ELI5 the economics of hockey podcasters/Youtubers

[jetsmooseice]

I am a pretty regular listener to some sports/hockey-related shows from Western Canada. Some of them are fairly small-time amateur shows done mostly for fun, while others are full-fledged professional operations that are practically indistinguishable from big sports radio/network shows. Others fall somewhere in between.

One thing I am curious about is what these look like from a dollars and cents point of view. I get that the huge mass-appeal Youtubers like Mr. Beast, Dude Perfect, etc. rake in massive dollars. But I always wondered about more small time, niche products like hockey shows. For instance, the Cam & Strick Podcast is not that big (4,400 subscribers) but they get big name guests including, most recently, former coach Rick Bowness. So how does this work? It's not like Bowness has a book to plug, so what's in it for him to appear on a show like this? Do these shows have to pay their guests to appear? (These shows need a steady lineup of guests or it gets stale fast) Or are the hosts just pals with their guests?

Always kind of wondered how smaller shows pull in enough money to pay their hosts/production staff and then have something left over for a steady stream of guests, assuming they get paid.

Are these guys making bank? Just scraping by? Or is something in the middle?

(And before anyone asks, I'm definitely not planning to start a podcast, I am just curious as a listener about how it all works...)

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[LadyStanley]

Some podcasts get swag from sponsors and guests are given swag for participation.

Some folks participate for the notoriety/publicity.

Some "big names" do it to give back.

(Often finding new podcasts and catching up. Some folks did it during the pandemic, especially during lock down for something to do.)

Some team specific guests (players) do it as requested through channels from team. As a get to know you better.

Sometimes the pod has a (good) relationship and get guests to do some soft news releases (not through team channels). Such as team president Q&A. Or team broadcasters, player alumni.

It is often telling how well a pod may be doing (financially) by the number/variety of sponsorship/commercial breaks. (Unless it's an entity that does it as public access. Like TSN/Sportsnet. IOW there may be no/few breaks. Or incorporating sponsor names by segments, e.g., sponsor-name news catch up.)

 

[jetsmooseice]

Yeah, I have definitely noticed that some pods have an impressive slate of advertisers. Locally here in Winnipeg, the ones that are former AM sports radio shows (Illegal Curve, Winnipeg Sports Talk) do very well in that regard, probably because they already had those relationships established.

I do find it fascinating that so many guests spend time on these shows regularly. I'm grateful that they do, of course, but I am curious about the economics of it.