Monetize This! Where Podcasting Best Practices Come to Die

Amanda Dames is the kink consultant of The Kink Consultant podcast. She specializes in intimacy, communication, consent, and kink education, working to help individuals and couples embrace their kinky side.

In this episode, Amanda joins David to talk about kink, gatekeeping, and what happens when you start a podcast before you have time to talk yourself out of it. She shares how an unexpected interview opportunity pushed her to launch, why she values telling stories people aren’t hearing elsewhere, and how her podcast eventually brought her clients—even though turning it into a business funnel was neve...

Beth Brookhart has spent a career finding her own way around the rules. As a freelance journalist, she ignored the conventional query-letter ritual and picked up the phone. Decades later, publishing a novel introduced her to a whole new collection of gatekeepers, rejection letters, and advice about what her book ought to be.

In this episode, we talk about who gets to make the rules for creative work, why writers and podcasters spend so much time seeking permission, and what happens when advice starts turning your creation into somebody else’s idea of what sells.

Be...

Willie Blake started his podcast with a phone, a record button, and a simple goal: get better at speaking.

No elaborate launch strategy. No expensive microphone. No plan to turn the podcast into a business.

And yet, 178 episodes later, the podcast had produced clients, a business partnership, unexpected opportunities, and connections with people Willie never would have met otherwise.

In this episode, Willie and David talk about what happens when you stop treating your podcast like a marketing machine and start making it for your own reasons.

Willie’s approach is pr...

You don’t need a $500 microphone, a sound-treated studio, and enough audio gear to launch a small radio station.

Dave Jackson explains why podcasters should stop obsessing over equipment and focus on the one thing that actually matters: making your audio listenable.

Get the basics right. Then make the damn podcast.

Check out the full episode:

Dave Jackson has been podcasting since 2005, which means he’s had almost two decades to watch podcasting advice evolve.

Or, more accurately, watch the same advice get recycled with increasingly expensive microphones.

Dave joins Monetize This! to talk about the podcasting advice industry, and naturally, we find plenty to disagree with.

We take a swing at:

* “Just start.”

* “Just keep going.”

* The promise that your audience is just around the corner.

* The promise that your podcast can easily make money.

* The apparent requirement that every...

Paul and Ellyn Mock didn’t start their podcast with a business plan, a growth strategy, or a monetization funnel. They started with something they actually had: 37 years of marriage, a shared history, and a story worth talking about.

In this episode, we talk about what podcast success looks like when you stop measuring everything by downloads, followers, revenue, and growth. Paul and Ellyn share how E Says, P Says came about, what they’ve learned from making the show, the listener feedback that means the most to them, and their encounters with the people eager to sell...

Podcast awards are supposed to recognize great work. But what are they actually worth to the people who win them?

In this episode, we speak with John Leschinski of the Canadian Podcast Awards about what podcast awards are really for, how nominations and judging work, whether winning can actually lead to money or opportunities, and why some awards can start to look a lot like pay-to-play.

We also get into celebrity podcasts, popularity contests, the $2,000 course you could apparently create about winning awards, and some surprisingly important advice.

And if you’re wondering wh...

Stand-up comedy looks effortless until you realize every laugh has been engineered.

This week, comedian, veterinarian, and author Matt Evans joins Monetize This! to talk about what actually goes into writing comedy. We get into joke structure, storytelling, callbacks, and why making people laugh is a lot more like learning a craft than waiting for inspiration to strike.

Along the way, we accidentally wander into some surprisingly useful advice about creativity, overcoming resistance, and why the hardest part of making something is often just sitting down and starting. Don’t worry—we make fun of ours...

Everyone wants to sell transformation.

In podcasting, it’s “Launch in 30 days.” “Grow your audience.” “Build a six-figure business.”

In leadership coaching, the promises aren’t all that different.

This week, I sat down with executive coach Kathy Hadizadeh to talk about something that quietly challenges both industries: the idea that real change can be packaged into a weekend workshop, a seven-step framework, or a single blueprint.

Kathy doesn’t coach podcasters, and she isn’t trying to sell you the latest podcast growth strategy. Instead, she works with engineering and technology leaders...

What happens when a Hollywood storyteller discovers podcasting?

Alan Katz spent decades working in film and television, including creating and writing for Tales from the Crypt, where getting a story from an idea to the screen could take years, endless approvals, and giving up a lot of control along the way.

