My podcast stats are only climbing, and I don't know what I should do next

I know, I know. I haven't written much this week, but that's going to change. There's so much going on in my personal life right now that I have to make harder decisions about where my focus goes.

I didn't build much either. I did start on a new idea for my Idea Bench, which I'll explain this weekend.

What I didn't stop doing was podcasting. I've been recording stories almost every single day, making sure I stay ahead of schedule at all costs.

Of course, when you're as early in your podcast journey as I am, you check the numbers far more often than you should. I think that's okay. But I had no clue I was going this strong.

Apple was winning, until I looked closer

Last time I wrote about my podcasts, I found out Apple Podcasts stats were far ahead of Spotify.

More consumption time, more engaged listeners, and faster follower growth on Apple. My audience mostly lives in the Apple ecosystem, and the numbers kept proving it.

In that same post, I told myself to start learning how to interpret stats properly: where to look, what matters, and whether I should improve anything.

So I started digging deeper. And Apple isn't the whole story anymore.

YouTube is still a bust

YouTube is still not working, and that's also okay. It might even help me rethink my strategy.

Right now, I upload an MP4 version of every single recording. That eats a lot of time. Rendering, uploading, filling in titles and descriptions, scheduling.

Every episode, on every channel. And the growth isn't there. Neither are the views.

Then I realized I could simply connect my podcast RSS feed to YouTube and let it pull in new episodes on its own.

But I don't know the specifics yet. Would I lose something? Would I gain something?

It would eliminate all the manual upload work. And since my followers mostly live on other platforms, that's a trade I'm tempted to make.

But I'm also afraid of losing clicks and link shares from my descriptions. Those links are one of the few direct roads from the shows to the Study Brew site.

I haven't looked into it deeply enough to make a call. It's lingering in my head.

Castbox is catching up

Back to the surprising part.

Only recently did I start checking my Castbox stats. And apparently, Castbox is my second-best platform for every English learning channel.

Story Valley is again the most popular show. It has 53 followers on Apple Podcasts, 44 on Castbox, and 16 on Spotify.

Story Brew has 41 on Apple, 36 on Castbox, and 20 on Spotify.

Study Brew has 37 on Apple, 6 on Castbox, and 1 on Spotify. That one is me.

What I'm still trying to figure out is why. Castbox barely has a market share. When I asked Claude, this was the answer:

Castbox is a small player: roughly 1.5 to 2% of podcast downloads, compared with about 35 to 50% for Apple Podcasts and 20 to 30% for Spotify.

I guess that Castbox wins because it's freely available, maybe without ads (I think), and probably popular with Android users.

Which would explain why its numbers lean closer to Apple than to Spotify. Two platforms where people come to listen, not to scroll.

And Spotify is the middle child, floating somewhere in between.

I don't know. I'm still guessing. But I think all of these add up.

The total count

I counted my total followers for all three English learning channels across Apple Podcasts, Castbox, Spotify, and YouTube.

Story Valley has 121 followers. The show started on September 14th, 2026.

Story Brew has 109. It's my oldest, original channel, and it started on April 4th, 2026.

Study Brew has 44. It started on October 8th, 2026.

Study Brew isn't framed right

Study Brew is the weakest of the three, and I think that's because I didn't frame it right. It's a bit confusing.

Study Brew is also the name of the language app I'm building, and the channels are the catalyst behind it. So when someone finds the show, it's not obvious what it is. A podcast? An app? A course?

The idea behind the Study Brew channel is B1-B2 English through real-life scenarios: daily life, travel, and career.

That isn't clear anywhere in the overall branding or image. Someone scrolling past the cover has no way of knowing that's what's inside.

Maybe it's also too early to tell. On Apple Podcasts, which accounts for 37 of the 44 followers, the listening time is highly encouraging. The people who find it stay.

274 followers

Altogether, that's 274 followers across three channels, with two of them barely scratching the surface. I wouldn't have thought I could get here this fast.

I'm soooooo stoked.

Sincerely stoked.

I don't know what I should do now

The numbers are tracking, and that's fucking great.

Today I also started rebuilding a large part of the language app. Just like with TWO, I rushed too much the first time, and now I have a better game plan.

But I'm a bit stuck on what comes next for all three channels.

Read also: My game plan for Study Brew: I almost blew it

A gap for adult beginners

I noticed there's a gap.

The adult channels are both B1-B2 English. One covers daily-life scenarios, the other is built around bedtime stories. But there's nothing at A1-A2 for adults.

Story Valley is A1-A2, but it's made for kids. The conversations and stories are aimed at six- and seven-year-olds or younger.

An adult beginner doesn't want to learn English through a story about a bunny who lost his hat.

So I'm thinking about the craziest part: adding ONE MORE English learning channel.

This one would be built around "why" questions, in A1-A2 English. Simple questions with simple answers that help listeners pick up new vocabulary and phrases, and maybe learn something along the way.

Why is the sky blue? Why do we yawn? That kind of thing.

I think this type of content could work incredibly well, and it would close the gap.

Seasons, starting in January

I've also been thinking about my stories, my characters, and new introductions.

I feel like I need to start building seasons, with the same characters plus new ones each season. Each season would last six months, and the timer would start on January 1st, 2027.

Seasons would give each show a natural rhythm. A clean point to introduce someone new, and a reason for listeners to stick around for what's next.

The problem is: how many new characters per show?

And would new characters undermine the baseline I've built with the current ones? Some listeners have been with these characters since the start. I don't want season 2 to feel like a different show.

A thank-you for each channel

I'm also thinking about recording a thank-you note for each channel. Without the people listening, none of this would feel as encouraging as it does.

Something short. "This is Pieter Borremans, the voice behind every story, and thank you for listening."

Maybe it's also a moment to subtly introduce the language app I'm building.

I really don't know yet. I need to think about the approach, without being aggressive about it. These people came for stories, not for a pitch.

Nobody on the waitlist yet

Even though traffic to the Study Brew site went up, nobody has pre-registered for the language app waitlist so far.

That tells me people find their way to the site, but the step from listener to sign-up isn't there yet.

So I want to rethink my episode descriptions, or find another way to push more of the right traffic to the Study Brew site.

Maybe I need more patience. Two of the three shows aren't even 90 days old, and they should only now be entering a discovery phase on those platforms.

Story Valley might need its own home

But the biggest question is Story Valley.

It's growing so fast that I'm not sure whether to keep it on the Study Brew site or finally build a separate site for it.

The show is designed for kids, but my data says parents are listening, with or without their child.

Read also: Story Valley went live on Spotify: what's my plan here?

That doesn't change the fact that it's a kids' show. Privacy laws and my own approach to protecting kids from data collection and tracking need to be front and center.

Not tucked away inside a site that also runs a waitlist for an adult language app.

I need to dig deeper into whether Story Valley stays a section on Study Brew or moves to its own home.

Either way, it deserves to be taken seriously. I've found my place in content creation, and English learning is something I really enjoy doing.

Final note

Everything I wrote today is a good problem to have.

I don't lack traction. I lack decisiveness in a few areas. Whether to hand YouTube over to an RSS feed. Whether to start a fourth English learning channel.

How many new characters each show can handle. Where Story Valley should live.

Two months ago, two of these three shows didn't exist. Now I'm deciding how to structure their second seasons.

Season 2 starts on January 1st, which gives me about eight weeks to make those calls and get ahead on recording.

And next time I check my stats, I'm opening four dashboards instead of three.