71 minuten test

00:00:00: Hello there, I'm Anna and this is Feed Dive,

00:00:02: Portugies podcast about, well, all things podcasting.

00:00:06: For the first time, we're bringing you the show in English.

00:00:09: And since it's our debut episode

00:00:11: addressed at English speaking listeners,

00:00:13: fans of Portugie and podcasting aficionados

00:00:16: in Europe and beyond, we fought a wee polite

00:00:19: to dedicate this one to the history

00:00:21: and the people behind Portugie.

00:00:23: A Berlin based podcast hosting company launched in 2013

00:00:27: as a site project by two colleagues,

00:00:29: Mateusz Sujka, also called Mati, and Ben Zimmer.

00:00:33: Today, seven years later,

00:00:34: Portugie is the largest podcast tech company in Germany

00:00:38: and one of the biggest podcasting players in Europe.

00:00:41: But how has it all started?

00:00:43: What contributed to the Portugie's success?

00:00:45: What were the challenges and the breakthrough moments?

00:00:49: How is the COVID-19 pandemic impacting podcasting

00:00:51: and the company today?

00:00:53: To get some answers for these and a few more of my questions,

00:00:57: I invited Mati, the Portugie CEO and co-founder,

00:01:01: as well as Jürgen Kraus, head of content at Portugie.

00:01:05: So I think let's dive into it.

00:01:07: Hi Mati, hi Jürgen.

00:01:22: It's great to finally talk to you.

00:01:24: - Hi Anna.

00:01:25: Hi, it's nice to be here.

00:01:26: Welcome to this English version of the Feed Dive podcast.

00:01:30: Are you excited to be switching from German

00:01:32: into English for a moment or rather petrified?

00:01:35: - I feel it's an important step.

00:01:37: The message we've been sending so far

00:01:39: in our German podcast,

00:01:41: I think it deserves actually to get out a little bit.

00:01:44: So some more people, it makes me feel excited

00:01:47: to reach maybe other people

00:01:48: that we use to reach with the other one.

00:01:51: Yeah, it's really interesting

00:01:52: because podcasting is such a global phenomena now

00:01:55: and there are no real boundaries to podcasting.

00:01:58: And yet we focus usually on our small German market.

00:02:02: So I guess it's really interesting for us

00:02:04: to open our mind a bit

00:02:06: and see what's beyond the German borders.

00:02:08: - We are on a mission today to talk about the story

00:02:11: and the people behind Portugie

00:02:12: and to introduce the company and the people

00:02:16: to the wider audience, so to say.

00:02:18: And I need to say at the beginning

00:02:20: that when I fought about 2013,

00:02:22: when the, maybe not company,

00:02:24: as we will shortly probably find out,

00:02:27: but the project, so to say, was launched.

00:02:30: And when I fought about myself in 2013,

00:02:33: I'm pretty sure I didn't know back then

00:02:35: what podcasting was and podcasts were.

00:02:38: And whether I was alone in my lack of experience

00:02:40: and knowledge, I will ask you guys in a minute.

00:02:43: But when we think about podcasting now, as you said,

00:02:46: I mean, it's massive.

00:02:47: I'm not sure whether I live

00:02:49: in a kind of a podcasting bubble, I hope not,

00:02:51: but it seems like everyone has a podcast these days.

00:02:54: I mean, including the former first lady

00:02:57: of the United States, Michelle Obama,

00:02:59: German East Chancellor, Angela Merkel.

00:03:02: We have Robbie Williams with his family,

00:03:04: just to name a few.

00:03:06: We're living in an era of Spotify exclusivity

00:03:09: podcast partnerships, like the recent deal

00:03:12: made by Joe Rogan, the creator of the WellPioneering.

00:03:15: Maybe we can say that, the Joe Rogan Experience podcast.

00:03:19: Basically, right now it takes what?

00:03:21: Less than five minutes to get your podcast out there

00:03:23: in the world and also thanks to Podigee,

00:03:25: providing hosting and statistics

00:03:27: and advertising for audio shows.

00:03:29: How was podcasting doing in 2013?

00:03:32: Was I really alone back then

00:03:33: and not being sure what podcasts were?

00:03:36: - In 2013, I think you were right

00:03:38: that most people that listened to podcasts these days

00:03:41: didn't know what a podcast is.

00:03:44: That's true, like if you look at the numbers

00:03:46: seven years ago, there was podcasting,

00:03:48: podcast is actually pretty old.

00:03:50: A lot of people talk about what's going on these days

00:03:53: in podcasting, but podcasting is,

00:03:55: let's say internet in digital years.

00:03:57: It's like Stone Age old, like 2005 or six.

00:04:02: But yeah, 2013, it was rather uncommon

00:04:05: to find other people listening to podcasts.

00:04:07: I used to be podcast listener in 2013 already.

00:04:11: So whenever I would meet someone

00:04:13: who would listen to podcast, like any podcast, let's say,

00:04:17: that would be already like a massive surprise

00:04:19: and people would start talking with the people.

00:04:23: Like just imagine like any, let's say niche hobby

00:04:26: you might have, it's similar.

00:04:28: It used to be like this, right?

00:04:30: Like if you think about it, how is it today?

00:04:32: It's like you say, like a lot of people produce podcasts.

00:04:35: I think there's still not that many,

00:04:37: but happily we see a lot of people starting

00:04:40: to produce podcasts, but there's actually

00:04:43: a ton of people listening.

00:04:44: And it's something that has become very common

00:04:47: and very normal.

00:04:49: Back in the day, you would say, oh, I read this article

00:04:52: or I read this thing.

00:04:53: And these days, you often hear like, oh,

00:04:56: I listened to this podcast

00:04:57: and they were talking about this topic, blah, blah, blah.

00:05:00: So yeah, it's changed a little bit since 2013.

00:05:03: - You mentioned that you were already listening

00:05:05: to some podcasts back then.

00:05:07: Do you remember any titles and shows?

00:05:09: - Oh, that's actually a very interesting question

00:05:12: because my very first podcast was actually

00:05:14: in Spanish.

00:05:15: In 2013, I was already living again, let's say, in Germany,

00:05:20: but before that I lived for a few years in Spain.

00:05:23: And my experience, like my first experience

00:05:26: with podcasting was a gaming podcast

00:05:28: that was produced by a, let's say, PC game magazine.

00:05:32: Back in the day, I used to play a lot of video games

00:05:36: and that was something of my interest, let's say.

00:05:39: And that's why I started listening to this podcast.

00:05:42: Partially, what I always remember is this experience

00:05:44: was how listening to a podcast was back then,

00:05:47: like 2013 or like before even 2013 was already,

00:05:52: but there was a more modern ways of listening to podcasts,

00:05:55: but like in 2010 maybe, even before that,

00:05:59: you would have to download MP3 files

00:06:02: and put them on some iPod or I used to have like some random

00:06:06: MP3 player maybe later on a mobile phone,

00:06:10: which was like not a smartphone yet.

00:06:12: So it was pretty wild.

00:06:14: Listening to podcasts was actually more a dedicated hobby.

00:06:17: You had to really want to listen to podcasts.

00:06:19: Like whenever I hear these days that people say,

00:06:22: "Oh, I don't know how to listen to a podcast yet,"

00:06:24: I think like, "Oh, you should have seen like,

00:06:26: how it used to be like 10 years ago."

00:06:28: - Jürgen, how was it with you and podcasting seven years ago?

00:06:32: - 2013 seems like a lifetime ago.

00:06:35: For me, it's three or four jobs ago,

00:06:37: but I just realized how close Maddie and I

00:06:40: already were, although we didn't know each other.

00:06:42: I was working as a video game editor from 2006 to 2012

00:06:47: around that.

00:06:48: And we started a podcast from our magazine

00:06:51: and we talked about video games and podcasts,

00:06:54: like starting 2009 or so.

00:06:56: So we totally could have met back then.

00:06:58: So that I just came to realize that.

00:06:59: - If only I have lived in the right country by then.

00:07:03: - Yeah, there was this.

00:07:04: But as I already said, podcasting for me is like,

00:07:06: there are no real boundaries except the language barrier.

