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Welcome to Stuff I Learned Yesterday. My name is Darrell Darnell, The Venetian is my favorite Las Vegas hotel, and I believe that if you aren’t learning, you aren’t living.
My wife and I love the movie National Treasure starring Nicolas Cage and Diane Kruger. It’s such a fun action adventure film. The characters are wonderfully cast and have great chemistry, the villains are intriguing, and the story has the perfect blend of conspiracy theory, legend, history, and suspense.
The film came out over 20 years ago so chances are you’ve seen it, but if you haven’t, I’m about to spoil some of it.
The story centers on Cage’s character, Benjamin Franklin Gates. His family has passed down a legend of a secret vault of treasure hidden by our country’s founding fathers who were freemasons. He’s on a quest to find the treasure and rescue the family’s name which has been disrespected and dismissed due to no one else believing their story about the treasure.
His adventure takes him to the Arctic Circle, where he finds a clue that leads him to believe there’s a hidden map on the back of the Declaration of Independence. That leads him on a series of clues that take him to Washington DC, Philadelphia, New York City, and Boston.
While in New York, the film reaches its climax and they find themselves deep below the bustling streets above in a large hidden shaft. After traversing the deteriorated and crumbling shaft, they find a room hidden for decades, perhaps even centuries. It’s the vault containing the treasure. Well, it’s empty, so technically it’s the vault that once held the treasure.
The villain of the film traps them in the vault and abandons them. Left alone, they stand there in despair having followed every clue and overcome extraordinary difficulty, only to wind up empty handed and abandoned. They have nothing to show for their effort.
That’s a feeling I can identify with. In previous episodes I’ve shared stories about my journey as an entrepreneur. I quit my corporate job in May of 2013 to start my own business where I provide support services for podcasters.
Just over a year later my biggest client ceased operations and I was left scrambling trying to make ends meet. By the end of 2014 my savings account was empty and I was wondering if I would make it or not.
Fortunately, I’d made some changes to my marketing late in 2014, and those changes had resulted in some new clients. At the end of the first quarter of 2015 things were certainly looking up, but finances were still very tight and the future quite uncertain.
In 2012 I spoke at my first conference which was Blogworld in New York City. In 2013 Blogword rebranded to New Media Expo and relocated to Las Vegas. Both Blogworld 2013 and 2014 would both see me returning as a speaker to help others grow their podcast audience.
But 2015 was different. The podcast track had a new director and I was not asked to speak. Since finances were tight, I’d chosen to not attend New Media Expo that year.
That changed when the finalists for that year’s People’s Choice Podcast Awards were announced. Three of my podcasts were finalists, so Kari and I both agreed that meant I should attend. I booked a room at the cheapest hotel within walking distance, found the cheapest flight out of OKC, and headed off to Vegas.
That year’s event turned out to be quite memorable for a variety of reasons. First, that year New Media Expo partnered with the National Association of Broadcasters to be held in conjunction with one another. While this could have been a great partnership, neither conference’s attendees were happy about the collaboration.
On the NAB side, their attendees saw podcasters as amateur hacks and wannabes. That is, podcasters wanted to be radio broadcasters but could never make it out of their basement. So they weren’t very inviting of us being in their space.
NAB chose to but all the podcast vendors in one corner of the conference hall, away from the main areas. For our sessions, NAB chose to move us slightly off site. Instead of using one of the many conference rooms available at the Las Vegas Convention Center, they put our sessions in a hotel across the street. That hotel was undergoing renovations. That meant half the elevators weren’t working and some of our rooms were way too small and had no air conditioning.
All of this built up hostility among the podcasters. We’d been excited to be a part of a bigger event, but the overall treatment of our portion of it left us feeling like neither NMX nor NAB actually cared about us. It’s no surprise that that ended up being the final year of NMX.
But what that conference lacked in execution, it made up for in other areas. I’ve long felt that the best part of going to conferences is the people you meet and spend time with, and that year’s conference is a big reason why I believe that.
I can’t tell you how many conversations I’ve had with people about NMX 2015. Nearly every conversation I have about it includes someone declaring, “That was the best event ever!” Why?
Here’s what I learned.
I mentioned that I was attending that conference on a threadbare budget just so I could be in attendance in case one of my podcasts won an award. This very podcast was a finalist in the General category, but Internet Box won. Arrowsquad was a finalist in the Best Produced Category, but Radiolab won. The Blacklist Exposed was a finalist in the Entertainment category, but my friend Rob Cesternino won that with Rob Has a Podcast.
So clearly the outcome of the podcast awards is not what made it the best conference ever.
What made that conference great was the people I hung out with and the support we provided each other. So many of us at that time had just started a podcast or new business, were struggling to make ends meet, and wondering if we would survive.