Podcasting changed that.

In this episode of Monetize This!, Alan talks about why the microphone might be the ultimate storytelling tool, why authenticity matters more than formulas, and why the best podcasts come from creators who understand the story they’re actually tr...

Podcasting exists in this strange space where creators are told the medium is exploding, the opportunities are endless, and success is right around the corner — usually after buying one more course, one more microphone, one more strategy, one more growth framework.

Meanwhile, most podcasters are making little to no money, fighting discouragement, staring at download numbers, and wondering whether anybody actually cares.

This week on Monetize This, I talk with Rory Paquette — podcaster, coach, self-described “podcaster advocate,” and someone with very strong opinions about how the industry treats creators.

This conversation moves between satire...

Podcasting used to be relatively simple. You recorded some audio, uploaded it somewhere, and hoped another human being voluntarily listened to it.

Now podcasting apparently includes Netflix shows, vertical video clips, content funnels, algorithm strategy, six-camera YouTube setups, and at least one person online insisting you need a specific microphone before you’re allowed to speak publicly.

This week on Monetize This!, David talks with audio fiction creator Jonathan Marsh about the strange modern universe surrounding podcasting — a place where nobody can fully agree on what a podcast even is anymore, but everyone still seems very...

What happens when a podcast isn’t a funnel for a business… and the podcast itself is the thing?

In this episode of Monetize This!, David Beckemeyer talks with Andrew Lewin, host of How to Protect the Ocean, a podcast with nearly 1,900 episodes built around ocean conservation, science communication, and helping people care about the ocean a little more than they did yesterday.

No mastermind.No “high-ticket offer.”No podcast growth empire.

And yet, somehow, the show changes lives.

Andrew talks about:

* why most podcast advice doesn’t apply to mission...

What happens when you take perfectly reasonable advice about “better audio” and follow it… way too far?

This episode of Monetize This! features voice actor Jodi Krangle—whose thoughtful insights on sound, emotion, and listener connection are immediately (and aggressively) overproduced.

We talk about why sound matters, how it shapes what people feel, and how quickly “good production” turns into… whatever this episode is.

Along the way:

* Duck sounds become a creative philosophy

* Bacon replaces rain

* Podcast gurus promise a million dollars (again)

* And we test the limit...

Most podcasts don’t fail because people run out of things to say.

They fail because people start chasing something they never clearly defined in the first place.

In this episode of Monetize This, I talk with Donald Dunn—who runs multiple shows, built a podcast network… and makes exactly $0 from podcasting itself.

Not as a failure. As a choice.

We get into why monetization advice often misses the point, how burnout actually happens, and why the most important decision you can make about your podcast has nothing to do with downlo...

What if your podcast… isn’t a strategy?

In this episode, I talk with Travis Rhoden, co-host of Bestie Approved—a show that breaks just about every “rule” in podcasting. No niche. No growth plan. No real monetization to speak of.

And yet—it works.

Not in the way the industry usually defines success. But in a way that’s a lot harder to measure: they actually enjoy making it.

We get into the reality behind podcast advice, the pressure to turn everything into a funnel, and what happens when you just decide no...

Podcasting advice usually follows a predictable script:

* Grow your audience.

* Monetize the audience.

* Sell a course teaching other people how to monetize their audience.

But today’s guest accidentally breaks that formula.

Alex Sanfilippo, founder of PodMatch and host of Podcasting Made Simple, builds tools for podcasters, teaches podcasting, and works with thousands of hosts… yet he argues something that sounds almost heretical:

Stop focusing on growing your audience.

Instead, focus on the listeners you already have.

In this episode of Monetize This!, we d...

It feels slightly off for this show to be talking about ethics.

But here we are.

This episode digs into a tension at the heart of modern podcasting:

* Be vulnerable. Tell your story. Go deeper.

* Ship fast. Don’t overthink it. Repurpose everything. Scale the system.

Those two philosophies don’t peacefully coexist.

Tonya just launched a deeply personal storytelling podcast built on radical empathy. Real stories. Messy communication. No heroes. No villains. No tidy “lessons learned.”

And when you’re asking people to tell stories th...

Most advice about podcast guesting assumes you want to sell a course.This episode assumes you want to get invited back.

