Popular industry podcasts join forces

Business of Betting and The Betting Startups Podcast partner up to increase coverage of the real-money gaming industry

Author

Betting Startups
December 11, 2023

The backstory

The Business of Betting Podcast is one of the longest running podcasts covering the betting industry - not to mention one of the most popular ones.

Launched in 2017 by Jake Williams, Business of Betting (“BoB”) featured guests from all corners of the industry. This included bettors themselves, many of whom were professionals that shared their expertise with Jake.

The show quickly built a loyal audience of people that were eager to learn more about the industry from people on both sides of the counter. Jake hosted and produced 170 episodes over 4 years, keeping close to a weekly publishing schedule throughout that time.

In 2021, life (and work!) got busy for Jake as he took on a senior role with PointsBet USA, where he currently remains as Chief Operating Officer.

Understandably, maintaining a weekly podcast became a challenge, and BoB ceased production after four strong years.

Enter Jason Trost, CEO of betting exchange Smarkets.

Bringing back BoB

As an avid listener of BoB himself, Jason couldn’t help but notice that the podcast had abruptly gone dark. That’s when he saw a window open:

Jake and I just sort of talked as friends, and we'd see each other at a conference, and I look forward to listening to the podcast every week.

And, you know, there's a huge break and I saw him in, I think it was New Jersey, SBC or something. And, uh, I said, “what's going on?”

He said, '“I just had to hang it up. It's too, it's too much conflict with my work.”

And kind of on a lark, I said, well, I'll take it over. And he said, oh, go for it.

And just like that, BoB was back on the airwaves! Jason revived BoB in May 2022, just over a full year after Jake retired his mic.

Naturally, Jason’s first episode as host featured Jake himself as the guest, who told the full story in episode 171.

Since May 2022, Jason has hosted 20+ episodes of BoB, featuring an impressive guest list of senior executives, investors, and entrepreneurs.

But after taking over BoB, Jason discovered the cold reality about podcasting: it’s a lot of work.

Despite his best intentions to keep the output consistent, he had a difficult time finding the 4-6 hours per week needed to keep the show moving. After all, he has a full-time job leading one of the world’s largest betting exchanges.

A podcast partnership is born

Like Jason, we have long been fans of BoB dating back to when Jake launched it. And since Jason took it over, we’ve enjoyed every episode he’s produced.

But as fans of BoB, we selfishly wanted more than what Jason was putting out.

We can deeply empathize with Jason’s challenge of maintaining a weekly publishing schedule, which we have done for the last 2+ years since launching The Betting Startups Podcast.

That led to an “aha” moment early this fall: what if we helped Jason with the boring stuff so he can get back to weekly episodes?

We met in October at G2E to spitball on the idea, and in the following weeks, figured out the details and came to an agreement.

We’re pumped to announce that BoB and The Betting Startups Podcast are officially joining forces to produce weekly episodes of BoB!

Looking ahead

With this new partnership, The Business of Betting Podcast will be returning to a predictable weekly publishing schedule.

New episodes will be released every Friday, so incorporate it into your pre-weekend routine!

👉 Want to be a guest on a future episode of BoB?

Jason is looking to speak with the movers and the shakers of the real-money gaming industry. Potential guests are hereby invited to submit their interest here.

👉 Do you have suggestions for a future guest?

Tweet at us over at @bettingpod

👉 Do you have other ideas for us? We’re open to ‘em all.

Shoot us an email: businessofbetting [at] gmail.com

Where to listen

Check out The Business of Betting Podcast on:

🟢 Spotify

📺 YouTube