From: acquiredfm
The publication of a Wall Street Journal (WSJ) article profoundly impacted the growth and success of the Acquired podcast, leading to an unprecedented surge in listenership and visibility [03:55:00].
Publication and Immediate Impact
The Wall Street Journal profile on Acquired was published around the end of April [03:49:00]. The article, written by Ben Cohen, who writes the “science of success” column for the Journal, was described by the hosts as the “best encapsulation of what Acquired is that has ever been published” [04:09:00]. It was considered a “lightning in a bottle” moment [06:23:00].
Following its release, Acquired rapidly became the number one podcast on both Spotify and Apple charts globally [04:35:00]. This achievement was particularly surprising and unexpected for the hosts [04:45:00]. The podcast’s sustained position at the top of the charts for weeks and months “massively Amplified” the initial positive impact of the WSJ piece, creating a “self-fulfilling prophecy” of continued growth [05:08:00].
Unprecedented Audience Growth
The direct result of the article’s publication and the subsequent chart performance was a significant increase in the podcast’s audience. Since the Wall Street Journal piece went live, Acquired gained 317,000 new subscribers or followers across Apple and Spotify [05:31:00]. To put this in perspective, the podcast’s estimated listener base at the beginning of the year (January) was approximately 500,000 people [05:46:00]. The hosts considered this influx a “major event” [05:52:00].
Historically, the Acquired podcast’s audience had grown organically and slowly, doubling annually for its first nine years without paid marketing [06:40:00]. This organic growth ensured a deeply engaged community, as listeners personally recommended the show to friends [07:09:00]. The WSJ article brought in the “exact right audience” of “well-educated, thoughtful business people” who were keen to engage with the podcast’s content [07:38:00].
Challenging Assumptions on Podcast Discovery
The success of the article defied the hosts’ previous assumptions about how people discover podcasts. They had believed that readers would not typically transition from reading about a podcast in a print medium to subscribing to it on their phones [08:12:00]. However, the WSJ article proved this wrong [08:28:00].
The growth chart for Acquired had been “perfectly smooth for almost a decade” until the sharp increase observed from May onwards following the article’s publication [09:50:00]. This “outsized external force” of growth was unplanned; the hosts explicitly stated they did not pitch the piece to the Wall Street Journal [10:00:00]. This unexpected success reinforced the notion, often explored in their episodes about outlier companies, that “every great success story is idiosyncratic” and cannot be planned [09:26:00].