"You have to be patient with your vision just because God has given you the vision. He then has to move people into place to allow the vision to manifest itself." -- Roland Martin

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ROB RICHARDSON
Welcome to Disruption Now. I'm your host and moderator, Rob Richardson. I'm excited to have my man, Roland Martin from Roland Martin Unfiltered. He's interviewed presidents. He's now got the only daily digital show that features all things black -- from sports to politics. I have the pleasure and honor of being a regular contributor on the show. -- Roland, how are you doing, brother?

ROLAND MARTIN
Man, all good. All good.

ROB
What do you think COVID-19 has done? You and I have talked about this. We've talked about COVID-19 really exposing businesses where they're at, the fact that they weren't ready for a moment that was clearly coming. Just talk a little bit about that in terms of black media and where you think we need to go and just maybe some experiences you've had in learning from this because we know we--

I can tell you this. I was with Radio 1. I did a show with them and I was trying to get them the whole time. This must have been... Man, this must have been six-seven years ago. I said, "Listen. This is what we should do. We should do a podcast. Work together." I said, "I guarantee we'll be able to grow it because...” And it was just like, “Wha...?" It was like they couldn't understand. I was talking like Chinese to them. They were like, "Wha...What?" So I couldn't do it.

ROLAND
You wasted your breath.

ROB
Clearly, I've learned that. -- Go ahead.

ROLAND
You wasted your breath. Probably about three years before that, I signed with Tom Joyner in 2008. 2010-2011, we had the next contract. I said, "Guys, we need to podcast my commentary." "No, no, no. No. We have the player on BlackAmericaWeb.com if folks want to hear it." I said, "Do you all understand? Ain't nobody sitting around listening to your player, waiting and waiting for commentary to come up." Bro, we went back and forth, back and forth.

I mentioned the idea of a podcast network to Alfred Liggins, the CEO -- nothing. In fact, we were playing golf and I said, "Alfred, we really need to go hard, to build a massive black database because we're going to get to the point--"

ROB
Yeah. When did you tell him that?

ROLAND
This was... We're playing golf. This is 2012.

ROB
You might have lost a billion dollars on not pursuing that idea.

ROLAND
This is what I said. I said... Jonathan Roger, he was the first CEO of TV One. Jonathan is in the Broadcasting Hall of Fame -- brilliant. He was on the board of Nike, Procter & Gamble, Comcast -- all these companies.

Jonathan said, "Roland, cable has, at best, six to 10 years left.” This was in 2011… No, 2012. He said, “At best, six to 10 years." I said, "Alfred, we need to be using our radio assets, our digital assets to build that black database because if we're able to get our people to subscribe to our own digital channel then we can bypass the cable deal." He totally blew me off -- totally blew me off. I was like, "Okay."

So where are we in 2021? NBCUniversal, they are emerging cable networks. They're focusing on Peacock. CBS is launching Paramount. They're emerging CBS Access and the other networks. You look at HBO, HBO Max, they’re all looking at streaming.

ROB
Correct.

ROLAND
The black folks are far behind.

ROB
And we're the entertainment genesis of all of this stuff.

ROLAND
There you go. There you go. So what happens is we are moving at a pace of six to 10 years behind.

Let's take my show. When I launched my show, folks, "Roland, you should do audio podcasts." I said, "No, I’m not going to do that." My executive producer, Jay Feldman, he's like, "Roland,” he said, "Look at all this money on audio podcast" and I was like, "Jay, I feel you." I said, "I’ve already done it." And it was funny because he was like, "What do you mean?"

Okay, what folks may not realize is that I launched the first black news source audio podcast in 2005 when I was at the Chicago Defender.

I was at a multimedia fellowship at the University of California, Berkeley, and one of the speakers gave a presentation. He launched a podcasting company called Odeo -- O-D-E-O. I’m sitting here and I’m kind of like... Now mind you, remember what I told you, I did radio in high school, in college because I saw what was coming.

So I worked in radio. I was a KKDA radio news director morning anchor after I left [as] the Fort Worth Star-Telegram Wells City Hall reporter. So I had radio in my background; TV in my background. So I’m sitting in the session and he’s telling about audio podcasting and I was like, "Oh hell, yeah."

We go back to the Chicago Defender. I said, "We're launching an audio podcast. Staff, you don't do any more interviews with celebrities or anyone else unless we record all of them on high-quality audio." So we launched the audio podcast 2005.

2006, we launched the video podcast. Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, the president of Liberia, when she came to Chicago, she had a Q&A she did with Congressman Jesse Jackson Jr. to do something in Chicago. We videotaped it. We uploaded it. That was the video podcast. Why am I laying all of that out?

So this guy who comes with this presentation to lay out a podcasting network, his name is Evan Williams. Who is Evan Williams? Evan Williams is the co-founder of Twitter.

So here we are in 2005. Now let me show you how black media, again--

ROB
Can I just say on that because this operates like real estate. I’ll let you finish but I want to say--

ROLAND
There you go. There you go. Keep going.

ROB
It operates like real estate. Had we gotten in there early, we would have had a much more valuable piece of position and that would be tenfold what it’s worth -- 20-30-40-fold -- because if you got in in 2005 and you're now 2020, now you have all that data you said. Now you're sitting on it and it's worthwhile more.

ROLAND
And you're not watching Spotify cut a deal with [inaudible - 07:02]...

ROB
Correct.

ROLAND
…for a podcasting network. We're talking black--

ROB
Because they got to go through you.

ROLAND
You're not watching Charlamagne do a deal with iHeartRadio because you've already created.

