Blog – Full Posts

When Blake Oliver, CPA, and I met in May 2016, we said, “we should do a podcast together.” Two years later, we started the Cloud Accounting Podcast which has grown to become the most popular accounting podcast in the world.

During the week, Blake and I were both working at fast-growing startups. We each had our side hustles. Then we would get together on the weekend to record our podcast.

Over the years, we realized we were trying to solve the same problem.

The problem is that traditional accounting media misses the mark.

• It misses the mark for apps that spend lots of money advertising but don’t reach their target audience.
• It misses the mark for firms that can’t afford to pay to play.
• It misses the mark for accountants because it doesn’t focus enough on their specific interests.

In essence, it misses the mark because it lacks variety.

That’s why today we are launching Earmark Media.  🚀

Our mission at Earmark Media is to increase the accounting industry’s quality, variety, diversity, and convenience of educational and entertaining content.

We’ll accomplish our mission by offering a wide range of accounting media production and marketing services for apps, firms, and individuals that are looking to make their mark (see what I did there 😉)

Here are examples of how Earmark Media can help you make your mark:

Accountants

• Offering a wide variety of content that delivers practical insights you can use in your professional role
• Ability to earn CPE in a more convenient and accessible way by listening to podcasts
• For instructors, converting your existing educational content into on-demand CPE
• Producing a podcast to showcase your expertise to your clients and colleagues

Firms 

• Giving your staff an easy and convenient way to stay up-to-date on their CPE requirements
• Showcasing your firm’s expertise to build brand awareness and generate new business
• Capturing video testimonials from clients to increase trust and win more deals
• Turning your internal training recordings into on-demand CPE for your team
• Advertise your firm on accounting and tax podcasts to augment your recruiting efforts

Apps

• Advertise on a wide range of the most popular and fast-growing accounting-related podcasts
• Create your own branded podcast to deliver continuing education to your customers and reach new potential customers
• Create sponsored content that generates leads by providing valuable information to prospects
• Convert your existing video recordings into on-demand CPE courses to increase the value of the content you’ve already spent time and money creating
• Stay in compliance with NASBA’s CPE requirements, so you don’t have to
• Capture video testimonials and customer case studies in a scalable way — you just make the intro

To learn more about our services and get started, visit earmark.me.

Last week, I sent a survey to all of you asking, “What would you be willing to pay for an unlimited subscription to Earmark CPE?” Watch the video below to learn the results and how it’s changed our plans.

Re-focusing on unlimited CPE

An incredible 157 of you responded to this survey (which is a lot, considering it only went out to about 1700 or 1800). Thank you to everyone who participated!

We’ll get into the numbers, but first, here’s my takeaway from the feedback you gave me in the notes: Unlimited CPE is what you’re here for. The Media Player and the Premium Content were not so necessary to your valuation.

So we’re just going to look at the pricing for this Unlimited Subscription in the context of Unlimited CPE, which is what you’re getting right now. And then, as we add the Media Player and the Premium Content, we might add additional, higher-priced tiers to capture the value of those additional features once we have them.

The results

So back to the numbers.

The count of responses is 157.

The maximum that anyone would be willing to pay? — $600! Wow!

The median is a hundred dollars.

The minimum is $0. Plenty of you said, “Hey, I get free CPE now. I love Earmark, but I’m fine with just getting free CPE. I don’t want to ever pay for it.” And that’s okay because we also generate revenue from advertising. We’re always going to have a free option for Earmark that sponsors will support.

The average is $122.

The standard deviation is $117.

The analysis: $99 is the sweet spot

I grouped all of the responses into buckets of “would pay X or more.” For example, if you answered $80 to the question of what would you pay for an annual subscription, you’re counted in the row “$49 or more.” If you answered $600, you’re also counted in that bucket.

Right away, something stood out. The “$99 or more” row has the most significant chunk of recurring revenue, representing 45% of the total possible ARR.

So $99 per year is the place we’ll start. Because most of you said, “I’m happy to pay that.” And if we’re going to offer a single subscription price, this price will generate the most revenue.

The table also shows there’s a gap. We could be making 55% more money if we figured out how to create and sell both less expensive and more expensive subscriptions. We will figure that out as we continue to add 5-10 CPE courses every week.

Adding in a member community

There’s one thing that I want to add to this: a Member Community. As part of the annual subscription, you will get access to a community of fellow Earmarkers. You’ll be able to talk directly to the Earmark Team (including me) and tell us what you want from Earmark. What sort of content? What authors? What features should we build? You can help guide the development of this app.

The importance of member support

The community is critical because I want to make Earmark a member-driven organization. That’s important when upholding the quality of the educational content. We appreciate the support of our sponsors, but independence is essential, and financial support from our members is what makes independence possible.

Again, thank you to those of you who participated in the survey. If I missed something, hey, let me know. The team and I look forward to continuing to build Earmark with you. And I’ll come back to you with more info as we move forward to launching the subscription, hopefully in June.

I’m pleased to report that Earmark CPE is working again on iOS devices. I appreciate your patience while we worked to bring the app back online for our Apple users.

So what happened?

We’ve outgrown the first version of the Earmark CPE app!

Since launching in late December, we’ve added over 30 channels and published over 100 courses. While we anticipated growth, we did not expect to achieve these numbers so quickly, and we’ve blown right through the limits of our MVP.

The exciting news is, we’re almost ready to launch the next version of the Earmark CPE app. Once it’s live, we’ll be able to host thousands of courses.

Meanwhile, we’ve hit pause on publishing new courses. Our goal is to resume publishing next week.

Thanks so much for sticking with us as we build the next great thing in continuing education!