00:07:09: And you remember, Jürgen, what kind of podcasts

00:07:12: you were listening to back then?

00:07:14: - The first podcast I started listening to

00:07:16: was called Bits und So, which still exists today.

00:07:20: It's a German tech podcast, so real nerdy stuff.

00:07:23: But as I already said, I worked in kind of a nerdy environment.

00:07:28: The podcasting was a thing back then, especially in 2013.

00:07:32: - We're talking about this 2013.

00:07:34: And this is also when the idea for "Potty G" come to life.

00:07:38: But how was that with you and Ben in 2013?

00:07:41: I hinted in the intro that you were colleagues back then,

00:07:45: but it's one thing to be colleagues in a certain workplace

00:07:48: and a completely different thing,

00:07:50: I think, to be starting a business together.

00:07:53: - We are both software engineers.

00:07:54: Like that's our background.

00:07:56: I mean, I am not anymore.

00:07:57: I'm more like the business guy these days.

00:07:59: Ben, fortunately, he of course has a bit more

00:08:02: of a business responsibility too,

00:08:04: but he's still closer to the tech.

00:08:06: But in 2013, we were both working as consultants

00:08:10: at a Berlin-based company.

00:08:12: So at this company, we would build content management system

00:08:16: that was sold to rather big companies and big projects.

00:08:19: And around those projects,

00:08:21: there was a few people working in different teams,

00:08:25: basically making it happen.

00:08:26: It was like basically an IT project.

00:08:28: So we have a fairly tech background,

00:08:30: but we realized when talking to each other that we,

00:08:33: in first place, we were interested in cloud software

00:08:36: and development of online products.

00:08:39: And that's how we got started.

00:08:40: But very soon at the beginning,

00:08:42: we realized this thing that I told you about,

00:08:44: Ben used to listen to podcasts.

00:08:45: I was a podcast listener.

00:08:47: So that was like immediately,

00:08:48: oh, this is something really cool.

00:08:50: And then we started talking

00:08:52: and some of these ideas just happened.

00:08:54: And soon we were talking about,

00:08:56: hey, wouldn't it be nice to have a solution for podcasters?

00:08:59: Before that, we actually had another one.

00:09:01: Like actually podcast wasn't like the very first one,

00:09:04: but making any product in the podcast space

00:09:07: was like a really immediate thing to notice.

00:09:09: Like this is something that we want to do

00:09:11: because we started talking to some people.

00:09:13: We looked around a little bit and we saw,

00:09:16: okay, there's not too many solutions there

00:09:19: to create a podcast.

00:09:21: A lot of people were complaining, especially in Germany,

00:09:24: but in general in Europe,

00:09:25: we noticed there wasn't any good hosting solution.

00:09:28: So this is something that we realized

00:09:30: like after only few times talking to each other,

00:09:34: and we saw, oh, there is actually a huge opportunity.

00:09:37: And we saw like, okay, we love to listen to podcasts.

00:09:40: We were not producers,

00:09:41: but at the same time we felt like, okay,

00:09:44: podcasting is something that we care about.

00:09:47: And we saw that the products on the market

00:09:49: weren't that good yet.

00:09:51: We thought, yeah, we can do better.

00:09:53: We can build something that people will use and will like.

00:09:55: - Would you say you were just like a solution driven

00:09:59: and kind of need driven with this idea

00:10:01: because you said that before you actually had

00:10:03: a different idea for a business,

00:10:05: but you decided to go into podcasting?

00:10:06: - I think that's key to getting actually something done

00:10:11: or working.

00:10:13: You cannot just think in one dimension,

00:10:15: which would be, oh, I love podcasting.

00:10:17: I have to do something about podcasting.

00:10:19: I mean, you can do that and let a lot of people maybe start

00:10:21: and they're lucky enough to find like,

00:10:23: just this passion leads them somewhere.

00:10:26: But usually if you only think about something

00:10:28: in one dimension, it would lead you to just like

00:10:30: a very dedicated hobby, let's say.

00:10:32: What we actually very soon realized is like,

00:10:35: we think about the product,

00:10:36: we think about the solution, we think about the problem.

00:10:38: You need to solve some problem

00:10:40: if you wanna build a business around it.

00:10:42: Otherwise why would people will pay you money for anything?

00:10:44: But this is something that we actually

00:10:46: discussed very often at the beginning.

00:10:48: And we noticed, okay, it was still a bet

00:10:51: because we felt like, yeah,

00:10:53: there's not too many people yet.

00:10:55: Producing podcast, listening to podcast,

00:10:56: it's a niche market, but at the same time,

00:10:58: because it's a niche market,

00:10:59: there is still a lot of problems to solve.

00:11:02: So it was kind of a bet that paid out later

00:11:05: because as you said, in the beginning,

00:11:07: it was just a project, like a really side project.

00:11:10: And one year later, cereal would come out in the US

00:11:13: and then we saw like, oh, wow, it might actually work.

00:11:16: - You mentioned that side project reality.

00:11:19: How was that on the execution?

00:11:21: Because side project that usually means

00:11:24: that you don't have the entire time

00:11:26: to dedicate yourself to this, right?

00:11:28: How did you execute on the idea back then?

00:11:30: - It comes down to, we had this idea.

00:11:33: We decided what is the next thing we wanna build.

00:11:37: So we started very soon to have

00:11:39: some form of like project organization,

00:11:42: but we were still working like full-time on our main job.

00:11:46: And we had to kind of, yeah, work after the daily job

00:11:50: on weekends, whenever there was a bank holiday,

00:11:54: maybe some, instead of going on vacation, I don't know.

00:11:57: There was a lot of grinding for a few months, yeah.

00:12:00: - Sounds like no work-life balance,

00:12:02: just pushing, pushing, pushing.

00:12:03: - It was a bit, I mean, it wasn't that bad

00:12:04: because in the end it was something

00:12:06: that we were really passionate about.

00:12:08: So it was more, yeah, a very dedicated hobby

00:12:11: in the very beginning, but we actually thought

00:12:13: like it was worth investing the time,

00:12:17: spending maybe some weekends working on it

00:12:19: because first it was a lot of fun,

00:12:21: but at the same time, yeah, there was this,

00:12:24: we had this kind of seed of hope

00:12:25: that someday it would become a business really,

00:12:28: and a company.

00:12:29: - Did you have like a dedicated space

00:12:31: where you and Ben would sit and brainstorm

00:12:33: and make things happen, or was kind of random

00:12:36: or like this garage kind of startup vibe?

00:12:39: - No, the garage came very late to the party actually,

00:12:43: 2020 and this entire COVID situation

00:12:46: pushed us a little bit into more remote working, everyone.

00:12:50: But we actually started like this

00:12:52: because yes, we would work at the same company,

00:12:55: but if you've been to Berlin, you know how big the city is.

00:12:59: So Ben and I were actually living like one and a half hours

00:13:04: from each other, even though we both lived

00:13:05: in Berlin officially.

00:13:07: So after work, you would just rather go home

00:13:10: and then be online and we would have software tools

00:13:14: to brainstorm or we would just have some calls.

00:13:17: I think Trello was one tool

00:13:18: that I still feel like it brought us very far,

00:13:22: being like very simple.

00:13:23: Like these days, Trello was a bit more advanced,

00:13:25: but when we started using it, I think they just had started.

00:13:29: So there was not a lot to do,

00:13:30: like you could just create maybe some stories

00:13:34: and add some comments, not much more,

00:13:36: but that worked fine.

00:13:37: That's how we used to brainstorm

00:13:39: and it was a lot of chatting and brainstorming.

00:13:42: - And how did the idea for the PolyGee's name come about?

00:13:46: Was there any story behind that?

00:13:48: - It's actually pretty simple.

00:13:49: Once you know how to read it,

00:13:52: we had a different name before and it was so bad,

00:13:56: but we knew we had to change it.

00:13:58: - What was the bad name then?

00:14:00: - Yeah, I know.

00:14:01: It would, and at some point we promised each other

00:14:04: that we would never tell this name anyone.

00:14:07: - So embarrassing.

00:14:08: - It's something that we are reserving for when we retired.

00:14:11: - I need to note it down in the calendar

00:14:13: when you retired to ask you that.

