The Socially Distant Sports Bar brings something extra to Spotify!

The Socially Distant Sports Bar has launched subscriptions on Spotify! Whilst the podcast isn’t new to paid content (it already offers bonus content on Patreon) this link-up with Spotify will allow them to share new recordings with their fans who listen on Spotify.

We asked host Steff Garrero to tell us a bit more about the process, what listeners can expect – and what they hope subscriptions on Spotify can do for the podcast.

You’ve just launched The Socially Distant Sports Bar Extra on Spotify – tell us more about your bonus content offering and why you decided to launch this?

Distant Pod Extra is an extended version of The Socially Distant Sports Bar. We’re not going to just be adding content for the sake of it though – if people are paying for it then it needs to be even better than what we already create. So there’ll be a whole section in the middle of the podcast which is just for subscribers. There are 3 of us on the pod me, Mike Bubbins and Elis James and each week we bring 6 sports clips from YouTube, a documentary and a book for us to riff around, it’s a sports format but it’s very much a comedy podcast. So 3 of the sports clips we talk make up the bonus content.

Why did you decide to go with the type of bonus content that you chose to go with?

If you’re going to start asking people pay directly for content then you have to make sure that you’re providing them with something worthwhile – something which they feel happy about spending their money on. We wanted it to be a whole section of the show which is just for them – still a part of The Socially Distant Sports Bar – but not a tag on just to make money. The bonus content on its own is longer and hopefully funnier than most other pods! We also think that the bonus section being in the middle of the pod rather than the start or end makes it feel like you’re missing out on something if you don’t subscribe, rather than it being an add on if you do.

Did you already have a subscription content offering prior to launching on Spotify?

We’ve been running a Patreon subscription for the past 15 months or so and it works really well in terms connecting with the audience. We’ve been offering various different levels of subscription which get you various different gifts. The audience have been amazing in supporting us financially via Patreon – Global DAX have been great with bringing in a regular advert revenue for us too.

The only drawback of Patreon is that the RSS feeds don’t work on Spotify – we have a large section of our audience who want to support us financially but love the way that Spotify app works. Linking up with Spotify makes perfect sense for us and adds to the ways in which we can reach the biggest possible audience. They were amazing at promoting us when we first launched in March 2020. We’re an independent podcast with no huge media machine behind us, so the help Spotify gave us at the start meant a lot.

Do you think there is an ideal time/audience size you think creators should consider before they go ahead with bonus content?

I don‘t think it’s about size or timescale when it comes to bonus content or asking for subscriptions.

It’s about engagement. If people are reacting to what you’re creating then there’s an emotional response – they like you a lot (or they don’t!) If your completion rate percentages are very high then your audience like what you’re doing and 5-10% of them might be prepared to pay for more content.

Realistically, unless you’re in the top 10 podcasts in the UK then the advertising revenue alone isn’t going to sustain your product long term.

Have you tweaked your bonus content based on audience feedback? Why and how?

When we started our subscription model we spread the bonus content throughout the episodes. The audience would get 30 minutes more than the free version but it was hard for them to identify where the content was within the pod – it was longer but it was too slick. So we rejigged it so that one of the sections of the show went fully behind a pay wall. The length of the free version stayed exactly the same, but moving part of the show to subscription only worked really well for us in two ways. The audience we already had could identify where the bonus content was and make a decision on the quality of it more easily; it also provided the incentive for far more of our audience to subscribe to the bonus content because they felt they were missing out.

Are there any best practices you’d like to share for podcasters looking to produce their own bonus content, but haven’t started yet?

It has to be part of the product you’re already creating and your heart needs to be in the extra content too. If it’s just an add on to make money then people will feel short changed pretty quickly. The same production values, the same effort & energy from your hosts are needed for it to be a success.

There are a million podcasts out there, streaming platforms and subscription channels – what makes your content stand out for your audience demographic? Podcast listeners are, on the whole, a loyal bunch. But that loyalty and trust goes two ways. If you launch something substandard just to get money in, it will damage your brand.

Listen and subscribe to The Socially Distanced Sports Bar Extra on SPOTIFY!

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This post was created in partnership with Spotify.