Matt: Episode 73. Matt loves audiobooks.

[intro]

Matt: Welcome to another episode of Publish & Prosper. This would be episode number 73, or at least what it says on my outline here. So I'm going to assume Lauren is correct in her maths.

Lauren: I don't know anymore. Everything's kind of blurring together at this point, so. 

Matt: That doesn't bode well for the next 45 minutes. 

Lauren: No, it doesn't. Or it could make a great episode. 

Matt: Well, we'll see. We'll see the download counts afterwards. But today we're talking about audiobooks. 

Lauren: Yeah. Yeah, we are. 

Matt: And I'm not going to say what I normally say. So I'll just leave it at that. Today we are talking about audiobooks. 

Lauren: And while it might not be one of Matt's favorite subjects, it is one of mine. 

Matt: I was trying to avoid that. 

Lauren: So I’m looking forward to it. 

Matt: Cause I really do feel like I say that a lot about topics. 

Lauren: Yeah, but I think you usually have a good reason for it. 

Matt: I mean, that's probably debatable. But just know that when I don't like audiobooks, when I don't like ebooks, it's just because I love print and I just can't fathom listening to a book and not holding it in my hands and reading it with my eyes and appreciating the tangible art that's in my hands at the time. 

Lauren: I totally get that. And I think that that's fair. And I also think that that's – you know, you are a prime example of the fact that people are very dedicated to specific mediums for reading, or whatever, consuming content. And so if you are limiting yourself from not publishing your content in a specific medium or specific format, you are ruling out – 

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren:  – a potential audience of people. 

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren: So if you're somebody who's only publishing ebooks, Matt's never going to read your book because you have never provided it to him in a format that he's interested in reading it. 

Matt: That's true. But you know what I am a fan of: making money. And so what you're saying rings absolutely true. And that if you're an indie author, self-published author, or whatever that might be, and you're only publishing in one format, Lauren's absolutely right. Forget about personal preferences. Forget about some of the other things that may come into play and think about your goals for your book. Like we've talked about before, and think about meeting people where they're at and making money. I'm a fan of that. 

Lauren: Well, I might disappoint you a little bit then in this case, I'm going to spoil – 

Matt: Oh how true those words have been over the years. 

Lauren: I know. But yeah, I'm not going to make the case in this episode that audiobooks are going to make you rich. 

Matt: I didn't say rich. 

Lauren: Or – no. 

Matt: I just say making money.

Lauren: Right. But my point is that while this is a new revenue stream that you can add to your brand and to your product lines – and I'm going to argue that it is a great discoverability option – I'm also not going to sit here and pretend that anybody is retiring young off of exclusively their royalties from their audiobooks. 

Matt: So what you're saying is the passive stream of revenue. 

Lauren: That is exactly what I'm saying. 

Matt: Okay. 

Lauren: Yeah. So, you know, I just didn't want you to hear that intro from Matt and go, oh, I'm gonna get money. I'm going make it, make it big off these audiobooks. 

Matt: That's not what I said. 

Lauren: Okay, just making sure. Making sure we're all on the same page here. 

Matt: But I think if you do it right. 

Lauren: Yeah. 

Matt: All formats. 

Lauren: Yes. 

Matt: Maybe. I don't know. 

Lauren: Yes. 

Matt: Alright. 

Lauren: Which is something that we've – 

Matt: Let’s jump into this.

Lauren: Okay, great. 

[3:40]

Lauren: Let's talk about some of the positives of audiobooks.

Matt: Yeah, let’s do.

Lauren: And the audiobook industry. Because it is, as of right now, pretty much the fastest growing format within the publishing industry.

Matt: So yes, but let's be clear, when we say something is the fastest growing that might be true from a percentage basis standpoint. 

Lauren: Yes. 

Matt: There was a time where ebooks were the fastest growing medium for books. But those percentage points are relative to the total volume. 

Lauren: Well, and also we have to acknowledge the fact that one of the reasons that it is growing, in this instance, is because of modern accessibility to it and modern ease of use – 

Matt: Sure. 

Lauren: It's the same thing – I got an email newsletter a couple of weeks ago that had the very clickbaity headline that AI search use was up 1300%. 

Matt: 1300? 

Lauren: Yeah. And then I looked at it a little bit and I was like, well, it's up 1300% from a time when ChatGPT was mostly in beta and or not in use at all. And so there were no – like it's up 1300 % over zero. Like, of course it went from nobody using it to… I mean, yes, absolutely want to acknowledge that one of the main reasons that we're seeing the steady growth in the popularity of audiobooks is because it is becoming more accessible – 

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: – in a variety of different ways. And we'll talk about that. We'll get to that. 

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: But I wanted to share some actual stats about this. A lot of this information is coming from two studies that were conducted by the Audio Publishers Association in 2024. And I have linked most of the resources that I used in the show notes. These two studies in particular that I'm referencing are behind a paywall, so probably won't be able to see them, but you can at least see the…

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: Stats where they came from. There's a bunch of resources about this whole episode in the show notes. But as of this study that was done last year, 38% of American adults were listening to audiobooks, which was up from 35%. 

Matt: So 3% growth. 

Lauren: 3% growth. 

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren: But it is, I mean – 

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren: It's growing. 

Matt: It is. 

Lauren: I mean, it was – and it was also something like, that 3% was something like 135 million listeners or something like, you know. That's not a small number when you think about the total number of people we're talking about here. And then also that 52% of American adults have listened to an audiobook at least once, so. 

Matt: See, I find that hard to believe. 

Lauren: Why? 

Matt: I just find it hard to believe that 50% of American adults have done anything. 

Lauren: Okay. 

Matt: Let alone listen to an audiobook. 

Lauren: Fair. 

Matt: I mean, 50 % of American adults have never tried a Mountain Dew.

Lauren: I've never tried Mountain Dew. 

Matt: My point. I mean, so again, clearly they have some way of measuring whatever their sampling size, whatever that might be. I mean, understand they didn't obviously survey every single American adult, but that's a big number. And if there's any amount of truth in that number related to the sampling size of that survey and then scaled out, like that's a lot more than I would have thought. 

Lauren: Yes. 

Matt: I mean, honestly, the statistic that 38% of American adults listen to an audiobook in the last twelve months was a little more than I thought it would be. So good for audiobooks, I guess.

Lauren: Yeah. Yes, absolutely. 

Matt: I still have a hard time believing that 52% of American adults have listened to an audiobook at least once. 

Lauren: Yes and no, because I do feel like that it is something that I mean, first of all, it is getting easier and easier to access them.

Matt: I understand. 

Lauren: And it is also, I think with the rise of things like long form video content on YouTube, things like podcasts becoming – podcast popularity kind of happened a few years ago, but still – like, as people realize that they like these long form audio mediums, they start looking into what other…

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: Long form audio exists. How else can I get through this commute? Which was another stat that I saw and I actually like, couldn't find it again when I went back to look for it. It was something close to…of the American adults that said they'd listen to an audiobook at least once, over 50% of those 50% listened to them on a commute. 

