Time We Discuss: What It Is Really Like Hosting The Dave Benson Show

Transcription

(Music)

Dave Benson: I don't follow the algorithm so much. I don't know. I don't have time. And I enjoy what I do. I don't believe that this is really going to pay my bills. So I'm doing it for what I want

Dan: Today on Time We Discuss, from halfway around the world, I want to welcome Dave Benson and it's time we discuss what it's like hosting the Dave Benson show. Dave, thank you for joining me today.

Dave Benson: Absolute pleasure, Dan. Thank you for having me on.

Dan: This is awesome. So I stumbled across your show a few weeks ago at this point. And I got to say, I am blown away by the caliber show we're dealing with here. I mean, even looking at the background there, the different props and everything, it's really, really fantastic. But I want to hear from you. The people want to hear from you. What's it like hosting the Dave Benson show?

Dave Benson: It's so much fun. I never imagined that I would be talking to actors, directors, movie stars, podcast stars, creatives, artists, man, you name it. The list has got crazy with the amount of people that I'm talking to on a daily basis. I've got people in my phone like Clifford Starks, MMA Hall of Famer, who I just messaged up and say, hey, what's a training tip? And this is a Hall of Famer MMA who's messaging me back and just saying, hey, Dave, why don't you try that? And I'm like, this is just crazy. Yeah, it's a lot of fun. It's not my main job, but it's my fun job. And I'd love to do this forever.

Dan: Why this type of show? Why did you not do that?

Dave Benson: That's a great question. No one that I've seen, and I could be wrong. There's a lot of people that tell. They do a late night show, a talk show. I did a lot of research before I kicked this off, and outside of anyone who gets paid by a network, so think of your Kimmels, your Fallons, Colbert-- poor guy. He'll probably kick my ass. Anyone else like that, they're the only ones who do a late night style show where you have this kind of ambiance and people get the feeling. Everyone else is more-- and it's evolved, but everyone else is more a general YouTube podcast, one-on-one kind of thing, rather than the feeling I wanted to give. And I love it when people say to me, man, I really felt like I was on a late night talk show, or something like that, because that's something that they resonate with from what they've grown up with and what they've seen on TV. So yeah, it's just something I wanted to do and I wanted to recreate. And it's been a lot of fun being able to do that.

Dan: What makes you different from the late night talk show people? They're the syndicated ones, the big ones. What makes you so different? What differentiates you from them?

Dave Benson: If you look at any late night show, they will only interview the actors. They will only interview A-list actors as well, or A-list TV shows, or musicians. But there's a level. You will not get on that show if you are a director who's done something amazing, unless you're Steven Spielberg. Any of the other directors, you're not going to have a chance. And I looked at it and I said, well, hang on a second. The directors, the actors who aren't A-list actors, the people who do the costume work, the musicians, anyone who falls below that category, well, where's their voice? Where are they telling their story? Where are they promoting their movies and looking at the world from that perspective? No one is doing it. So I said, OK, you guys have your talk show and you do it for the A-listers. I will do it for everyone else. I will make sure that they get to tell their stories.

Dan: That is awesome. I love that. And I got to admit, when I first saw the trailer for your show and you talking about that, I was just blown away. I was like, ah, I love that. I absolutely love that. So how do you find these people? How easy is it to just go to a local playhouse? Are you in touch with different agents? How do you find all these people?