00:14:16: - No, but really, yeah.

00:14:17: I don't even know it yet.

00:14:19: - Oh no, then we need to come together

00:14:21: and then ask him when he retired.

00:14:23: - I think we should add it to our contracts

00:14:24: that no one is allowed to SLA.

00:14:27: (laughing)

00:14:27: So no, the name of PolyGee's actually relatively easy.

00:14:30: I mean, it has something to do with podcasts,

00:14:32: as you might have noticed,

00:14:34: but just imagine the double E was a Y

00:14:37: and that maybe the second letter is missing.

00:14:41: Prodigy?

00:14:42: - Prodigy, exactly, yeah.

00:14:44: - That's kind of what we used as a base for the name.

00:14:47: It's a double E because we were a little bit afraid

00:14:49: that at some point someone might sue us

00:14:52: for having a very similar name to the band Prodigy.

00:14:56: So that's why the double E, pod because of podcasting,

00:14:59: of course, and why Prodigy?

00:15:02: Because if you take the English meaning of Prodigy,

00:15:06: that's kind of something that I know very pretentious,

00:15:08: but at the same time, we thought like,

00:15:10: yeah, we would like to be something--

00:15:11: - Prodigy child?

00:15:12: - Yeah, something like that.

00:15:14: At least being impactful in some way.

00:15:17: - Do you think you're on the way to be?

00:15:19: - Yeah, what we've been through,

00:15:21: especially the last couple of years,

00:15:23: it's been quite a ride and we are still not finished.

00:15:26: What I see is definitely what we have,

00:15:31: like to say achieved now in terms of the company

00:15:34: and the people that we have,

00:15:36: there's actually even probably more than we would wish for

00:15:39: in the beginning, but of course,

00:15:41: the more you dedicate your time and at some point,

00:15:45: actually your professional life

00:15:46: and actually familiar life as well.

00:15:48: It is what it is.

00:15:49: You start realizing then, yeah,

00:15:51: the more you believe it yourself,

00:15:53: the more you see like it can become even bigger

00:15:55: and better and whatnot.

00:15:57: But if I had to look back from where we are right now

00:16:00: to let's say 2013, I think, yeah, we succeeded so far.

00:16:05: I'm not saying we are finished

00:16:07: or we could just celebrate,

00:16:09: but there's more to come.

00:16:12: - Who can we call a podium geek?

00:16:14: I found that on the Podigy website.

00:16:17: Now, who is that person?

00:16:18: - That is very well hidden on the website.

00:16:21: I started to use that internally for describing ourselves

00:16:25: because that's like the kind of person

00:16:27: that works at Podigy.

00:16:28: You have to be a bit of a geek for the medium.

00:16:32: The Podigy started with a lot of tech guys

00:16:34: and they were of course a lot of geeks

00:16:36: for the tech behind the medium.

00:16:38: So I thought that that would be a good term

00:16:41: to describe ourselves, to say we do this

00:16:43: not because it's a business,

00:16:45: but because it's something we love to do

00:16:47: and we really wanna get into it.

00:16:48: - Okay, makes sense.

00:16:50: When we come back to the beginnings of this project,

00:16:52: Podigy as a site project,

00:16:54: what were the mission and the vision

00:16:56: that you set for this project at the very beginning stages?

00:17:00: - One of the first visions was that podcasting

00:17:05: actually is a very, let's say valid medium.

00:17:09: Back then it wasn't that easy to understand

00:17:14: and actually division was more like,

00:17:16: back to this Podigy actually,

00:17:18: we wanted to be the geeks, so you don't have to be.

00:17:21: That would be like a claim.

00:17:23: Like we would take care of the technical stuff

00:17:28: so that other people do not have to.

00:17:31: And there's different reasons why you don't want to do that.

00:17:34: I mean, a lot of people can.

00:17:36: It's not like there's enough people

00:17:38: who can do technical stuff

00:17:41: and understand how to install servers

00:17:43: and maybe or I don't know, a WordPress installation,

00:17:46: maybe that's what used to be the case back then, usually.

00:17:49: Still these days, there's a lot of people who do that.

00:17:51: But at the same time, there's even more people who say,

00:17:55: I either don't have the skills,

00:17:57: I don't want to have them, I don't need them,

00:18:00: I work in a different business, so I don't have the time.

00:18:03: Or I just don't have the time to do it, even though I could.

00:18:07: So that's kind of like the division mission

00:18:09: was like making podcasting so easy

00:18:13: so that even people who are not very technical

00:18:15: or don't have this huge technical knowledge

00:18:18: could have a chance to get their voice out

00:18:21: and reach a lot of people.

00:18:23: - You started pitching this idea and sharing this idea.

00:18:26: You remember some reactions,

00:18:28: what you heard about your business to be from others?

00:18:31: - We kind of got two different reactions from people,

00:18:36: positive ones and not so positive, let's say.

00:18:39: And actually both were pretty good to have

00:18:42: because the positive ones gave us the necessary,

00:18:46: let's say push to see like people are interested

00:18:49: in what we're doing and actually like the idea.

00:18:52: And at the same time, the people who would say like,

00:18:54: no, I don't see this happening as a business

00:18:56: or I don't know why people would pay for this.

00:18:58: You can do this cheaper yourself,

00:19:01: stuff like that.

00:19:02: That would actually make us challenge our assumptions

00:19:05: because we would think like maybe some people are right,

00:19:07: maybe what we are trying to do is not what the people need

00:19:12: or maybe it's too expensive or maybe it's not,

00:19:14: but lots of questions, both were equally necessary.

00:19:19: And if you only get like positive feedback,

00:19:24: maybe it's not that helpful in terms of knowing

00:19:28: what could not be ideal.

00:19:30: I think even if you get only negative feedback

00:19:32: when you pitch the idea,

00:19:34: of course you have to change your assumptions,

00:19:35: but at some point maybe you have to think also,

00:19:38: do I believe that this is the right vision?

00:19:40: Because it wouldn't be the first time

00:19:42: that someone comes with a crazy idea and actually succeeds.

00:19:45: So I would not say just listen to reactions,

00:19:48: have your own kind of vision as well.

00:19:51: There's not an easy answer to this question.

00:19:53: I think it's very important,

00:19:54: definitely especially in the next phase,

00:19:57: it's very important to get reactions once you have something,

00:20:00: once you build something, like let's say this MVP,

00:20:03: the minimal viable product that you have,

00:20:06: like something that you can show someone,

00:20:08: then it's crucial to get opinions.

00:20:11: - Tell me, are you this kind of a person

00:20:14: that if you were getting only positive reviews,

00:20:16: you would just also become suspicious?

00:20:19: - I don't know because that didn't happen.

00:20:22: That wasn't the case.

00:20:25: I mean, if I start asking a lot of people I know maybe,

00:20:29: and they all say like, yes, yes, this is a great idea,

00:20:32: I would probably get suspicious and say,

00:20:34: maybe they just don't wanna talk about it,

00:20:36: or they think it's a very bad idea,

00:20:38: but they just don't wanna hurt my feelings, I don't know.

00:20:40: But I have a lot, I think I know a lot of people

00:20:43: who are not like that,

00:20:44: so I think most people would give me solid feedback,

00:20:48: even if it was something I would like to hear.

00:20:50: - You started saying about the value of some negative,

00:20:55: or maybe some constructive criticism, comments,

00:21:00: they were very important

00:21:01: when you actually have something build already.

00:21:04: So is that the better phase that you're trying to hand here,

00:21:09: how this came about,

00:21:10: and how important the comments were actually in that stage?

00:21:15: - So when we decided that we wanted to build something,

00:21:20: and that would be a podcast hosting service,

00:21:24: we started first working on it, took us a few months.

00:21:28: So actually the beta phase started in 2014,

00:21:33: I think around March or April, maybe.

00:21:36: And that phase was long-ish, but not too long,

00:21:40: I think a few months.

00:21:41: During that time, obviously we would reach out

00:21:44: to even more people,

00:21:46: because once you actually have something that you can show,

00:21:49: then you just do that, and we would invite people,

00:21:52: it was still invite only.

