Pitch Please

00:00.45
mike_flywheel
All right everybody it's Mike welcome back to the pitch please podcast today I'm here with Rand from youcast rand why don't I hand it over to you and you tell us a little bit about your background your role at ucasts and a little bit about how you got here.

00:16.33
Rand
Awesome! Thanks Mike hi everyone. My name is Rand i' am the founder and Ceo of Ucast. So um, it really started with my degree at university I studied entrepreneurship and strategy my undergrad which is a very nationian specific degree. Um, I've always known I wanted to go down the entrepreneurial route but I had absolutely no tech background um, turns out my degree was just user experience. Design so product design. In other words, um, with a little bit of like business on top. So luckily for me I got exposed to tech and product ah design and creating scalable products at a very young age from university which I think um was a very unique experience for me that primed me to this career route. Um, and then throughout my entire university experience I've had internships at incubators like the dmc here in Toronto which is a very famous one locally. Um and I would work with. Tens of startups. Um I would work personally within the incubator or outside of the incubator startups I would consult incubators as well. Um, on the startup journey. So really I've been working in this space for for a while now and so when I graduated really I had the option of.

01:33.69
Rand
Going the full-time route. Um, and start a career there or do my own thing and I remember when I first got my first couple of job offers. Um, my mom was like screaming from happiness because you know we came here ah as refugees and so. Being able to have a career right outside of university was it was a pretty you know, cool thing and I remember just looking at her and being like nah ain't goingnna happen and she's like h and then she calls my dad and she's like yo did you hear your daughter's not going to accept any of the offers. Um and they all sign me down and they're like what's going on. And I told them I'm like hey I didn't study entrepreneurship just so I can go and accept a full-time offer I want to do my own thing I am I was 21 at the time I was very young I had some capital you know, saved throughout the years um I won around $60000 in grant funding to build ucas. Um I didn't know ucaste at the time like qcastse was not the thing it was something completely different. Um, but I had the time I had the capital it was the middle of the pandemic and I was like you know what might as well do it so I started you know looking for ideas looking for ah problems to to solve. And I stumbled upon upon ucast and yeah, that's how that's how it got started.

02:51.88
mike_flywheel
So many questions. So maybe let's let's dial back So where did you go to school this awesome program specifically around entrepreneurship in case, people are curious.

03:02.00
Rand
Yeah, so um, what is now known as Tmu um, used to be ryerson so that to drger's goal of management.

03:10.66
mike_flywheel
Amazing and so they have ah and dedicated is it an undergrad program 4 years specifically around entrepreneurship or how does that work.

03:17.94
Rand
Yeah, yeah, so I have a bachelor of commerce. Um, so it's a bachelor of commerce degree. So if you decide to go that route and then you think oh I want a full-time job. It's very easy to go into consulting or finance because you ready took you have a commerce degree and you took the core courses. Um, but really the core of the program is we have a capstone that lasts for 2 years and what made the program very unique because we didn't have many exams or tests. Um, we had to build businesses and report on them and report on how they were doing so my entire third and fourth. Year of university it was just exploring plot problems. Um building ah startups building ideas, starting shopify ecommerce stores. Um, just doing the most to try and get that hustle and that knowledge. Um, when we're an undergrad. And the idea was like you know Fail Fast Fail fast fail fast keep trying fail fast. Try the other next idea until you land on something so it was a pretty cool program.

04:15.57
mike_flywheel
This is this is definitely a passion point for you this entrepreneurship so shouldn't have been a huge surprise for your parents. But I'm sure it was an interesting moment when you had all these job offers and you chose to turn them down when you think about what or who inspired you you said early on in life. You knew you wanted to be an entrepreneur.

04:33.35
Rand
Yeah, yeah.

04:35.24
mike_flywheel
Um, some people have that some people find that out later in life. But what sort of was the moment or what inspired you to to love entrepreneurship and want to go into this.

04:44.55
Rand
Yeah, um I don't think there was a moment I think it was just accumulation of experiences and moments that I've had in my life where no matter what was in front of me. There was always a keen to to sell to. Um, bring resources together to build. There was just and there was something that always um, put me on that path even like my older brother. He's practically a genius He's been um, building robots since he was seven years old um and he was like doing a lot of. Really cool shit at a very very young age and I remember just always like packaging his stuff and going to other people and trying to sell his stuff and then he'd get mad at me. He'd like why are you selling my stuff and I tell him? Well there's a real opportunity here. You know you can make money. Um, from the stuff that you're creating. So I think we've all like I've always had the dynamic where um, I've always been like the business mind. Um, so I don't know it was just very natural could be could be a.

05:45.15
mike_flywheel
So so some of it might have just been hard to hardwired into you right from the start which is awesome. So so obviously if you love entrepreneurship. It's 1 aspect of loving what you do now but can you tell us a little bit about.

05:54.66
Rand
Yes.

06:01.80
mike_flywheel
Why or how you love what you're doing now.

06:04.15
Rand
Yeah, um I can also tell you how and why I hate what I'm doing now. So I can tell you both I can tell you both sides. So um I Love the Okay how do I put this? um.

06:05.61
mike_flywheel
Yeah I think both sides are important sometimes the the raw grit.