Matt: Yeah, I mean, that's how I got into podcasts. 

Lauren: Exactly. 

Matt: I had no desire to listen to podcasts until just a couple of years ago. And it was because of my commute to work. I thought, you know what, you know, thankful for true crime. Obviously, that's where my foray started, but – so I say, I don't like audiobooks. I say I'll never listen to one, but as you're laying the argument or foundation for there probably would be a natural progression for somebody like me who likes to read and who now is an avid podcast listener, to potentially, secretly, without telling you, maybe try an audiobook one day on my ride home, but I get it. I know there's an evolution there and I understand accessibility really drives adoption. I don't disagree with any of that. I just think honestly if they're looking at more of these numbers that we're going to go over, I think right now one of audiobooks’ biggest problems as a medium, as a format is data representation. 

Lauren: Yes. 

Matt: I think audiobooks has a data problem. 

Lauren: I think so too. 

Matt: But anyways, go ahead. 

Lauren: I mean, I think so too. And also that's why it's so funny to me that you don't like audiobooks because that is exactly my journey that I went through with them. I listened to a lot of My Favorite Murder and then kind of reached a point where I was like, I like these episodes that are like two, two and a half hours long. What else can I get into? I'm going to try an audiobook, see what happens there. And it was a slippery slope down that hill to being an avid audiobook listener. So it's funny to me that you've gone half the journey that I did, but then you haven't quite gone the rest of the way yet.

Matt: Well, in general, I try not to follow in your footsteps. 

Lauren: That's understandable. And I think most people should take that advice. But yeah, I mean, it is something that we are going to see as we're talking about data with these numbers. One of the stats that is very popular to report is that their prediction for worldwide revenue with audiobooks by the end of 2025 is 9.84 billion. That's what they're predicting the global audiobook market revenue will be. The problem with that, and the problem with reporting something like revenue for audiobooks, is that most of the audiobook platforms that exist as a tool for people to listen to audiobooks are subscription-based or library-based and you're not outright buying the audiobooks. So that is kind of skewing the numbers on what revenue looks like. 

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: You know, as opposed to it's really easy to say, like, we can predict revenue for book sales because people are buying books outright for the most part. But audiobooks, not as much. So definitely some data questions going on with this. And then also, similarly, that same study that was looking at adult audiobook listeners, 47% of the people that reported listening to an audiobook in 2024 also admitted that they got at least one of those audiobooks through YouTube or another file sharing website. So they were pirating them. So that's not going towards revenue at all. 

Matt: How would you be getting an audiobook from YouTube? Well, I guess – 

Lauren: People, like –

Matt: No, it makes sense. 

Lauren: Yeah. 

Matt: Well – 

Lauren: You know? 

Matt: It doesn't make sense, but I get it. Okay. 

Lauren: Yes. I mean, there are definitely ways to illegally access audiobooks in the same way that they can with ebooks. So, you know, that's, that is something that is hard to control within that industry and then hard to represent within the data. I mean, I could sit here and recite numbers at you all day. I think Matt's already bored with the numbers, which is funny because you're usually the data person here. 

Matt: Yeah, but, you know, again – 

Lauren: But…

Matt: It's – I love data that I feel like I can trust a little bit more, but you got to work with what you got, right? And I don't think any data is 100% accurate when you're talking about stuff that you're pulling off the internet or these are things that are based on sampling size. 

Lauren: Yes. I mean, it is something too that we've talked about fallacies in data when it's self-reporting. People always want to make themselves look a little bit more favorable –

Matt: Yeah, yeah. 

Lauren: – one way or another. So people are going to lie whether they mean to or not when it comes to that. And also, you know, one of the things that I said to Matt before we started recording, as I was getting into this further, when I was looking into things like how can I share with the listeners, how royalty breakdowns work with different audiobook platforms? A lot of these platforms are doing a lot of work to not be super clear about what their royalty breakdowns are.

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren: Or what their data, what their numbers are and like kind of, you know, seeing the numbers that are reported for things versus seeing like, authors that are talking to each other in communities and comparing notes and saying like, these don't always…what they're saying and what authors are seeing is not always lining up one to one. So it is something that, you know, take it with a grain of salt. And that's fair. 

Matt: Yeah. And you know, most of the ones that I've talked to lately these days, whether it's at shows or just social media, whatever, it seems like a lot of people are just kind of trying it out because it's like a lot of other things that come and go. It's one of those things that's kind of taken off and people aren't sure if they should do it or not. And so I think that's also part of the impetus for this episode, but understanding and we're gonna get into this, there's some good data out there right now and some of the stuff you're presenting I think is, is pretty compelling. But like anything else, whether it's BookTok or anything else that's considered a trend in the beginning but maybe has some staying power, we've yet to see that. So understanding and knowing what you're getting into when it comes to how do I create one, how much am gonna get paid every time one sells, where am gonna sell it, you know, all of those things is really, really important. Because I don't think there's anything yet to tell us definitively this is a trend that's going to be around for a while or that's going to keep growing or is it going to plateau like level off plateau and then drop. I think, at the very least, it's going to get to the level where, or close to the level where, ebooks got – ebooks are kind of stagnant, to a degree, when you look at industry numbers and things like that, but.

Lauren: Yeah. 

Matt: Nonetheless, I have a feeling, and I don't like it, that by the end of this episode you're going to have me convinced to go listen to an audiobook.

Lauren: I mean, I wouldn't hate that. And I would be very curious to get your feedback at the end of it. But I do think that there's kind of two parts to that, because yes, while it's true that like, this is a fairly new format in terms of its popularity and accessibility, audiobooks are older than ebooks. Audiobooks on cassette –  

Matt: Yeah, books on tape. 

Lauren: Yeah. 

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren: That predates ebooks. 

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren: So this is a format that has existed for a long time. The new element within this is the idea that instead of having a box set of books on tape that I get forty-five minutes per cassette side and then have to flip it and then put a new cassette in, I have my phone sitting here that I have hundreds of thousands of hours of audiobooks available to me in like thirty seconds or less. That's the accessibility that is new to the industry and that is making it more popular, more common, something that more and more readers are buying into and something that more people are like, really starting to pay attention to. 

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren: One of the other things that I think is really important in the audiobook conversation is how controversial audiobooks are. It's something that comes up like clockwork every four months, somebody on BookTok or somebody somewhere has a shocking hot take that's never been heard before that is: audiobooks do not count as reading. And if you are one of those people, you can meet me outside. 

Matt: First of all, you need to say it properly, which is you can catch me outside. 

Lauren: How about that? 

Matt: That's right. Second of all, those kind of people suck because they're just trolling and posting rage bait. 

Lauren: I mean, absolutely they are, for sure. 

Matt: I mean, yeah. Anyways. 

Lauren: Yeah, no, I'm going to plant my flag on that hill for sure. 

Matt: So because I'm not in most of these communities, is it…are audiobooks as controversial – it seems weird even saying that – as ebooks? Or more? 

