Oh, Julia, Julie's You Beautiful creative you yes, another India
episode with me, Sarah Golding. Hello and today, oh, you're so
lucky. Some beautiful wise words from
none other than super creative character.
Awesome and the most exciting person you probably need to
speak to if you need to know what a network does, is and
should be. Yes, it's much more hello.
That's a big intro. I hope I can live up to it.
It's going to be. So networks, fable and folly,
how does it work? Sure, sure yeah, a little peek
beneath the hood. So Fable and Folly is a fiction,
not strictly fiction, but primarily fiction podcast
network where we represent producers primarily across the
indie space and help them with tools and and information on how
to grow their shows, how to get to the next step from wherever
they are, be it, you know, just starting, having been doing it
for a year and not seeing the success that they hope or down
the road while releasing a very successful show like where is
the piece that we can put in there?
So we deal with a number of facets.
But who makes it run? Myself and my business partner
in this, Sean Howard. I'm the COO of Fable and Folly.
So I deal with all the operations from producers to
sales to growth, liaising in between.
Sean is our CEO and he is Co founder of Fable and Folly as a
name in the space, which has been around for much longer than
the total Network has. And we also have two other
amazing people who work with us. Carla Maxted, who's our creator
liaison, who does a lot of review and vetting of people who
put in applications and then helps them kind of get started
through our onboarding process. And Damien Zidlow, all of these
people are also creatives in this space.
And he is our marketing director who handles all of our socials
and newsletters and helping boost the voice and message of
all the producers who have great things to say to all of our
platforms and in our audience. Fantastic.
And the shows on there are phenomenal.
Like there's an array of them. And I mean, you can have a look
for yourself. And I'm lucky enough to be
involved in helping create AUS 9, just a slice of it with the
editing and have a good, good little play on it.
And yeah, so I've had to sort of delve into that brilliant,
comforting hug of the network that is working.
So how did it start? You tell us, like, what was the
need? Why is it there?
So Fable and Folly Productions, this was Alba Salix.
Eli and Sean created Alba Salix, End of Time and Other Bothers
and Civilized. And then the great year of 2020
came along and Sean, like so many others, lost a lot of
opportunities that he had going on.
So while he had a gap, saw a need in the space for
independent fiction producers who really couldn't get a seat
at the table or through the door to even have a conversation for
any sort of ad representation or ad.
I with brands saw a need to come together with a coalition, A
conglomerate, a group of people who we could test this with just
to prove that fiction advertising could and would
convert just as well as talking heads or an interview style
podcasts. Yes, it felt new and foreign to
a lot of buyers in the space. But what he, and later I once he
called me as one of those first 12 people saw was like a lot of
mainstream media, be it TV or movie, is all fiction.
So why? Why is podcast so different than
that? So he called up 12 friends in
the space. To to.
Which we all looked at him, I think all but one basically
looked at him and said, well, we aren't making anything now.
What's the worst that happens? We can come out of it a year
later and say, well, that was that was fun, but we move on to
something else. So we all said yes.
And then he at the time went to market, started pitching the
network and the shows that we represented, which included
Unwell and The Amelia Project and my own shows, Dungeons and
Dragons and others, and showcased that not only could we
do successful advertising, but it could be different and
unique. Not just a standard host read,
but because we have these fiction worlds, these serialized
worlds, we could put the cocaine and Tony Stark's hand, so to
speak, and have that in world endorsement where it makes
sense. I kind of got a little down the
road there, but that's that's how it started.
And then since then we've just every year keep finding more and
more people who we can help from that 12, I just did a count,
we're up over 120 shows representing Direct Line, about
80 producers. And in our community, there's
much more than that, obviously, with actors and showrunners and
writers and all of that all working to do the same thing, to
promote something that they love to a wider audience.
That is phenomenal. I'm really excited and can I say
grateful on behalf of like, I'm sure everybody listening that
there is such a thing where as a podcaster you can build
together, you're not isolated and on your own.
Because that's exactly it. A lot of the, the, the case,
isn't it for a lot of of creatives.
And I, I said in an interview in the audio drama production
podcast networks are the way forward.
We need to be working together. And it's like, I do feel that
Faber and Folly is definitely one of the brilliant examples of
how doing that can be really useful.
Not just identifying yourself as a maker that other people
believe in too, which helps, but also, yeah, connecting with
other people who are, you know, likewise trying to make their
way and share their art essentially.