00:21:54: Funnily, we found it easier to find people

00:21:57: for the beta phase than when we started actually,

00:22:00: with the final version,

00:22:01: because I believe at least at that point,

00:22:05: that there was a lot of people interested in trying out

00:22:08: new stuff and whatnot,

00:22:10: but maybe weren't the perfect buyers yet for our product.

00:22:14: So yeah, during the beta phase,

00:22:16: of course we had lots and lots of tweaking of feedback

00:22:20: that we would get, like people once they actually start using something,

00:22:23: then that's when you get the valuable feedback.

00:22:27: And yeah, so we would just pick up the stuff as it would come in,

00:22:32: fix it, improve it, and go for the next thing.

00:22:34: And basically it's the same as it is even these days.

00:22:38: It's about getting feedback, iterating, improving,

00:22:42: and waiting for the next round.

00:22:44: Did you have some goals and the time frames back then?

00:22:48: We had a lot of, I would say, ideas.

00:22:51: During the phase when we considered PartijDMOR as a project,

00:22:55: we did not have yet something like a business plan

00:22:59: or maybe a time frame or very specific, let's say, time-based goals.

00:23:05: In the very beginning, we would just really focus on the product a lot,

00:23:10: like really trying to improve it and build features

00:23:13: and build new stuff, get feedback.

00:23:15: And the, let's say, most more business side of things,

00:23:19: that was something that started maybe three years later.

00:23:25: There was a very long phase where we would actually see it still as a side project,

00:23:31: not like a business.

00:23:32: Funnily, from the very beginning, once we left the beta phase,

00:23:37: we already charged for the service.

00:23:40: Because that's something that happens to a lot of side projects,

00:23:43: that they never become a service where you can actually pay or something.

00:23:47: This is just like this dedicated hobby again.

00:23:50: But once we left the beta phase, we were convinced that the next step

00:23:54: is to actually put in a payment system in place.

00:24:00: So people, once we are out of the beta phase, of course, they have to pay for it.

00:24:04: It took us a little long to realize that this is really a business,

00:24:09: but we started acting as one already, like in 2014, I guess.

00:24:14: And what would you say was the moment when you actually started thinking

00:24:20: that, okay, this project can become a business?

00:24:24: Was there any breakthrough moment when you started thinking about this

00:24:28: in a more professional way?

00:24:29: Breakthrough moment is when you realize that this can actually be a business.

00:24:36: It can bring enough money so that you can even think about it.

00:24:42: Because that's what happened to us.

00:24:43: Since we saw it in the beginning as a side project,

00:24:46: we would actually accept that it's not bringing lots of money in the beginning.

00:24:50: That is something that we actually very, in the beginning, very naively thought.

00:24:55: Like, if you have the perfect product, then everything else is going to happen

00:25:00: just magically, which is not the case.

00:25:03: So yes, you have to build a strong product.

00:25:06: But then you need a lot more stuff.

00:25:09: You need to build a business around this product.

00:25:12: You have to promote your product to new people, find new customers,

00:25:18: make everything run smoothly.

00:25:20: The good thing is we put a lot of effort into building a good product.

00:25:24: But at the same time, it took us a while to realize,

00:25:26: okay, if this is going to be a business, we are going to need a lot more stuff.

00:25:30: But when we saw that we actually are getting more and more customers,

00:25:35: and that was actually the first time we thought about it was like 2016, 2017.

00:25:42: At that time, by the end of 2016, we had some,

00:25:46: the very first German podcast label joining us and they started hosting with us.

00:25:53: And that was like this very first moment where we saw like,

00:25:56: oh, if this, let's say, professional company that is building a business

00:26:01: based on podcasting, if they are trusting us,

00:26:04: it might actually be possible to build a business in the future.

00:26:08: But it was still a little bit of too early to decide anything,

00:26:13: like, well, we just quit our jobs at that point.

00:26:16: One year later, it was a whole different story

00:26:18: because that's when, let's say, the podcast booming started in Germany.

00:26:23: And then we got lots of very interesting new customers.

00:26:27: We started talking to a lot of people who at that moment

00:26:31: were thinking about starting podcasting.

00:26:33: So that was the moment when we saw, okay, this is real.

00:26:37: This is soon going to be like really full-time job for us.

00:26:41: And so we decided to just go and follow that dream.

00:26:46: Can you actually tell me a little bit more,

00:26:49: tell us a little bit more about that boom, podcasting boom in Germany,

00:26:53: especially I think here about our English-speaking listeners,

00:26:57: someone who might just not be too familiarized

00:27:00: with the podcasting situation in Germany back then?

00:27:03: Were there any big podcasting news, big names coming on the market?

00:27:08: Or how did that boom really look like?

00:27:11: In Germany, it was especially the news media, newspapers,

00:27:15: digital news outlets, some media companies who started the,

00:27:21: let's say, the podcast boom.

00:27:24: Before that, of course, there was plenty of podcasts, big and small.

00:27:28: But in 2017, it was when especially one big newspaper that is site online,

00:27:34: they started their podcast production.

00:27:37: They created a team, a dedicated team for it.

00:27:40: They hired one of the best podcast producers in Germany, Maria Lorenz.

00:27:45: And they kind of invested a lot into podcasting.

00:27:49: And they're still one of the biggest, let's say,

00:27:51: podcast publishers in Germany these days.

00:27:53: And they actually joined from the very beginning.

00:27:56: They started toasting with Podigy and outsourcing,

00:28:00: let's say, a lot of this stuff to us.

00:28:02: That was like the very, very big customer.

00:28:04: And they actually showed to lots of other companies

00:28:08: that it was possible building a business around podcasting.

00:28:11: And that's something that we kind of took with us.

00:28:14: And of course, when they joined,

00:28:16: they had lots of future requests and wishes.

00:28:19: So we had a lot of work in the beginning.

00:28:21: But once we had them and we saw that others are very interested in our service,

00:28:26: that's when it was like 100% clear that this is what we need to follow.

00:28:32: And this is actually the time, 2017,

00:28:35: we reached out to first time to some external people, let's say, to help us.

00:28:39: And Jürgen is actually, I think the very first one of all of the people,

00:28:44: like he later joined the company properly as an employee.

00:28:47: But back in 2017, I think it was just you, Jürgen, right?

00:28:51: Yeah, that was the first time you hired me.

00:28:54: What's special about the situation in Germany, I'm feeling,

00:28:57: is that we have a very huge community of indie podcasters and hobby producers.

00:29:04: They're not just podcasting,

00:29:05: they're also developing software around podcasting

00:29:08: and providing solutions from the community for the community.

00:29:12: And actually, that was when we came in touch with each other.

00:29:17: So that's where we met, actually.

00:29:19: That's why I thought from the beginning that Podogy

00:29:21: is a really interesting company because they really focused on becoming part of this community

00:29:26: and really listened to what the community was doing and what they wanted

00:29:31: and what their challenges were.

00:29:33: And I, as part of this community, noticed that and I thought,

00:29:36: "Hey, Podogy is actually really interesting."

00:29:40: And then, I'm not sure when, late in 2017 or so,

00:29:43: you asked around looking for some freelance writer

00:29:47: and that's where I raised my hand and we've been working together ever since.

00:29:51: Mati, you mentioned that before Podogy became a company and went fully professional,

00:29:59: there was plenty of stuff to sort out.

00:30:01: Did you know how to sort all of this stuff?

00:30:03: Tax issues, Germany, well-known finanzums

00:30:08: and all of the other issues that are technicalities of the law and tax here in Germany.

00:30:15: How did that go for you?

00:30:16: We're still on the market, so I guess it didn't go that bad.

00:30:21: No, it was a lot of new stuff.

00:30:24: It doesn't matter what you want to look at, like taxes, legal stuff, contracts,

00:30:30: hiring people, first employee, working with freelancers,

00:30:34: planning your business, setting goals.

00:30:37: The list is so long, I could probably go for hours,

00:30:41: just the stuff that you normally don't do for a living

00:30:46: or you just do one of these things.

00:30:48: I was software engineer, I knew how to build my software,

00:30:51: but don't ask me about the contract, where do I even start?

00:30:55: There's really millions of different things that you don't know how to do

00:31:00: and you have to do them.