Lauren: More. 

Matt: More. 

Lauren: More so. 

Matt: Okay. 

Lauren: Yes. 

Matt: But why? 

Lauren: Because listening does not count as reading. 

Matt: Ah, I see. 

Lauren: Is the argument that is made. 

Matt: Wow, that really is dumb. 

Lauren: It is so dumb. 

Matt: I mean, I can see it. Like, from my own personal standpoint, I personally wouldn't consider that reading. I really wouldn't. But I wouldn't argue with somebody whether it's reading or listening. Who cares? You're absorbing the information. 

Lauren: There was actually…neuroscientists at UC Berkeley did a study on this and they did find that people listening to audiobooks process information in a very similar way to people that are reading.

Matt: Did we really need neuroscientists at the University of California Berkeley to tell us that though?

Lauren: Apparently some people do, yes. 

Matt: It's no different to me than if you're sitting in a college lecture hall and you're listening to the professor talk to you versus reading the textbook. You're absorbing information. 

Lauren: Yeah, and it is I mean the argument that I will always make to people that say that audiobooks don't account as reading is sorry, that's really ableist of you. Does that mean that somebody who's blind and physically cannot read pages on a book and wants to listen to it instead has never read a book before?

Matt: I mean, don't wanna go down this path, but I agree with you. 

Lauren: But no, mean, you know, there's, we all have different ways of consuming information, consuming media. 

Matt: Sure. 

Lauren: I'll tell you that I'm somebody who, I am a speed reader. I read so fast, sometimes too fast. And –

Matt: Do you listen to your podcasts on 2X?

Lauren: I do not. I listen to them on 1X. 

Matt: What about your audiobooks? 

Lauren: Also on 1X. 

Matt: But you speed read.

Lauren: I do. And that's one of the things that I like about audiobooks, is that it forces me to slow down and actually process the information. I will do that a lot where I will… if I'm looking for an audiobook that I'm like, oh, you know, I just want something on in the background while I'm cleaning. I will listen to an audiobook for a book that I've already read. And I find myself hearing things in that audiobook that I missed the first time around because I was so busy, like burning through the book that I didn't actually process this hint that was dropped or this scene that I missed or this clue that was planted here or something. 

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren: And so…

Matt: Okay. 

Lauren: I'll make that fight. I'll die on that hill for sure. So if you disagree with me, come at me.

Matt: I’m not dying on any of those hills. 

Lauren: You've got your own hills to die on. 

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren: We'll find one somewhere. 

Matt: It's deep in the niches of my mind. 

Lauren: No, absolutely not. 

[17:54]

Lauren: Anyway, all this data is well and good. All this discussion of controversy is well and good, but it's all kind of leaning towards the argument of; is it actually worth it for indie authors? 

Matt: Yeah, and just –

Lauren: Like, that's where we're going.

Matt: One last point of clarification. 

Lauren: Sure. 

Matt: Yeah. So, you presented a bunch of data. I poked fun at some of it. But at the end of the day what can't be disputed is that it's a viable format. There is some growth there, more and more people are looking into it, if not actually adopting and utilizing it. So for indie authors and people in general that are serious about adding passive streams of revenue or exploring other format options or growing their reader base, it is something you should probably look into. I imagine we're going to dive into that next. 

Lauren: Yes. 

Matt: Okay. 

Lauren: Yeah. And we've talked about this. We mentioned it already in this episode and we've talked about it in other episodes too. We cannot overemphasize the value of going wide with your book, whether that's going wide with your book distribution options or going wide with your book format options. 

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren: When it comes to something like an audiobook, you're reaching a whole new audience of listeners with that that you might not reach with a print book or an ebook. 

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren: One of the things that I – this is anecdotal in the sense that I don't have evidence, actual data to back it up, but it's anecdotal in that with enough conversations that I've had with different people that I'm going to stand by it anyway. Audiobook listeners, people that are like, actually avid audiobook listeners, don't just have favorite authors. They have favorite narrators. I'm not making this up. 

Matt: Man, I don’t know about that. 

Lauren: I'm absolutely not making this up. 

Matt: Who’s your favorite narrator? 

Lauren: Julia Whelan. 

Matt: Who? 

Lauren: Julia Whelan. We'll actually talk more about her later in this episode, but then I also have another, an indie favorite. I will absolutely – and I know I'm not alone in this, I've talked to other people that do this – I will go and I'll say I don't have any books right now that I have downloaded already, but I know that I like this narrator. I'm going to click on their name in this catalog and I'm going to see what other books they've narrated and I'm going to choose one. Not because I've ever heard of this author or this title or whatever, I'm gonna choose something that Julia has narrated. And that's how I'm gonna – 

Matt: Okay. 

Lauren: And that is an extra level of discoverability for you. 

Matt: That’s interesting. 

Lauren: And I know that I'm not alone in doing that. I've had this conversation with multiple other people. 

Matt: I would say that the fact that you can click on a narrator's name and find more titles that they've narrated probably supports your argument. 

Lauren: Yeah. 

Matt: Yes. 

Lauren: Absolutely. 

Matt: Otherwise they wouldn't have gone through the trouble to build that feature set into the platform.

Lauren: Yes. 

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: Yes. And that is another element of that. If you're somebody who's listening to this and you're like, well, I don't know a whole lot about audiobook discoverability, but I am an author that relies on ebook discoverability. I am an author that uses KDP or Kindle Unlimited as a way to reach new readers, audiobooks are very similar. 63% of audiobook listeners, per one of those studies that I was referencing earlier, get their audiobooks through a subscription platform. When you have these subscription platforms, one of the things that's built into them is discoverability of authors within these platforms. 

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren: And it's this idea that the people that are subscribed to these platforms are browsing the content that's on there. And this is another way for them to find you and come across your content. Also, if you're listening to this and you're like, yeah, audiobooks are super trendy for romance and mystery and whatever. It's absolutely not just fiction-based. This is definitely not something that is just for fiction authors. That same survey, the fastest growing genres, according to the data they collected for that survey, were history, biography and memoir, health & fitness, and then faith-based books. 

Matt: See, that all makes sense to me and I would not assume that people only used it to listen to fiction. I would imagine it's a big part of it, but I could see where for me, for example, if I was going to try an audiobook, it'd have to be nonfiction – 

Lauren: Yeah. 

Matt: – for me to even give it a fair shot. 

Lauren: That’s fair. 

Matt: Like, fiction is one of those things to me right now that is still so nostalgic and guarded in my head that I could never fathom reading it on an ebook or listening to it on an audiobook. Like, I don't know, maybe I would get to the point where I could, but nonfiction, absolutely. Like, I could completely see after having read some really good nonfiction or business books or marketing books, then listening to the audiobook version during my commute as a way to reinforce some of the things I learned in that book. 

Lauren: Would you be more inclined to read or listen to a fiction audiobook if it was a full cast audiobook? Have you ever seen any of those, where you like, it's like actually kind of a production? 