06:21.62
Rand
When you work for someone else. You're building someone else's life. You're building someone else's wealth you're bringing value to yourself, but the value that you're adding is collectively adding more wealth to someone else and so in my head it did not make sense. Why I would be putting in probably the same efforts because when you're first starting your full-time job. You're putting a lot of extra time. So it's like building a startup. Um, so in my head it did not make sense why I would put in the same effort to make someone else richer. Um, and so when I started. Ucasts and we finished our first fundraising round understanding that I now have a net worth um, at 22 that was something that I've always dreamed of and that was something that just gave me that empowerment that holy fuck sorry i'm. And know if I'm if I kick I'm like holy fuck I have a net worth I never thought I'd have a that worth before and so that was a moment of empowerment that made me realize it's just there's so much I can do for myself and there's so much I can do for.

07:18.20
mike_flywheel
It's all right? It's all right.

07:35.96
Rand
Like the people around me whether it's my team whether it's my family whether it's my friends. Um, if I put in you know if I trust in myself enough if I believe in myself enough if I put in the work and the effort. So I think that was the first like aha moment of the power of entrepreneurship on my personal life. Um, of course there's the flexibility as well. Um, and I love product. I love the fact that I'm able to like every day decide where I want to go with product I love product so much I think that I'll always say that um and understand being able to understand the dynamics of a startup how to scale a startup dynamics of a good product that iteration. The innovation piece is just. To me. It's so beautiful. Um, and it's just so raw and so authentic in itself that I feel like it would be missing if I had um, went and worked for someone else. So that's what I love um about entrepreneurship. Um, and about what I'm doing what I hate is.

08:29.48
mike_flywheel
Now What you hate.

08:33.64
Rand
Um, well it turns out I hate selling turns out I Really really hate I should not be hearing I should not be saying this if my investors hurt this they would kill me I mean I said it to their face. They know? Um, but. Yeah, it turns out I Really don't like selling and I love building product and I love building product that sells but in my head I was like um if I build a good enough product eventually people will buy it but then turns out that people need to know about the product for them to buy into it right? So That's the piece I hate the most.

09:07.70
mike_flywheel
It's okay, you can be an advocate and you can be a great leader that understands product and you can hire Grade sellers when you when you look at so many amazing companies in the world. So many of the founders and ceos weren't weren't specifically great sellers I think you're going to be Okay, um.

09:13.90
Rand
Full of.

09:20.55
Rand
I Hope so but.

09:24.12
mike_flywheel
Sort of like your comments you you did talk about. You know it's amazing that some people choose to create value for other companies and work hard but some people prefer to create that value for themselves. Do you have any companies that you specifically look up to and if so why.

09:31.20
Rand
And.

09:42.70
Rand
Oh I think shopify is one of the biggest ones that I look up to um if there was one company that I would would have worked for It was shopify their um integrity in everything they do um to me that's that's. Really beautiful. It's very difficult to see a company grow to the scale of Shopify. Um, while keeping its core its integrity core integrity to clients. Um and to employees the employees who started with shopify and he grew with shopify they all. Became so well off they all went and started their own ventures um their own funds like they all just benefited collectively. Um, and there was just like this beautiful sentiment of we all grew together. We all created this beautiful amazing life changing product for millions. And we all changed our lives in the process to to me shopify will always be like 1 of those companies that I will always respect and look up to yeah yeah.

10:38.85
mike_flywheel
And it's really like a really cool close to home canadian success story and it's awesome that Harley and Toby are still super involved I loved there was actually a podcast with someone from the Microsoft engineering team related to a topic round github and I spent an hour watching Toby talk.

10:57.16
Rand
His his Twitter his tweets are amazing like if you like he's one of the people that I love following on Twitter.

10:58.62
mike_flywheel
Talk to Kevin about it.

11:04.63
mike_flywheel
Yeah, he's He's quite awesome. Well now I'd love to flip about talking a bit more about about Youcast So I'm probably goingnna want to learn a little bit about even how you got here. But before we do, There's a key element of every podcast and this is hearing your best elevator pitch. So.

11:11.47
Rand
So.

11:23.86
mike_flywheel
Rand your pitch please.

11:24.60
Rand
Know yes, um, so ucast is a marketplace and an ad management platform that helps connect brands and podcasts launch ad campaigns in the easiest safest and most effective way. So right now. The podcasting world is very segmented because the way it works is there are hundreds of networks and each of those networks manages hundreds of podcasts and so if you as a brand you want to go and explore the market you go to each of those each of those agencies individually. Um, and you're able to only grasp the market of each network and each agency so you're not really looking at the overall market of what exists in podcasting and how can I get the best results for me as a brand. You're just looking at how can I get the best results from that specific network. So really, what we wanted to do is we wanted to defragment the. Um, industry and there's a whole big sentiment right now of decentralization but we wanted to kind of like defragment it and bring it back into 1 centralized source that helps you see the overall picture of the podcast that exists and be able to help you ah select in an intelligent way. Um, which podcasts are the best going to be which podcasts are going to be the best for your brand to advertise on so that's really what we do.

12:42.77
mike_flywheel
That's super cool. So when you started the show you talked about the fact that you knew you wanted to be an entrepreneur but you didn't specifically know that you would end up doing something like Ucast you were sort of looking for problems in the market.

12:48.90
Rand
Yeah.

12:56.54
Rand
Um.

12:59.12
mike_flywheel
Tell us a little bit about how you started or why you started to latch on to this problem which I think maybe even learning a little bit about the problem you're solving would be good.

