Whatever came from those calls for podcast pitches?
Vol. 49 - Pitching updates from Canadian podcast networks, 5 Random Questions, and Harbinger's 18th wave expansion.
Hihi!! Happy Pod the North Tuesday! I hope you’ve enjoyed at least one BBQ so far this summer! Drop your ultimate hamburger/veggie burger topping combo in the comments.
In this issue:
Here’s what ended up coming through 2023’s podcast pitching pipeline.
Canadian Indie: MORE THAN A MOM
True North Podcast Feature: The Aunties Dandelion
There are currently 30 long-term drinking water advisories in effect in 28 First Nations communities across Canada. The last lifted advisory was in June 2024, the most recent added advisory was July 2024.
An update on Canadian podcast networks’ various calls for pitches.
Since the launch of Pod the North I’ve tracking the various opportunities for Canadian podcasters to pitch shows and ideas to national podcast networks, and tracking what kinds of pitches are realitically being greenlit.
For both CBC Podcasts and The Sonar Network, folks have been able to submit podcast pitches anytime, but in 2023 even more opportunities opened up with calls for podcast pitches coming Rogers’ Frequency Podcast Network and Canadaland!
The late spring of 2023 seemed to be when the floodgates opened for Canadian network podcast pitches, and so a year-ish later, I reached out to those networks to see how those calls for pitches have gone and what success stories they had to share. Unfortunately, Frequency wasn’t able to share any updates, but I did get some exciting follow-ups from the folks from CBC, Sonar and Canadaland.
Here’s what ended up coming through 2023’s podcast pitching pipeline:
Canadaland
In June of 2023, with industry icon Julie Shapiro at the healm, Canadaland launched their call for podcast pitches. When I talked to Julie at the time, she told me that she was looking for “creative ideas” that would fullfill a goal of broadening what identified the Canadaland brand — and so they did!
Earlier this year, Canadaland launched a pretty impressive and diverse slate of brand new, and mostly in-house productions — some under a new “sub brand” name; Double Double. I caught up with Alan Black to get his insights on the big changes coming to Canadaland since that call for pitches.
When we opened up our call for pitches, we had no idea there was so much good work out there looking for a home/partner. We received nearly 300 pitches through our open call and from journalists, filmmakers, audio producers who were just waiting for an opportunity like this. We got pitches that came from all parts of Canada and many more than we expected from the US and much further afield. Given what had been happening in the industry, we got ideas from unbelievably seasoned producers and journalists that had seen their projects orphaned by layoffs of cuts. We got work that was very much in line with the kind of show Canadaland typically makes and we got things that were lare leaps of faith. The breadth was astounding.
Ultimately, we developed a dozen shows, licensed one from Radio France (the amazing Inside Kabul), and have 5 shows in various states of completion. The first two shows - Pretendians and A Field Guide to Gay Animals have been released over the past month and a half both shows far exceeded our expectations. We could not have been happier.
Some pitches came from people we knew who were asked to submit (The Worst for instance) or people who had worked with Canadaland but most came from people with whom we had no previous relationship (The Field Guide pitch came from a team in New Orleans and we were blown away).
DoubleDouble came from both an internal need to distinguish shows and content that come from our newsroom and shows that play in other genres. We also wanted to create a sub brand that could speak to international audiences. We have been told many times that the name of the company is a deterrent for people in the States and otherwise from even starting to listen to our shows. This is something we were thinking about in parallel with opening our doors to submissions and is an idea that developed as we started putting shows into production and talking to lots of people about how we might build audiences for things that are not expected from Canadaland.
— Alan Black, Chief Operating Officer
CBC Podcasts
At the end of 2022, I talked to Chris Oke about CBC Podcast’s longtime, always-on call for pitches. Some of the biggest takeaways from this chat was around the teams a shift away from in-house production to collaborating with independent production companies, and their interest in narrative and ‘character-focused’ stories over chatcasts.
It’s been over a year since that conversation, so I asked Chris for an update on successes that came through the CBC Podcasts pitch form over the last year and a bit.
There are sometimes long timelines from pitch to publishing in podcasting. For example, The $6 Billion Gold Scam, our third co-production with the BBC World Service, releasing right now, was the result of a commission call that we made back in May 2021! You can’t rush a great series!
Thankfully, things often move much quicker than that. Especially with our new umbrella feed, Understood. Following on the heels of the success of the first season, The Naked Emperor, the team has put out two more seasons: The Pornhub Empire, and Modi’s India. A successful call for pitches has resulted in the next season - about Celine Dion - in production now. We’re currently considering pitches for future seasons.
Speaking of new umbrella feeds, we launched Split Screen — our home examining the sometimes unsettling world of entertainment and pop culture — with season 1, Kid Nation. Season 2, Thrill Seekers is coming this fall, and we’re actively accepting pitches for future seasons.
This summer, after the success of Broomgate: A Curling Scandal (a co-production with USG Audio) we’re doubling down on sports podcasts! We’ve partnered with NPR to create Tested, about sex testing in women's sports (launching July 15) and we’re also releasing FOMO (Fear of Missing the Olympics) a pop-up, daily show covering the summer Olympics (July 27).
Calls for pitches from last year resulted in an upcoming season 2 to our hit series, Love, Janessa (coming October), as well as new seasons of Uncover. And we’ve also returned to classic podcasts like Personal Best, which will begin releasing Season 3 in September. And Season 4 of Love Me, which recently won the Tribeca Audio Award for an absolutely stunning piece called Delejos.
We’ve got a number of other exciting projects in production, which we plan to release in 2025, but we’re still looking for others! So please do check out cbc.ca/pitch for details about what we’re looking for and how to pitch.