Yeah. In a, in a way that, you know,
hopefully embraces and gets noticed.
But yeah. So do you have a specific
mission statement? We do, yeah.
It's like a joint vision and mission that we we try to strive
for. And it's evolved since we kind
of started the network. But where we're at right now is
a vision of a world where independent producers can make a
good living telling their stories.
And then the mission that kind of follows behind that is to
create significant audience growth, which is a hard thing to
do for a lot of people without resources or means in the space,
as well as scalable revenue opportunities for all the shows
we represent. That sounds exciting and also
scary. It is.
Right, There were periods where
we thought like this is this is hard and it continues to get
harder to launch a show even back in 2020.
But before that, when Sean launched his shows or you know,
the early 20 tens, yeah, it's a different podcast landscape
shows like Wolf 359, who's on the network, who's one of the
still one of the largest fiction shows in the space.
There was less there or less to weed through you just there were
5 or 6 that came up on your feet.
And those were the ones. Yeah.
Now truly, even in the network alone, there's hundreds.
So how do we help them stand out and give them the tools and
ideas that some sometimes feel a little gate kept?
We're unabashedly very transparent, sometimes to a
fault. But we want to make sure that
whether you come in with us, whether you stay with us or you
find a better opportunity down the road, that we leave you with
something that will help you continue to progress beyond just
being in the network. That yeah, I mean, that sounds
very exciting because it's nurturing ambition too, right?
To do more. Well, that's it.
And you know, we as fable and folly, we know we have our
limitation like we know that there is a there is a ceiling
based on just the number of people and man hours that we
have that we can do. So you get a call or you start
pitching to other places for funding or all that like we're
here to we're here to help. We want to see you move on to
something bigger. Maybe you stay with us, maybe
somebody else has a better opportunity for you.
We try very hard not to leave any relationship with a bad
taste, right? Sure, we want to make this easy
for people. Yeah, that makes sense.
I mean, just how much hard work is it for an individual or team
wanting to join in? If you've just perhaps been
accepted by whatever process, which we might talk about in a
moment, what happens? Like how much input does that
individual or team then have to put into keeping things buoyant?
Yeah, we take a different network approach to a lot of
experiences that both Sean and I have had in the space.
We are a small team as, but what we do through the onboarding
process is we get you into the network which is to come over to
our host so we can help you migrate the show, which is one
of the most seamless migrations. Yeah, well, I created it, but
you know, I've been through in the entire space, so I'm a
little bit biased. We currently right now are a
split network between Megaphone and R-19.
So we're on a couple different just depending on the shows.
So you come in and as part of the onboarding process, you have
a A1 on one call with me or where we walk through industry
best practices, what works, what doesn't work for growing your
show. And a lot of those, which a lot
of people in this space have a good concept of or have a good
idea than are doing at some small scale.
But that's being in other feeds, talking to other creators, doing
those host thread swaps, promos, feed drops, that sort of thing.
But then the work really comes down to, and those producers who
see the most success are the ones who can carve out the time
to do the cold outreach. Do you know the internal network
outreach get a consistent rotation of those swaps and
trades and stuff going so that you're always fueling the engine
That on top of the things that we can help support and do in
the network. But because we have so many
producers and because time is always fractured and everywhere,
like we really continually want to make it known that your show
is your show. We are here to support and help
you. We will take any calls that you
need for clarification for running things by us for, you
know, have you tried this like always here for that.
But that work of going out and telling people how great your
show is and can we do this is the hardest part because we're
all our own biggest critics, and stroking our own ego is the
hardest thing sometimes when we're trying to bridge that gap.
It does sound, you know, very supportive indeed.
I mean, what requirements would there be for someone listening
now who might want to approach you to say, actually, yeah, I've
got some episodes in the bank. I feel like I'm a good fit.
So on our website, fableandfolly.com under, I
believe it's under the about tab, there's a network
application which is, which is an air table form where we ask
several questions about your show, like how long have you
been in release? What what's your average
traffic? And by traffic, I mean weekly,
monthly downloads, that sort of thing, which we for some time
had like a hard cap like many networks do of like, well, a
show has to be here. But what we found was that
became very limiting for creators without years of
broadcaster digital marketing experience.
That became very limiting for shows and producers who were in
marginalized groups. So we looked at it.
We want to see that you have they tried to release it on your
own and then judging from that, the level of success.
