{"id":8828,"date":"2024-03-24T19:34:40","date_gmt":"2024-03-24T19:34:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/03\/24\/voice-of-pod-inside-indias-entrepreneur-led-podcast-boom\/"},"modified":"2024-03-24T19:34:41","modified_gmt":"2024-03-24T19:34:41","slug":"voice-of-pod-inside-indias-entrepreneur-led-podcast-boom","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/03\/24\/voice-of-pod-inside-indias-entrepreneur-led-podcast-boom\/","title":{"rendered":"Voice of pod: Inside India’s entrepreneur-led podcast boom"},"content":{"rendered":"
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(This story originally appeared in <\/a> on Mar 23, 2024)<\/div>\n

Phani Chundru, a 27-year-old product manager in Mumbai, has a ritual: he sits down to listen to \u201cWTF is With Nikhil Kamath\u201d, a podcast<\/a> by the Zerodha<\/a> cofounder, soon after a new episode drops. Chundru says he enjoys his Sunday dinner with the show: \u201cIt prepares me for the Monday work mindset.\u201d <\/p>\n

In a world of short-form content, he explains his attraction to episodes that run for two to four hours: \u201cUsually, founders offer broad advice in public, for instance, work hard. But \u2018WTF\u2019 gets into the nitty gritty of actual execution, outlining specific steps.\u201d <\/p>\n

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This detailed approach is what captivates him. Kamath\u2019s podcast, where he chats with friends, entrepreneurs and experts on a range of subjects, from ChatGPT to What Character Flaws Make the Best Entrepreneurs, is growing in popularity and has clocked over 16 million views on YouTube since its launch in March last year. A significant share of his listeners are young, aged between 18 and 34 years. <\/p>\n

Kamath is part of an emerging trend of Indian entrepreneurs who are hosting podcasts, video or audio shows in digital format. <\/p>\n

They include Bombay Shaving Company<\/a>\u2019s founder Shantanu Deshpande, Zomato founder Deepinder Goyal, Kunal Shah of CRED and Myntra and CureFit founder Mukesh Bansal<\/a>. When Indian founders turned into mini celebrities with the screening of the television show Shark Tank India<\/a> and the bull run in the startup market<\/a> in 2021, they started tapping into podcasts as a way to personally connect with their audience. <\/p>\n

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Discover the stories of your interest<\/h3>\n<\/div>\n
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These shows feature in-depth discussions on industry topics or solo introspections, but they shy away from probing questions. Instead, these entrepreneur-led podcasts take many other forms such as personal branding exercise and indirect advertisements for their companies as well as for their talk show guests.<\/p>\n

A marketing expert, who has worked with a unicorn founder on their podcast, points to two factors behind this chat show zeal. \u201cCapital is scarce. It goes to people with high visibility. Also, while it takes crores of rupees to pull off traditional advertising, podcasts are low-cost with a massive impact because they work as content,\u201d he says, requesting anonymity. Listeners are not unaware of these layers in these chats. <\/p>\n

Says Chundru: \u201cI watch the content with some amount of scepticism. Everyone is trying to put up a different face on podcasts for personal branding, which I have accepted, but if I can get six-seven tips to apply in my daily life, it is useful.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lights, camera, startup<\/strong><\/p>\n

Meanwhile, on the 23rd floor of an apartment building in Haralur in South Bengaluru, a microphone turns green. Every fortnight, Bansal lands there. In a room that has morphed into a studio for his podcast SparX<\/a>, he talks to experts\u2014 from historian Manu Pillai to businessperson Dheeraj Pandey\u2014or holds forth in a solo show about the insights he has gained from close to two decades as an entrepreneur. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere is a lower cognitive demand in listening to a podcast compared with reading a book,\u201d says Bansal, who has published two books and is working on a third. \u201cDespite the positive reception of my two books, which sold 20,000-30,000 copies, their reach was inherently limited. Podcasts, meanwhile, allow for a broader distribution, potentially attracting millions of views,\u201d says Bansal, whose episodes get 100,000 views on average and has over 300,000 subscribers on YouTube. <\/p>\n

Deshpande\u2019s The BarberShop, which has amassed 6 million views on YouTube, has made both him and Bombay Shaving Company, his personal care and grooming solutions brand, popular. Whenever he is waiting at Bengaluru airport, youngsters come up to him for a selfie and a chat. <\/p>\n

They ask about a particular issue that was discussed in a particular episode. That instant recognition is thanks to the podcast. \u201cSuddenly I have become part of conversations, which is something my razor could never do,\u201d says Deshpande from his Gurgaon office, as he gets ready to interview Mamaearth founders Varun Alagh and Ghazal Alagh for an episode.<\/p>\n

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He realises there is an advertising fatigue among the young audience. Instead of constantly promoting his products, he makes the brand an essential part of the podcast. <\/p>\n

\u201cVery purposefully, I put in six to eight anecdotes, information points and qualitative insights on Bombay Shaving Company in every episode. I get the other person, too, to talk to me about my company. I don\u2019t show my logo and my products, but the conversation is about Bombay Shaving Company a lot more than people think,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Deshpande says while it is not easily attributable to the podcast, his brand\u2019s top-of-the-mind awareness has increased in the last eight quarters since his chat show launched. \u201cOur performance metrics are a lot better. For every rupee we used to spend on marketing earlier, we would get Rs 2.5 in revenue. That has now gone up to Rs 4,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