Matt: Well, no, I'm not seeing any of those. 

Lauren: Okay. 

Matt: I don't hang out in audiobook circles. 

Lauren: Okay. 

Matt: But to answer your question, I don't know if that would make me want to try a fiction audiobook any more than one that was just narrated by a single person. I might get more aggravated with the multi-person cast of narrators, feeling like I'm watching a TV show in the dark or something like that. I don't know where I can't actually see anything? I don't know. That's weird. But the more I think about it… Yeah, I don't know. I think nonfiction makes a lot more sense to me –

Lauren: Yeah. 

Matt: – as audiobooks. But yeah, I don't know. I just feel like with fiction, especially multi-character, I would just feel like I'm laying there with my eyes closed while the TV's on. But I don't know if that's a bad thing. 

Lauren: Yeah, I was gonna say is that a bad thing?

Matt: See, I told you. I feel like by the end of this you're gonna be convinced to listen to an audiobook and I'm not liking that so let's just move on. 

Lauren: Well one of my – I don't know if this helps one way or another – 

Matt: It probably won’t. 

Lauren: – but one of my all-time favorite audiobooks that I've ever listened to was Salem's Lot. 

Matt: Now you're really trying hard. You know that's one of my favorite Stephen King’s. 

Lauren: I know. 
Matt: You're not playing fair. 

Lauren: It scared the crap out of me. 

Matt: I thought you were going to say Mary Poppins, which also would have got me but. 

Lauren: Oh no, although I read all those books as a kid. 

Matt: I did too 

Lauren: I read them though. I didn't listen to them. 

Matt: Mary Poppins could be cool if they use the original voices of Julie Andrews and…

Lauren: Dick Van Dyke. 

Matt: Dick Van Dyke, yeah. 

Lauren: Yeah. I don’t know. 

Matt: Salem's Lot, although, I will say Salem's Lot would be a weird one as an audiobook, there's so much of that that is visual as a movie and or when you're reading the book I tend to visualize when I'm reading with my eyes a lot more than – like if I'm listening to a podcast, I'm not visualizing anything they're saying, even if it's true crime – 

Lauren: Yeah. 

Matt: - or anything like that. Like. Well, that would make me a psychopath, but.

Lauren: That's fair. There’s – 

Matt: You know what would make a really cool audiobook, now that I think about it, would be Jaws by Peter Benchley. 

Oh yeah? 
Matt: I think that'd be a cool audiobook

Lauren: Could be. Maybe it is. 

Matt: The movie, I think, kind of made some concrete decisions for you as a reader or viewer in terms of just how big the shark actually was or what, you know, some of the other things that were happening where I feel like if you were listening to it as an audiobook, maybe you could draw some different conclusions in your mind about some of the scarier aspects of Jaws. 

Lauren: Yeah. 

Matt: Which could be really cool. But all right. 

Lauren: Yeah. 

[24:19]

Lauren: Well, let's talk a little bit about where you're going to find these audiobooks. 

Matt: Sure. 

Lauren: So, you know, when we convince you to listen to one. I'm going to convince you. I kind of wanted to break this down in two different ways. Just kind of do a little bit of an overview of the most popular platforms that listeners are using to find their audiobooks on, and then talk a little bit about how indie authors are actually getting their books created and distributed to those specific platforms. 

Matt: So I'm going to call you out. 

Lauren: I – 

Matt: You left one out. 

Lauren: I know I did. 

Matt: This probably, I can tell you right now, when I – when and if I ever listened to an audiobook, I will do it through BookFunnel. 

Lauren: Okay.

Matt: I firmly believe that in the audiobook market, they are doing really good things. We know the people over at BookFunnel and Damon and his team are doing a fantastic job. They are probably one of the more popular choices for fiction authors. Now, to be fair, it's – to be fair – it's because BookFunnel also has other aspects of their platform that many of the others don't. Around marketing your books, building an audience around them and things like that. But I've been told by audiobook people and people who use BookFunnel that one of the reasons that people like BookFunnel so much is the player that Damon built. The BookFunnel audio player is supposed to be like, one of the best. 

Lauren: That’s interesting, actually. 

Matt: If you're an indie author – 

Lauren: Yeah. 

Matt: – and you want to sell your audiobooks and you know, or even give them away as arcs or whatever, you know what I mean? It doesn't, it sounds like they're probably one of the better choices right now. And I do know that they're one of the only ones that are set up to help you sell your audiobooks direct. So if you're one of those people who is working with the concept of selling direct, whether it's your print books or your ebooks or anything else, you could sell your audiobooks direct too, also using BookFunnel. So I really like that. But ultimately they have some other things built into their platform where you can do like, giveaways and author swaps and group promotions. There's some really cool marketing aspects built into the platform as well. And the pricing is really, really affordable in terms of an audiobook distribution platform that has a really well built player attached to it so that people don't have to use some of the other players that are out there that maybe are not as good. So yeah. I just wanted to point out that BookFunnel is probably one of the leaders right now, especially in the fiction world. 

Lauren: Yeah, that's so fair. I actually have not listened to an audiobook on BookFunnel, so I will have to rectify that immediately. 

Matt: And you know, Damon's going to be really upset, because you've met Damon. 

Lauren: I know. 

Matt: Damon is a massive Taylor Swift fan.  

Lauren: I know. 

Matt: Loves your bracelet work, and he's going to be upset if he even heard this episode ever. I'll make sure not to tell him about it. 

Lauren: Thanks. I appreciate it. 

Damon, I got you, bud. 

Lauren: I will fix that immediately. I will, because I think it's important. And for the record, for anybody listening, if you're like, who cares if the player is good? Absolutely that is something that people care about. 

Matt: What do your bracelets say today? 

Lauren: One of them says All This and Heaven, one of them says YOYOK, which is you're on your own kid, and the other one says Bothered and Bewildered.

Matt: That last one is definitely me right now. 

Lauren: Yep, that's valid. 

Matt: All right, so. That's BookFunnel. 

Lauren: Yeah. 

Matt: That's my plug for BookFunnel. No, I'm not paid to say that. I just like those guys. I like their products and platform in terms of what they offer, their story. I like that they're an independent platform. 

Lauren: Yeah. 

Matt: And they – we know them really well, and they do put a lot into the indie community. So, yeah. 

Lauren: And I mean, as always, we're going to support and promote any platform that is an alternative to Amazon. 

[27:39]

Lauren: Because yeah, the most common and the most popular one that people think of when they think of audiobooks is Audible, which is a platform that is owned by Amazon. 

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren: It is estimated that Audible controls approximately 63% of the audiobook market share, but there are a lot of competitors that are gunning for that that are really trying to take back some control and give indie authors and traditionally published authors alternative options to using Audible. 

Matt: Which is great because it also forces all of these platforms to revisit what their royalty structures are and things, right? 

Lauren: Right. 

Matt: So when Audible was pretty much running the market, they could pay you whatever they wanted to. 