Dave Benson: I think we've got to go back to the start. So the show started originally in November. It's a year. November last year. This time last year, the show originally started. And it was one of my friends who does a podcast, prompted me to get into doing this. I told him about it. And I got him excited about what I wanted to do. And he said, Dave, you've got to do that. You've just got to do it. So I did. And he had, at the time, Clifford Starks, who was the MMA, he had a connection to him. And he said, I can hook you up with Clifford. And we'll get him as your first guest. So I had Clifford and that person, his name is Nate, on as the first guest. And then I was wondering how I get more guests. And I started to reach out directly. I thought I'd go for creatives through YouTube to start with. So I started reaching out to creatives in YouTube. No reply. No one had the time of day for me. There was nothing. So then I created a LinkedIn account, which was specific to hosting. I've got my second life. But I created it specific to this life and hosting. Don't tell LinkedIn they don't allow that. And I just started connecting with actors and directors. I just literally typed in actors, directors, anyone in the entertainment industry. And I started hitting Connect with these people through LinkedIn. And then I just had a standard script that I would send them. And I would send-- because you're allowed to connect with 100 people a week. I'd connect with 100 people a week. And those 100 people would receive a standard script saying, this is who I am. This is what I'm doing. I want you to be on my show. And I would take the time to understand why I wanted them to be on this show. So I'd say, you're an actor. You've done this. I'm really inspired by your work. Or you're a director. You've done this. So it was slow going to start with. So between November and March, I was getting one episode out sporadically a month. No one was watching. And no one was paying attention or getting any guests. So from March, I said, right, we go out every Monday. This show goes out every Monday without fail at the exact same time on a Monday. And we are going to build the cadence up. So I say I officially started in March. And since then, it's rocketed. I don't have to ask guests to join anymore. I get a lot of people asking to come on the show. So I'm fully booked out now until July next year already. And people just contact me continuously on LinkedIn, saying, I love what you're doing. I'd love to be on your show. And I'd love to promote this. Or they send me-- I get a lot of screeners sent to me these days as well. And they say, I'm doing this movie. And we'd love to talk about it. So here's a screener of the movie. And let's have a chat about that when I come on. So I guess I put the hard yards in at the start. But I don't know if I class them as the hard yards. I mean, think about it. November to March is not a long time to be going. So there was something about this that attracted people, I guess, to make them want to reach out to me.

Dan: That kind of reminds me of when I got my first start, too, the first couple of months being very slow. And then I got a huge influx. At one point, I had like 40 people booked and ready to record. And it's like, shoot, where am I going to find the time to do all this? So now that brings me to my next question. So how do you-- and I get this question a lot from different people. How do you balance your two jobs? I forget what you said, the one job and the fun job. How do you find the time to balance all of that?

Dave Benson: Man, it's hard. So I've written on LinkedIn quite open, and honestly, how I do this. So my real job is in a different city to where I live. So on a Monday, I fly down to that city. And on a Thursday, I fly back. And I've got a family here with two kids. So Monday-- let's just say the episode's gone out. And then I start planning for the next episode, right? Who's on the show this week? OK, so now I need to start doing show prep. So Monday night, do my work standard on Monday. Then Monday night, it's show prep. I start prepping for the guest. I start working through the research, who they are, what they've been doing. Specifically, I want to find golden nuggets, things they've never been asked before. So I'll start watching some of the podcasts that they've already done. I'll cheat and use transcripts and throw that into AI and say, OK, what's it telling me? Just because I don't have all the hours in the world to watch all of these things. But I'll start doing that research. Tuesday, I start thinking about the monologue. So I have a monologue on my show, which, again, I'll talk about that in a second. But that takes a lot of work to prepare. So I'm starting to think about the monologue. I'm starting to do my guest research. Wednesday, I'm reaching out to the guests, making sure they're lined up. They're ready. They're good to go. I'm refining all the work we've got. Thursday, I get home. And then I will be pulling the studio together. This is not permanently up, sadly. So pulling the studio together. Friday, I usually shoot on a Friday. And then throughout the week, I'm also editing the following Mondays episode as well. So I'm getting that ready through the week. I do the monologue on a Friday, which means it's ready to be edited Friday or Saturday night. And then that'll go into the Mondays episode.

Dan: OK, all right, cool, cool. So I do enjoy the monologue. I really do. I love all the little quips that you have, the jokes, the fun lines. Do you write those yourself? Do you have someone that does that for you? Where do you come up with all that inspiration if it is you?

