Diary of a CEO shouldn't be this popular

Wrong

>> worked. Weird.

>> Anyways,

>> angry

>> problem stamina.

>> Bad.

>> Nope. Extinction.

>> Diary of the CEO is a weird show. The

thumbnails are often pretty trashy.

They're lying. They want us to be sick.

If a nuke drops, here's what happens. A

lemon will fix your erections. But the

interviews are actually very

sophisticated, even life-changing. The

topics are all over the place. financial

advice, societal collapse, foot health,

sugar consumption, celebrities. But they

consistently bring in millions of views,

not just once a week, but twice a week.

To get over 14 million subscribers and a

billion views on YouTube alone, Diary of

the CEO has to be doing a lot of things

right.

>> So many people copy our thumbnails now,

for example, cuz they think that must be

it. So many people copy the trailers,

they think that must be it. But it's not

that.

>> Question is, what is it then? [music]

For the last month, I went down a rabbit

hole to try to answer that question and

break down the invisible machine behind

the show. [music] And what I discovered

is that what makes this podcast one of

the best in the world isn't what you

see, it's what you don't.

A lot of people think Diary of the CEO

succeeded because Steven Bartlett was

rich and he was famous. Cuz I mean, he

was rich and he was pretty famous.

Founder of a marketing empire that's

become one of the world's most

influential social media companies is

the den's youngest ever dragon, Steven

Bartlett.

>> But then I found something that pretty

much proved this wrong. Kim Kardashian

launched a new criminal justice reform

podcast this week.

>> The Duke and Duchess of Sussex have

joined forces with Spotify.

>> Addison Rage launched a podcast

exclusively on Spotify. Former President

Barack Obama teaming up with one of

America's biggest rock stars for a new

podcast.

>> From 2018 to 2021, Spotify bet the farm

on the idea that famous people equals

successful podcasters. They poured

hundreds of millions of dollars into

deals with celebrities. But that bet did

not pay off.

>> Harry and Megan's estimated $25 million

podcast deal canled after less than a

year.

>> The Obama's production company is moving

to Audible after a three-year run with

Spotify. So, while being rich and famous

helps with I mean it helps with

everything, it doesn't explain how

Steven was able to rise to the top of

the podcast mountain. So, I decided to

go back to the very beginning to the

fall of 2017 when Steven records his

first ever podcast.

>> The first five episodes weren't really

the show you hear today.

>> Every Sunday, I'm going to share my

personal diary with you, and I want to

give you an insight into what it's like

behind the scenes being an entrepreneur.

But that didn't last long. Around 6,

Steven started interviewing people. And

so I went back and I actually listened

to those early stripped down episodes

before he had the fancy gear and famous

guests and huge team. And what I found

surprised me because even back then,

Steven was actually a pretty good

interviewer. He didn't commit any of the

usual mistakes that beginners make, like

talking too much about himself or asking

questions just to sound smart. But there

was one thing that he got way better at.

First though, let's look at what kind of

interviewer Steven actually is. Roughly

speaking, there are three types of

interviewers.

>> Hey there. Welcome to Conor O'Brien

Needs a Friend.

>> Welcome. Welcome to Armchair Expert. I'm

Dax Shepard.

>> Yeah.

>> The friend interviewer puts their guest

at ease and it feels like a hangout.

Then you have the second type.

>> Bradley Pets. Thanks for joining me.

>> It's my pleasure.

>> I'm quite picky, so I wouldn't have

asked you if I wasn't in love with you.

Here we are at Neptune Records waiting

for Tyler the creator.

>> The weirdo interviewer cuts through the

usual boring celebrity talking points.

It's hard to act normal when the person

interviewing you isn't normal. In both

cases, the interviewer is part of the

show. The friend talks a lot. Joe Rogan

will jump in with

>> I don't remember what happened, but she

started throwing punches at me and I'm

like, what the

>> with the weirdo interviewer, the guest

can be almost boring because the

interviewer is the entertainment. I feel

like there's quite fiery energy between

us. [laughter]

>> Oh no, don't get

>> But Steven Bartlett doesn't belong to

either category. He falls into a third

type. Part of a long tradition of

interviewers like Larry King or James

Lipton, the invisible interviewer.

>> How did that happen? Why do they hang

around?

>> Okay, that's a pretty good question. I

guess

>> when the spaceship lands, how do they

communicate?

>> That's a very good question. I like

that.

>> This type of interviewer is a magic

trick. When it's done really well, all

you see is the guest. Under the surface,

though, there's a lot going on. So,

let's get into that.

>> When you listen to Steven's interviews

with celebrities these days, his opening

is almost always the same.

>> Louie, to understand you, what is the

earliest context that I need? Trevor,

what are the most important things that

I need to understand about your earliest

years? For you to be the way that you

are, there must be some kind of early

context.

>> So, this doesn't seem that remarkable.

It's a pretty obvious starting point,

but look at how he used to ask this

question. This is the transcript from

one of Steven's early interviews before

he was even on YouTube. Look at how long

it takes him to ask the first question.

>> Tom, thank you so much for inviting us

into

your content as well is hugely

inspiring.

Inspiration and knowledge.

So, my question, I guess it where did

you come from?

>> It takes him 44 seconds just to get that

question out. Now, it only takes them 5

seconds. But that's not the only

difference. If you ever listen to some

of the great Invisible interviewers,

it's not just how tight their questions

are, it's also the focus. Remember the

question Stephen asked?

