# Meeting Notes: Podcast Hosting Platform Product Sync

**Date:** August 1, 2026  
**Time:** 10:00–11:00 AM ET  
**Location:** Zoom  
**Facilitator:** Maya Chen  
**Note-taker:** Daniel Ruiz

## Attendees

- Maya Chen — Product Manager
- Daniel Ruiz — Engineering Lead
- Priya Shah — Product Designer
- Marcus Lee — Growth Marketing
- Elena Petrova — Data Analyst
- Jordan Brooks — Customer Success
- Sam Okafor — Infrastructure Engineer

## Agenda

1. Review listener analytics feedback
2. Confirm priorities for the next release
3. Discuss storage and bandwidth costs
4. Review migration experience for new creators
5. Assign owners and next steps

## Discussion Notes

### Listener Analytics

- Customers want episode-level retention charts and clearer download definitions.
- Current analytics update every six hours; several larger publishers have requested hourly reporting.
- Engineering can support hourly aggregation for paid plans without major architectural changes.
- Customer Success noted recurring confusion between downloads, unique listeners, and streams.

### Next Release

- The team reviewed three candidates: retention charts, dynamic ad insertion, and automated transcripts.
- Dynamic ad insertion remains strategically important but requires more work on campaign reporting and regional targeting.
- Automated transcripts could use the existing transcription vendor, but projected costs need validation.
- Retention charts are the most requested enhancement and have the lowest implementation risk.

### Infrastructure Costs

- Media delivery costs increased 18% quarter over quarter, mainly due to growth in long-form video podcasts.
- The current plan includes unlimited bandwidth for all paid tiers.
- The team agreed that introducing abrupt bandwidth limits would create unnecessary churn.
- Sam proposed evaluating a separate video add-on and renegotiating CDN rates before changing plan limits.

### Creator Migration

- Imported RSS feeds occasionally lose episode season and type metadata.
- Redirect setup is the largest source of migration-related support tickets.
- A guided redirect checklist and automated feed validation could reduce support volume.
- Product Design will test a revised migration flow with five creators next week.

## Decisions

- Prioritize episode retention charts for the next release.
- Provide hourly analytics updates on Pro and Business plans; Starter will remain on the six-hour schedule.
- Add plain-language definitions for downloads, unique listeners, and streams within the analytics dashboard.
- Keep existing audio bandwidth policies unchanged while infrastructure evaluates cost-reduction options.
- Explore a paid video hosting add-on instead of applying general bandwidth caps.
- Move dynamic ad insertion to the following planning cycle.
- Run a limited validation study before committing to automated transcripts.

## Action Items

- **Daniel:** Produce an engineering estimate for retention charts and hourly aggregation by August 6.
- **Priya:** Deliver updated analytics dashboard designs, including metric definitions, by August 8.
- **Elena:** Validate retention calculations against raw CDN logs and document edge cases by August 7.
- **Sam:** Compare CDN pricing options and model costs for a video add-on by August 15.
- **Jordan:** Compile the top 20 migration issues and recruit five creators for usability testing by August 5.
- **Priya and Jordan:** Conduct migration-flow usability sessions and share findings by August 12.
- **Marcus:** Draft customer messaging for the analytics improvements by August 14.
- **Maya:** Prepare a transcript-vendor cost and demand assessment for the next product review.

## Risks and Open Questions

- Can hourly analytics remain reliable during major episode launches?
- Should retention data exclude embedded players that block client-side events?
- What video storage and bandwidth allowance should be included in a potential add-on?
- Will existing customers expect hourly reporting without upgrading?
- Can RSS redirect validation be automated across all major hosting providers?

## Next Meeting

**Date:** August 15, 2026  
**Focus:** Release scope confirmation, CDN cost review, and migration testing results