Dave Benson: It is me. I write that myself. The monologue consists of-- it's changing. First, it's an introduction, and it's a welcome. It's always an introduction and a welcome. And now I've started to incorporate within that welcome. And I don't know why I did this. I just found it amusing, a song. So last week, it's not a song that I sing. It's a question I ask. So the first week was, was everyone really kung fu fighting? I mean, everyone? So last week was, who let the dogs out? And this week, I won't ruin it, but there's another one. And I've just started that, so I find that fun. So that's the opener. Then we go on to the main monologue, which is a news story. And that's the news of what's happened this week. Now, I'm very careful. I initially started copying some of the other talk shows and going into your politics. I did that for two weeks. And then some of the comments, I don't know. I just decided that I don't really want to go into a political conversation. Everyone else is doing it. There's a lot of talk shows that do go into politics. So I said, right, that's not my jam. So I stay clear of that. So now I only go for-- I go for fun stories. I avoid war, death. There's a few things I really try and rule out. But anything that's really cool, fun, enjoyable, that people can disconnect and have a laugh at. So I go through the world, news stories. There's a lot of unique ones out there, websites that you can find from true stories. Then I'll pull that together. Then I've got to work out how to make those stories sound fun. And then the difference. No one's doing this, which is why I started to pick it up. YouTube news and podcast news. If you look at any news, and if you even try and search it, you will get-- if you say news of YouTube that week, you will get someone who's told you what the news is that week. No one is telling you what the news of YouTube is. What's Mr. Beast done this week? So he's building a whole fun fair in Africa. I know that because I've just written it. No one's telling you the actual news of what the creators are doing. So then I do that. I've got a 60-second movie review, which is new, which I've just started doing. And then there's a wrap up and introduction of the guests. All self-written. Yeah. That's why it changes so much every week.

Dan: You are doing a lot of this, if not all of this yourself. So let's talk about how you acquired those skills. Did you go to university for this? Did you learn on your own through different platforms? How did you get the education that you need to do everything that you're doing right now?

Dave Benson: I left school at 15 years old. School didn't work for me. So I went to school in England at a time in the 80s where education was one way. If you can't learn through this method, then I'm going to focus on the children who can learn from this method and will kind of ignore you. So I was in that category, which meant that I didn't connect with it. I didn't learn. I left that fairly-- well, I left at 15. And then I became an engineer. And then I worked at a factory when I was 19. And I saw people with fingers missing. And I was like, do I want this life? So then I was like, no, this is not-- and then I went into a whole IT kind of world, which was just kicking off at the start. But it wasn't until maybe four years ago that I was at work. And they said, hey, we would like to do a presentation for what your account is doing. We're asking all of the accounts to do it. There's 20 accounts on the list. You're the biggest, so you're the last. So we want you to present. So I watched the first three. And I'll be honest, it was generally three guys at a table like this with a laptop. And there was hundreds of people online watching this from around the business. And they had a PowerPoint presentation. And they would literally just talk to the PowerPoint presentation. And these are great people. I love them all to bits. But it was boring as anything. So I was like, we've got to change this up. So then I said to the person who was doing it, does it have to be live? And she looked at me as in, what do you mean? Who asks this question? I was like, does it have to be live? And she's like, no. And I was like, great. And there was an editor on my team who I knew randomly. And they said, we're going to make a video. We're going to film everything we do but in a video format. And we did. And it blew everyone away because at the start, we pretended like we were live. So there was three of us sat with a laptop. And then we did a bit of a skit where we said, no, we're not going to do this. And we threw the table and walked out. And then the credits-- sorry, the titles came up. And then people were like, what the hell is this? And I don't know. From that, it triggered a switch in me that was like, this is what I want to do. This is where my passion is. And yeah, since then, I've just been chasing the dragon until we've got to where I am today.

Dan: Changing direction slightly, what do you think is the best part of what you do?