13:06.65
Rand
Um, yeah, um, so it was a plethora of different things. Um, it started with an interview that I did at Cbc fresh air when I was like I think 18 um. They had invited me and they're like hey do you want to be on our radio show podcast and I was like fuck. Yeah, you're Cbc of course I'm going to be there. Um, so that was like the first time I got exposure to I think that world. Um, and I just found it pretty cool that I was able to just sit in there. And just tell my own story of how I came here how I built what I've built. Um and I just fell in love with it. I've always also been a very talkative person and I love talking um to a point where like when I was a kid my uncle used to pay me to shut up. Um, so it was just like I just fell in love with the idea that. I can just send them from the phone mic and just talk about anything so that was the first exposure that I had to podcasting but I never really thought that I could like create a business ah out of it and then the years goes by and I still do like podcasting here and there I still hop on podcasts. Um, and I still. Talk to podcasters and I'm like very familiar with the problems of the industry and that's when I started like hearing a lot of my friends or a lot of my fellow podcaster friends saying oh my god I hate that I'm not making money. Oh my god this agency fucked me over oh my god I hate my network. Oh my god this brand did this.

14:33.21
Rand
Um, my god I just got scammed oh my god this company is just not giving me enough ads and just like the the amount of complaints that I was seeing in my head I was like no way there isn't a solution out there. It turns out there isn't a very good solution. There are solutions but there isn't a very good well-rounded solutions. So my 21 year old brain was like I can solve this so that's how it started.

14:59.50
mike_flywheel
That's super cool. Ah and to your point I think we're still pretty early in the infancy of monetization of podcasts. There's a lot of podcasts out there. There's probably less.

15:05.75
Rand
And.

15:13.77
mike_flywheel
Avenues of monetization or ways to actually monetize them in ways that are super value that will and people end up putting them with video on Youtube and all these other ways to try to make money so I'm super interested to learn how that works so when we think about your primary audience.

15:16.72
Rand
Um, and then.

15:20.21
Rand
No.

15:26.17
Rand
Yeah.

15:31.40
mike_flywheel
Who uses this, it does sound a little bit like a 2 sided marketplace because you're going to need podcasters and you're going to need it sounds like advertisers but maybe tell us about who are your customers and if it is a 2 sided marketplace how that works for each side.

15:37.80
Rand
Um, it is um.

15:40.53
Rand
Okay.

15:46.94
Rand
Yeah, um so I kind of fucked myself over with this one because everyone says how difficult it is to build a 1 ne-sided um startup so I went through right into to sided marketplace as my first startup so it's very difficult. Um. And right now our 2 user bases are podcasters and brands brands are the advertisers. We just don't like to call them. Advertisers. We call them brands. Um, and so yeah, those are there are two sides of the market. The dynamic of. The marketplace or what we call the flywheel is we bring in as many podcasts from agencies and networks into the platform and we list them consistently every day. So the goal is every day we have hundreds of podcasts being listed on the platform and. We bring in brands from different sectors to advertise on those on those podcasts and then we're hoping that you know those brands are able to generate recurrent revenue for agencies and networks when networks and agencies sees that there is value in using the product rather than just using emails and you know their. Outdated systems. They list more podcasts in the platform. So there's ah like more supply chain. Um more supply. We're hoping that they also bring their brands with them so we were hoping that the networks also bring in and channel the brands into ucasts because we're also a management tool not just you know a marketplace to find podcasts.

17:17.53
Rand
Um, so yeah, that's really how like the dynamic works. So we're hoping that one channels the other and brings in more from the other and a flywheel I don't know if I explained that well but.

17:23.34
mike_flywheel
So no, it makes sense so when you think about which one you need to or you're focusing on acquiring first as you cast do you focus on scooping up as many podcasts as possible or building as many brand relationships as possible.

17:34.30
Rand
Um.

17:42.00
mike_flywheel
Um, obviously you have to do both but what's sort of like priority one versus priority 2 for you.

17:43.23
Rand
Um, it's building relationships with brands because today I'm not sure if you know this. But last quarter there were only one thousand brands that advertised the quarter before there was nine hundred the quarter before there was like around 850 it is growing. But yeah, but podcast advertising. So if you compare that to literally the millions of startups and businesses that are advertising elsewhere. It is heavily um, undersaturated right now? Um, but then it brings up a different argument with.

18:01.47
mike_flywheel
Um, and that's specific to podcast advertising or just advertising in general. Got it.

18:19.20
Rand
Is more saturation going to create better results. But that's a completely different argument. Um by other brand relations is really the the one we look for.

18:26.87
mike_flywheel
Got it so you're solving two problems. It sounds like 1 is finding out how to help podcasters monetize their shows and the other is helping brands better.

18:36.60
Rand
A.

18:42.79
mike_flywheel
Create interactions with podcasts that are better aligned to their brands and make sure that their advertising dollars are going to the right places is that sort of the right kind of thinking.

18:54.26
Rand
Um I don't think so because those problems are kind of being solved by others. There are other monetization tools. So really, that's not the problem we're solving what we're really solving is um, the.

19:02.58
mike_flywheel
Got it.

19:10.39
Rand
Efficiency of your advertising Timeline. So the way that agencies and networks work today is let's say I have an agency I manage 100 podcasts me as an agency I have to go and get brands. So I have to hire salespeople then I get a weight card. That rate card is essentially an excel sheet that has all my podcasts with the rates with their demographics all of that once I send that to the brand that I'm prospecting now we go back and forth and email trying to negotiate trying to find the right podcast. I've done this so many times with agencies and my threads are no less than 50 emails per 1 campaign. Um, and then there's contracts and then there's payments and then there's ios and then there's um reportbacks and it's just everything is done in an outdated system and it's a very bad system. So. Really one of the problems that we're solving is that management piece of how can agencies and podcasts better manage their entire deal flow without that headache without that confusion without that 50 emails back and forth. So that's the first piece. Yeah.

