All the Hacks Update and Plans for 2022
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Hello and welcome to All The Hacks, which is normally a podcast about upgrading your life, money, and travel, where I chat with an incredible guest to learn as many hacks as I can. However, today is an episode all about the podcast itself, and a look at my plans for the show in the coming year and beyond, as well as a recap of some of what I took away from the survey that so many of you graciously filled out.

I actually thought about doing this episode as a short clip at the beginning of a regular episode, but I realized I had so many things to share that I wanted to put it out separately and be able to cover it all. So let's get into it. First of all, thank you so much to everyone who filled out the survey. I can't explain how helpful it is for me to hear what you all are thinking, especially because it's so hard to learn anything on a one-way channel like a podcast.

That said, I do read every email that comes to chris at allthehacks.com and I try to respond to all of them. So please keep those coming. As for the winner of the free flight, I'm going to do a random drawing this Friday and we'll share who wins on next week's episode. All right. So first of all, I want to share one of the most interesting things I learned from the survey.

I asked what everyone's favorite episode was, and I assumed people would all gravitate towards the same two to three episodes, and there'd be plenty that didn't make the list. But that wasn't the case at all. In fact, there wasn't a single one of the 40 episodes I've done that wasn't at least one person's favorite, which was so cool to see.

While the votes were distributed across the whole catalog, there were a few episodes that made it to the top. So whether you're new here or just curious, the top five were number 32 about health hacks and NFTs with Kevin Rose. Number 27 about travel hacks with the points guy, Brian Kelly.

Number one, also about travel hacks with Lee Rowan. Number three, about credit card points and miles with Alex Miller. And number 19 with Andy Ratcliffe about investing. The listener Q&A episodes number 20 and 33 also ranked really high. So I'll link to all of them in the show notes. Or you can just go to allthehacks.com slash the episode number if you want to find them more quickly.

All right. So despite that some listeners seem to love every topic I've done on the show, there were two big topics that rose to the top. And I'm definitely going to try to have more regular episodes on. Number one, travel, credit card points, miles. And number two, money, personal finance, and investing. That doesn't mean I'm going to stop talking to people about productivity hacks or health hacks or life hacks. But you should definitely see these two topics more regularly.

One thing I didn't get from the survey are the specific, let's call them subtopics you're interested in within travel, personal finance, investing, or credit card points and miles. So if there's anything specific you want me to touch on or find a guest for, just shoot me a quick email. Even if it's just a blank email with the topic and the subject, I would love to know.

And speaking of email, if you have any negative feedback on the show, please go ahead and email me. I'm saying this in response to a review on Apple Podcasts.

They had some feedback about how I've focused less recently on the original travel money aspect of the show. And if they're listening, I really appreciate hearing your feedback. And as I said, I'm already planning on making changes as a result of it. However, a one-star rating and review definitely hurts the show in search rankings, with sponsors, and if we're up for any podcast awards. So first off, if you have feedback, feel free to share it with me first. And if you're still disappointed, by all means, leave your negative review.

To the 221 of you who took the survey and said you haven't left a rating or review in the Apple Podcast app or on Spotify, but that you would, right now would be an amazing time to do that. And I would really appreciate it.

Okay. So another survey question was about me doing some solo episodes. Somehow in my mind, writing a 3,000 word newsletter with everything I've learned and researched about a topic made so much sense. But on the podcast, I feel like I needed a guest for everything. So I still want to focus the show on interviewing incredible people because after all, the reason I started all the hacks is that I wanted to go out there and learn from all these amazing people myself.

However, there are some topics where I'm the expert or maybe I've done enough research to at least feel like one where I might just do a solo episode and put it in the feed and talk about something I think you all will find really interesting. And speaking of the newsletter, it was eye-opening to realize that many of the podcast listeners don't subscribe to the newsletter and many of the newsletter readers don't listen to the podcast.

In many cases, they just didn't know it existed. But for a lot of people, it was just that they prefer one type of content over the other. Well, I didn't realize that. And I've been writing some great newsletter content that's never made its way to the podcast and vice versa. So the best way not to miss anything is to obviously just subscribe to both of them.

but I'm also thinking about ways to make sure the best content from each platform finds its way to the other platform as well, so stay tuned. And if you're not subscribed to the newsletter yet, you can do that at allthehacks.com slash email. Okay, a few other quick things. First, I've been recording video of almost every single episode, so for anyone who's interested in seeing what these interviews actually look like, I'll be putting all of them on YouTube as soon as I can get them all edited.

Number two, I'm going to start experimenting with asking every guest for some of their best local recommendations and hacks from wherever they live now or have lived to add a bit more good travel content to each episode. Three, thank you for all the great podcast and newsletter recommendations. I have such a long list of things to check out.

Four, I'm going to set up an online community where you guys can join me. And the feedback was split almost perfectly down the middle between doing it as a Facebook group or on Discord. So stay tuned on which one of those platforms I choose, or maybe I'll find one that's better than both.

Five, I was surprised and honestly a bit excited to see that so many people were interested in live events. So I'm going to think about what that looks like. But fun fact, Amy and I are expecting our second child this June. So live events might not happen until the end of the year or next year at the earliest. Okay, finally, I want to talk about sponsors and subscriptions. I really hope I didn't scare any of you off asking questions about charging a subscription to the podcast.

In fact, I only asked because I had a few conversations with people who told me they actually prefer to pay a monthly fee for an ad-free version of the show than listen to a show with ads. And I just wanted to see how large that group of people was within this audience.

Well, now I can tell you it is not very large. In fact, I can tell you it is exactly 1.7% of you. That said, many of you said you would love to support me in the show. So for now, the best way to support me is to share the podcast or your favorite episode with someone you think might like it, or honestly, lots of people you think might like it, or leave a five-star rating and review in the Apple Podcast app. But I will let you know if anything changes here.

As for sponsors, my plan is to only have sponsors who have products and services I can get behind. When I say I personally recommend something, I want that to mean something to all of you. And it should because I've either used the product or done a meaningful amount of research on it or both. And if you ever think that's not the case, please reach out to me directly and I'd love to hear more.

However, I actually hope that by doing this, you view the sponsors as an opportunity to learn about new products and services you didn't know about already. In fact, you all sent me so many great ideas for sponsors that I haven't even gotten through reaching out to all of those companies to see if they would sponsor the show.

So hopefully you guys are excited as I am for the future of All the Hacks. I have some amazing plans for 2022 and beyond, and I appreciate you all so much for listening, for giving me feedback, and for everything else you've done to support the show. Thank you so much. And quick reminder to leave a rating and review for the show or email me anytime with feedback, chris at allthehacks.com. All right, see you next time.