Russell Van Brocklen doesn’t host a podcast. He doesn’t want one. He ignores most guesting “best practices” — and somehow keeps landing interviews, speaking slots, and follow-ups anyway.

In this short case file, we look at what actually breaks when guru advice meets real hosts, real shows, and real audiences.

In this episode:

* Why most podcast guesting advice fails outside the guru economy

* How guest appearances can lead to re...

First of all… apologies.

This episode contains actual advice… sort of.

A listener asked us to talk about microphones — the most over-Googled, over-YouTubed, over-affiliate-linked topic in podcasting. So today we’re doing something radical:

We’re simplifying it.

Instead of a Top 10 list.Instead of a comparison chart.Instead of a 47-minute deep dive into capsule patterns.

We’re answering the question:

Do you even need a microphone to start a podcast?

And if you insist on buying one… we give you exactly one recommendation.

No affili...

Podcasting advice loves certainty.Rules. Checklists. Launch plans. Guarantees.

This episode is for the people who already know that most of that… doesn’t really matter.

We hear from Julie Marty-Pearson, a podcast coach and host of multiple shows, about why podcasting has become overcomplicated, how guru culture sells confidence instead of interesting audio, and what happens when you stop treating your podcast like a funnel.

They talk about:

* The “launch” that never actually happens

* Why checklists don’t make podcasts better

* Breaking every rule and still finding an...

What if you’re not a guru…you’ve never taken a masterclass…and you’re still somehow surrounded by podcast advice culture?

In this episode, we talk with Chris Castanes, host of You Are Gonna Be Great at This — a proudly demotivational business podcast with a six-minute attention span and zero interest in “the Top 10.”

Chris isn’t selling a course. He’s not optimizing funnels. He’s just making a podcast he enjoys — and somehow still attracting AI-generated emails, ranking promises, and merch-for-reviews tactics.

This is a field report from the civilian zone:

* W...

Who gets to be a podcaster — and who quietly gets told they don’t belong?

In this episode of Monetize This!, David talks with Dave Campbell, a Canadian podcaster behind nine shows and the creator of The How to Podcast Series, about the growing gap between podcasting as a creative medium and podcasting as a gated, guru-driven industry.

They dig into how “best practices” turn into gatekeeping, why monetization is treated as a credibility test, and how most podcasters are being excluded by advice that assumes everyone wants the same goals.

This is a conver...

We were recently listed in Podnews—the calm, global, highly respected podcast industry newsletter read by people who seem to have their lives together. Naturally, the only responsible response was to immediately turn around and bite the hand that listed us.

In this episode, we roast Podnews, podcast industry news, and the strange ecosystem of press releases, “industry insights,” watershed years, and inevitable platform predictions that surround podcasting.

This is a roast, a thank-you note, and a sincere acknowledgment of the Herculean task of making sense of an industry where everyone is talking at once.

G...

Podcasting advice is loud, confident, and everywhere.Most of it insists there’s a right way to do things — and if you’re not doing that, you’re falling behind.

In this episode of Monetize This!, I’m joined by podcasting pioneer Jennifer Navarrete to talk about why that pressure is unnecessary, unhelpful, and often wrong.

We talk about podcast gurus, “best practices,” creator overwhelm, and why so many podcasters don’t need more advice — they need permission.

Jennifer has been producing audio since the early days of podcasting and brings a grounded, long-view perspect...

Welcome to Monetize This — the contrarian, anti-guru podcast for creators who are tired of being told they’re “one secret formula” away from going viral. In this short intro episode, David sets the tone for the show by sharing a totally real, definitely legit, absolutely not suspicious email promising the Instagram Virality Formula.

Spoiler: if someone is selling you “the formula,” it’s already a punchline.

In this episode, you’ll hear:

* The satire-filled vibe this show runs on

* A dramatic reading of the latest “secret system” hitting creator inboxes

* Why the promise...

This is the official trailer for a show that was absolutely not approved by any guru, coach, accelerator, mastermind leader, or LinkedIn “expert.”

Here’s what you’ll hear:

* Why “best practices” aren’t actually practices or best

* Creators who break every rule and somehow thrive anyway

* Lighthearted roasting of the guru-industrial complex

* Conversations with overwhelmed podcasters, contrarians, and good-sport coaches who can take a joke

If you’re craving a creative space that values curiosity over funnels, experimentation over optimization, and joy over metrics, you’re in the right place...