20:17.14
mike_flywheel
Yeah, it's but it's a brokering platform component of it.

20:23.63
Rand
Um, so that's the first piece. The second piece is um, how can we help brands find the podcast that are going to give them the best results. So it's very easy for brands to go and find podcasts really There's so many search tools. There's so many databases but the problem is how can you find the podcast that is for you. So I'll give you an example, 1 of our clients is empire record labels and we're doing a campaign for Chris Brown so they came to us and they're like hey what podcasts have been talking about Chris Brown in the last couple of weeks and so that's how we determined which podcasts were right for them. It was not podcasts that were in hip hop and culture necessarily but it was more so podcasts that have been using Chris Brown in conversation more often, right? So it's determining. How can we find the right fits for for brands.

21:10.14
mike_flywheel
It's now that we're talking about Chris Brown they're super interested in us right? We're orre talking. We've mentioned Chris Brown at least 5 paul 1520 times yeah that's perfect. So that's awesome. Um.

21:14.26
Rand
Ah, sorry, yeah, yes, now they're gonna advertise their podcast I'll send them your podcast after.

21:24.81
mike_flywheel
And so you mentioned that other people are helping monetize um, helping people find ways to monetize podcasts you talk about your unique differentiator.

21:26.73
Rand
Says it.

21:36.98
mike_flywheel
Do you have competitors in this space if so who are that you don't have to even mention their name but like what are sort of the styles of competition or alternatives that exist in this space today.

21:46.70
Rand
Um, yeah, there are many competitions. Um I think the biggest are. Um, advertised cast and acast which are agencies that use tech. That's how I like to describe it. They're not tech startups. They're agencies that use tech. Um, so literally that's that's who they are but they are one of the biggest um, a startup that actually. Uses tech to try and empower monetization as Podcorn. Um, but podcorn has been used or all most of the use. Successful use cases has been in what we call cross- podcast pollinations. So it's podcasts looking for other podcasts.

22:28.89
Rand
Advertise their podcast. So a lot of the advertisers on popcorn are just literally other podcasts looking to pay other podcasts to advertise their own. Um, and so those are really the competitors that exist there are so many different programmatic and dynamic ad insertion tools. We don't compete with those because that's really not our. Thing. They're indirect competitors but not really direct.

22:49.14
mike_flywheel
And so is there a specific size of podcast that is right for you cast and is there a specific size of brand that you cast makes sense for like I don't know if it's for everybody or if there's a certain sweet spot.

22:56.79
Rand
So and I.

23:03.83
Rand
For podcasts we welcome everybody for brands. We welcome brands that are looking to start testing with at least $5000 um previously a lot of the brands that we worked with they would give us like 1 k and we do it. But what we realized is if you're not willing to spend $5000 to test. Not even to get good results but just to tests you're not going to get good results. Five k is really the minimum. You need to start testing and then if that five k does not give you a positive roi. You cannot just be like oh I'm done with podcast advertising you need to spend more money to find the right fit and there are so many use cases where brands would spend. You know 10 to 25 k at the beginning just to figure out their sweet spot as soon as they figure out their sweet spot. They're able to be like okay now I know exactly what kind of ad podcasts work for me. Those are the ones that I'm going to create a very large distribution strategy with. So really, those are the brands that we love to work with are the brands that are not afraid to spend the money to test. Um, different strategies.

24:03.42
mike_flywheel
Talk to me a little bit about the brands for a moment. So the brands who traditionally are you seeing as the brands that generally advertise through podcasts like you said it's ah it's just it's a finite market today.

24:06.12
Rand
You will see. And.

24:18.34
Rand
A.

24:21.20
mike_flywheel
Who are the typical styles of companies and brands that do on advertise on podcasts and why did they choose podcasts Specifically do you find.

24:29.32
Rand
So the biggest have been actually b two b um, of course you've got like the better help the godaddies the squarespace the vpns um, those are like the most known ones. Um, but b two b has been one of the highest. Spending sectors in the last couple of Quarters um and sorry what was the next part of the question.

24:47.50
mike_flywheel
Yeah I think the part was like who generally are you seeing advertising on podcasts and why are they choosing podcasts and then sort of even the expansion of that is why.

24:53.39
Rand
And.

25:02.80
mike_flywheel
Or what other types of brands should be getting into podcast advertising as as they think about their strategies.

25:09.15
Rand
Yeah, the reason why we find brands or exploring podcasting is because other means of advertising is just not working. Um, it is very easy to drown in Facebook and Instagram ads. Ah, well, first of all, if you're b two b really you've got only a couple of options you've got maybe Twitter I don't know um maybe Linkedin maybe product hunt um email marketing like you you have very limited options right? So b two b has found podcasting to be 1 of the most successful um strategies because it. There's so many business podcasts so many marketing podcasts so many b two b podcasts that target a very specific demographic that they're looking for. So we found that um b two b they love podcast advertising but in general um the advertising market is oversaturated. The emails is. Overdone and overused and overabused same with Facebook same with Google ads really every advertising method has been overused and overab abuseed podcasting has not and we're not saying that it should be overused and overab abuseed. But what we're saying is it should be explored at least and then the.