00:31:01: There is the path of you raise some money

00:31:05: and then you just buy the people that do stuff for you.

00:31:08: That's also an option.

00:31:09: I don't think it's an easy one either.

00:31:11: It's just that that might reduce the amount of stuff

00:31:14: that you have to learn yourself in a short time.

00:31:17: For us, it was like this, we didn't start looking for VC money or anything,

00:31:22: we just bootstrapped it.

00:31:25: We had to do everything ourselves in the beginning

00:31:27: because there was barely money and in 2017, there was barely money for us.

00:31:31: No, sorry, it was actually the year after.

00:31:34: Until two years ago, we were still having some daily jobs

00:31:40: or at least part-time jobs.

00:31:42: Until two years ago, we would not even be paying two salaries.

00:31:47: So we had lots of things to learn, to do yourself.

00:31:51: And only recently, when we started hiring more people,

00:31:54: we could diversify a little bit the tasks, giving them to different people.

00:31:59: So yeah, we had to learn a lot of things.

00:32:02: Were you just you and Ben googling things

00:32:05: or you have some business mentors

00:32:07: or you were looking at other people, for example,

00:32:10: not necessarily in podcasting business,

00:32:13: but maybe in other businesses are dealing with these situations in Germany

00:32:16: or you were, I don't know, calling a friend?

00:32:19: I think googling is very important.

00:32:24: Yeah, there is a lot of googling involved still today.

00:32:27: Even if you have people who can help you or mentor you,

00:32:32: there's always situations where you just need to get information.

00:32:35: So I think it's not a shame or something to be ashamed of,

00:32:38: to be googling stuff just to find a way,

00:32:42: because in the end, it's how you move forward,

00:32:45: especially if you have a limited budget, of course.

00:32:47: It depends on what time, at what phase.

00:32:50: We had some people I would consider mentors,

00:32:52: or now we have more people that I would consider mentors these days,

00:32:57: like for the last year maybe.

00:33:00: But back in the day, it was more reading online,

00:33:04: actually looking at other companies, that's a good point.

00:33:07: Of course, first you look what is the direct competition

00:33:10: that you have in the space and what are they doing,

00:33:13: but we would not overdo that,

00:33:16: because I think if you inspect your competition too much,

00:33:20: like if it's just this obsession,

00:33:22: it doesn't matter what they are building, I want to have that too,

00:33:26: because apparently that's something that everyone should have,

00:33:29: then you're kind of only becoming a follower

00:33:31: and not building your vision.

00:33:34: But looking at other companies that have similar business,

00:33:38: like let's say we are a software as a service company,

00:33:41: so it makes sense to look at software as a service company

00:33:43: in other areas to get the interesting ideas,

00:33:46: maybe to see how you can build your business,

00:33:49: but that's something that came maybe a couple years ago.

00:33:52: For me at least, from what I understand,

00:33:55: what you're mentioning, it's a little bit of a learning experience.

00:33:59: Do you remember any lessons?

00:34:01: Maybe the hard lessons along the way, or some setbacks,

00:34:05: or maybe in quotation marks,

00:34:08: failures that actually pushed you forward

00:34:10: and you've learned something out of them?

00:34:12: Get your taxes right from the beginning.

00:34:15: It's a very German thing to say, you know?

00:34:18: Yes, I know, but it's one thing that we kind of underestimated

00:34:22: in the beginning.

00:34:24: So yeah, for those or listeners who are not familiar

00:34:27: with the German way of having a business,

00:34:30: it's like 90% about taxes and the rest is like the rest.

00:34:34: No, it's not that bad, but when you don't have

00:34:40: the professional legal advice that you can afford later on,

00:34:44: then you have to improvise in that area as well.

00:34:47: And fortunately, we never got into a situation

00:34:50: where it would ruin our business

00:34:52: or where we would have problems with the tax authorities

00:34:56: or something like that.

00:34:57: That never happened, but it was a lot of stress.

00:35:00: There is other things in different phases of your company

00:35:04: that, you know, they come and go.

00:35:05: You go through different phases and you leave one phase behind

00:35:08: and then you go for the next phase and that's okay.

00:35:10: Taxes, they never go away.

00:35:12: They will follow you until you either pay them

00:35:15: or you go to jail.

00:35:16: Oh, wow.

00:35:17: That's, you know, yeah, it's like this.

00:35:20: And that's why in the beginning,

00:35:21: we didn't spend enough time thinking about taxes.

00:35:26: We would pay taxes, but it wasn't,

00:35:28: our accounting wasn't that professional yet

00:35:30: and that's something that followed us for a while.

00:35:33: Fortunately, these days, it's not the...

00:35:35: not an issue anymore. And now we have actually a very good setup. We even pay taxes before

00:35:40: they are due. So

00:35:41: wow,

00:35:42: setting example,

00:35:43: we managed to get out of that. That was quite an experience. Yes. You know,

00:35:48: we'll lots of hours to get get everything, you know, back to working like there was

00:35:54: like just a lot of accumulated stuff that we would have to fix first before we could

00:35:59: actually move on.

00:36:01: But with all those challenges, you, you were not alone. There was also Ben, of course,

00:36:06: you mentioned before that you both worked remotely. And I want to ask you first of all,

00:36:12: how this remote working looked like and whether you faced any challenges. And second of

00:36:21: all, I would like to ask you about the characters of you too, how the cooperation

00:36:27: looks like, what kind of people actually you are, whether you're like, you feel like

00:36:31: through all those years that Ben and Mati proved to be a good fit for a business.

00:36:37: Yeah, the remote work has this, of course, huge advantage. It is very flexible. You can

00:36:45: be for example at home and still kind of get to get work done with someone who is

00:36:51: sitting a few kilometers, maybe on a different continent even. So that's

00:36:55: something that amazes me every time about remote working. Like it's something that is

00:36:59: not possible in many other areas still today. And like even a few years ago, it wasn't

00:37:06: possible either. So it's something completely new actually, for humanity, let's say. But

00:37:10: to me, it was, I realized that just by having this remote setup, we could focus on a lot

00:37:18: of things that normally I would say that there's a lot of friction going on. Like if

00:37:23: you go for an office, an office has a lot of advantages. That's what we have an office.

00:37:28: But some things can be done more easily, more quickly when working remotely. We had a very,

00:37:36: I think a very solid setup from the beginning. And since we were working most of the time

00:37:42: remotely, we would actually set up everything to be either possible to do

00:37:46: remotely or be efficient and fast enough so that we would not have to spend hours and

00:37:53: meetings and discussing things. Of course, we would brainstorm, we would communicate. But

00:37:58: most of the time, we would just have some quick sync meetings between us. And then each of us

00:38:06: would run in one direction and just build something. And then whenever we felt like we need

00:38:10: to talk to the other person or show something, then we would just get back and have another

00:38:15: session where we would discuss. So that would work pretty well. And I think actually the

00:38:21: question like the characters, I think that the remote work and the characters had a lot of

00:38:25: things in common. Like I think we are both people who can work very autonomously. We would just

00:38:32: discuss the basics and then just do something and then get back. So that's how I think remote work

00:38:37: can actually work.

00:38:39: Whoever enters the PolyG website and goes on the team section can see instead of a normal

00:38:48: rather traditional bios of company employees, podcast cover arts. And you have a cover art

00:38:57: showing you as a muddy experience. And I have a question to you again. How would you describe

00:39:05: this muddy experience from your perspective?

00:39:07: Yeah, it's how muddy is. He's basically, he's handling a lot of stuff at the same time. And

00:39:16: he's trying to do everything equally well. And I guess he's really good at that. That's how he

00:39:23: sees himself. And that's, I guess, how the rest of the company also sees him. So he's in the

00:39:28: background and it's enormous, which projects he's involved in and how many things he has to

00:39:35: deal with and how many interviews he gives and how many phone calls he has to take. And I'm not

00:39:41: sure how long his days, but it can't be just 24 hours.

00:39:45: Marty, do you want to comment on that?

00:39:49: Yeah, thanks. Thanks a lot for that. But I think it's not true that in all those projects, I'm

00:39:54: equally, you know, doing an equally good job. I think at some point you have to accept that when

00:40:00: you're managing a lot of things, some things just don't get enough attention and stuff like that.