>> Where did you come from?

>> Listen to how confused his guest is by

that question. [sighs]

>> Where did I come from? Well, I grew up

in Tacoma, Washington.

>> Um, so

>> respectfully, nobody cares about that.

And so, Steven changed the question so

that it nudges people into a more

interesting answer. What do I need to

know about your earliest context to

understand you now?

[singing]

All right, so the questions got tighter.

They got better. But there's another key

to the invisible interviewer.

>> Research, research, research, research,

study, study, study, study.

>> Research has always been a huge part of

any interview. The more you know about a

person, the more interesting answers you

get. Even Joe Rogan, who is probably one

of the chillest interviewers, still does

a lot of research. If I have uh an

important subject and I don't understand

it too much, I'll read someone's book,

watch documentary. I love things like

the UFO subjects because I don't have to

do any preparation.

>> But the king of research has to be

>> guns Garcia.

>> Yo, he know too much.

>> Narwir, HOW

>> HOW THE [ __ ] do you know that?

>> Wow. How the [ __ ] do you know about

>> Yeah, how do you know?

>> You got a hell of a research, bro. So,

let's look at how Diary of a CEO does

their research. One way to understand

what makes the show special is to listen

to other interviews their guests did.

Take this mafia boss. He'd been

interviewed dozens of times before he

went on Diary of a CEO. His most popular

interview was probably this one on

BuzzFeed. And the most viral moment in

that video,

>> never have I ever killed someone. Oh

boy.

>> It was the most watched, most commented

on. But the answer he gives is honestly

pretty lame and generic.

>> I will tell you this, that life is a

very violent life. Murder in that life

was taken very seriously.

>> I'm pretty sure we all know that murder

is taken seriously in mob life. I mean,

I've seen movies. So, people were

interested in the topic, but the

interview didn't really deliver. And so,

when Steven interviews him, he makes

sure to ask him three probing questions

just to try to get him to talk as much

as possible about that moment that he

knows people are interested in.

>> You've never talked about having to kill

someone, have you?

>> No.

>> Why is that? It's just not a subject I

care to get into. You know,

>> when I when I read that, I thought maybe

it's because there's some might be legal

retribution, but I wondered why.

>> It's honestly totally worth watching. I

mean, at one point he says,

>> "I don't have immunity for anything that

I've done in the past."

>> I'm just going to say that definitely

means he didn't not not do it. So,

that's one way that Diary of a CEO makes

sure their guest gives interesting

answers by watching the other interviews

and mining them for greatest hits.

>> I was thinking about Lewis House and you

had a conversation with him. is

something that I've heard you talk about

before. I've heard you say before that

the most important the things I heard

you talk about are I heard you talk

about this sort of

>> and that's the second technique Stephen

uses as the invisible interviewer. I

kind of think of it as the rock concert

technique because he's basically

figuring out what the guest's greatest

hits are and then structuring the

interview so they can play those

answers. But even the best answers don't

matter if people click away. And that's

where retention comes in.

There's a lot of complicated theories

out there about retention, but if you

just replace retention with attention,

you'd understand more than 99% of

people. What I noticed about Diary of a

CEO is that even if I wasn't that

interested in the topic or the guest,

I'd pay attention to most of the 2-hour

long episode. But when I listened to a

lot of other podcasts, sometimes I'd

find myself zoning out. And it wasn't

until I actually watched a Diary of a

CEO episode that I understood what was

going on. This is what the chapters look

like for an average episode. probably

doesn't look that significant until you

compare it to what other podcasts look

like. Lewis House averages five minutes

per chapter. My First Million clocks in

around four. Chris Williamson is

averaging 10 minutes per chapter. But

Diary of a CEO is averaging 2 minutes

per idea. And that's the third technique

Steven's using as an invisible

interviewer. Without anyone realizing

it, he's subtly moving people along the

breadcrumb trail of ideas.

>> Say I was trying to sell you something.

What is it that you think you know that

the average person doesn't know about?

If you have a system or a framework,

>> 2 minutes per idea means that each

section is close to the length of a

YouTube short. So, people aren't really

watching a 2-hour interview. They're

watching a playlist of carefully chosen,

carefully paced clips.

Those are just some of the techniques

that Steven Bartlett uses to make Diary

of a CEO one of the most listened to

podcasts [music] in the world. But

here's the thing. As good as Steven's

interviews are, [music] and they are

really good, it doesn't matter if nobody

knows about them. And that's when I

stumbled upon one of the weirdest parts

about Diary of the CEO. Over the years,

[music] Steven has had some pretty

famous guests on.

>> Oh boy,

>> I know a scam when I see one.

>> Fun question.

>> But one night, I started looking at

their top 10 most popular episodes, and

I realized something. Almost none of

them are the famous guests. These videos

all got tens of millions of views. Yet,

it's one of the most random collections

of people I've seen in a while. I mean,

look at this guy. I've never heard of

him before. Yet, he got more views than

the world's biggest YouTube star, one of

the most famous actors, and the highest

paid comedian all put together. So, the

question is, how is Diary of a CEO

convincing millions of people to click

on someone they'd never heard of before?

This is obviously pretty far down the

rabbit hole, but if you're interested in

it, I put together what I figured out

about their thumbnails in a PDF below.

For something totally different, watch

this. For something similar, click on

this.