26:15.00
mike_flywheel
And is that because also to your point. There's lots of business podcasts. But the people listening to them aren't always listening to them as their business right? A lot of times they're wearing their personal hat but are just interested in these topics.

26:17.67
Rand
Of.

26:27.00
Rand
Yeah. Yeah.

26:33.44
mike_flywheel
Is that sort of your point. It's like how do you recreationally get to individual consumers that could be key decision Makers for B Two B solutions in a new way is that.

26:41.18
Rand
You know like I am I'm the founder of ucast I am never no matter what I'm doing I will always have that hat on right? So if I'm listening to a podcast about I don't know anime. I still have the ucastst hat on if I hear a product that I think is really fucking cool on that podcast I'm still going to be like let me send this over to my team like I will always have the hat of my professional um of my professional career on and I'm sure most people will. So when you're listening to a podcast. You're not just listening to it as you know as a you know person as Mike. You're also listening to it as the person who can make decisions at Microsoft so that's how we look at podcasting is not just who's listening but what kind of decisions can people make.

27:25.54
mike_flywheel
Um, yeah, um.

27:36.60
Rand
When they're listening to specific podcasts.

27:40.36
mike_flywheel
Totally makes sense and I mean I love Podcasts I found personally? um I I am not a person that prefers reading books I like reading articles or topic deep diving. Um.

27:49.98
Rand
Yeah, yeah.

27:57.57
mike_flywheel
And then I started listening to audiobooks because they helped me on the go. But I found that podcasts draw me in a lot more frequently because the topics discussed in podcasts are far more here and now for the most part, the ones that I listen to where.

27:59.23
Rand
Oh.

28:10.20
Rand
And it's a lot more human than an audio book like an audio book is nice. Yeah, and exactly there was a connection like an audio book is nice but you get bored very quickly. But when you're listening to a podcast. It's I It's a lot more human.

28:16.52
mike_flywheel
You build a connection.

28:26.70
mike_flywheel
And it's so funny because you actually if done right? You feel like you're part of the conversation and I was joking when starting up pitch please I had probably just as many people interested.

28:32.81
Rand
Move in and. Oh My God I Just got the bun I Just got it you I literally just heard it. Yeah anyways, go.

28:44.84
mike_flywheel
You got it right? You got it that it's It's a clever bike thing I Love my puns but the amount of people that want to come join in these seats to participate.

28:55.20
Rand
A.

28:58.74
mike_flywheel
Not even as necessarily topic experts but they just love the concept of hearing what other people are doing and being a part of that conversation. It is a piece that I'm going to be weaving into this show which is totally anybody that wants to come participate. Even if you I invite you if you want to participate especially if it's someone that maybe you're introducing. I Think it's super cool to bring in new dynamics of other people because the point of these shows is to be a conversation. It's like if we met at a tech to event. We'd be talking about the same things I might not get as much time because there's so many people there but I do love the conversational aspect of podcasts personally.

29:23.23
Rand
You.

29:34.92
Rand
Yeah, me too I Love when I feel like a lot of the times when I'm listening to certain podcasts and everyone starts laughing I start laughing with them and I'm like I feel like I'm in the room I feel like I'm sitting with my friends laughing. You know it's It's pretty cool.

29:49.40
mike_flywheel
Really pitch. Please. Um, so so tell us it sounds like I can make some assumptions but I actually wanted to understand a little bit about how you monetize.

29:56.45
Rand
Oh yeah.

30:01.10
mike_flywheel
How you how you monetize the brands and if there's a piece where you monetize on the podcasts.

30:05.57
Rand
Yeah, so right now we take um, it's all transaction fees. So we take a 15% transaction fee from the podcast. Um, and then we take a 2 by 5 % processing fee from the brand. Ah, per campaign we are looking to introduce Sas models for agencies for listening podcasts and creating admin accounts but that is like couple years in the work I'm not right now.

30:29.00
mike_flywheel
And you said obviously any size podcast can join brands $5000 or greater for testing now I want to circle back to that any size because like.

30:33.19
Rand
So yeah, yeah.

30:45.40
mike_flywheel
Are there actually brands looking to advertise on people with listenerships that are maybe 2 5 800 listeners per episode in a micro strategy or like what what is sort of the thresholds of that I'm curious.

30:52.95
Rand
Dan.

30:59.68
Rand
We've had brands advertised on podcasts that have a hundred listeners. Um, so really, there's no discrimination there. Um, yeah, um, they pay per podcast.

31:05.72
mike_flywheel
I Mean they're paying for listens anyway is that sort of how they pay it's it's per listen. Okay.

31:15.76
Rand
Yeah, a per podcast per lesson. So a regular cpm. Um, it really depends on the brand like we've got very small startups who like 1 of the best examples is a um food app in the us and. They're like oh get us on like a podcast but we don't like we want to pay only five hundred dollars I was like cool so I found them a podcast that is all about couponing um in the us. Um, and I was like hey you guys are a food app that is all about saving money. This is a couponing podcast. It's all about literally saving money I think it would. A good fit so that podcast I think had like 200 listeners ah but was charging like $50 per episode so they advertised for I think it was like 6 episodes and yeah, like we don't have discrimination of listeners it really just depends on the brands and then needs. The needs of the brand some want like a very niche micro strategy where like they want to advertise on like 100 podcasts that have like very small listenership some want larger podcasts with a lot of listenerships. anyone should sign that anyone should sign up

32:20.43
mike_flywheel
So I should sign up, you just sold me I should sign up That's it. Yeah I mean as a podcast I Guess there's no harm in being.