So as we talk through the onboarding process and the
application process, like, you know, we'll talk about what kind
of things you as the creator have done to be able to put your
show out there. Some people have tried very
little, but some people know very little about the industry.
Others have tried a lot and they, you know, then we can
gauge their level of buy in for putting in the work.
But really what it comes down to is we're looking to work with
and help support creators in the space who are creating cool
things, who we see have the drive, have the the ambition,
have the want to not just make their show bigger because they
hope they can turn this into a day job.
Like that's all of our goals. Also just are you in it for you
or are you in it for the greater community of producers?
It's a very tight knit community.
We say that you can say that about any industry, but because
there are so few of us in the grand scheme of like podcasting
in general, like you get to know everybody very quickly and my
listeners are probably at least some fraction of going to be
your listeners as well. So how can we share that?
And how can we look at it as a rising tides?
All ships float. How can we make that true among
a much larger network of people essentially trying to do the
same thing, just with a different story?
Connectivity within the teams there, I know there's
opportunities regards to produce a meet which you have regularly
is of course the Discord server which you connect everybody
through and various channels there.
How would say a proactive creative present?
What would they get involved with within the network other
than sorting their own show out? Do you think, and I mean, you
mentioned the Discord, which every network experience I've
been a part of hasn't really had that same experience where all
of the creators and producers are put into one place.
Most networks don't have such a niche environment, but being
active in the community is always helpful.
But being open to collaboration. And that collaboration doesn't
necessarily mean creating an episode together, but like to
help boost an Instagram post or to help somebody who's launching
a new show who we know has 0 downloads right now.
What can we do to help them now to get their voice heard quicker
on my already established show? So knowing that the payback, the
reciprocal doesn't necessarily come now, but when that show
hits, like that's where the return opportunity is going to
come. What is the experience that you
have as a producer that you can share that will help somebody
next door to you? We just started as part of being
a part of the network is Community Sessions.
So you mentioned the producer sessions every month, which is
where we just kind of give the state of the nation of the of
the network and what's going on in terms of sales and growth and
opportunities and all that sort of thing that we're seeing.
But we've also started community sessions which are organized by
Damian and Carla on our team, but run by members in the
community who have the specific knowledge set.
So we've done one on sound design, we're prepping one on
trailer design, we're prepping one on contracting for
beginners. So we're trying to do a wide
range of topics that not everybody is involved with in
their day-to-day. So knowing that you don't have
the same experience as the person next to you, So what can
you do to help them if they have a question and support the
community through that method? Just sounds glorious and with
regards to the highly connectedness of it, what things
other than that and finance do you think can the creative team
get from actually just being a part of a network?
It, it is amazing to be in a room, be at this corridor on a
Zoom call with so many people who share a common vision.
For many of these people, it probably will remain a a side
hobby that they do. But for many of these people who
are, they've made leaps and bounds since they've come in and
seeing that growth among them all and knowing that doesn't
matter which one of these people, it is like they all have
the capability of doing that. Obviously there are things
stylistically and show wise that can help your show reach those.
But being a part of the community is the main selling
point of our network. Shawna and I are great.
We we talk all the time. Like I'm sure we've shared
everything that we have to share.
Some days it feels like, which is still beneficial for for
those who haven't haven't talked to us or haven't met us, but
talking to Joe from Midnight Burger or Pip from Amelia
Project, who have been doing this for quite some time in not
only the podcast space, but like in the theater space.
So coming from it, an already difficult creative environment
and moving into this one, seeing their success and being able to
message them or e-mail them as being a part of the network.
That makes the intro so much easier to make, I find than just
a cold e-mail of like, Hey, I like your stuff.
Can I ask you some questions as opposed to, Hey, we're part of
the network. Can we have a coffee?
And I've had so many people who come in and they're they're new,
they're green, they're like, oh, it's intimidating.
Well, yeah. But they're all very cool
people. And if you just, if you reach
out, chances are great you're going to find 15 minutes that
you can just sit and chat with them.
And maybe something more develops from that.
Yeah, that's it. Collaborative with people who
you perhaps have admired from afar that now maybe you have
slightly closer access to, to potentially make something even
more amazing that I love that so, so much.
And so let's just like shift our gaze to the to the finance side
of things. And how has that network enabled
folks to perhaps gain advertising or other support
that has given them some some recompense for their hard work?
There's several kind of levels, not tears, everybody's part of
the same area, but there's several levels of sales that we
do with the network. First is direct sold.
