December 2024, and Andrew and I find ourselves in front of the microphone for the final time until 2025 – from my perspective a mere 28 days away. It is the annual state of the state address where we look back at all the interesting bits and pieces covered over the last 12 months while providing a sneak peak at the adventures to come in 2025. . … Welcome to EP 166: 2024 Yearapalooza.
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Today we are wrapping up the 2024 podcast season. I don’t know about you but I am ready for a break. Any part of wrapping up should include some sort of reflection but we will also be spending a portion of the show – presumably towards the end – of looking forward, what do we think we are doing and what might we be talking about.
I built todays conversation based on a similar format to how we wrapped up 2023 – a pulling back of the curtain to talk about what matters – at least where this website and podcast are concerned, and what we are thinking for next year. In an effort to look forward, I am a believer that you have to look back, take a look at what work – and what didn’t – so that you can modify behavior in a way that is beneficial and meaningful to all those involved (us as creators, you the listener as participants.)
By the Numbers jump to 6:56
I will admit that I used to be obsessed with the numbers associated with the blog site – and eventually the podcast – but the reality is that I don’t care so much anymore. That doesn’t meant that I don’t ever look, but my reasons for looking have less to do with how the show or site is performing and more about what topics and discussion are of interest to the people who visit this site and listen to the podcast. While I still end up choosing topics that represent my current activities and interests, it’s interesting to know what people think is worth their attention.
Since there is a lot of secrecy surrounding the true metrics of how podcasts perform, most of the benchmarks I refer to are fairly generic and all are free to access. The gold standard to determine how a podcast is performing is how many downloads an episode has at the 30 day mark, and according to data commonly cited by platforms like Libsyn and Buzzsprout, this is where ALL podcast (regardless of genre or topics) fall based on that standard:
Podcast Performance by Percentile
- Top 50%: ~30 downloads per episode in 30 days.
- Explanation: This is the median—half of all podcasts achieve fewer than 30 downloads within 30 days.
- Top 25%: ~100 downloads per episode in 30 days.
- Explanation: Podcasts in this range are doing better than 75% of shows and likely have a niche audience with consistent engagement.
- Top 10%: ~400-500 downloads per episode in 30 days.
- Explanation: These podcasts are often well-established and attract a steady audience, making them appealing to niche advertisers or sponsors.
- Top 5%: ~1,000 downloads per episode in 30 days.
- Explanation: At this level, a podcast is highly successful in its niche, with a strong following and the potential for premium sponsorships or monetization.
- Top 3%: ~3,000 downloads per episode in 30 days.
- Explanation: These podcasts are industry leaders within their category and are often approaching mainstream popularity.
- Top 1%: ~5,000+ downloads per episode in 30 days.
- Explanation: These podcasts are typically professional productions with large budgets or significant marketing reach. They often attract substantial sponsorship deals and are highly recognized within the industry.
For the 2024 season, the Life of an Architect podcast averaged 4,847 downloads per episode at the 30 day mark …which puts us just shy of hitting the Top 1% of all podcasts. Andrew and I are obviously proud of this accomplishment but the reality is that neither one of us can properly explain how this came to be. We work hard, we try to keep things sounding professional (at least in terms of audio quality) and we are constantly reevaluating what we do so that we don’t a) become stagnant in what we do, and b) cover topics that are current and relevant to the people in this industry that do the exact same things and most likely have similar experiences and questions that we have.
The Blog jump to 28:33
One of the questions that I have, and I would be surprised if any one else had this question, is how many people are aware of the podcast but AREN’T aware of the blog site (and vice-versa). I know there is some percentage that falls into this category but I can’t help but wonder how much value the written version of these podcast episodes bring to the mix. As an example, Andrew and I finished recording today’s podcast episode 12 days ago, but then we recorded the sponsor spot just 5 days ago, but the entire thing was assembled and completed before the start of the weekend. For the record, it is Sunday morning at 11:10am CST and this is the second day in a row that I have spent a few hours making the graphics and writing this blog post. If there was no blog post, this episode would have been done ages ago. I often ask myself the question if these blog posts are worth the time and if more than a handful of people read them.
To that end, and maybe to help reinforce my point, the 27 blog posts that were prepared this year had 63,606 total words. To put that in perspective, last years blog post word count was 57,977 words, a difference of 5,629 words … apparently I am wordier this year. Here is a list of classic novels that I could have written (if I was actually one of the great novelists of our time) at least in word count:
“The Scarlet Letter” by Nathaniel Hawthorne – Approximately 63,000 words. A classic piece of American literature.