Dave Benson: The guests, without a doubt. Having fun with them. I had a director on last week. And we had-- I think we were on-- we overran. It was about an hour and 15 minutes. And I've got people backed up. So it's always worrying when that happens. But man, we had so much fun. I was in tears from some of the jokes we were just riffing on. When I've had stand-up comedians on, man, like-- oh, Jenny. I can't remember her surname, but she's a stand-up comedian. She just had me in absolute tears. She was so much fun. So the best part of any of this is the guests. And I love it. It's got its challenges. I mean, you'll know. You're on episode, what, 149?

Dan: Episode 149, yep.

Dave Benson: Yeah, so there's tricky guests who give you one-word answer, or don't give you enough. And you're constantly trying to pull something out of them. What's the best thing you've done? This. And you're like, OK, I've got nothing from this. So there's tricky guests. But if someone's fun and energetic and passionate and man on the same wavelength, Aaron Ryan, shout out to that brother. Man, he was my third guest. You know Aaron. He was on your show twice. He's been on my show twice. I love him to bits. He is so much fun. And I've made a friend for life out of that guy. He's just so amazing.

Dan: Yeah, I agree. Such a hoot. I had him on the summer of 24, and then again just recently in the fall of 25. And he actually reminds me of a friend I had when I was a young adult. So seeing him on camera the first time, I was like, whoa, wait, oh, I know, you're someone else. Really, really great guy. And so personable. Such a good time. So talking about YouTube, people often talk about chasing the algorithm. So what are some secrets, if you have any, that you can share with people about chasing the algorithm? How are you able to do what you do, get the views that you get? Do you have anything to share? Anything that's working, not working? What's that look like?

Dave Benson: Shorts has been my secret to gaining subscribers randomly. And there's a lot of mad-- and I've done a lot of research into what you should do with shorts. You have to have subtitles at the bottom, a picture, a hook. Within the first 10 seconds, if you've not hooked them, that's why there's all of this kind of stuff that goes into it. So I break my monologue now into shorts. All of them are shorts. And I put them out throughout the week. There's about four or five that come throughout the week. And they're starting to gain a lot more traction. So last week, a couple of them got 30,000 views, which for me was great. I was like, this is awesome. This is building momentum. And my subscribers are going up more than ever, just because of the shorts. That's where I'm starting to find a lot more build. And people are getting interested in what I do. So that's my secret. I don't follow the algorithm so much. I just-- I don't know. I don't have time. And I enjoy what I do. I don't believe that this is really going to pay my bills. So I'm doing it for what I want to do it for, which is fun and enjoyment. I started initially-- I don't know if you've done this. I started by one of these companies where you pay for advertising. So I paid for some advertising. And I think the first time I did it, I gained like 100 subscribers within a very short space of time. It was like $50. It wasn't much. But I gained a lot of subscribers. And then I looked at the stats. And those subscribers never watched again. Their initial view time was like three seconds or something. And I was like, this is all fake. And I don't want fake numbers. It doesn't appeal to me at all. If people want to watch the show, I'd love for them to enjoy it, share it, you know, all of that good stuff. But I get emails from people all over the world all the time. I can make yours the number one. I can do this. And I'm like, people will make it what they want to make it, buddy. I don't need to pay you to try your best. That's my only secret, shorts. Have you found that? Is that what your secret is?

Dan: Yeah. So shorts are very interesting. They will help with subs. Not all subs translate into long-form content viewers. But sometimes there is bleed over. And I've had that shift over time. So that is very interesting. But a lot of times, it's like you have your long-form people, and you have your shorts video, or your shorts people. And they don't necessarily intersect.