So like we're talking to a brand who's either come to us or we
have a relationship through another partner working on sales
that way, which is knowing who to talk to you is often the
hardest part. So we manage that relationship
and those conversations for all of our producers through our
hosting provider we have access to on Megaphone, it's the
Spotify audience network span, which is the backfill
advertising on our 19. It's task targeted audience
solutions. So that becomes a very scalable
model where if you are OK with radio style advertising, because
I know some folks are not, which is more the pre produced
advertising model, having those appear on your show, the more
you are able to grow your show, the more that follows you.
CPMS of 15 to $20 on that payout.
You can imagine as you start that's quite small, but as you
see success, as you do more drops, as you do you know you
gain more audience, those will follow with you.
Additionally, we work with external partners like Sound
Stack and Red Circle who we have enterprise agreements with.
We manage those relationships and they're very similar
backfill style advertising that will follow the growth of your
show. But a lot of these come with
costs and for an independent producer to step in and approach
these companies, some of them may be out of reach in terms of
hosting coverage or it costs to turn certain features on with
their hosts. So we, we cover that like it's,
we cover hosting for all of our producers, but we also make sure
that if we start working with a new partner like any initiation
or upfront cost like is covered by us and then the producers on
our network benefit from that. And how are the adverts chosen
to fit? Because some people won't want
specific topics or products and advertised on the show.
So how is that the? Biggest, the biggest difficulty
on our side is just managing who can and cannot have what.
So everything as being a part of our network is opt in.
Like we will not put something on your show unless we ask you
first. That's through advertising,
that's through growth opportunities.
There's a few like blanket opt in's that we do.
But like as far as advertising goes, like if you tell us you
don't really don't want politics or credit or any of that on your
show, we make sure that we turn on every exclusion possible in
any of these programs and vet any specific direct brand asks
beforehand. That said, we all change, our
ideas change. So if I know you, Sarah, have
told me like I don't want this specific brand for some reason,
but a year goes by and that brand approaches me again, I'm
still, I'm going to come to you because I believe your show
could be a good fit and just see if you're still sitting in the
same place. When we first started the
network, like we were in a space where advertising was seen as
selling out. I come from a commercial radio
background, so I've never had that.
But people who have come from more creative space first, the
idea that whether it's self-imposed or from their
listeners, the talk of the space in that time, which I still see
across some Reddit threads and that sort of thing.
Like ads, but ads in our capitalist environment fuel a
lot of things. Yeah.
So separating that a little bit to be like this is the part of
the industry of that we have to engage with in a meaningful way,
in a thoughtful way so that I can then turn around and
continue creating more of what I love, what my listeners love.
And hopefully one day that means that either I can be less
reliant on that because maybe my audience has grown and I can be
more reliant on a Patreon model or something like that.
Yeah. So taking those and finding the
happy medium where ideally nothing that I don't want on
there is going to get onto my show.
So I can benefit from the machine that is in order to
create art and make something beautiful in this space.
Right. There have been times when I
have been not with Faber and Folly but specific podcasts and
there'd be 3 adverts in a row and that's like I want to listen
to the show. So there were frustrations like
that, but I also understand that potentially that is what is the
only way that that particular creator or team is getting any
recompense really for the immense amount of work that
they're doing to make that come to life.
So there's got to be give somewhere.
And I think obviously the setup of podcasting in the days of
yore has made them free, and that has become the bane of our
lives since. But I used to listen to so and
so and there were never ads. It's like, well, that's, that's
great, yeah. I mean, and yeah, and you can
opt in to pay a certain amount and then you have no adverts and
that again goes to the creative teams and is helpful for
everybody and then you can have it how you want it.
And so many of our producers do offer that, right?
And that's people come into the network like we as a network
take a percentage of anything we bring you, which is the way that
it should be for a network. Yeah.
Otherwise, how are you going to? Anything you bring in though,
like be it Patreon or indie go go or Kickstarter, or you go out
and to your local game store and you sell an ad for yourself,
like that's yours. We will help you schedule it.
We will help you flight it. But I didn't do anything to earn
my cut. So yeah, that's your money.
That's really interesting. Yeah, it's.
Something to kind of, yeah, I guess keep in the back of your
mind as you're having talks with networks of like, what do you
do? What do you take?
And if I go do something, is it seen as equitable on this side
or do I just get to keep it because you did the work, you
did the cold call, like I shouldn't take that percentage.
