#67: Assessing The Ringer & Bill Simmons's Video Progress in 2024 — The Next Needed Improvement is Social Media; Plus, Bill Simmons Current Events & More NBA Rights Deal Discussion

Welcome to Episode 67! We bring back fan favorite Zach (@_zachblatter) from Episode 55 for a return visit to The Ringer & Bill Simmons' video, social media and growth strategies. Zach (Brand Manager at The Strickland) is highly experienced in the field as anyone who listened to #55 can attest to and once again brings a variety of excellent ideas to the pod.

We first discuss The Ringer's video progress in 2024. In Episode 55 Zach highlighted The Ringer's lack of focus on video, especially short-form, and thus we begin by evaluating Bill's new YouTube Shorts content and strategy. Bill also just last week finally got a high-res camera - another discussion point in Episode 55 - which is promising but has not yet been utilized effectively in his content. And, while The Ringer has begun posting more YouTube clips, we don't think it's enough. Our overall assessment is that while The Ringer & Bill have made progress here, and it's a good start, there's a long way to go.

Next we discuss The Ringer's social media. Zach brings the receipts and they are not positive - The Ringer barely has a presence on a variety of social media sites compared with their competitors. We formulate a gameplan for what The Ringer could do to massively boost their numbers. With so much good content generated from the site, the podcasts, Bill Simmons' tweets and more, this is a huge missed opportunity that would not take much additional effort in our view.

We then finish up the pod discussing Bill Simmons current events, including his enjoyable pod with Derek Thompson, JJ Redick and Pat McAfee market correcting him, and discuss the shock of no BS/Russillo pod this week - Zach had never listened to Pardon My Take before but did for the Russillo NBA Preview, and we suspect he wasn't the only one. We also touch on what a new NBA rights deal could look like if YouTube gets involved.

Hope you enjoy the show! Find Zach and his work (he created there podcast cover art) on Twitter @_zachblatter. Also thank you to Wiser Times (@WiserTimesmusic) for the intro song.