Lauren: Yep. 

Matt: Because there really wasn't any competition around at all. And then you had one or two others start to kind of creep in on market share. Spotify acquired Findaway, and I know you're going to get to that. They had a little bit of trouble in the beginning sorting out their royalty and creator structures. 

Lauren: Yep. 

Matt: But I think they've since fixed that. And now as more start to pop up and I think that's great, because royalty structures start to also evolve with the competition and think that's a good thing.

Lauren: Yeah, I mean, it is. And it is also something that we see the more that this industry grows and becomes mainstream and the more that some of the really big players are taking interest in it, we kind of see – we've referenced in the past Brandon Sanderson's record-breaking Kickstarter. 

Lauren: Yeah. 

Matt: Where he did the four secret novels and self-published those. And he originally declined to publish those as audiobooks on Audible because he had a really big problem with their transparency and royalty just in general, and then also how they were reporting it and sharing that information. And he spent about a year negotiating with them and very publicly admits – there's, he wrote a whole blog post on it. I have that linked in the show notes – kind of very publicly acknowledges, you know, we spent a year negotiating this and I didn't really get everything that I wanted out of it, but I feel more comfortable with what they've promised to do moving forward. But it took a massive prolific name in publishing to kind of step up and be like, hey, you want my content on here? You've got to be a little clearer with what you're doing here. You got to be a little bit more fair to the authors, to the creators, to the narrators, to the publishers. 

Matt: And you know what sucks? But it's expected, and I'm glad. It took an indie creator, to a degree, to stand up to them and be like no, this isn't right, you know, and thankfully he did, yes. But I think people should take note of that as well. And I think more people should do that. You don't just have to take what's given, go back to the table, ask for something different in certain situations. You know, we saw the same thing with some other celebrities and genres of content and – The Cure did that with Ticketmaster, remember? When they went on tour, their last tour, there was some, as usual, some shenanigans going on with Ticketmaster. 

Lauren: Always. 

Matt: Ticket prices and the way drops were being handled and Robert Smith was like, uh-uh, no, let's figure this out. And Ticketmaster wanted that business. They wanted that money. And so they did. They went to the negotiation table with Robert Smith and The Cure. I think more people need to, to stand up to some of these, these larger entities that tend to run various different verticals and channels. 

Lauren: You know who else has done that historically? 

Matt: Tay-Tay. 

Lauren: Yeah. 

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren: With Spotify. 

Matt: Can you edit that out? 

Lauren: No. No, but that is something I feel like that's lore – 

Matt: Yeah. No, you’re right.

Lauren: – that people forget. 

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: Taylor's entire catalog wasn't on Spotify, because Spotify was paying fractions of pennies per plays to artists. 

Matt: Well, to a degree they still do, sort of. 

Lauren: Right. 

Matt: Yeah, so. 

Lauren: But like – 

Matt: But yeah. 

Lauren: – she negotiated with them for years, and she did not negotiate for her own royalties. She negotiated for royalty changes – 

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren: – for the entire program.

Matt: Programmatically, yeah.

Lauren: Yeah. And did not put her music back on Spotify until they came to an agreement with her. Which is also kind of one of the things when people are like, oh, you know, Spotify breaking into the audiobook industry. Like, there were also some issues with royalties on that. And I'm like, yeah, are you surprised? Do you guys not remember when Spotify did a terrible job paying music artists? Like, why do we think they're going to pay authors any more than they've paid their musician? 

[31:49]

Lauren: If Audible is not your vibe for whatever reason, the up and coming biggest alternative to that right now is Spotify. Spotify right now, if you are a premium subscriber, you have access to fifteen hours of audiobooks for free each month. 

Matt: I don't even know what that… fifteen hours, how many pages is that? Is there some sort of formula? Like, are you getting through an entire book in fifteen hours or multiple books? 

Lauren: It depends on what it is. The average like, romance novel that I listen to, probably about a ten hour audiobook. 

Matt: And how many pages would that book be if you read it? Have you figured that out? 

Lauren: Emily Henry's new book came out a couple of weeks ago, and I'm a big fan of hers. And I actually finally went and read that book last week. It was great. The hardcover of that book is 432 pages. 

Matt: Okay. 

Lauren: And the audiobook, which is narrated by Julia Whelan is…723 minutes? Penguin Random House, that's not how you describe time. Like what do you mean? It's a twelve hour audiobook. 

Matt: Okay. 

Lauren: So it's a, what did I say? 432 pages. 

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren: It's about twelve hours. 

Matt: Wow 

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: Okay. 

Lauren: Some of those bigger books, like the ACOTAR books, I think those are about 24 hour audiobooks. Yeah, they're massive. 

Matt: So you're getting 15 hours a month, is that what you said? 

Lauren: Yes. 

Matt: Or ten hours a month? 

Lauren: Fifteen hours a month. For me on Spotify, for the types of books that I listen to on Spotify, fifteen hours a month, I can usually get through one and a half books on that. And if you plan it – 

Matt: And that's already included in your premium Spotify? 

Lauren: That’s. Yes. 

Matt: Okay. 

Lauren: Yeah. That is just free as part of your access to premium. And if you plan it well, you know, you listen to one ten hour book and then you start one book towards the end of the month. Then you just roll that over into the next month and you finish it. And then you get three books in two months. 

Matt: Yeah 

Lauren: You got to be a little strategic about it, but it does work.

Matt: But can't you just buy the book – 

Lauren: You can.  

Matt: – download it, and listen to it? 

Lauren: You can. 

Matt: What's – are the prices comparable to, let's say, the 400 page hardcover? 

Lauren: Yeah, so that is actually and that's also something that is happening now, as audiobooks become more popular. They used to be more expensive, especially when they were still creating them as physical media. Buying a CD box set – 

Matt: Right. 

Lauren: – of an audiobook was going to cost more than the hardcover book did. These days they're actually pretty comparable, but that's also one of the things that the subscription platforms like Audible and Spotify and Libro.FM, which is another one. One of the things that make them an attractive option, is that you pay $15 a month for the subscription, and you get one credit for that $15 a month. And every audiobook is one credit. So if the book that you're buying is more than $15, you're getting a deal on it. 

Matt: Why don't they just say fifteen bucks to read one book? Why is it gonna be one credit if every book is one credit? 

Lauren: Because you can also then buy additional books on top of that. 

Matt: So – 

Lauren: And so that is something – 

Matt: Let me back up for a second. 

Lauren: Okay. 

Matt: Back to Spotify. You said you can just buy and download the whole book, right? 

Lauren: Yes. 

Matt: So in that instance, and you’re paying what I'm gonna assume is retail price. Do you know if on Spotify, if I wrote a 432 page book and you downloaded the whole thing and read it via Spotify or listened to it via Spotify, am I obviously getting more royalties on that one versus if you just listened to my book in part of your monthly fifteen hours? 

Lauren: Well, okay, so that's where the royalty breakdown gets…dicey. 

Matt: I'm not trying to make you do math – 

Lauren: No, I know. 