Yeah. Do you have any recommendations
for folks who might be on the hunt for sponsorship or
advertising? Are there any hot takes on
things that definite? Try and see what happens.
A lot of what advertisers are looking for right now are shows
and this kind of goes in waves as the industry figures itself
out and then forgets and then figures itself out and forgets.
A lot of what advertisers are really looking for and pushing
for right now in today's May 2025 space is shows that are as
close to always on as possible, which is a very often difficult
ask for fiction creators and serialized creators because you
can't just keep churning out scripts and production and all
of that. You often times you know shows
are in on hiatus or it that first one takes you years to put
together and then and you finished six to 10 episodes and
you're like, well, I did that now I got to start three more
years of production to get the next one.
But in working to stretch out the release of a show can can
keep you in market longer. You know, there's a lot of
thought that got to be weekly or I've got to be I've got to put
them all out at once that we've had conversations with producers
for, which is I guess it's great for a listening experience
because then you know that you've always got a season to go
listen to. But if you're trying to get
sponsorship and you're trying to do show growth overall,
spreading that out to bi weekly or even a monthly release if you
don't have many episodes in the bank can help you stretch what
you already have while you continue to work on the next
season in the background. Oftentimes we talk to
advertisers and put forth a whole bunch of shows because we
will pitch everybody and anybody who's interested in a brand.
But oftentimes we see what comes back time and time again is they
remove the shows that aren't in release.
So looking at ways that you can stretch the time you're in
season, the biggest pushback I get from that is obviously like,
well, I have short episodes or I expect that my listeners will
want it weekly. But if we set that expectation
up front to say, you know, new episode monthly and you stick to
that, your listeners will continue to listen to you.
Audio fiction listeners are ravenous for storms.
Once we get somebody into into fiction, like once we get them
to learn that behavior of starting with one and pull them
in, like they will stick with with you.
If they if they love your story, they're going to come back for
that new episode, whether it's a week or a month or you drop them
all at once, like they're waiting there and they do have
other things to go listen to while you wait.
They're not going to stop listening to podcasts.
They're going to you're a trailer at the end of your show
and go listen to that one and then hear another and then make
their way back around to you. It's hard at first because you
have finite resources. You have a finite number of
episodes. But if you're looking to get
into this for a longer term for an advertising game, for a
sponsorship game, like coming up with ways that you can be on
more and have plans for future seasons, that's the other kind
of piece too, is. First season is tough.
You have to grow it, you have to get people to know it.
You have to do all that. You know, you may be trying to
get advertisers, but oftentimes we tell people who are launching
a first new season to a new feed, it's like the first
season. We really have to just focus on
growth and put our time there. And then season 2 becomes easier
because you're not starting at 0, you're starting at 1000 or
10,000 or wherever you're starting at.
So that we now we can start having those conversations about
advertising to supplement everything that you're already
putting in. But have that plan for season
1-2 and three or beyond in your mind of like how long do I want
this story to go? And if it's one and done, it's
one and done. But know that the next one that
you launch into a new feed is going to be just as hard a big
success of like shows like unwell, who has been on forever,
but then ended Unwell, you know, and started a new feed.
They, I helped, I was there with them as they were doing it.
And there's a, there's a stress, there's a tension, there's a,
there's a like, are people going to come?
Because it. It was different than 510 years
ago, but the audience is finding them like and there's like, you
can see the growth and you use that larger audience feed to
launch your next idea. So what can you build that you
can make sustainable to run for a long time that can help you
branch off and do other things later if that's your goal?
Yeah. Could you give any examples of
what the take home might be for a creative who's got, let's say
A10 episode run of something? Can you give any examples of
that at all? I would start talking to other
creatives in the space. It's hard, especially if you're
not a part of a network, but it's it's hard.
It becomes easier, especially if you reach out to anybody in the
Fable network. Like we all go through the same
conversations with me as as anybody else, but reach out to
folks in the space that you admire.
Ask for that 15 minute coffee. Come with some questions.
Find a group of podcasts that can help you launch that show
that can do a promo swap or a feed drop for you for your first
or second episode. Make sure you've got a couple in
the feed so that people can really dig in.
But line those up for the beginning of your launch of your
show and you'd be that I often hear is that Oh well, I, I don't
have another show. I, I don't, I can't return it in
in a good amount of time. I can't.
I can't, I can't, I can't. But what you have to remember is
those shows that are very successful were once not
successful. And them and their and their
grandparents were the only ones that downloaded it on day one.
