Podcast Season Order: if/come
Proposal: Co-host and produce an 8-10 episode podcast season called if/come with Kathryn.
if/come is a podcast about pitching television and movies in Hollywood, something that Kathryn is very good at. It's also something she hates very much. I have seen her get so agitated before a pitch, and then heard her through the door deliver the most amazing presentation. She has this really fantastic framework she uses and it has a lot in common with how I was taught to do a startup pitch.
Over the course of the season I'll have Kathryn break down and her process and teach it to me, but we will also track the next few months of her career where she has some really, really, really big opportunities.
We recorded a teaser you can listen to here.
I'm excited about this because I love a framework, but also because I'm excited to do a podcast that has a docuseries element. Having seen Kathryn go through the wringer before with a pitch I expect there will be a lot of ups and downs and I want to catch as much of that as possible.
This project is in some ways a spin-off of 3 Minute Review, a daily podcast that is occasionally only 3 minutes long and sometimes includes a review.
50 users voted with 7899 shares
voting yes because it's an interesting topic, Kathryn is always compelling, and I think anything that gets the shareholders more access to your life is a good thing
Yes!
Are you going to have any guests on it? I'm curious how Kathryn's framework compares to things other writers have said in Dead Pilots Society, a podcast about pilots that got picked up but never made.
@harper357 - We've talked about guests and we're both into this idea. I love hearing two people talk inside baseball about their craft!
I’m sick of podcasts.
I’m also sick of podcasts (and I don’t even listen to them), but II mostly voted no because I don’t like the name “if/come.” It’s funny that it’s an industry term, but I feel like it’s a bad name for this podcast.
Voting yes because I think this is a really great idea for a podcast and it's something a lot of people could benefit from learning! Question: will you two still be producing 3 Minute Review? That seems like a lot of podcast for one couple and I worry about you spreading yourselves thin! Also the name does sound like a sex act.
I like this idea a lot. Is there a specific commitment to a number of episodes or length of time? In the past these kinds of things (e.g. EGG) quietly drifted off. I would be in favor if this had some concrete constraint, and then you all could explore (and possibly have a vote on) if it should continue.
@westonwestonborg - Yes, i learned an important lesson from EGG! When we voted on HBR it was for a single season of 8 episodes, and this proposal is the same: 8 to 10 episodes for season 1 is what is being approved.
@claire.evans - 3 Min Review is super quick for us, we do it essentially "live" in the morning and record right into the podcast app. So yes, it will keep going, but I don't think it will cause any issues.
I think a power couple naming their podcast after an ambiguous sex act is good for business. And I'm shocked that anyone voted no. Kathryn is so good at radio!
I'm only voting No because I'm confident this will pass, and I have a single objection: why give away this content for free? If there's a "freemium" play to this I would happily change my vote back to a yes, but I think Katheryn can sell an advanced version of her pitch process (which seemingly crosses industry boundaries and could help folks even outside of Hollywood).
@thomasjosephking - I appreciate the focus on making money! The idea is definitely to do a "listener supported" project, and Kathryn and I are into the idea of giving a little extra to those folks and letting them see a little more behind-the-curtain.
I love this idea (pitching is an insane art that many writers are clueless about), and even moreso that it's not for money, because there are a lot of grifter and grifter-adjacent classes/programs in the "here's how to sell your TV show!" space that I am certain are much worse than what will be shared here.
Two more thoughts: instead of releasing this into the podcast pit/void, why not show us how good Kathryn is at pitching and pitch this to a podcast network? Also, how about letting the shareholders know how many listeners your current and previous podcast projects have? I guess I want to know what this is for? Is it to reach as many people as possible? Are you going to promote it?
@jona - Kathryn is pretty "pitched out" and she has mentioned that something she likes about this project is that we can do it ourselves, with no corporate overlords. I also like that idea, because I want to keep getting better at editing and producing. In terms of previous numbers, it's hard to say because every platform has different stats and I don't know what the industry norm is for those numbers. We run 3MR through what was Anchor and is now Spotify's podcast platform. It shows that we have 40 Spotify listeners and estimates our total audience size as 180. As a daily podcast with 800+ episodes we have 84,339 "plays" across platforms.
For HBR we used Substack and have 67 subscribers with five of them paid supporters. For the podcast they tell we've had 1.27K downloads and looking at the episode by episode numbers it seemed to be growing as we went along.
In terms of "what this is for" I think it's to make something that is a) fun to make and b) useful to listen to. It's also a subject that Kathryn and I talk about a lot, and I hope is as interesting for other people as it is us!
I'd love to make a wildly successful podcast, and maybe we can pitch it to a bigger company someday, or maybe we can get it optioned for a TV show (ha ha), but in general I hope that any success comes from pursuing personal and ambitious projects while embracing my own curiosity, especially those projects that push me to keep learning and diving into new things.
Loved the preview, think the idea is great, also it sounds like this pitch philosophy/framework may have lessons for ppl who do other kinds of speculative creative work. Excited to be here, this is my first vote! really bummed I missed the vote on ghosts but excited to see how that one plays out