Matt: – because we all know how that's gonna go. I'm just curious about... 

Lauren: I know, no, and that's where it gets dicey. So all of these platforms, when you go look into them and you look like what are the royalty breakdowns on these? They all will be very upfront with like… or books purchased. So like Spotify's royalty breakdown with Findaway Voices, their royalty breakdown right now is any audiobooks sold through Spotify, the author earns 100% of royalties. And then any audiobooks that are sold through another retailer, hat are distributed through Findaway Voices, but it's sold somewhere other than Spotify, the authors earn 80% of their royalties. So that's great, but that's telling you for books purchased. 

Matt: Right. 

Lauren: When it comes to the like as a Spotify premium subscriber, I listened to about five hours worth of the new Emily Henry book. And then I switched from Spotify to the actual physical copy of the book I had and read the rest of the book as the hardcover. I don't know what kind of royalties Emily Henry or Penguin Random House saw from that five hours – 

Matt: Right. 

Lauren: – of free listening that I did.

Matt: So it's similar to ebooks in the sense that – 

Lauren: Yes. 

Matt: – Kindle has some of those programs where as an author, you're only getting paid based on the amount of pages read, which is wild to me. 

Lauren: Yes. 

Matt: So, right. I do not like that. 

[36:35] 

Matt: Why would I, as an author, want to use Spotify or Audible for my audiobooks? 

Lauren: Discoverability. 

Matt; Oh yeah. Okay. Alright. 

Lauren: That's, that's like absolutely the number one. 

Matt: Okay. 

Lauren: It's the accessibility and discoverability, especially something like Spotify. If you are someone like me, I have been a Spotify premium subscriber since like 2014 or something like that. It is the most –

Matt: Now tell the truth, does your dad pay for it? 

Lauren: No, I pay for it. 

Matt: Tell the truth. Are you on your dad's cell phone plan? 

Lauren: Yes. Yes, I am. But I pay for that. I pay for Spotify.

Matt: Family plan.

Lauren: For me, Spotify, I've got – Spotify, I've got my entire music collection in there at this point. I've got audiobooks bookmarked, audiobooks that I like, audiobooks I've never heard before in there. And I listen to my podcasts in Spotify, too. Spotify is quickly becoming the one stop shop for any kind of audio media. 

Matt: Well, I think that's a really good point to make I listen to everything on Spotify too, by the way. So podcasts and music. 

Lauren: Yeah. 

Matt: I agree with the point you're making there. I do think they're probably best poised to take on Amazon. 

Lauren: Yes. 

Matt: You know, Audible in this market share battle. But I'd still love to see some of these smaller ones come up and eat some lunch, too. 

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: So. 

[37:51]

Lauren: So, yeah, in the interest of time, I'mma burn through a couple of these really quickly, but I just do want to shout them out. I did already mention Libro.FM. Libro.FM is a subscription platform that is also one that you can, not as a subscriber, just a la carte, go purchase an audiobook on there and have it in there. They're really cool because they're very comparable to Bookshop.org –

Matt: Oh, okay. 

Lauren: – in terms of their business model.

Matt: We like that. 

Lauren: We love them. Huge shout out for Bookshop.org. When you go on Libro.FM, you can choose to purchase your book through a local or indie bookstore. And then they get the proceeds from the sale. Yes.

Matt: They get some of the proceeds. Yeah. 

Lauren: Which is an awesome model. Apple Books and Google Play Books are, you know, just the built-in…

Yeah. 

Lauren: Audiobook apps for those two respective – 

Matt: Devices. 

Lauren: – phones. And they are the same thing where it's not a subscription model. It's just like if you want to one-off purchase an audiobook for something. And then I have to shout out Libby. Libby is my absolute favorite. I don't know if we’ve really talked about Libby on here before. It's an app that is owned by Overdrive. It's a library app and it is completely free to use. All you need is a library card and you can log in and access your local public library’s ebook and audiobook database. I mean, it is a library. So you do, you are limited to what they have in their catalog. And you know, if they only have ten copies of a book and all ten of them are checked out, you have to get on a waitlist and you have to you know, it works the same way as library does. But it is completely free and it is a phenomenal way to have an access point to all different types of audiobooks. 

[39:29]

Matt: I have another question. 

Lauren: Okay. 

Matt: So we've talked about all the places where you can buy them and listen to them. 

Lauren: Yep. 

Matt: Can you make your audiobook at all these places?

Lauren: Not all of them, but some of them. 

Matt: Which ones can you actually create your audiobook on? 

Lauren: Findaway Voices. 

Matt: Okay. 

Lauren: Is –  

Matt: Which is Spotify? 

Lauren: Spotify.  

Matt: Right? 

Lauren: But that is actively in flux right now. So. 

Matt: We don't have to go into that if you don't want to, but we can. 

Lauren: Well, but it is something that I don't want to go too deep into it right now, because if you listen to this podcast episode in two months, it might be different. So. 

Matt: Two months from recording. 

Lauren: Yes. 

Matt: Which is May 12th. 

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: And you're probably listening to this…

Lauren: Well, this episode doesn't come out until I think actually the last week of May. 

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren: So we're a couple of weeks ahead. So… 

Matt: By June this could could be different. 

Lauren: By June, definitely by August. So I don't want to get too far into Findaway Voices, but Findaway Voices, Spotify for Authors, and Voices by InAudio are these three interconnected platforms that are all audiobook production and distribution tools. 

Matt: Okay.

Lauren: So. Maybe we'll do another episode on those in the summer. Matt's like, you're fired. Absolutely not. 

Matt: You'll be fired before the summer, that's for sure. 

Lauren: Absolutely. Only one audiobook episode ever. That's fine. But the other like, kind of main tool right now for production, for audiobook production, that is the most accessible for authors is the Audible one. And that's kind of where it comes in when we say, you know, there's a reason that they have a majority of the market share, especially for indie authors. I mean, traditional publishers are producing their own audiobooks or licensing them out to other publishers –

Matt: Right. 

Lauren: – that are producing the audiobooks. But for indie authors and self-published authors, the kind of tool on the market right now is ACX, which is the Audiobook Creation Exchange that is within Audible.

Matt: Right, Okay. 

Lauren: Yeah. Built into that is a narrator marketplace where creators that are interested in having their books on Audible can go in there and find vetted freelance narrators, contract them, have them create their book. And then even the royalty splits between the author and narrator, that's all done within that platform. And then that is then the distribution platform that distributes the audiobook to Audible. If you want it to be an exclusive contract, or Audible and other audiobook retailers for a non-exclusive contract. 

Matt: Gotcha. 

Lauren: Did that answer your question? 

Matt: Yes. 

Lauren: Yeah? 

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren: Okay. Another thing about – these are the pros and cons of like, on the one hand, I really don't want to be sitting here plugging an Amazon tool. But also I would be lying if I said I didn't use these tools. And if they didn't have some cool features.