Maybe unless they launched with like huge budgets.
But like most of us, for most of us, that's not the case.
It's like you trying to get your friends to download it like
spoofing their phones being like how many more can I get just to
kind of like tap into an algorithm or something like
which? There's no way to tap.
You're in too many things, Sarah.
We can't keep up, so it's right. Yeah, it's.
Like ohh but listen to this one, it's really good.
Yeah, ohh, I'm, I'm the same. Like my voice pops up in so many
places and I in my own discord. It's like, well, I heard you
over here. Like, Oh yeah, I I did that.
It's funny. Trying to develop that
community, right? If you're not a part of a
network, like what can you do with the people that you can get
access to? And there's, there's an e-mail
in every RSS feed. Open it up in a browser, do a
little control F for e-mail and you'll find it, which is usually
the person's personal or like business personal e-mail that
you'll get in front of them and pick their brain.
Find out what they did to launch.
Find out where the point was that they saw that that curve
start to go up of people finding them and discovering them and
what they felt that was that really launched them.
Because that can help you set a few stones in front of you that
you can leap to that are easier from there.
Anything you can do to make it not so scary and unknown?
Is really. The key.
Yeah. And belief in your product, too,
the thing that you've spent your brain output and teamwork
creating. You know, I'm sure there is an
audience for everybody. Yeah.
And I know some people are really disappointed because they
get, you know, 20 downloads or whatever it might be.
And it is about the tenacious kind of keep going and keep
trying to do all the things that this program itself and other
folks are suggesting in the space.
And obviously what you've just stated as well.
But yeah, it is difficult, isn't it, to kind of maintain that.
And you've already said that you do consider that there isn't a
potential cap on downloads for joining you for for some
reasons. And do you think downloads are
important? Do you really think gaining more
audience is more important than anything?
Well it is and you're looking for not just downloads help from
a milestone success from and you know what can you sell to
advertisers success. But I think, myself included,
there has to be another reason that you're doing this show.
Yeah, to to remove success from the number of downloads or
impressions you can deliver every month.
My personal shows aren't the largest, like they're, they're
mid, mid tier as far as the network goes.
Where the success has really come from is the community
behind my show that we've just organically created since we've
been releasing it. When did we start 2017?
So we've been going for eight years now.
But there are people in that specific Discord community who
have met there. Who have started weekly games
and have been playing for three to five years, who have gotten
married, who have had kids, who I feel like through this
parasocial bit of a distance relationship like that, I know.
And if I if I met them on the street, like I would be probably
really good friends with them. Like that is the gel.
Like seeing that and every time a new episode comes out,
everybody in there laughing about the things that me and my
friends were laughing about, like they were a part part of
it. I do an actual play.
So it's like, you know, we try and set it up so that people are
can feel like they are sitting at the table with us.
Yeah, brilliant and. I think that's really come
through in the not only that and like just spending time with my
friends doing something cool every week like.
That's the level. Of success.
For me, the growing success that comes behind it is it feels like
just gravy some days. Yeah, I mean.
Decouple the numbers if you can. Yeah, it's like what is
important, isn't it? And the fact that a lot of folks
have said to me, you know, like if you had 80 people in a room,
that's a lot of people in a room listening to you doing your
thing. So yeah, I think it's sort of
take breaking it down to thinking about that being in
front of someone because you are a mic right now.
You know, people might be listening to this in from Abu
Dhabi in Iran and all sorts of wonderful places, various places
across the US who are really enjoying the content here.
And it's just exciting to think that you might be, you know,
you're doing shopping, running, walking on the beach, walking
with the dog, chilling and. Joining with them in a in a
personal moment, in their day. It's lovely, it's so special.
So thank you for listening firstly and switching into this
and I hope this discussion has been really useful.
I just wonder if if there is a listener, they're kind of so
inspired, how can they support the Fable and Folly network if
they're not even a creative that wants to to join you, but feels
like for the 'cause we want to support the Fable and Folly
cause. Yeah, no, I mean, anything you
can do, like if you have a specific creator that you listen
to, like find that creator's Patreon or next Kickstarter
campaign, like go support that. That's the most direct way to
support the people that you love the shows for.
If you want to support the network as a whole, the easiest
way is to go through Fable and Folly Plus, which is our ad free
offering for the network that gets paid out based on on who
you listen to. So one month you listen to
Midnight Burger, you burn through all their shows, more of
your monthly or yearly fee will go to that creator and then you
move on to somebody else down the list.
