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TalkShoe Redirects its Business Strategy

A couple of my favorite podcast shows are stopping their live versions because of a business decision that TalkShoe had to make to protect their investors. At least that is what TalkShoe said on an article posted on their blog, I tried to understand their decision and even my own conclusion was surprising to myself.

TalkShoe released a post on May 29, 2008 where they explained why they were stopping their ad revenue sharing with producers of shows in TalkShoe because they were paying more in royalties than what they where getting back in advertising revenues. Fair to say that a decision like this is very well understood by me but there is a “but” that deserves to be explained.

Among the complaints I heard from people hosting shows in TalkShoe, the most common was that TalkShoe backdated this decision to the beginning of May leaving shows that were produced already without the money they earned. In my opinion this was a bad decision but I also understand their rush on stopping the money to escape out the door keeping it where it is needed the most.

I read the comments that people left on those shows about this situation and most of the followers agree with the producers of these shows in leaving TalkShoe immediately. In the other hand, you could read how some people where actually mad at the producers of these shows for the lack of loyalty to TalkShoe in this transition period.

I slept through this information and came up with my point of view that some of you may not like, I’m with TalkShoe on this one. I want to make sure that everyone understand that the only business decision that TalkShoe did that I don’t like is to backdate their profit sharing cancellation to the beginning of the month, other than that, I’m with TalkShoe.

All businesses, especially in the new media arena go through changes in the first couple of years that may seem drastic to someone from the outside but totally necessary to the survival of the entity. TalkShoe did great in explaining their side of the story with details that would usually be kept to the board of directors.

I’m an accountant by trade and the decision TalkShoe made is one of the hardest that any leader can take on a company to safeguard it assets and values to their shareholders. I can only imagine the losses they must have had to take desperate measures and come up with a decision like this one.

I have a little message to all parties involved, to TalkShoe, tell your board of directors and finance personnel to make better use of their accounting data before making decision that affect the company adversely. To all podcast shows producers, remember that we are all new here and this space is always changing, plus what about your audience, you could continue the show until another viable solution was found, not just cutting it cold for monetary reasons.

A little message to all the people that follow shows that left TalkShoe, don’t take this personal, remember that the producers of these shows have no other option but to react aggressively to changes that affect their ability to continue paying for bandwidth and other miscellaneous cost that take producing shows like this one.

If you feel like adding to this conversation feel free to leave your post here, if you want a more organized place to discuss the subject, use my forums at lwees.com/forum. Also, remember that you can find me on every major social media outlet, follow me on Twitter, or Facebook, thanks for reading.