Before we arrived in Vegas, my friend Jared and I arranged to meet for breakfast. I was so discouraged and uncertain going into that meeting, and I was hopeful he could provide me with some insight. As it turned out, he was feeling the same way about his recent career move and was looking for the same from me.
What was interesting is that we each had blind spots and didn’t know it. I saw things in him and his business decisions that I thought were incredibly encouraging, and he saw the same for me. We each left the restaurant feeling encouraged and hopeful. We took a picture outside the restaurant and each year when it shows up in my Facebook feed it serves as a reminder of not only that amazing conversation, but as encouragement of unseen possibliities.
That summer I attended another conference and set up a vendor booth for my business for the first time. As a result, business exploded and all the predictions Jared made came true. Likewise, Jared’s business venture turned out to be perfectly timed and his company became the leader in his space.
But it wasn’t just us. Like I said, I’ve had conversations with many people about that conference. So I reached out to a few of them to get their take on it. Here’s some of what they had to say.
Jen from Congressional Dish said that when the conference fell apart the way it did, it brought us podcasters together as a tighter community. At that point, she wasn’t making money from her podcast and wasn’t sure if she would make it as a podcaster. She told me, “But after that event, I decided to stick with my show despite the lack of money because it wasn’t just me and I wasn’t alone. New Media Expo made a difference because it wasn’t just networking, it was more important than that because the people that we went to New Media Expo with remain my pod besties to this day.”
My friend Troy mentioned those pod besties too. Troy mentioned Jen, and he also mentioned guys like Brian Kane, Jason Bryant, and Nick Suberling. Troy said, “All of us were sitting on the brink of breaking out and all of us sharing our stories to that point really made an impact on each other and we celebrated each other’s successes. Nick hitting it big with Cincinnati Soccer Talk as the club moved into town, Jen – crushing it with appearances on CSPAN and covering all things politics, Jason Bryant – announcing at the Summer Olympics and our show The Blacklist Exposed integrated into the NBC property forever on the S4 and S6 DVD extras.”
What a statement from Troy. Did you catch that? Jen just said she was convinced to keep going with her podcast because of that event. Now she’s been featured on CSPAN I don’t know how many times and was even in their media booth last year doing live coverage of the national conventions.
Nick’s podcast boomed as he went all-in on his local soccer club. Jason Bryant not only has a golden voice, but he knows all things related to Freestyle and Greco-Roman wrestling. The very next year he was invited to be the in-arena announcer at the Rio Olympics and has since done the Tokyo and Paris Olympics too.
Troy’s own podcast, The Blacklist Exposed took off and got embraced by the talent creating the show. They did several collaborations with the show runners and cast, breaking news on behalf of the show, and even being included in the DVD extras of the show.
Not only that, but because of Arrowcast, Brian got invited to be the emcee and moderator for the Heroes and Villains conventions. That not only gave him the chance to interview and interact with many of the actors from his favorite shows, but it gave him even more opportunities to meet listeners from his podcast and interact with them face to face.
One other moment that often gets brought up is the last night we had together. Right across the street from the convention center was the Riviera Hotel. At that time, the Riviera had been sold and was set to close within days. Our night there may have even been the last night it was open. I definitely remember the staff was super chill because they were about to all be unemployed.
We all crammed into a booth, ate, told stories, laughed, and made memories. Pod besties for sure.
The Riviera and NMX may have each gone down in a flume of dirt and debris, but that wasn’t the fate destined for all of us. We were all on the cusp of a breakthrough and we had no idea.
And that was the case for Benjamin Franklin Gates too. As he and his friends stood there in that empty vault, he knew there must be another way out, a path he’d been blind to. Suddenly he noticed something. Taking an artifact from his pocket that he’d found in the arctic circle, he placed it in an odd shaped cutout in the wall. An unseen door suddenly opened and the true vault was revealed! They discovered far more treasure than they ever imagined and his family’s good name was restored.
Have my friends and I each enjoyed a blissful journey since those days in Vegas? Absolutely not. Every one of us has since experienced very low lows and very high highs.
But the lesson for today is this: Surround yourself with a group of friends that will encourage you, stick with you, help you see your blind spots, and give you that necessary encouragement on those hardest of days. Otherwise, you might give up when all your dreams are just outside your grasp accessible via a path you’ve just not yet seen.
I’m Darrell Darnell, and this has been Stuff I Learned Yesterday.
I want you to be a part of the next Monday Mailbag on June 30th! Monday Mailbag is your opportunity to Share what YOU’VE learned, so that other listeners and I can learn from YOU. It can be a message as short as 30 seconds or several minutes long. It really doesn’t matter just as long as it’s something that will benefit others. You can send in questions or responses to my SILY episodes, and I’ll respond to them via Monday Mailbag episodes. You can participate in Monday Mailbags by visiting the Golden Spiral Media listener feedback page.