00:40:05: So I'm very, let's say, critical with myself when it comes to that, because I know that in the

00:40:09: end, even though I try to make it something positive right now, I'm actually trying to get to, you

00:40:16: know, at some point be able to say, okay, I'm more of in control of my work, my day, my workload,

00:40:23: especially. But it's kind of true. Yeah, as a CEO, I think that that's how it goes. Like the good

00:40:29: thing about having lots of people, I mean, I probably do have a lot of very talented people,

00:40:35: really, who can also work very autonomously in general. And a lot of people who joined the

00:40:40: company actually like it because we give a lot of freedom, of course, there's always expectations

00:40:47: and work to be done. But even though the people are very autonomous, of course, you have to bring

00:40:53: stuff together. There needs to be some kind of, yeah, someone who has a bit of the broader view

00:40:58: at things. And sometimes you have to dive very deep into some topics, because that's like, what is

00:41:04: needed at the moment. So in the end, it's a lot of juggling different, different topics. At the

00:41:10: same time, I apparently am pretty good at that. Yeah. But it's not easy. Yeah, I also want to add

00:41:16: not that the people become the wrong picture or the wrong impression of you, you're not that kind

00:41:21: of control freak. You're also very good at enabling people to work independently. So that's also

00:41:26: what you could add. Because I used to come from a company that used to be very conservative. So

00:41:31: where you had your strict office hours, and where your boss or the person in charge always wanted

00:41:37: to know where people are throughout the entire day. So he was really controlling and he really

00:41:42: got nervous if somebody left early or came late or wasn't in his office when he expected them to be.

00:41:48: And that's totally not the case at Potigy. We're now in this remote situation. I guess that was not

00:41:53: completely planned that way. But now after a few months, we really got used to it. And it really

00:41:59: works very well for everybody, I think. And everybody knows what he has to contribute to the

00:42:03: company and what he's got to do. But there's no one controlling your working hours or telling you

00:42:08: when to be available and stuff like that. I know Ben is not with us, but his cover art, podcast

00:42:14: cover art on the Potigy website says, "Running for Saniting." Would you like to say a few words

00:42:21: about how Ben is with the company and the employees? I guess I give that to Mati because I'm not that

00:42:27: closely working with Ben because he's on the technical side and I'm on the marketing side,

00:42:32: which is more of Mati's responsibility. So I don't want to say anything wrong.

00:42:37: Yeah, I think it's more about him having this huge passion about running. It's very cool because

00:42:46: he actually runs like marathons and stuff. He's living in New York these days. So he has plenty

00:42:54: of space to run. I think he crosses from Manhattan to Brooklyn a few times a week. I believe we all

00:43:05: have this one way of finding a balance in our life. And for him, it's running. And I think that's

00:43:12: actually a very good thing. I think since he started running, I feel like he has a lot of time to

00:43:18: think while you're running and you get a lot of ideas and you kind of get away from the daily

00:43:27: stuff. So I think it's actually a pretty positive thing. Let me take you now to 2018 when Potigy

00:43:35: employed its first employee, Christopher. Mati, did you need some convincing to hire a new person

00:43:44: or was it a high time? By convincing, you mean? For example, you may be thought that you still

00:43:49: can handle everything, the two of you. Or you actually needed to, for example, be convinced by Ben

00:43:55: that this is the time to bring someone on board. How did that look like? How did it actually feel

00:44:02: to bring also someone new to this configuration? I think we knew that we needed someone. Actually,

00:44:10: that's one thing that we sometimes when we look back think like, okay, some things we could have

00:44:15: done a little bit earlier. I think we were very conservative in the beginning with hiring people,

00:44:22: probably because it's just something that was a learning as well. That's something that you

00:44:27: normally don't do unless you are in a position to hire people. And we weren't. So I would be a team

00:44:36: lead at other companies before, but being a team lead is still very limited in terms of

00:44:42: responsibility. You have to go to, you have some interviews, you have to choose the right candidate.

00:44:48: But in the end, the money still is coming from somewhere else and then being budgeted and stuff

00:44:54: like that. And knowing that you are hiring someone to join that company that you kind of

00:45:01: co-founded, there was just Ben and me basically. So adding one more people, that's kind of a huge

00:45:08: change or like just in terms of numbers, you know, like relative to the number of people.

00:45:15: It was a very important step. We kind of were too conservative, felt like we could handle it a little

00:45:21: bit longer. So when we decided to hire Christopher, it was like, okay, let's try. The worst that can

00:45:28: happen is that we have learned something and we will have to react to what's going to happen. But

00:45:32: now when I look back, it was like, okay, of course, it's an important step, but just hiring one person,

00:45:39: it's not that much of a risk, let's say, because, you know, you send out a message to

00:45:46: the people and say, hey, we need help with something. And the people that apply

00:45:52: must feel like they want this job. So it's kind of being adults and stuff. Everyone knows, okay,

00:46:00: you applied for this job. And now I see this, you know, but back in the day, it was like,

00:46:04: really, oh, wow, now we are responsible for this person. And also maybe that's a cultural thing,

00:46:10: like especially when comparing Germany and Europe in general, I would say to the US,

00:46:18: you know, hiring people is much more of a commitment, like both because it is like in terms of legal

00:46:24: kind of responsibility that you have, but also like of this, you know, kind of social contract

00:46:29: that you feel. And it's actually a huge difference here, having a, you know, someone freelancing,

00:46:36: just having some, you know, working for hours, that are completely different pair of shoes. But

00:46:41: once you hire someone, it is kind of a big deal. But actually, it's more like people think it's

00:46:47: more of a big deal than it is in reality. Then of course, you have to take care of the employee,

00:46:53: you have to pay the taxes and everything. And but once you've learned what it is, it feels like

00:46:58: natural. But yeah, when we hired Christopher, it was it was a huge, huge step, probably the biggest

00:47:05: of all till today, the second biggest being hiring a lot of people, I guess. Yeah. And with time,

00:47:13: you did hire many more people. And yeah, later after the first employee after Christopher came on

00:47:20: board, you actually moved to an office space, right? When we hired Christopher, we used to be

00:47:27: sitting at the office of a partner company at their office, let's say, this company started more

00:47:34: or less at the same time than we are, they had the mother ship company that founded the podcast

00:47:39: division as a company. They're called Zebra Audio Net. We've been partners in crime for a while now.

00:47:46: And in the beginning, they offered their their office space to us. They had like this one room

00:47:50: with a table like for four people. And two of these desks were for apology and two were for Zebra

00:47:57: Audio. And our first office, I don't know anymore, it was I think February 2019 next year. So that

00:48:05: was the very first time that we moved into our own office. Was it because you actually grew

00:48:11: so much in numbers? Or you also thought that it's time to have our own office

00:48:16: because of the operation? So because we want to feel more like we're the family, we're the

00:48:22: prodigy here? Yeah, at that point, we didn't have to find a new office strictly because of the people.

00:48:28: But because we I think at that point, we felt it's time for us to have our office.

00:48:34: It's time for us to be independent, you know, because it was nice to start small and just,

00:48:40: you know, sub renting a little space at someone else's office. But as soon as you as you kind of

00:48:47: start thinking about your company, your goals, your priorities, you just want to have your space as well.

00:48:53: I think this this is one thing that I personally thought like, why having an office that our own

00:49:00: office was important at that point is because, you know, we're starting to feel like that we need

00:49:04: more space for our ideas for our projects. So yeah, that's that's how it came to be.

00:49:09: No, I completely understand that. You again, a new joint prodigy in February 2020. Do you

00:49:16: remember your first impressions? And yeah, my first impressions, they go way back. So

00:49:21: when I started in February this year, I felt like it was not that big of a change.

00:49:30: So I already worked for Polychaic as a freelancer, and we kept increasing my hours and we kept

00:49:38: increasing our commitment on both ends. So it kind of felt it just felt right. We talked about

00:49:44: hiring me, I don't I don't know, like in 2018 or even in 2017. When we had our first talk,

00:49:52: Mati, do you remember? Around 2018, so more or less the time, I think Christopher was hired maybe.

