A Media Operator Jacob Cohen Donnelly
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- Business
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A Media Operator is a community for entrepreneurs and operators in the digital media space. This podcast is a natural extension of the newsletter (www.amediaoperator.com) and community that has already been built. Each week, I will interview entrepreneurs and operators that are building these media companies. Over the course of approximately an hour, we'll discuss their businesses, their success and failures, and, ultimately, what they learned about building media companies.
This podcast will provide actionable insights for current and prospective media operators. That means we're not only talking strategies in media, but also the tactics. We'll be diving into business models, audience development, subscription, commerce, advertising, audio, video—you name it, we'll be discussing it.
A Media Operator is also very much about niche media. That doesn't mean small. To me, niche media means depth. We should celebrate these stories and there are plenty of them. On this podcast, you'll finally hear them.
Wherever you listen to podcasts, hit that subscribe button so you know when I release an episode. As the show starts, considering rating it and leaving a comment so I know how I'm doing. I view A Media Operator as a tool for you; if I'm failing, I want to know.
Thanks for tuning in today and I'll be talking with you soon.
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Jim VandeHei Talks About Everything Axios, Past and Future
My guest this week is Jim VandeHei, co-founder and CEO of Axios. In this hour long conversation, we talked about the importance of advertising for the main business and why they never paywalled that, the company’s expansion into niche subscriptions, events, local news, entertainment, and software, how they've structured the team to build these various division. We also dug into a couple of M&A what-ifs tied to Politico and The Athletic, and then ended with his new book, Just the Good Stuff. I hope you enjoy our discussion.
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Andrew Perlman Talks About the Growth of Recurrent
My guest this week is Andrew Perlman, co-founder and CEO of Recurrent. In this 45 minute conversation, we talked about the firm’s M&A strategy, their thesis on content to commerce and the various revenue sources, how they are thinking about platforms cutting into traffic to publisher sites, and how they’ve structured the teams with various GMs across the portfolio. I hope you enjoy our discussion.
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Andy Cates on Why Non-Profit The Daily Memphian Must Be Self Funding
My guest this week is Andy Cates, the President and founding Chair of Memphis Fourth Estate, a 501(c)(3) that launched and operates The Daily Memphian. In this conversation, we talked about why The Daily Memphian care so much about reaching break even on operating revenue versus purely fundraising, the inherent challenges they have raising money from national journalism funders due to this belief in building sustainably, how they’ve thought about growth over the six years of its existence, and so much more. I hope you enjoy our discussion.
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Stephanie Kaplan Lewis Talks About Bootstrapping Her Campus Media Over the Last Decade
My guest this week is Stephanie Kaplan Lewis, co-founder and CEO of Her Campus Media, a network of brands that serve college students across thousands of colleges. In this conversation, we dug into the early days of the business, the various advertising products they take to market, how they think about the inevitable graduation of their audience, and where they see the business going from here. I hope you enjoy our discussion.
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Isaac Saul on Building a Truly Independent Tangle
My guest this week is Isaac Saul, founder of Tangle, a media company that tries to summarize the best arguments from across the political spectrum. In this hour-long conversation, we talked about the brand's exceptional free to paid conversion rate, where they are exploring advertising and events, the major headwinds the brand and all political media is dealing with, and how he plans to overcome it.
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Ellen Hyslop Talks About the Various Stages of Building The Gist
My guest this week is Ellen Hyslop, co-founder of The Gist, a fan-first sports media brand based out of Canada (but serving the United States). In this episode, we talked about the early days of the business, what sorts of growth tactics they used when first starting versus what now works, how their user onboarding impacts the types of content that readers see, the various ad products they take to market, and where the business goes from here.
Customer Reviews
Please make more!
Love this podcast, learning a lot, and I hope you make more episodes!
Five Stars for Jacob
I’ve recommended this podcast already to many people. Not only is Jacob one of the most well researched hosts but he’s also picking the best guests which show his subject matter expertise. By best I mean most adored niche B2B media companies. Highly recommend.
A Media Operator is a Must Listen
Jay is a crusher. If you are in the media business, you need to listen to his podcast. If you aren’t, you will be fired because you are missing knowledge bombs from Jay.