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podcast shorts featuring founder interviews of Canadian startups.

It's a startup coach and I'm down here at Collision and I ran into Nathan from Podbean.

Nathan, why don't you introduce yourself and tell us about Podbean.

Thanks a lot, Craig.

My name is Nathan Montieth.

Our startup is called PodBeat.

PodBeat lets you out of beat to any podcast for a workout.

So the biggest thing is podcasts are great, but they kind of lack some energy and some motivation.

I love podcasts, but you want to add a beat to them because it just adds some energy and focus.

Yeah, like my podcast like this can be pretty dry.

So having something underneath it while you're trying to be active rather than like if I'm out riding, if I'm listening to something that I find I'm slowing down.

So what you're saying is your tempo means that it'll help me keep my energy level up and keep my tempo up.

Totally, Craig.

And what's so nice about the way we design the beats is we keep them very minimal.

People come to us and listen to podcasts for exactly the way they say it, for the content.

You might say it's dry, but they love hearing whatever you're talking about.

I was speaking earlier to a lady who has a podcast about mining.

And I was like, alright, and she was like, people would love this that I could add a beat to it.

So it totally allows you to add more energy to it and keeps you going for your run.

So it is for podcasters to put rather than users to add background to it?

No, it's for users.

That's a great question.

I mean, the reason most podcasts don't have music is, hey, you shouldn't kind of like presuppose what type of music people want to listen to.

Right?

So someone might want to put a lo-fi beat to your voice.

Others might want to add a metal beat to your voice.

So depending on what they want to do, we let them do that.

We put the user in control of how they want to take your podcast in.

So it sounds like you're targeting people who love podcasts and exercise in the intersection of those people.

How do you target that?

You know, it's pretty easy and social because when we show how the interface of PodBeat works, it's so easy to do in a social post, right?

So we can do a TikTok about it.

We have a big TikTok channel, a nice following there because people see it.

And what's so nice about social channels too is we can actually sample your podcasts and play for them, what it sounds like with and without a beat from PodBeat.

So the targeting is, yes, people that love podcasts, but there's also a lot of people that don't have time to do podcasts.

They're getting longer.

There's some that are like three or four hours and there's also so many good ones.

So we're trying to create a new use case for that, right?

If you're sitting there going, "Well, I used to use my playlist for an hour and a half while I was working out in the gym, but now actually I can do a podcast with a beat on it and get the same motivation that music gave me."

Is there a personal story that inspired you to start this?

There actually is.

My wife and I created this.

She actually lost her sight for six months.

She had cataract surgery at 38, which is pretty rare.

So she had a reaction to it and lost her sight, but she still wanted to work out.

So she would get on the treadmill, which is still kind of safe.

And she's a former DJ, so she would say, "Hey, can you play some beats behind this for me?"

So we would grab a separate audio speaker and play beats because there was no way to do this.

You can't play a podcast and beats at the same time.

So we just kind of made an agreement that once she got her sight back, she did six months later and we built PodBeat.

And now people are using it.

We've got a pretty good user base and it's growing really fast.

So we were mentioning before we were recording that you've got a booth here and you were impressed by, you know, what was happening down here at Collision.

What has been your experience so far?

Our experience with the booth is a bit great because I think it helps when you have any product that's easy to understand in one sentence.

People walk by and say they see PodBeat.

Add a beat to any podcast for some energy.

And instantly they stop and go, "Wait a second.

I would love to do this."

Almost every time we tell someone about PodBeat, they go, "Oh my God, I've been wanting something like that.

I just, you know, that's amazing."

And I like the fact that it's consumer driven because you can control the level of the volume probably of the beat as well.

Because that's always a problem as a podcaster.

If you put something underneath it, sometimes it's too loud and you don't know.

But as an individual listener, having that preference.

It's so important to us, Craig, that we don't affect your content, right?

So having the volume control of the user helps us.

We can also make it so that they can speed it up and slow it down.

Everyone finds different beats too that work with different voices.

So your voice actually might sound amazing with a funk beat on it, but it also might sound so kind of cool with like a trip-hop beat.

And what's the plan to grow in the next couple of years?

The plan to grow is we're getting users coming in.

We're offering it free right now.

So you can download PodBeat for free.

We have a freemium model.

Some people kind of use it.

So we just want to get users going.

Eventually what we're going to do is we're going to lock some of the beats and we just offer it for $2.99 a month.

$2.99 a month for someone working out.

It's not a big thing.

And what they do is once they subscribe, they get new weekly beat drops each week.

So as a podcaster, do I want to throw my RSS feed your way or you grab it somewhere else?

Oh no, we'll totally take your feed.

Because also what we do is we want to build a community.

Community building is super important.

So the way we do it on our TikTok channel is we work with podcasts where we promote their podcasts.

We use their content and then what they do for us is off the top of their podcast, they say, "Hey guys, if you're listening to my show today, you want to add a beat from PodBeat to add some energy, say you're working out or go for a run.

Download PodBeat for free.

I sound pretty good with a trap beat.

And then, alright, on to the show.

That's amazing.

And if people want to find out more or get it, where do they go?

They go to the App Store or the Google Play Store.

You can also go to podbeat.com.

You know, you can read a little bit about it, but then it'll send you right to the App Store.

We try to make it as easy as possible for people.

I'll be downloading PodBeat on the way home tonight, so I'll be taking a look at it.

I really appreciate your time, Nathan.

You taking the time out of busy collision to talk to me.

Thanks a lot, Craig.

I appreciate you, man.

Great bumping into you.

This has been Who Are These Startups.

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