00:49:59: Back then, it just didn't we weren't at the right place. So I was in an employment that I

00:50:05: that I was happy with that I that was secure and it was okay for me. And Polychaic was not that

00:50:11: how to explain that they were just growing into being that company. So it was just,

00:50:18: they did a really smart move by hiring Christopher first, I must I must say. So

00:50:22: he he came for customer service. And that was what I always felt Polychaic was all about.

00:50:27: So they really listened. I come from a place from this independent podcasting scene from these

00:50:33: these hobbyists that put in a lot of hours into their hobby without getting much in return,

00:50:38: where money always comes with suspicions. When a business enters a community like that,

00:50:42: you always are suspicious. Polychaic entered this community and and I hadn't didn't have this feeling

00:50:48: because from my perspective, they did everything right. They listened, they built a product based

00:50:53: on what people actually needed and wanted. And they didn't try to exploit the hobbyists or the

00:50:59: market or or they didn't try to maximize the money they earned. So that's why it was really

00:51:05: a question for me if I should hire at Polychaic or not. It was just a question of when and you're

00:51:11: the head of content at Polychaic today. What does your role imply? Yeah, one thing is I love

00:51:17: podcasting. And that's what I'm able to do now in my working hours, which is a really cool thing.

00:51:23: And I'm basically in charge of everything that that we put out in the open, every blog article

00:51:29: that we produce, our website, every social media post we do, every podcast we produce,

00:51:36: and also a few things that go behind the scenes like being in touch with several companies about

00:51:42: podcast promotion or talking about marketing stuff with other companies. So it's a pretty,

00:51:48: pretty broad field. We started talking about 2020, as we mentioned that Jürgen officially joined

00:51:55: Podigy. Mati, do you remember when this year started and what the goals were for the company

00:52:02: and how then we had the coronavirus outbreak in March when Germany actually went into a strict

00:52:11: or stricter lockdown? And could you tell us a few words about those goals for this year back then

00:52:16: and if anything has changed? Yeah, I mean, we started 2020 with five people. We are 25-ish

00:52:27: right now. That was one of the things that we knew that this was the year we would invest in

00:52:35: building up the team, building up a little bit the internal structures, especially growing those

00:52:43: internal structures. And it's been quite a ride. So just from five to 25, that's a lot. That's

00:52:53: only a few months between actually. And yeah, so the goal was to grow our internal structures, be

00:53:04: able to work on, let's say, more projects, more ideas in parallel. Also, we started, of course,

00:53:12: hired people for entire departments that we didn't use to have by the end of last year.

00:53:18: At the beginning of the year, for example, Jürgen joined officially in May. He was working with us

00:53:25: already before that. But in January, I think it was the first time that we actually officially

00:53:30: started having a marketing team. Same with sales, same with business operations that came later.

00:53:37: New people, new teams. Now we even have an HR department. So if you want to read between the

00:53:44: lines, you can understand what hiring HR means for a company means that there is going to be a

00:53:49: lot more hiring probably next year. Especially since the coronavirus situation, we could not do

00:53:56: anything else than focus on the business, focus on building up the product, building up the teams.

00:54:03: I think it's not spoiling too much that we are still not finished with our growth and with

00:54:09: our ambitions. We want to expand more internationally as well beyond the countries that we already

00:54:16: work on. The English-speaking world is very interesting for us as well. So there's that.

00:54:20: Did you see your numbers, for example, being impacted by the coronavirus outbreak? Or do

00:54:26: you have any observations on not only on the company, but also on the industry, on podcasting in

00:54:32: general? Finally, it was, I would say, manifold. The first numbers came from the US and a lot of

00:54:38: hosting companies observed a reduced usage. And at the same time, when we looked at our numbers,

00:54:44: we saw growing numbers, increasing numbers. Apparently, there was different effect on different

00:54:50: countries. In Germany, I guess it wasn't just because of the pandemic, but what we observed

00:54:57: was, yes, some people probably reduced their regular podcast usage because the commute time

00:55:04: wasn't there. But then again, the average commute in Germany is much shorter than in the US, for

00:55:11: example. So that means that podcasting in Germany was not that dependent on the commute time.

00:55:16: And we found that at the same time, there was one very successful podcast in Germany that was

00:55:23: happening. That was the leading virologist, let's say, in the Berlin-Russ-Scherry-Tay, which is a very,

00:55:29: let's say, famous hospital or health center in Germany and actually worldwide. And he started

00:55:36: a podcast, actually, the public radio station here, one of the public radio stations started it.

00:55:42: And it was a huge success. And even Chancellor Merkel had mentioned podcasting as a way, like,

00:55:52: she has a podcast and actually she started talking about it. And she mentioned podcasting as a way

00:55:57: to reach older people, maybe who are at home. So she said, I think the nephews can record a

00:56:03: podcast and send it to. It was a bit fun because at the same time, yeah, some people were observing

00:56:08: that the usage was reduced. There was a huge boom. Suddenly, people realized, okay, I can use

00:56:15: podcasting to produce relatively cheaply information. I can record a podcast even if I'm stuck at home.

00:56:23: It's very cheap. I don't need a beautiful background, like on YouTube, let's say. Yeah,

00:56:30: I think just because of these different factors, we saw a huge growth and a huge push in terms of

00:56:37: new podcasts being started in more listeners and for us, like, lots of new customers as well.

00:56:43: If you hit up Google Trends and you're limited to Germany, you can put in podcast. And then you

00:56:49: really see the exact moment when Corona hits and the virologist starts his podcast, you really see

00:56:56: a huge spike. It gets lower after that. So it takes like a few weeks and then it becomes a bit

00:57:02: lower. But you can really see on Google Trends how people in Germany found podcasting. So not

00:57:09: only the ones producing, but also the ones listening. I also remember my habits definitely

00:57:15: changing. When I was also living in London, I remember myself, but also a lot of my friends

00:57:20: listening to podcasts on the commute, also going running at the gym and so on. And now I feel,

00:57:26: due to Corona and moving to Germany, I see myself turning more German, listening to podcasts

00:57:33: more at home on the speakers. So that's an interesting fact about my changing habits.

00:57:39: Funnily, that's also something we can see in our numbers. We can see that

00:57:44: yeah, we have a huge increase in podcast listening time, but we also see that we have a

00:57:49: potential increase in the time people listen via web player. So not on the smartphone,

00:57:57: not in the usual podcatcher app, but in front of the computer on the internet, on the website.

00:58:01: I'm one of them. Have you changed any of the goals for 2020 or revised them in any way,

00:58:10: Mati, for the company and maybe implemented new ideas of what you would like to achieve this year?

00:58:17: Still, we are on the edge of Q4. Not really a lot of time left, but maybe

00:58:24: something has changed, something has been added. For sure. We had to reduce a little bit

00:58:31: our ambitions on, let's say, an international level because of just basically not being able to

00:58:36: travel too much. That's something that we had to change a little bit. So we kind of accepted,

00:58:44: okay, this is not the time to start any major expansions or anything. And at the same time,

00:58:51: by focusing a little bit more internally, by internally, I mean on the company and

00:58:57: on growing, on preparing a little bit, we kind of found that that helps us finding processes or

00:59:04: maybe even some solutions that that we offer that are not ideal and we can improve. So it's kind of,

00:59:12: yeah, making the best out of the situation. We moved to mainly working from home as well,

00:59:18: same as most of the companies. We are slowly moving back to the office, let's say, very slowly.

00:59:25: So it changed a little bit also the way we work together. Jürgen here is, for example,

00:59:30: one of the, let's say, exceptions to the exception because he's always working remotely. He's not

00:59:36: Berlin based. And I feel like he appreciates a lot that the communication has improved.

00:59:43: Yeah, I can remember the short time earlier that year when I was the only one working from home or

00:59:48: besides Ben, the only one working remotely. And that's always kind of a challenge to get all the

00:59:54: information you need and to stay in the loop of everything. And now, since everybody's at home,

01:00:00: it's way easier on that end. So it's really going well for me.

