CEOs on podcasts – PR masterstroke or minefield?

Is a podcast any different to any other media opportunity?

Perhaps some organisations see podcasts as a form of amateur, on-demand radio, a nice-to-do rather than a valuable option for media exposure. They couldn’t be more wrong.

Perhaps that was the case for Intuit CEO Sasan Goodarzi, who took part on the Decoder podcast recently.

Mr Goodarzi spoke about his success with the Intuit software giant, which owns Mailchimp amongst other platforms, but as the conversation moved onto wider topics, he clearly became uncomfortable.

There are issues regarding tax reform in the United States and a refund that Intuit made to low-income Americans who paid for Intuit services when they could have filed their returns for free.

Company spokespeople need to be prepared for questions that relate to their wider experiences and knowledge, above and beyond the focus that they anticipated for an interview in the first place.

Knowing how to navigate these hurdles, through robust preparation and the ability to adapt to an interviewer’s angle, is fundamental for anyone taking part in any interview, pitch or presentation.

It’s the failure of spokespeople and their teams not to anticipate the possibility of wider contextual questioning and any self-respecting interviewer is well within their rights to broach difficult topics.

Intuit then made the situation worse by asking for that segment of the podcast to be deleted and accusing the host of being “inappropriate” and “disappointing.

We commented in PR Week about this incident and said: “Having robust answers to other potential talking points is fundamental, as is the competence to handle difficult questions you may not want to answer,” he says.

“To ask for content approval or editorial control for anything other than a factual error speaks of a significant lack of understanding about editorial integrity and undermines the credibility of the speaker and the organisation that they represent.”

There are more than 546 million podcast listeners worldwide and almost half the US population listen to a podcast at least once a month.

In 2024, worldwide podcast ad spending is estimated to hit $4.02 billion, underlining the value brands achieve when associating with shows and platforms.

Ultimately, a podcast is a media opportunity just like any other. Spokespeople should treat them that way and see them as an opportunity to speak to target audiences.

To read our comments and those of others in the PR Week (£) article, please click HERE

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