32:27.79
Rand
I'm not saying you're going to get deals right away but anyone should sign up.

32:35.76
Rand
Um, yeah, exactly.

32:37.54
mike_flywheel
Listed in the marketplace right? As as an option Now. Actually how how does that systematically work does it live pull the regular listens of your podcasters during the sign-up process do I list. The topics. We talk about to the audience or how how does that piece work.

32:56.61
Rand
Yeah, so um, the core information is pulled from an api so like your cover your description your name um publishing sites all of that is covered by the api the rest like your own data. Um like a listenership and demographic. You have to manually input it. Um, and then if you want to get your podcast verified then you'd have to send us proof of your um of your listenership and then we verify your podcast based on that and we give you like a blue check Mark Verified ah and categories. We also ask you to list that based on. Kind of category based on the category of your listenership or like the category of of the topic but also thinking about it from perspective of what kind of brands. Do you want to pull. So if you want um b two b brands to advertise on you then you would be putting like business marketing sales. Whatever right? so. Also thinking about the kind of brands you want that track. So some of it's manual. Some of it is automatic.

33:57.17
mike_flywheel
That's cool and it and makes sense is the goal automatic over time to automatically pull. But yeah.

34:02.43
Rand
Yes, the goal is to be able to um, always have your life data um from listenership and Cpm because listenership it changes you know every month. Um, and it's going to be very. Very hectic and drastic for us to ask podcasters to pull in monthly listenership reports and upload that for us to verify it. So really, the goal is to have live listenership data always being updated on the platform.

34:31.89
mike_flywheel
Totally makes sense so where where is ucast today if you're comfortable sharing some some stats. Are you able to talk about how many brands are already using Ucast how many podcasts or networks. Brands have access to via yeah Ucas where are you in the journey.

34:51.61
Rand
Yeah, um, there's not much I can share right now. But what I can tell you is we fund raised or valued that $1000000 today. We um have over 500 verified podcasts on the platform. That you're able to go take a look at I cannot share the number of brands that we were working with but we do work with a lot of b two b um fashion sas and record labels. Apparently I thought i.

35:21.70
mike_flywheel
Um, Chris Brown Chris Brown

35:21.84
Rand
You know I didn't think this was going to be an interest for record labels but a lot Chris Brown Chris Brown um but we work also with with with artists to advertise their their releases and get them streams. So yeah, those are the kind of brands that we work with.

35:38.21
mike_flywheel
That's super cool. How how long have you been working on ucast.

35:43.71
Rand
Um, we incorporated may of 2021 but really the first and Mvp did not launch till November of 2021 but then the real product um did not launch up until of may of 2022 I think so

35:58.19
mike_flywheel
Okay.

36:00.98
Rand
It's been a while but actually constantly working on with a good product on a client strategy. Um I would say has been maybe six months

36:11.44
mike_flywheel
Got it So you're just you're sort of still a little bit in that seed phase just under a year past Mvp with some actual users on on the product. It sounds like a decent amount of of users which is really cool. Um, what's been.

36:15.00
Rand
Yeah.

36:28.24
mike_flywheel
What's been one of your most memorable stories on this journey so far.

36:32.16
Rand
Yeah, um I think it was the day we fundraised? um I had almost just given up on fundraising. Um I had talked to maybe like 70 vcs. No one understands what we're doing now they they don't understand but they're.

36:47.83
Rand
Unbelievably pessimistic. Everyone's so pessimistic these days. Um, but I have like I was about to just throw my hands up and be like you know what? I'm bootstrapping this whole thing I'm done talking to investors and then we get on a client call with I was doing a demo with a podcaster. Um, and he owned at that time a podcast agency a very big podcast agency in the Us He's a podcaster himself that makes a lot of money and he was Interested. He's like oh let me see what this is about so I get on the client call with him. Um, and at that time I was also like talking with 3 other angels that I was like very close to closing.

37:21.86
mike_flywheel
Um, yeah.

37:23.30
Rand
He sees the product he falls in love with it and he's like are you fundraising I was like yeah we are actually like are trying to close right now our first round and he asks how much we're closing and immediately matches him and he's like okay ah like at that point I remember just.

37:35.59
mike_flywheel
Wow.

37:41.85
Rand
Being like what the fuck's going on so I close the call with him and I call my advisor right away. My advisor is like again this genius entrepreneur who made it very big, very young. Um, so he's had a lot of experience with fundraising so I pick up the phone and I'm like hey did it this happened. He's like holy shit I'm like yeah holy shit. And he's like okay you got to become? don't do anything do exactly what I tell you like word by words. So I'm like on 2 phone calls at the same time with my advisor and like with this potential investor like word by word trying to translate to 1 another. What's going on and essentially we end up closing that deal that night we end up fundraising. Thank you, we end up fundraising um that night two days later the money's in our bank and yeah it was one of the craziest nights ever because I was like I remember like that day I was given up and then by night we had you know a safe.

38:21.60
mike_flywheel
Congrats.

38:39.34
Rand
Was signed by an investor who is also a podcaster who understands the industry who knows what we want who's able to help us so it was just like it was a magical moment. Yeah.