“Lord of the Flies” by William Golding – Approximately 60,000 words. A powerful allegory and essential reading in schools.
“Fight Club” by Chuck Palahniuk – Approximately 61,000 words. A modern cult classic.
“Flowers for Algernon” by Daniel Keyes – Approximately 60,000 words. A moving tale of intelligence and humanity.
“The Perks of Being a Wallflower” by Stephen Chbosky – Approximately 62,000 words. A deeply personal and resonant novel.
“The Catcher in the Rye” by J.D. Salinger – Approximately 61,000 words. An iconic coming-of-age novel.
“Ender’s Game” by Orson Scott Card – Approximately 63,000 words. A classic in science fiction.
For fun, here are the two blog posts with the most extreme word counts – from most to least:
Most Words: 4,542 – Ep 163: Architectural Wanderlust
Least Words: 1,543 – Ep 155: Optimism
Sadly, I don’t think that word count equates to effort – some topics are just more difficult to write about than others.
The Graphics jump to 31:15
For the 2024 season, we ended up making 176 custom made graphics … of which 54 (just over 30%) were created using AI generated graphics. Andrew and I both have some mixed feelings about using platforms like MidJourney to create supporting images for the site – most of the time it isn’t anywhere near as quick and easy as you might think. I will confess that it is almost always fun since trying to beat the program to have it generate exactly the sort of image you want, at time, can be hilarious. The results are frequently ridiculous … but I still have a deadline and an objective to accomplish and half the time I don’t want to spend 2 hours trying to get an image of futuristic robots facing off in a pool while riding inflatable flamingoes. Fun – yes. Constructive? Most of the time it is not.
How Do We Chose Our Topics jump to 34:32
It’s not as complicated as you might think (or maybe it should be a little more complicated than we make it …) but mostly it’s based on the work we are currently undertaking. I take the workload I am currently tackling and try and make those efforts work for what I need for the podcast. Since the show is literally based on what it is like to be an architect (and work with one) sharing what we do on a day-to-day basis seems fundamental to our objectives.
What do we want to accomplish? More guesstimating on the show … but here’s the problem with guests …
- Topics that we (Andrew and myself) care about.
- Writing the blog post is considerably harder
- Coordinating schedules (since we record off work hours)
- Avoiding someone else’s agenda aka, one big advert
Andrew and I are going to make an effort to expand our prejudices on having guests on the show – we are committed to making this happen. – BUT – if you are some media person looking to place your client on the show to advance their accomplishments or talk about how amazing they are … please don’t contact me. I will still be trying to follow the 4 items listed just above.
Would You Rather / Hypothetical / What’s The Rank … jump to 46:23
The question is “Do we keep doing these questions?” … Andrew and I would like some feedback, even though I will most likely reach out through Instagram to get a poll started, to help us determine if these end of show questions are worth doing. We can tell that the people who listen to this show fall into two distinct categories:
- Those that listen to the entire episode, and
- Those that exit the podcast once we get to the question portion.
I will admit that I like doing them, despite the challenges of coming up with the question for each episode. As an academic pursuit, I can see that through practice (and attempting to foil Andrew’s attempt at finding the loophole in the question) that this is a good exercise in process-oriented thinking. Even if we do end up removing them from the show, I will most likely look for a different avenue offline to continue to practice.
To that end, let’s get to the final question of the 2024 season, and possibly the final question of the Life of an Architect podcast. This is a simple would you rather and I could imagine that your individual decision probably reflects how you enjoy spending your off time from work. Few big adventures, or frequent small getaways.
Would you rather have two weeks vacation along with half-day Fridays a year, or 4 weeks vacation per year?
In the end, It simply came down to the amount of time I had dedicated out of the office. Since I don’t typically take vacations that last much more than a week, I would choose the additional time.
Episode 166: 2024 Yearapalooza
This was an interesting year, full of really fun and interesting things, with a decent chunk of pretty bad – but that’s life. One thing that I am proud of – still – is this website and the podcast. I still enjoy doing it and the opportunities it brings me. Andrew and I went to a few events, met some interesting people, and we expect to do more of that this year. In fact, I am thinking that we will make it a goal to have more fun and create more adventures for Andrew and myself, and the podcast, and I hope you stick around to come along with us.
Warmest appreciation and gratitude, until next time –
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