— Chris Oke, Executive Producer
The Sonar Network
Like CBC Podcasts, the opportunity to pitch to The Sonar Network is always open, and pitching well is something you’ll often see Co-founder Michael Mongiardi talking about at various podcasting events, including the recent Soundwave Summit in Toronto.
At the end of 2022, Sonar told me that their goal for the year ahead was to “support local podcasters who have unique voices, and to try to help them find success”. I asked Sonar’s Brand & Content Manager, Marianna Miniotis, for an update on what came through Sonar’s pitching pipeline over the last year and a bit.
One of our proudest achievements in 2023 was the launch and success of Summer Camp: The Case of the Phantom Pooper. This podcast is a true example of how an indie creator with a unique idea can find the right partner by pitching themselves. We got a pitch by from Jeremy Enns in April 2023 containing a short demo clip and a one-pager. You could tell he had put some work into the show already. He gave us a taste of the branding he was envisioning and a sample piece of audio to showcase the editing and tone. He also mentioned that he had pitched to a different network and they recommended he try Sonar because the content was more comedic and, of course, we love comedy over here.
We were immediately smitten. The story was hilarious, the style and tone fit in perfectly with our roster, and, best of all, we could see from the materials he provided and the way he described his goals for the show that he was committed to giving this podcast his best effort. That's a huge bonus when we're reviewing pitches.
The challenge was that this was going to be a 7-episode limited series. It's much harder to build an audience when you're only releasing 7 episodes! But we decided to partner with Jeremy and we put all the resources we could into getting the word out there.
The show was extremely well received and found its audience very quickly. It was a super successful run and it all culminated in Summer Camp winning the T.O. WebFest 2023 award for Best Scripted Podcast! We now use the Summer Camp pitch as an example to new podcasters of how to successfully pitch a show to a network. And we're excited to see more amazing pitches this year!— Marianna Miniotis, Brand & Content Manager
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Check out this Canadian Indie: MORE THAN A MOM
The most beautiful shit show you’ll ever experience.
Paige Johnson-Serjue is a barely experienced mom of two and the host of MORE THAN A MOM — a podcast empowering other moms to give the middle finger to societies expectations of how they should act. The show celebrates identities beyond motherhood, one episode at at time.
True North Podcast Feature: The Aunties Dandelion
#listentoyouraunties
Sharing stories of Indigenous changemakers who inspire you to revitalize your land, language, and relationships.
Don’t miss the flagship podcast from Pod the North, Canardian: the podcast that’s gossiping about the hometowns of various Canadian podcast personalities.
What’s going on in Canada’s podcast ecosystem:
New Releases:
June 27, 2024 — Captivate’s Danny Brown has launched a new show, 5 Random Questions. Each week, Danny sits down with his special guest and uses a random question generator to come up with five unpredictable, thought-provoking, and sometimes downright hilarious questions.
July 3, 2024 — Harbinger Media Network has announced its 18th wave of expansion! The expansion includes two brand new shows; Palestine Debrief from Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle, and Expats & Allies from The Maple, a show unpacking the history of the Nazi war criminals who came to North America after WWII. The expansion also includes the re-introduction of Cited, the series revealing the hidden stories exploring how experts shape our world.
July 15, 2024 — TESTED comes out next Monday from CBC Podcasts. The show follows the story of two athletes, assigned female at birth, raised as girls, and who have never questioned their gender identity. But who have bodies that some argue give them an “unfair advantage.” Now, new rules in sports offer them three choices: give up their Olympic dreams, try to challenge the rules, or alter their bodies.
You should know:
CBC Podcast’s Podcast Playlist has come to an end.
Joel (J.D.) Montgrand recently contributed the EarBuds Newsletter to showcase Podcasts Celebrating Canada's Indigenous History Month. Check out and subscribe to his recommendations!
On July 15th, the F*ck Buddies Podcast is due to release their 300th consecutive episode — that’s right, this indie podcast has NEVER missed a week! Originally spurred by the concerning rise of the Red Pill movement and Incel communities, hosts Dain and Niall have been inspiring folks struggling with romantic, sexual, and relationship difficulties and sharing earnest advice free of judgment, before frustration manifests into toxic behavior or worse. Congratulations!
What’s new in Canada’s podcast scene? I joined Meg Wilcox for a conversation on J-source about the biggest issues facing Canadian podcasting, and how Canardian helped infuse more joy into my podcasting practice. Check it out!
Looking for a support group for women in podcasting? The women at Opinionated Lushes have started a Facebook group for woman/nonbinary/gender-fluid individuals looking to commiserate about podcasts.
Approximately 24 million podcast Listeners have side-hustles, according to Signal Hill Insights and CUMULUS MEDIA’s Spring 2024 Podcast Download report. “It turns out, a clear majority of the youngest adult demographic have a side-hustle: 60%. Given that 18 – 34 year-olds constitute 41% of weekly podcast listeners, that adds up to 24M young podcast listeners with side-hustles.”
Congratulations to Crime Beat, the hit true crime podcast from Curiouscast, which recently surpassed 1 million downloads over 30 days! The show takes listeners on a bone-chilling journey through some of Canada’s most high-profile criminal cases.
Events:
CBC’s acclaimed podcast, Personal Best, is set to record a live show at PodSummit YYC 2024! PodSummit YYC 2024 is set to showcase a diverse and dynamic lineup of keynote speakers, panel discussions, workshops, and interactive sessions exploring the latest trends, strategies, and technologies shaping the future of podcasting. Find more info here!
For your pod:
Just Joe (staring me down from afar as I ate a piece of steak)…
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Kattie
@Podkatt (Twitter, Spotify, and Goodpods) | @PodtheNorth (Bluesky and Instagram)