38:48.94
mike_flywheel
And I think that's super special right? You have not just an investor and I think that's an important piece that people looking for investment is finding oftentimes someone who can help guide or coach or be more than just the money and it sounds like you got exactly that which is the best.

39:00.12
Rand
Oh yeah.

39:07.94
Rand
And not just that also with like our advisor I always I'll always call out my advisor to be 1 of the best decisions I've ever made for the company um having someone by your side that you can call day and night.

39:08.24
mike_flywheel
And match possible.

39:22.87
Rand
For whatever even like personal issues. Um like that acts genuinely as your friend for your best interests that can guide you throughout. You know, frantic moments like that It is just it's it's Priceless. You cannot put an equity amount or. And like a dollar amount on it because that kind of support really is very difficult to find.

39:42.62
mike_flywheel
How how did you I'm sure there's going to be some startups listening to this but how did you find or choose your advisor since it sounds like it's such an important piece I'm sure people have many advisors but it sounds like you found a couple special ones or at least one that's been super helpful.

39:52.97
Rand
And.

39:59.33
Rand
You know.

40:01.30
mike_flywheel
How do you go finding or matching with such an amazing advisor and what are some things you look for.

40:06.32
Rand
Yeah, so for this one. Um, it really happened by chance. It was my best friend's boyfriend's um, client and I was in the car with my best friend and her boyfriend talking about you cast. And he was like oh by the way. Um I have like equity in this company. Um, the founder is like 26 genius just raised like 100000000 valuation. Really cool guy I think maybe he can help you I was like cool connect us. Um, so he connects us and. Think it was like it was a match first meeting like as soon as we met each other like I knew I wanted him and he was like I'm ready to sign like where is this? Um, so it was really just like a very good fit for the both of us where. He was building a marketplace so he knew the dynamics of the marketplace of a marketplace not necessarily our marketplace but he knew the dynamics of for marketplace. He knew the dynamics of building a business and scaling it very fast. He knew how to fundraise he was at a very similar like age. You know generation is me. Um, so there was just like so many things that just overlapped that made sense and then over time what really made me realize that this relationship with this advisor is very special is well number one he never tells me what to do the way he approaches our meetings.

41:36.84
Rand
Is like in a very problem solving kind of way where we look at the things that are not working we trace back. Everything we look at leaky buckets we see how we can cover those leaky buckets. So really, it's never I'm telling you what to do? It's always we're working together to figure out what is working what's not. Um, so that's very special because I've had mentors that would always like undermine me and tell me what to do and then get mad when I don't do what they want so that was the first thing. The second thing is like that availability piece like whenever I need him he is there and I'm able to pick up the phone and call him very comfortably. Um, that is another thing is finding someone that you know is on your side that you know would be like your ride or die day and night that is very important. Um, and then someone who's advocating for you like he always advocates for us which is awesome and I love that and we never asked him to like I've never asked him to pitch you cast ever. He does that from the good of his own heart where like no matter what room he is. He's always mentioned or at like at the beginning he was always mentioning us. He was always connecting me with investors like he was always very proactive in his way of advising and in his mentorship which I really really appreciated because. I didn't know what the fuck to do like It's my first time building a tech startup and I have no idea what to do so him being very proactive in in the way that he mentors was just really incredible.

42:57.57
mike_flywheel
Is there like 1 or 2 questions I'm sure there's many but is there 1 or 2 questions you would ask or think of for people to ask while looking for an advisor to to land on a similarly great match.

43:11.84
Rand
Yeah, so what is your mentorship style. That's I think the first thing you got to ask is understanding how they mentor there's a lot of authoritarian mentors like I said who tell you what to do and then get very offended when you don't do it and then there's. Mentors who kind of need you to be there to be someone who's constantly asking them questions. So like I know I've had also mentors who if I don't reach out to them in a week or two weeks they kind of get offended like why aren't you reaching out to me so finding a mentor. Who doesn't make things about them who really works around your needs I think that's very important. Um, and then the second question that I would ask them is just really I would vet their experience. Um I would vet their knowledge. Um, if there's someone who built a startup and in a specific. Like let's say someone who builds software tech but you're in deep tech. It's not going to be a match because they you're not going to understand your problems. So finding someone who understands the problems that you're going through. Um I think it's it's very important like for him he built a marketplace so he understands the problems the dynamic of a marketplace so. That's why it made sense for us to partner. Um, so yeah, those are really like the the 2 key factors I would look for.

44:32.96
mike_flywheel
That's super helpful when you think about looking for like super long range planned 5 years out what what sort of your vision for what you cast might look like and what things might look like for you.

44:36.25
Rand
Me.

44:42.70
Rand
Yeah, what I'm trying to do with with ucas is I'm trying to have or my goal is to have 80% of podcast at deal flows to go through ucas that is my goal is to be able to transition. The way airbnb did where it was able to transition almost like most of the travel real estate into 1 platform. Um, that's really the goal the 5 year goal for you cast.

45:10.52
mike_flywheel
That's amazing and obviously you're hard at work. What does the next six months look like for you cast any major milestones that you're looking forward to over the next six months or anything specific. You are looking to launch over the next six months

45:20.58
Rand
Yeah, ah, yeah, we're really, it's it's going to be on the sales end for us. Um, we really want to hit a 20 to thirty k yeah emv monthly so that's going to be the next like. Big milestone in the forward the next six months um so really sales that's going to be the biggest thing go I know. Thank you.