Matt: What's that little emoji guy that I like to use where he’s like…

Lauren: The shrug emoji guy? 

Matt: Well, I mean, listen, it is what it is. I think that it's okay to present all the options. We're clearly very opinionated. Probably me a little more than you. We would probably be remiss if we didn't mention some of these things. And just because we don't particularly support their business ethics or lack thereof and some of the other things, it is what it is. 

Lauren: Right. So the point is that that's kind of an all-in-one built-in tool. 

Matt: Yeah. 

[42:45]

Lauren: But that is not the end all be all. That's not the only way that you can have an audiobook created, produced, and distributed.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: If you are an indie author interested in doing that. 

Matt: That's what I'm trying to understand. Like if I wanted to…our book, that we're writing. 

Lauren: Yes. 

Matt: If we wanted that as an audiobook, which I'm sure you will. How would we go about making that?

Lauren: Well, personally, I think for that one, we should record our own audiobook. 

Matt: Okay.

Lauren: I'm going to regret saying this because it's going to be my job to edit it then. And I'm going to regret that for sure. 

Matt: Very much so. All right. So we know you can make one on Audible through ACX. 

Lauren: Yes. 

Matt: You can do it on Spotify through Findaway, which will also be morphing into some other stuff. 

Lauren: Yes. 

Matt: Okay. There's gotta be other – what if I don't wanna use a big name platform though to make my audiobook? 

Lauren: That is so fine. There are definitely service providers out there that you can hire or that you can contract with. We have a couple listed on our Hire A Pro page on our website, Content Monsta and Pro Audio Voices were two that we had up there. 

Matt: Okay. 

Lauren: You can hire like, an actual production service to help you out with that. You can also use freelance narrators. There are people that are, whether they're freelance voice actors or people that are just freelance audiobook creators, that will kind of do the – 

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren: – whole package where they'll do the narration for you and the editing and all of that for you. I'm linking in the show notes a Dave Chesson article. It is a couple of years old, I think it was 2022.

Matt: He often updates his stuff. 

Lauren: Yeah. I mean, I think that even if it's a couple of years old, the information in it is still relevant and good. He put together a list of indie narrators that he recommends, and then also a list of service providers and platforms and companies that you can hire. So I would check that out. 

Matt: So, you said our book.

Lauren: Yes. 

Matt: You would want us to narrate it. How would we do that? 

Lauren: The same way that you would create any other kind of audio or video content if you wanted to. So if you are writing a book as somebody who is, you're already a podcast host, you're a vlogger –  

Matt: Right. 

Lauren: You're some kind of long form video content creator, you've done a bunch of online courses, you've got the studio, you've got the equipment, you've got all that stuff. You can technically narrate your own audiobook the same way that you would create –  

Matt: But is there software? That's what I'm trying to get at because yeah, I mean, we have microphones and stuff in here and we could, we could do it. But I mean, audiobooks, don't they have like, chapter breaks and all kinds of other things? And I mean, there's gotta be some sort of software or something we would use to do that, right? 

Matt: I'm sure there is for the more specific details like that where it is chapter breaks. But realistically, you could also just produce that the same way that you would produce like… I'm producing an online course where I want to be able to skip through to each chapter of the course. Or I'm producing a podcast and every episode is a new chapter. I mean, one of the things that I saw, one of the resources that I saw as a recommendation for how to edit your own audiobook if you want to do that is Audacity, which is literally the software that we're using right now to record the audio on this episode. And that's a free editing software. 

Matt: Why did you just lead in with that? 

Lauren: I like to overcomplicate everything. I think it's really important for everybody listening. 

Matt: Alright. 

Lauren: I will also say, not for nothing, that while the idea of narrating an audiobook yourself might sound crazy, it can be a great option if you're looking for something cost efficient, but it's also a really great way to make yourself a better writer. One of my favorite editing recommendations is to read your content out loud. I know. 

Matt: Okay. 

Lauren: But. Or, also –

Matt: It makes sense, I mean.  

Lauren: Yeah. It's also a great way to make yourself if you're using a book as an authority building tool. 

Matt: Yeah. That’s fair, yeah. 

Lauren: Doing your own audiobook is a great way of saying, hey, I'm super confident about what it is I'm talking about. I'm adding a little note of authority to this by doing this in my own voice, putting my own voice behind it. It's something that you can use if you're trying, if you're interested in getting into public speaking – 

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren: – or something. 

Matt: That's a good idea. 

Lauren: Yeah. 

Matt: I like that. 

Lauren: So just saying there are some pros and cons to that. For sure. 

[46:45]

Matt: Alright. Here's the elephant in the room. 

Lauren: Oh gosh. Go ahead. 

Matt: What about AI? 

Lauren: AI and digital narration is an option that is becoming more prevalent. 

Matt: Okay. 

Lauren: These days, it is something that not all distribution platforms are open to it right now. So it is something that again, like with what's going on with Spotify and Findaway Voices and everything, there's every chance in the world that three months from when this episode comes out – 

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren: – there will be a different policy in place. But as of right now, Audible does not accept AI narrated audiobooks. 

Matt: Which is wild to me.

Lauren: Yeah, I'm sure there's reasons for that. But Spotify does. They have a partnership with Eleven Labs, which is an AI audio company that isn't specifically an audiobook production company. 

Matt: Right. 

Lauren: They are doing much more than just audiobook production. 

Matt: They actually do some really cool stuff. 

Lauren: Their website was really interesting to dig through. 

Matt: Well they were at London Book Fair and other places we go. So we've been around them a lot over the last couple of years.

Lauren: Yeah. 

Matt: They do some really cool things. 

Lauren: Yeah, they're really interesting, but they are, among other things, a tool that you can use to create an audiobook that is narrated by AI. 

Matt: You don't like this, do you? 

Lauren: No, I don't. No, I don't. 

Matt: How come you don't like it? 

Lauren: I think it's kind of hypocritical for a community of people that are going to sit here and say, I don't want writers replaced with AI. Like, we shouldn't be publishing books written by AI. They should be published by authentic human writers that are writing this. And then I'm going to turn around and say that I'm going to replace authentic human voices with an AI generated voice? That's weird to me. 

Matt: I'm going to play devil's advocate. 

Lauren: Okay go ahead. 

Matt: Just for a minute. The idea that we should not replace humans as writers, creators of content. don't necessarily disagree with. I do believe in, and we've already been experimenting with this personally and, using AI to help you write a book when you're doing it, you know, in various different ways. I think it's great, you know, using AI for productivity stuff like that, like take the stuff off your plate that is just busy work. I guess for me, I don't see it as much of a flagrant violation. If I had already created the content and then I let something like Eleven Labs or an AI tool narrate it for me because maybe I want all of my sections of our upcoming book to be narrated in a Yoda voice. 

Lauren: Sure. 

Matt: And then you have to deal with that. And I certainly can't do the Yoda voice and I can't afford to pay the actual Yoda to narrate my sections of the book.

Lauren: Is that voice actor still alive? Who's the voice of Yoda? 