Dave Benson: Yeah, no, I agree. Yeah, it's-- I don't know. I don't understand the algorithm. Before it used to be subscribers, everyone was mad about subscribers. If you have 10 million subscribers, you are making this much money. And now, I think it's getting to a more pragmatic part. It's about views. If people or advertisers care about how many views you get, they don't care about how many subscribers you get. So it's shifting. I'm sure it will shift again. I've some fun facts about you that my research team did. So you can tell me if these are true or false. Sorry, buddy. Nature of the beast, I can't help myself. I get too excited. Here we go.

Dan: Go ahead.

Dave Benson: You composed a theme for For the Paranormal Podcast, Wondering Monsters.

Dan: There is a podcast called the Wondering Monsters Podcast, which you bring it up as kind of interesting, because you were actually just mentioned in one of the episodes. So keep your eyes open for that. Yes, sir. But yet, the opening song for that, I edited it and remixed it.

Dave Benson: OK, fun fact number two. He once shared a ghost story on a popular Jim Harold's Campfire podcast.

Dan: That is also true. I shared two stories.

Dave Benson: In the early 2000s, he co-created a comedic radio play called Tea Time with a Vampire. Yes.

Dan: That is 100% true. I encourage everyone to do a search for Tea Time with a Vampire.

Dave Benson: I've got lots on here. Something about Zombies Ate My Hamburger 2010. What was that?

Dan: I am dying over here. I am dying. So before I answer that, Dave, a lot of times, when this actually is produced, whoever is speaking the camera is on them, and then the other person is hidden. So while you're talking, while you're asking these questions, I'm over here. I'm losing it. It's wonderful. So Zombies Ate My Hamburger, that is an electronic album. It was an EP released in 2010. And it's in the style of chip tune music. So think of 1990s video game music. It's written in that style. So that was an EP that I created, Zombies Ate My Hamburger. Check it out.

Dave Benson: See, people are learning things they didn't know about you now, Dan.

Dan: It's so true.

Dave Benson: Director of Web Communications, passionate about web accessibility, host of Time We Discussed, launched the paranormal podcast, Wondering Monsters. Prolific independent music, released at least seven albums. Honestly, we did our homework. I couldn't just come on here.

Dan: I love it, you can make up some stuff too. And I can agree to that too.

Dave Benson: Strongman competition, 1932. No. Did you see there was a strongman in Egypt? I did a thing about him the other week. And he pulled two ships with his teeth.

Dan: Did you have that on your show? Because I remember seeing or hearing that. Yeah, OK. Yep.

Dave Benson: Yeah, crazy. Honestly, I was like, why would you? Who would think, hang on a second, guys. We're doing strength here. Yeah. What do you got? What about if someone pulls a boat now that strength? Like, no, with their teeth. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. I mean, it doesn't even feature, right?

Dan: I wonder how many times people try that and then lost teeth as a result. Yes.

Dave Benson: It's thinking best on the side. Yeah, bleeding.

Dan: So let's talk about this. I asked you about your favorite part of doing the show. What is your least favorite part of doing your show?

Dave Benson: I don't mind editing. I love editing the guest. I find it fascinating. You might find this as well. When you interview a guest, as you do, sometimes it's weeks before I can get back to them. So I started off the show as a standard talk show, which is two guests, a music artist. And editing that was an impossible nightmare. So I cut it down to one guest. Occasionally, a music artist. Some of them reach out. But when I go back and look at some of the people as I'm editing them, I have a perception in my head as to how it's gone. So once I've done an interview, I'm like, that went well. That didn't go so well. I didn't feel they opened up. Or I thought, whatever it is. And then when I watch it four weeks later, there was one. I can't remember who it was. But I thought it went really badly. And I thought they were really staunch. And their responses were quite short with me. And then when I watched it back, I was like, wow, they weren't at all. I don't know where I got that perception from. Maybe it was because I had a previous guest who I was riffing with a bit more. I don't know. But yeah. So I like the editing from that perspective of seeing what actually happened. But I hate. And I mean, I hate seeing myself on camera. Like, I don't know. People would think doing this that I love being on camera. I do, I guess. But I don't like watching myself on camera. So yeah. I like throwing out there.

