The Power of Informal Conversations: Pilot Season 2024
We’ve just launched our second Pilot Season, a campaign featuring five independently produced podcast pilots sans a commissioning brief. Collaboration drives this year’s Pilot Season. 2023’s inaugural campaign was Unedited’s response to the industry’s commissioning slowdown. I created a vehicle for our own audio pilots to generate intellectual property and prove our concepts. Competition in a saturated market meant doing more than a 500-word submission for ideas to stand out.
As an idea, Pilot Season came to me following a trip to Los Angeles in 2022. I had arranged to meet production companies and streaming platform heads. Armed with a deck of 23 ideas, I quickly discovered:
The commissioning process in the UK, primarily driven by the BBC, often requires high research/low output to shift through the thousands of applications for the limited commissioned hours. Production companies can spend hours preparing a concept that stands up as a feasible and repeatable strand. Then, they have to reduce it to a short synopsis, which, if unsuccessful, might never see the light of day again. This truncation of masses of pre-work also means that ideas might only be thoroughly tested for viability once commissioned. By then, it’s often too late to make the business side of content sales work.
So, in 2023, with a stack of uncommissioned favourite ideas, I worked with Christopher Mitchell to devise a showcase of four (we lost one in the process) that we could pilot as a proof of concept. The ambition mirrors the US TV industry’s Pilot Season—where original ideas get shared, showcased, and sold to create some of the most enduring programmes on our screens. It also helped that we had Patrick Younge and Maxine Watson on board to help accelerate some of their ideas ‘flip’ to TV.
For the second year of Pilot Season, I knew I wanted to build on the ambition of the first year. But what truly set this year apart was the power of informal conversations. We found an antidote in ordinary, organic exchanges in an audio industry often marked by high-level, highly negotiated collaborations.
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The standout aspect of this year’s Pilot Season is our collaboration with ACAST, Breaking Atoms, Kingtown, Mags Creative, and Reduced Listening, each bringing something different to the campaign. What made this partnership special was not a grand strategy meeting or a meticulously planned negotiation. Instead, a series of frank, casual, low-pressure conversations established the collaboration.
It began with Hannah Russell of Mags Creative , who leaned over while we were on a City St George’s, University of London panel and whispered, ‘Love that Pilot Season. I wish we had done that.’? Her acknowledgement struck me. See, I always wanted Pilot Season to be an industry-wide moment, similar to the TV version. But more than being an ally for Pilot Season, Hannah had inspired the mandate for collaboration.
Similarly, an incredibly cathartic conversation with Joby Waldman at Reduced Listening was indeed my most affirming conversation of 2023. Our discussions were more chats over coffee than boardroom meetings. We discussed our shared passion for audio, challenges, and dreams for a more entrepreneurial audio industry. These conversations were free-flowing and unrestricted by the usual formalities that can often act as barriers. It was the same with Lizzy Pollott from Acast . Undoubtedly, the campaign needed a platform to distribute and monetise it properly - even if these were single-episode pilots. Thank you.
Like in 2023, we embraced spontaneity and openness, allowing ideas to emerge naturally. This method fostered a sense of genuine collaboration, where everyone felt comfortable sharing their thoughts and contributing creatively. In the end, we were able to pull in some funds from Content is Queen ’s microgrant scheme powered by Audible UK. Together, we have created another showcase of genuinely interesting podcast pilot shows that might never have gone further than our internal folders without a unifying moment like Pilot Season.
In an industry where collaborating can seem like a high-stakes venture, our experience with Pilot Season this year was refreshingly different. It proved that the best ideas and partnerships sometimes come from simply talking, sharing, and being open to new possibilities without the pressure of formalities [link to last month’s article]. This sentiment echoes in the responses to our panel at The Podcast Show last month, where we previewed some of the shows. There is an appetite for collaboration. Let’s see who joins us next year.
I am proud of what we’ve created together for the second launch of Pilot Season. It’s a testament to the power of informal conversations and the magic that can happen when we lower the barriers and let creativity flow freely. I am excited for you to experience this year’s season and hope it inspires more collaborations - for creators and commissioners. Thanks to the team at Unedited: , Chloe Straw at AudioUK , Brett Spencer and The Podcast Show .