But a lot of the shows on the network are a part of that.
It is a great way to not only support people based on your
listening for a relatively low fee of $4.00 a month so you can
do that. And then also you may find new
shows that you would have otherwise never stumbled across
because it's out of your general interest, but they're all
amazing. What are your favorite success
stories from The Favor and Fully Network so far?
It's so many. I think a lot of the shows that
I've mentioned, like from when they've come into the network,
thinking of like seeing the rise of a show like Midnight Burger,
Yeah, like they came in and they were not.
They were not unknown when they came in, but they came in at a
point and gave Joe some tools and best practices and have just
seen his show skyrocket. And the community behind his
show is so amazing. Like anything Joe will promote
in network or out, his fan base is there to support it as well.
And we've seen them move to other much smaller shows have
helped give them a boost, which is huge.
Like it's amazing to have that in the community.
The Unwell team launching a new show from having released Unwell
for so long, jumping into the scary world of like, we got to
start this feed up on our own again.
But seeing that and then, I mean, we're talking to some
producers right now who are going to be launching on the
network. I don't have any details that I
can provide right now, but there's some cool news stories
coming up that I think people are really gonna love.
Brilliant. Well, we'll put all links to
favour fully on the on the show notes and anything else that you
want to send me, Russ, to get people invigorated and excited
about the whole network experience.
Ping those onto and links to your works too.
If folks haven't found dungeons and jargons and.
End of Time and other bothers show end.
Of time and other bothers yeah you're great in that and yeah
there's a lot of exciting things to enjoy isn't there so so have
a good delve and. If you're listening and you, you
just need a new show, come on over to the website.
And what I sometimes do is if I'm not sure if I'm in the, what
I'm in the mood for is I'll just go on and scroll through the
shows and hit stop. Like just click on something as
it scrolls down the game. Show.
A bit of a game show, but there are so many out there, it is
hard to decide. But like, thank you for
continuing to listen. Thank you for supporting the
creators that are a part of the network and outside of the
network, like every listen, every comment, every rating,
every join of a Discord. It does a lot.
Sometimes it can feel like screaming into a void.
But when you have people who are there to say, hey, that was
really fun or that was really cool, I liked when you did this
thing. Like, it can go a long way.
It's a little scary to do it, but you can do it, Yeah.
Thank you Ross. It's been absolute joy to speak
to you and and thank you for all the hard work that you do, you
know, to support other creatives working and as long as you've
got time for your own creative soul too.
That's that's the most important thing.
I try and make time. I stay up very late, I get up
very early. It all gets done.
There's. No point going to bed before
2:00 AM, is there? Yeah, I'm getting older now
though, so it's making it harder.
I feel that 27 inside, I was 22. Now I'm 27 just gone up gently,
incrementally. Well, listen, happy creating and
happy on boarding and, you know, making the the growth continue
because I think it's a brilliant, brilliant thing on
the audio drama landscape. And and yeah, you and the team,
Sean, Eli, everybody, Daniel, I think just yeah, it's, it's a
wonderful thing to be a part of. And if that's something you want
to do, well, it's given you perhaps a slice of, of the of
what you can look forward to and all to set up your own network
and do the same kind of thing with some other likewise shows.
You know, I think there's no harm in being ambitious and
trying that. So, yeah, thank you so much for
joining us. Have a wonderful creative
weekend and beyond. Thanks so much, Sarah.
Well, well, another fun episode just finished.
Oh, don't worry, there's more to come on Discord and Orphonic and
Wasteland and Jonathan Pesar and oh so much more.
Please contact me if you'd like to appear on any future episodes
of NDAF. Next season is all about the how
to from the very beginning of a process to the very, very end,
and it'll take me probably a year to make, but I would love
you to rate and review. If you like this podcast, please
pass it on to other people who may also find it useful.
The whole point of it is for it to be useful, so if it's not
being shared, it can be less useful than if people shared.
I'd really appreciate that if you're able.
Thank you very much to Twiglet and the Audio Drama Hub and AJ
Fedalgo, who share lots of my episodes.
I really appreciate you very much.
Thank you. Thank you to Andy White for
editing this wonderful episode today.
Made it sharper, more concise. Beautiful work.
Thanks, Andy. Andy makes the Walker Mysteries.
If you haven't found that, have a hunt.
There's a link in the show notes.
Thank you for listening. Bye.