45:43.91
mike_flywheel
It's big sales year you're gonna have to put your sales hat on you're selling it great by the way without even selling. So It's really good. You're you're you good year ahead? Um, where can people find out more and what are the best places for them to go if they want to either sign up. As a podcast or sign up as a brand.

46:02.58
Rand
Yeah, just go to yourcast dot x y z you can find everything there or you can find me on Linkedin and Abudras um, and you can ask me any questions you have.

46:11.10
mike_flywheel
And I'll make sure to link all of these in the show notes. But if you're listening and want to type it in real fast. It's you like letter u cast CASTDotXYZ correct

46:22.92
Rand
Yes, and then you can also email me anytime at rand@ucast.xyz.

46:28.41
mike_flywheel
Amazing I have to ask? what's the XYZ I'm sure some people are wondering what that is they maybe it might be their first time hearing x dot x y z ending.

46:38.58
Rand
Yeah, so um XYZ was like a very big crypto gen z thing during like 2020 crypto boom 2020 2021 everybody was buying x y z so I just like bought x really I just thought it was more hip. Yeah.

46:50.94
mike_flywheel
That's cool. Yeah I'm sure someone's asking the question when we said it so I was like let's just answer it real time.

46:56.10
Rand
I was just like it was very hip I was like X Y Z that was really it. There's no background.

46:57.70
mike_flywheel
It is pretty up. Well we're going to give some free advertising so you said you know you're obviously in in the space and know a lot of amazing startups after the show. It'd be amazing if you can introduce 1 or 2 or 3 or however, many you really want that you think would fit the bill to.

47:08.41
Rand
Um.

47:16.31
mike_flywheel
To bring in their best elevator pitch 1 or 2 that you want to give a shout out to on the show that people you think are super cool doing interesting things that people should check out.

47:25.68
Rand
Yeah, um, my good friend Justin Fort he has javelin sports um, pretty cool app if you're locally in Toronto you're looking to book um, specifically volleyball venues. That's the app to go to or if you're looking for sports communities to play with. Um, really, that's the app to go to um, another one is by my good friend. Um, ah Jaden and he is working on thrive which is a really really cool concept of being able to advertise streams and taxis where you're. Uber drivers or taxi drivers. They put a coupon code and that coupon code updates with like you know the the regular streams or regular songs that are going up trying to increase dreams. So really another really cool startup I know I did a terrible job pitching that. But.

48:16.75
mike_flywheel
It's fine. We're gonna let them. We're gonna let them come pitch so thrive in Javelin we've got to talk to at least thrive in Javelin That's amazing. Um.

48:17.47
Rand
Nice. Yes, yes.

48:25.65
mike_flywheel
Any other thoughts that you want to make sure that we've kind of mentioned today and then there's something really cool. We do on the show and I'm going to kind of spring it on you. You don't even know it's coming. We do it on every single podcast but before we jump into that is there is there something that you want to kind of make sure you add that we didn't cover today about you cast and your journey.

48:32.80
Rand
Or okay and.

48:43.11
Rand
Now. Um, all I'm gonna say is if you want to do it Go do it. Don't listen to nobody don't let nobody put you down.

48:50.70
mike_flywheel
That's amazing. Well the thing that we do here on the pitch please podcast as you heard me say it. It's It's actually a little bit tough to say pitch please podcast pitch please podcast over and over and over again. So I ask guests to see how many times they can say pitch please podcast.

48:57.52
Rand
And you okay.

49:07.70
Rand
Okay, no okay.

49:07.25
mike_flywheel
In a row fast. At some point I'm going to circle back with a prize but so far I've been keeping count and then you all have to listen to the episodes to figure out where you rank but I can't tell you you'd have to listen to the podcast to see where you rank. There's a pretty high number in there though. So let's see where you stack up.

49:17.90
Rand
What's the highest 1 so far. Okay, okay, let's do this who.

49:25.28
mike_flywheel
You can start whenever you want I'll keep count fired up.

49:30.34
Rand
Pitch Please Podcast Bitlea Podcast Bitlea Podcast Bitlea Podcast Bitlea Podcast Bitlea Podcast Bitlea Podcast Bitlea Podcast Bitleaase Podcast Bitleaas Podcast Push please podcast bit please bit please podcast bishop please podcast bit please podcast bitlea podcast fish please podcast beach please podcast bit please podcast pitch please podcast bit peaceac podcast. Bit piece podcast bit please with it. Okay I'm done.

49:51.33
mike_flywheel
All right? That's like 23 that's really good I can't tell you if that's the highest but I think I think we're getting up there with 23 yeah ah ran thanks for joining us today I know we had to shuffle around the time a little bit to make it work I really appreciate that.

49:51.70
Rand
Um, nice. That's pretty good are up there and I'm up there. Thanks so much. Mike.

50:09.25
mike_flywheel
Thank you everybody who tuned in to the pitch please podcast to learn more about you casts and the amazing work they're doing I know I'm going to be signing up if you have a podcast and you're listening to this podcast I think it would be wise for you to at least check it out. As Rand said you might not get. Brands coming to right away. But I think this is a really smart thing to do as they build up an inventory of amazing brands and amazing podcasts looking to conquer 80% of the market in the next five years good luck on the journey Rand any closing words from your side. Thanks a lot.

50:31.93
Rand
And here. Yeah, no thank you so much for having me stay blessed. Everyone.

50:44.27
mike_flywheel
Have a great night. Everybody.