These platforms have turned out to be an effective marketing medium for guests on the shows as well. In the second week of March, Bansal was interviewing Awais Ahmed, the young founder of space-tech startup Pixxel, for SparX. Ahmed, 26, says he has been on multiple podcasts since his startup launched in 2019. <\/p>\n

In the early days, it helped the young entrepreneur build credibility among venture capitalists, and now he views it as an effective recruiting tool even. \u201cIt helps with potential employees and customers,\u201d he says. \u201cWhen people see and listen, they get the confidence that this is a legit company, especially at an early stage. We also want to attract the best talent and as many folks log in to see the podcast, it will help increase the talent flow.\u201d<\/p>\n

Peas in a pod<\/strong><\/p>\n

Social media has enabled celebrities to shape their own narratives, bypassing the mainstream media. This is visible among leading Silicon Valley entrepreneurs, most famously by X CEO Elon Musk<\/a> who uses his own platform for it. Podcast is in many ways an extension of this, but Bansal argues that while the media is becoming more sensationalist, the talk show has become rather sombre. <\/p>\n

\u201cAs people\u2019s attention span becomes shorter, mainstream media is gravitating towards bite-sized, sensationalist content. In contrast, podcasts serve the need for a more thorough engagement, capturing depth and context, which are often overlooked in conventional media stories,\u201d says Bansal, just before he starts recording his podcast with Ahmed.<\/p>\n

However, unlike journalistic content, these podcasts are previewed by guests and are edited at their request. Sometimes guests themselves sponsor the episodes they appear in.<\/p>\n

Deshpande says about The BarberShop: \u201cThis is not a sensational podcast. This is not a podcast where I want to extract information or make my guests uncomfortable. This is a very positive podcast.\u201d Some founders have begun to monetise their platforms. In Deshpande\u2019s show, which has about 350,000 subscribers on YouTube, 30% of episodes are sponsored by guests who want a platform to share their stories. <\/p>\n

However, Deshpande does not disclose to viewers if a show is sponsored or not. \u201cWe will never tell our listeners which is paid content, because it doesn\u2019t matter. I\u2019m giving the consumer the best content for free, regardless. I have a P&L to run so I will find five people who will kind of pay and cover that up,\u201d says Deshpande.<\/p>\n

Gauri Devidayal, founder of The Food Matters, which operates the Table restaurant in Mumbai, recently launched the second season of her podcast, Speak Greasy. In this season, she interviews the chefs at her experiential kitchen in Byculla. It is sponsored by food ordering app Thrive. <\/p>\n

\u201cSponsors and advertisers are still trying to understand this medium. Things are changing. Four years ago, when I launched my first podcast, the question was what is a podcast? Now, as a brand, if you do not have one, you are behind,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

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The backend<\/strong><\/p>\n

Startup founders hire external agencies like Revolio and Owled that offer a range of services\u2014from conceptualisation to production of podcasts. Founders also have internal teams. Kamath\u2019s podcast team has 15 people looking at production, content, fundraising and community engagement. <\/p>\n

In an emailed response Kamath says they \u201care building more verticals under the same umbrella for better value addition and resources for the young entrepreneurs of today\u201d.<\/p>\n

Bansal set up SparX Studio for his content projects like books and podcast, and possibly \u201cother formats and features\u201d in the future. He is footing the bill for his five-member crew, whom he calls a team for \u201cresearch, editing and production for nonfiction content\u201d. <\/p>\n

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A podcast can spin off content in many forms. Says Ayush Wadhwa, cofounder of Owled, who has helped founders like Kamath produce their shows: \u201cFrom a single, three-hour podcast session, we can create up to 15 reels. These can turn into LinkedIn posts, X threads and clips for various channels. We have estimated that one podcast can yield as many as 64 different pieces of content.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wadhwa says the production cost of a podcast episode is typically between Rs 3.5 lakh and Rs 10 lakh, although it is possible to produce content for significantly less, depending on factors such as graphics, episode length and the complexity of the production setup. Sayasha Sharma, cofounder of Revolio, says while short-form content is \u201cvirality-driven\u201d, the moment you get \u201cpeople to sit and watch you for over an hour or two, that\u2019s when you are building community, and communities are more likely to make a monetary decision in your favour\u201d.<\/p>\n

Another marketing expert, on condition of anonymity, says founderled podcasts that rely on guests will \u201chave a correction in the next couple of years as they would have run out of people to talk to\u201d.<\/p>\n

Entrepreneurs like Shah of Cred and Mamaearth founders have already appeared in multiple shows. Sharma of Revolio says startups as a podcast category has become saturated, and entrepreneurs who are venturing into chat shows may have to explore other niches. <\/p>\n

Ankur Warikoo, an entrepreneur and content creator, says, \u201cSocial media can be a double-edged sword. On the one hand, it brings the exhilaration of connectivity and reach, but on the other, it can potentially distract with vanity metrics. That can be detrimental because the founder\u2019s sole responsibility is towards the startup; creating a personal brand is a means to that, not an end.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

(This story originally appeared in on Mar 23, 2024) Phani Chundru, a 27-year-old product manager in Mumbai, has a ritual: he sits down to listen to \u201cWTF is With Nikhil Kamath\u201d, a podcast by the Zerodha cofounder, soon after a new episode drops. Chundru says he enjoys his Sunday dinner with the show: \u201cIt prepares […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":8829,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/img.etimg.com\/photo\/67195924.cms","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[607],"tags":[13667,2413,1778,13673,925,13671,13665,13672,236,13666,13670,13669,2285,11776,13668],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8828"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8828"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8828\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8830,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8828\/revisions\/8830"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8829"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8828"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8828"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8828"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}