Matt: Yoda? He's probably very expensive on an hourly rate. So anyways, I don't, you know, I don't know. I know that you and many others probably feel strongly about that, but I don't know. I think it's really cool what AI is doing right now. Or some platforms, I should say, are doing right now with AI and the ability to narrate things like audiobooks and stuff like that. But I recognize that's not for everybody and I recognize there's some strong opinions on both sides of the fence there. But I don't agree with using AI to write your entire book, or whatever, just to put out garbage. But to me if I'm creating content and I've created the content and now the idea of narrating it just sends me to a dark place but I can pay an AI tool to do it for a fraction of the cost of a production studio. Because maybe I don't have that kind of money, by the way. If I wanted to get an audiobook right now, narrated, edited down, put into the proper formatting and file that I needed, you know, that could cost anywhere from $1,000, $1,200 to $20,000. Like, I don't, not everybody has that kind of money, so. 

Lauren: And that's, that is so fair and, you know, I think that's one of the great things about the technology evolution that we've seen, is making things more accessible to the average consumer or the average creator or whatever. I also just, I know a little bit too much about the industry standard and like, traditional publishing and traditional audiobook creation. Audiobook narrators already kind of get the short end of the stick. The industry practice for audiobook creation right now is that an audiobook narrator gets paid a one-time fee for doing their voice recording and that's it. If you get – if somebody narrates a book that winds up selling a million copies, they're not getting royalties off of the audiobook. Their content that they created, the audiobook could be the best-selling audiobook of all time and that narrator is not seeing a penny more – 

Matt: I understand. 

Lauren: – than if it sold two copies. 

Matt: I think there's a lot of arguments there too, and now you're going off on a different tangent. Lauren: That's fair. 

Matt: Which, maybe there should be a whole episode dedicated to the various different types of royalties involved in the publishing industry. 

Lauren: Wow. 

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren: Okay. 

Matt: I don't want to go down that path because I have some strong opinions there too, but I don't personally know any audiobook narrators so I can't really speak on it without potentially offending some that may or may not be listening to this. 

Lauren: That is fair. 

Matt: You know, again, that's not what we're here for.

Lauren: That’s – that's fine. I will plug, in this moment, that if that is something that you're interested in learning more about the the narrator that I said earlier, Julia Whelan, who is one of my favorites. She actually launched her own audiobook platform called Audiobrary that is her like, mission behind it. To find a more equitable royalty split between narrators and authors and publishers. So she talks a lot about that. She's a big advocate for that. So if you're interested in learning more about that, check that out. Also, if you are a fan of audiobooks and you've somehow not listened to any of Julia Whelan’s work, highly recommend. She's a phenomenal audiobook narrator. More importantly, I am mortified at myself for not realizing I knew…I like, I know that I knew this. Famously Yoda is voiced by Frank Oz. And I am a terrible, terrible Muppets fan for not being able to recall that off the top, and I will – that will live rent-free in my brain for a little while, I think. 

Matt: I'm a Muppets fan and I didn't know that so, whatever. I'm not gonna lose sleep. 

Lauren: But you're also not really a Star Wars fan that much, are you? 

Matt: Oh, I am. 

Lauren: Are you? 

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren: Just the older stuff, not the newer ones?

Matt: That's right. 

Lauren: Okay. That's – 

Matt: I mean, I like some of the new stuff, too, but by the time that stuff started coming around I was too old to really get... 

Lauren: That’s fair. 

Matt: Anyways. 

Lauren: Okay.

Matt: Yup. 

[52:58]

Lauren: Anyway. Sorry to the incredible legacy. 

Matt: You realize, look - 

Lauren: I know. 

Matt: 75 minutes on the clock right now. 

Lauren: I know. On audiobooks. 

Matt: On audiobooks.  

Lauren: I know. 

Matt: Ew, dude. Come on, let's wrap this thing up. 

Lauren: I'm ready to go. I think I've covered everything that I've wanted to cover here. Do you have any other questions? 

Matt: No. 

Lauren: Anything that is unclear? 

Matt: I don’t. No.

Lauren: Are you never going to do another audiobook episode again? 

Matt: No. I’m not. 

Lauren: Okay. Well then it was worth all 75 minutes. I had to get it all out in one episode. Are you really going to make us record an audiobook for our own book when we're done writing it? 

Matt: Oh, I don't know. That's up to you. 

Lauren: Interested in, in the audience weighing in on that one. Could be great. Could be terrible. 

Matt: I've got a pretty strong inkling that they hear our voices enough. 

Lauren: I mean, personally, yeah, 

Matt: They don’t need to hear us reading our own book. 

Lauren: I mean, sometimes it is cool. I, you know, I said My Favorite Murder earlier, prolific podcast, obviously, but they co-wrote a book together and they do their own audiobook for it. And it's great. 

Matt: I want our audiobook to be read by Muppets. 

Lauren: Okay. 

Matt: Which Muppet is going to represent your chapters?

Lauren: Gonzo. 

Matt: Damn. That's okay. No, you know what? I'll take what's his name? The prawn. Pepe. 

Lauren: Oh.

Matt: Is that it? Pepe? 

Lauren: Yeah, Pepe. 

Matt: I love that dude. 

Lauren: You know, we could we could go, like – 

Matt: He was the one in Muppet Haunted Mansion. 

Lauren: Yeah, he's great. 

Matt: Yeah. 

Lauren: And like, I always loved Rizzo and I was kind of – 

Matt: Rizzo’s good.

Lauren: – kind of bummed when they started replacing Rizzo with Pepe. So our audiobook could be Rizzo and Pepe. 

Matt: Oh, okay. 

Lauren: Yeah. 

Matt: See, now the only way this is going to happen, by the way, is probably through using an AI tool.

Lauren: No. 

Matt: Yeah. We're not going to clear licensing from the Jim Henson Foundation or Disney. 

Lauren: I know. 

Matt: So. Look, now we're almost at eighty minutes. 

Lauren: All right. We'll circle back on this. If anyone has any advice or input one way or another, feel free to chime in. You can email us at podcast@lulu.com with your thoughts…and prayers, maybe, for whatever's going on there. Or you can leave us comments on Lulu's social media, or on our YouTube channel. Of course, you can talk to us about anything unrelated to this podcast episode as well, or unrelated to audiobooks. If you have any questions about anything else, any other topics you want us to explore, anything else you might be interested in, let us know. Leave us a comment. Leave us a review. Like and subscribe. I don’t think I've said that recently. Like and subscribe. 

Matt: No. 

Lauren: Thanks for listening. We'll be back next week – actually, Matt won't be in next week's episode. 

Matt: Why? 

Lauren: We have another guest on next week. 

Matt: We do? Who? 

Lauren: Paul. 

Matt: When did you record that? 

Lauren: Tomorrow. 

Matt: Oh. 

Lauren: So you'll have to tune in next week, including Matt. You'll have to tune in next week to find out what we're talking about tomorrow. Thanks for listening, everyone.