And here's the thing. I’m running the Chicago Defender -- again, vision, podcasting. If you look at the conferences, the Atlantic and political puts on, I... Dude, that was a part of my plan. All this stuff was laid out.

They come to me and they say, "Look, what's all this?" These are black millionaires out of Detroit who made their money in the automotive business. I said, "I need you all do me a favor. You all have no idea what the hell you all are doing. This is what I do. Let me do what I do and I guarantee you, I am going to build this newspaper into a national media company."

This is what they said to me, Rob. "Look, we just want to be a small community paper." I said, "I got to go." I said, "You all have the only person who is appearing on national television. There's nobody else in a black newspaper making national TV appearances. You're getting free marketing and you all are going to let that walk out of the door.” [They let you, man - 08:20].

A year later, they came. "Dude, we screwed up. We screwed up." They've been apologizing to me every time I see one of their people. They've been apologizing since 2000... I left in 2007. They've been apologizing, bro, for now 14 years because... It is 14 years next month. 14 years because they did not see it and they didn't listen to the person who saw it. And look, today Chicago Defender no longer prints. It's a joke of a paper. They don't--

ROB
And that story repeats over with Ebony, with Jet.

ROLAND
Go down the line.

ROB
We have these strong... We have these--

ROLAND
Go down the line. Go down the line. Go down the line. Go down the line. You can just go down the line.

ROB
Yeah, you can. But that offers new opportunities for us, for you, because we got--

ROLAND
Yes. My show got cancelled. Bro, I’ll tell you--

ROB
I have a quick question for you on that point. Knowing what you know now -- this kind of goes back to that question earlier -- would you maybe have gone off and ventured off on your own and just started it and just did it earlier?

ROLAND
No.

ROB
No? Okay.

ROLAND
And here's why: You have to understand when you're ready. I signed with CNN in 2007. We did several pilots in 2007. I remember sitting down in September 2007 with Jim Walton who was the worldwide CEO of CNN. Jim said, "Roland, we think you are a better counter-puncher than a puncher." And what he was saying is, "We think you are a better panelist contributor than a show host." I go, "I know."

He goes... [Pauses] I said, "I know I’m not ready to host a show. So what I need you to do, I need you to get me with your talent coaches. I need you to give them notes on what I need to work on.” See, remember, I’m going back to high school -- "Work on your skill set development."

“I need to know what I need to work on so I can be ready for a show host.” He calls my agent. He says, "That was not how I expected the conversation to go." We then go--

Okay, so we didn't go through the whole deal, Rob. We're sitting here going through this. And then all of a sudden, 2008, I’m hosting more shows. By December 2008, Glenn Beck leaves and I said, "I know I’m ready." And I hit them up. I filled in the camera, bro, for two months. It was a miserable experience because they put handcuffs, shackles, duct tape on me and I couldn't do me.

I was playing baseball. I’m left-handed with a right-handed glove and everything… The uniform didn't fit. Nothing worked. But I knew I was ready to at least host a weekend show. They told me, "We're not going to give you a weekend show."
I wasn't even a hundred feet out of the office before I was on the phone with Jonathan Rodgers when he said, "We're going to launch One." Why am I saying that?

2012, Wonya Lucas is now the CEO. Jonathan retired. I said, "It's time for a daily show." I hosted the Sunday show for three years. I knew I was ready.

By hosting NewsOne now for four years, everything that my career brought me to this point -- radio, television, newspaper, weekend show, daily show, morning drive, radio show, midday show, all the pieces -- now the industry had gotten to a point where all the forces converged so that the thing that I wanted to do, the situation, now had been created.

So I could not have been able to launch the show because the podcasting piece had not matured to the point where it became readily-accepted from advertisers. The technical piece had not come in where--

Remember, when I launched, we were dealing with 3G when we started the Sunday morning show in the NewsOne Now. Then we worked to the point of 4G moving towards 5G. 60% of the people who watched Roland Martin Unfiltered watched in a mobile device.

ROB
Absolutely.

ROLAND
And the relationships that I built up from CNN, Sunday Morning Show on TV One, Daily Show on TV One, WVON Radio, all those experience, contacts, political relationships, business relationships, all came together the appropriate time so when I launched, I go out and I present to AFSCME and I lay out, "This is the vision that I have. This is how I built my social media up.” They called me back the next day and said, "We're in for the first $250,000.” Oh by the way, AFSCME president is an Alpha. So Alpha helps, dude.

ROB
Yeah. [Laughter]

ROLAND
So the point is, to anybody listening, you have to be patient with your vision just because God has given you the vision. He then has to move people into place to allow the vision to manifest itself.

The only thing I would have done... the only thing I would have done differently is that I would have been far more aggressive. I would have figured out, through my contract, to be far more aggressive in building out my YouTube channel because when we launched my show in September 2018, I had 157,000 subscribers. A year earlier, when we really started paying attention to the YouTube channel, we only had 75,000. So the only thing I would have done is gone back.
So when I was focused on building my Twitter page and my Facebook page, I would have been building the YouTube channel because today, we're at 730,000 subscribers. Had I done that, I think we probably would be sitting at a million to 1.5 and we will be in a much better position today.

That's the only thing I would do differently which is why when people come to me and they're talking about trying to do their content, they're like, "Yeah, I'm in Instagram." I said, "No. No. Do not do that" because financially, Instagram's business model, you ain't making money. Facebook's model is--

Out of all the platforms, the absolute best in terms of fair share with content creators is YouTube because you get 55%. They get 45%. And folks is like, "Yeah, I’m creating.” Yeah but you don't have to hire a sales team -- all sort of stuff.

So I tell everybody, "Build your YouTube channel because that is going to give you the economic base to be able to build from there.”

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