01:00:04: Since we're talking about this, we are also right now working from home and recording this

01:00:08: from homes. So just listen to us a few words about the background noises. We have some kids,

01:00:14: of course, at homes playing in the background. So hopefully you can forgive us that about reduced

01:00:20: travel and home working. You also, as Podigy, implemented the four day work week idea. How

01:00:27: is that going? Actually, we implemented it last year, by the beginning of last year, I think,

01:00:33: around like when we had, I think, three employees. No, sorry. Actually, with Christopher, we still

01:00:41: started like, let's say with the regular work week, which in Germany at least is 40 hours.

01:00:48: And soon after that, we started thinking about how can we become an attractive employer. I had

01:00:58: the past experience and I think Ben had a similar one with working not ourselves, but with other

01:01:04: companies that had this four day work week. I had worked with a software agency in Zurich in Switzerland.

01:01:11: And they had this model where every Friday, they have the day off basically. And I found it very

01:01:18: interesting because it was so different from what you assume as an employee. And they found it very

01:01:26: attractive to have. I know it's like this cliche thing, but it's finding more balance between

01:01:33: work and life in your private life, let's say. That's how this started as an idea. We kind of took

01:01:42: it as an experiment in the beginning to see how it goes. We found that it's actually very helpful

01:01:49: for employee satisfaction and also making us become this more attractive employer, of course.

01:01:58: And yeah, since we've been sticking to it, I think that's one thing that is unique to us as well.

01:02:04: I mean, unique in the sense of I think that most companies don't have, of course, the idea is not

01:02:10: unique just to us. But if you compare it to most of the companies that you find, especially in

01:02:16: startup Berlin, it's not even close to a 32 week work week or four day work week. We're sticking

01:02:24: to it. We believe in it. We feel like people have because they have this balance, they are also

01:02:28: feeling more like part of the entire thing. When they work, they give everything. And because

01:02:37: they know that they can find certain balance, I mean, Jürgen can add some, you know, some of his

01:02:42: perspective. I can remember the weird feeling when Mati reached out to me and I was working as a

01:02:48: full-time freelancer back then. And he reached out to me asking me to write a blog post about how

01:02:53: they implemented the four day work week. And maybe that was the point when I decided, oh,

01:03:00: that might be a good company to work for. Actually, I started freelancing because of health issues,

01:03:06: because I didn't want to work in this strict office confinement anymore, in this strict hours

01:03:12: and have to be there. And no matter what, I couldn't really do that anymore. And that's why I started

01:03:17: freelancing. But I ended up working a lot more, of course. So when you have to be the one responsible

01:03:23: for earning everything, then you don't end after 40 hours. So you end maybe like after 60 or 70.

01:03:31: And then there came this company along and they offered a position with like half the time.

01:03:37: That was really attractive. Yeah, actually, that was one of the main reasons I decided to join

01:03:42: Podigy. Well, we are bragging so much about Podigy. It's soon maybe that instead of 25 employees,

01:03:48: you will have more Mati. Yeah. I mean, it has some things to, you know, take into consideration,

01:03:55: at least because it's in some positions, I would say, because the bet, let's say, was like people

01:04:02: by feeling, you know, they have more balance, they are more flexible if they're working,

01:04:06: they will, you know, put more effort into the time that they are working actually. So maybe

01:04:12: just leaving out your typical kind of I'm just sitting there because, you know, I have to work

01:04:17: 40 hours. That was one thing. But of course, there's some shortcomings like there's some

01:04:23: workloads, let's say, some kinds of like jobs, there's not possible to just get the same amount

01:04:29: of work like done in this reduced work week. But that's something that you can work around easily

01:04:35: because like in theory, the good thing is instead of maybe hiring two people, you can just hire three.

01:04:40: And that has also some benefits. In most teams, we're not there yet, but we're going to grow

01:04:46: to a bigger team. Once you get past the threshold of three people in the team, it doesn't matter

01:04:53: actually that much because you just can, you know, even if you assume that maybe the productivity

01:04:59: is a little bit reduced, which in most cases, it's not. Still, you can just have, you know,

01:05:05: the comparable amount of people just by counting as everyone is 80% of the time. So it's actually

01:05:12: even for employers, not that much of a risk. The only thing you have to manage is a little bit

01:05:17: the expectation, maybe what is going to happen when you introduce that. But for us, it's been a

01:05:24: really huge boost to our attractiveness as a company. So we've been able to hire a lot of people

01:05:30: because they found it really refreshing and an interesting idea. At least there is one person

01:05:35: telling me about this every week, how much they love it. So I guess, yeah, it's good.

01:05:42: That's amazing. That's really fascinating for me also from the perspective when you look at

01:05:46: how work habits and workplaces are changing. Not only in the corona times, all the changes

01:05:53: that had to be implemented or were forced in a way, but also like how we evaluate certain things

01:05:59: and how the workplaces are evolving or revolutionizing sometimes in some cases, there are ways

01:06:07: of doing business and functioning. We started our conversation today about how podcasting

01:06:13: looked like in 2013, so seven years ago. And if I can dare you to dream a little bit

01:06:21: and think about the future, how podcasting can actually look like in 2027. Do you have any

01:06:28: ideas? What can be happening in seven years' time in this industry? I'm not sure if anybody can tell

01:06:33: what happens in such a long time in such a vastly changing industry. But I feel that we haven't

01:06:40: really reached the top yet. So there's a lot of creativity in this field and a lot of interesting

01:06:46: formats and it's colorful and it's loud and it's interesting. But there is so much more that this

01:06:52: media or this channel has to offer. And I think we're going to see a lot more of that at the same

01:06:58: time. I think we have a bit of a lag in terms of creating content. So we have this like charts

01:07:06: that we had since podcasting started and there were these iTunes charts. Now it's Apple Podcasts

01:07:12: and this is the way where you find new podcasts. And it's really hard even now to find podcasts

01:07:18: that are not on the charts. And there are a lot of good and interesting small indie podcasts that

01:07:23: are really fun to listen to that you have a really hard time finding. And I think in the short

01:07:28: future it will be very much about curating podcasts, finding new podcasts, discovering

01:07:34: new podcasts, recommending podcasts or at least that's what I hope. I hope we evolve from that

01:07:40: end a bit. I would base my answer on some data that I saw recently because I think we don't know

01:07:46: what's going to happen in the future. But there's some interesting indicators that show us at least

01:07:52: where podcasting could be going. And I saw that I think it was a study made in Germany that compared

01:08:00: different audio channels that was like digital radio, on-demand radio, podcast, audio books,

01:08:07: like different, let's say, yeah, digital audio channels, including live radio streamed on the

01:08:14: internet. And podcasting was growing as compared to last year by around 42, 45%. Second best was

01:08:26: audiobooks, like 30% ish, and then was radio with 2025 maybe, which shows podcasting growing double

01:08:37: as fast as radio, which might not be a big surprise. But at the same time, when you look at it,

01:08:43: it means just assuming that this trend continues, like just it's enough that it continues for a

01:08:49: couple or three years from now. It still means that podcasting is going to grow much faster than

01:08:55: other digital audio channels. And that means there is still a lot of opportunity in podcasting.

01:09:03: That means that podcasting is probably keep on its path and becoming like one of the most important

01:09:10: media channels out there, which is at least in some countries like in the US. If there is one

01:09:17: country you can say it has become mass media, it's there. And it keeps growing everywhere around the

01:09:23: world. It's actually pretty international phenomenon as well. So I know this is maybe

01:09:29: an easy answer, but we know for sure that podcasting is still growing, which means that there is going

01:09:36: to be a lot more podcasts happening, a lot more people producing, a lot more people listening.

01:09:42: I hope a lot interesting ideas. I hope that we are going to bring some new fresh ideas as well

01:09:48: very soon. We're working on that too. But I believe in general, just having more usage,

01:09:55: more people listening means more people producing or more people producing means more people

01:10:00: listening. But in the end, it's going to help podcasting grow as a whole and making it even

01:10:06: more interesting. That's amazing. For sure, we can say, I think you will all agree that the future

01:10:12: of podcasting seems to be bright. We will be keeping a close eye on what is happening in

01:10:19: general, but also on this podcast. So thank you very much. Thank you to Mati and thank you

01:10:24: to Jürgen. Thank you for the fascinating discussion today.

01:10:27: Thank you very much. You're very welcome.

01:10:42: Thank you.