Liam is founder of Mercury Podcasts — this interview has been lightly edited for style and readability
Sam Sethi spoke to Liam for the Podnews Weekly Review
Liam Heffernan: We launched Mercury in February last year. We launched as a typical network, but our plan was always to do a bit more than that, and be more of a an advocate for the whole indie podcasting space. In the last year, we started with a couple of really great indie shows. We’ve now got a roster of about 20, and we’re going onwards and upwards. We’re one of the fastest growing independent podcast networks in the world. Last year’s just been an absolute blur. It’s been a lot of sleepless nights growing a network, but we’re doing some great things.
Sam Sethi: Give me some examples from some of those network podcasts you’ve got.
LH: The first is our first original that we launched last year, which was Spooky Storytime, a weekly horror anthology. It’s one that we we worked very closely on to bring to life, and we completely own that. That’s gone from strength to strength. We’ve started growing a nice little audience there, and we really wanted to tap into a female hosted, female targeted horror podcast, which we noticed didn’t really exist, and we thought, let’s do it.
I think one of the things that make we can do really well is it can give a bit more creative autonomy to independent creators in ways that bigger networks maybe can’t because they have certain commercial pressures to deliver straight away. We can create shows that have a slightly slower burn to them, and that’s what we’re seeing with spooky storytime. And because of that, we’ve been able to deliver something that fits in a real niche and a gap in that space, and we’re starting to see the results from that.
Another example of a show that we’ve worked with is Pastmaster, they’re a phenomenal show with a couple of really, really talented guys, Ryan and Tan, who put a lot of blood, sweat, and tears into their show, and they just need that help with the growth, with the brand building, and some of those elements that they just don’t have the capacity for. And you know, again, it’s one of those that just requires a hell of a lot of just banging on doors and sending emails, and it’s in theory easy enough, but it comes down to time, it comes down to money, it comes down to resource, and all of these things are just stuff that independent creators don’t have, and that’s where we’re stepping in to help.
SS: Now, let’s start to talk about a couple of things you’re announcing. One is the Hall of Fame. Now, why do we need another Hall of Fame?
LH: One of the real things that we wanted to do at Mercury was not just to represent and support podcasters, but to celebrate those who have already contributed enormous value to the independent space specifically. We call it our Hall of Heroes that celebrate those who have really championed independent podcasts. And we think that by doing that, what we’re able to do is really bring together that community of people who have changed the game in the independent world and shine a spotlight on them, really. I mean, Emma Turner, one of our first inductees this year, she’s frustratingly modest considering everything that she does for our industry. Um so being able to actually hold her up and say, look, she’s awesome, and this is what she’s doing for you, it’s great to be able to do that.
Arielle Nissenblatt is our other inductee, and we do have a third this year to round off our 2026 cohort. It is currently under wraps, it’s a surprise they don’t know yet. Very few people know who this person is, but we’re working out a way to surprise them at some point in the future.
SS: Oh, you’re so kind! Just bring it around anytime you like! Now, one of the other things you’ve done is created a product called Orbit. Tell me more.
LH: Orbit takes the infrastructure that we’ve now built at Mercury, and offering that to all podcasters. Now, the the challenge with that as a typical network is that you can’t just invite everyone and anyone onto the network because you have to be able to deliver a certain amount of support with that. What we can do is say, look, we have a this sort of network, we have free hosting to offer you, we have the ad marketplace to plug you into, and we have by building up that community, we have a lot of cross-promotional power with that. We can also use some of our own promotional expertise and network level resources, and for a small monthly fee, less than you’re gonna be paying currently for any hosting plan, you get to use that. So, what we’re doing is giving all podcasters this immediate day-one cost saving with the potential to then also earn money from advertising in ways they just can’t do on their own. And this is all part of what we wanted to do at Mercury, which was to find ways to actually empower all independent podcasters with the same resources and tools that that currently and up to now have been hidden behind a paywall.
SS: Will you cherry pick some of those from Orbit and bring them onto the Mercury network?
LH: There’s definitely a long-term plan there on our part. I think at the moment, doing that scouting and going out there trying to find shows that are really good fits for Mercury is a heavy lift on my part, but it there’s also an awful lot of discretion and sort of qualitative judgment there. There has to be always, and that will never change. But the more that we build Orbit up and the more people we have there, the more just insights we have. We can see that data, we can see what shows are doing well, what shows aren’t doing well, we get that first-hand data set that we can use to do the sort of trend analysis and really understand what is happening in our industry, the shows that are showing the most potential, and where we can step in and offer the support. It’s going to make our decision making a lot smarter so that we know that the shows that we then promote up to Mercury are shows that we we genuinely know we can help to succeed.
SS: Liam Heffernan, thank you so much.