by-step guide for how you develop and launch and run a successful show and to become that showrunner — like we’ve talked about on this episode — then go to Showrunner.FM. You’ll see right there a place to enter your email address and get on the list. You want to do that.

You’ll receive an opportunity to join the pilot program. It’s not going to be open much longer. We’re doing a very limited pilot launch initially so that we can get some people in, even get some feedback, make the course even better. We will be re-releasing it at some point.

To get in on the pilot program, which has some specific perks to it that won’t be available once we launch it in full, you don’t want to hesitate. Go join the email list at Showrunner.FM, and the rest of the information and instructions that you need will be provided there.

Any thoughts on the course, Jon, as you continue creating the lessons and getting everything ready for the pilot launch?

Jon Nastor: I’m just really looking forward to getting it out. It’s been months in the making. I’ve spent the last eight months 100 percent heads down and in the trenches of creating my podcast. Literally from no audience to, I am pushing like 400,000 downloads now — which is amazing to me.

Jerod Morris: Wow.

Jon Nastor: Yeah, exactly. I’ve been living this show for eight months, and to now have to go back and piece it all together how I did it has been really enlightening and fun. I know it’s going to be really beneficial to a lot of people. Plus, getting to, like we said, the private group and also getting to look at some people’s shows ourselves is going to be really rewarding. It’s going to be just a lot of fun. I’m really, really, really looking forward to just getting the course out the door and getting people into this first launch.

Jerod Morris: Yeah. That’s something I’m really excited about. The show reviews, actually being able to review people’s shows individually, go over it with them, that’s something we probably aren’t going to be able to do once we launch it in mass. That’s one of those perks to joining the pilot program and launching on a limited basis. I’m really looking forward to that, too. Just getting it out there, getting feedback, and helping people with their shows.

I know how much it’s meant to me to start shows and develop shows that have created an audience, and really built something meaningful, not just to myself, but to other people. To be able to help people with that road map and help people avoid some of the mistakes that we made, it’s going to be really rewarding. Looking forward to getting that out there. Again, go to Showrunner.FM, and you will see all the information you need to take the next step. Alright. Jon, thank you for another great episode, and we will speak again next week.

Jon Nastor: We will. It’s been fun.

Jerod Morris: Take care everybody.