Dan: Interesting. It reminds me of any time people hear their self-recorded. It's like, do I really sound like that kind of a thing?

Dave Benson: Yes. You have to get over that pretty quick. But I mean, you must know. You must spend hours-- do you edit-- sorry, we're getting into the technicalities. When you've done a show, do you go through and then edit, cut out all the gaps, and pull things together, flip between scenes, cut out maybe some of the questions? Or some people literally just cut out the start where you say the hello that doesn't happen off camera. And then the goodbye. And they just literally just led the middle bit. There's no editing. They're just like that. There you go. Out it is. Enjoy.

Dan: No, I definitely edit for coherence. And some people, it's a very easy edit. I won't say the person's name, but the person I was just editing the other day, very seamless edit. I mean, it was about whatever the length of the video was, maybe about that and a half. So if it was like 30 minutes, I was done in 45 or something like that. But then some other people where it's-- I am making all kinds of edits, and it easily is two, three hours, something like that. The Wondering Monsters podcast, which we talked about earlier, I do a lot more with that. I splice in a lot of fun. Far Side Gallery type cartoons while we're talking. I definitely try to edit for coherence. Yeah.

Dave Benson: I love every part of it, but editing would be my least favorite part. I mean, and it takes the longest time. If at some point I can outsource that, I'll be very happy because that means I can get back to what I really do, and that's just hanging out with cool people.

Dan: For me, social media, I don't like the social media stuff.

Dave Benson: Yes. No, you're quite right. I'm rubbish at it. I'm so inconsistent. YouTube, and I've got the Spotify creative thing. So on a Sunday or a Saturday, whenever I can get the podcast done, it'll be ready, and I'll put it on both. And then LinkedIn, I'm pretty good. I will put it on the LinkedIn feed. But everything else, I'm like, oh, yeah, it's so painful to me. And I know there's tools that you can get, like HubSpot and various other things that do it all for you. But then you've got to pay for another thing, and it's like, ah.

Dan: Dave, I could keep on talking to you for hours, I feel like. And I'm glad that I'm signed up to be on your show, that we're going to be recording in January. So I'm super excited about that. But I am running out of time. And one thing I'd like to do before I cut my guest loose, I'd like to give you the opportunity to talk about a project you're working on, a cause you, believe in, more about your show, whatever you'd like to discuss, the floor is yours.

Dave Benson: The only thing that I'm focused on right now is the Dave Benson show, which a link will appear right here. Sorry, Dan, there's some editing work for you. And if anyone who hasn't seen it, it's a late night style talk show. We do a huge monologue, as we've been talking about. We get amazing guests on. This week's guest coming out on Monday is Christopher Shaw. But this probably won't be out by then. So he'll have been on a few weeks ago. But it was Christopher Shaw, who is the filmmaker of the movie Church People. If you haven't seen that, it's a great movie. Check that out. But that's all I'm about. That's all I'm promoting. You can see all of the links, which appear just here and here. (Laughing)

Dan: That is perfect.

Dave Benson: And so you're dropping.

Dan: I'll absolutely do that. I'll put a link down there, like you said. I will also put a link up here for your show. The episode you just talked about, I'll throw a link up there for that as well. And I'll also put a link up for your trailer, because I thought the trailer was amazing. For anyone interested, check out all those things.

Dave Benson: Very kind, thank you. Yeah, hopefully I'm applying for it to go on Tubi. Just working through the process there and a few of the other free TV shows. So hopefully I can see it from there in the new year. That'll be exciting.

Dan: It's been awesome having you on Time We Discuss and we learned what it's like hosting the Dave Benson show.

Dave Benson: It's a pleasure, Dan. You're a legend. I love this. Thank you so much. I can't wait to get you on my show. And I'm gonna get even more research done to find out even more nuggets and tidbits. I'm gonna call your headmasters from school. That's the only way.