“Instead of chasing political and social sensationalism, the perfect media outlet for me offers respite and a break from the daily grind”, says Piotr Nesterowicz, founder and former publisher of Pismo. Guided by this philosophy, Pismo has set a high standard for in-depth journalism in Poland, which reaches around 50,000 people on a monthly basis, including 20,000 regular readers. Yet even thoughtful journalism faces the challenge of diminishing trust and engagement.
To counter this, Pismo began experimenting with audio storytelling five years ago. Its flagship product, Pismo Investigation podcast, combines narrative craft – emotional storytelling, plot twists and cliffhangers – with rigorous investigative reporting on issues such as foster care, youth violence or stalking. As Nesterowicz explains, even if people read less, they remain deeply curious about the world – and audio lets Pismo meet them halfway, engaging both reason and emotion, drawing listeners in without oversensationalizing.
By the time Pismo joined IPI’s Transition Accelerator, its audio model had already proven successful. Across five seasons of five to six episodes each, the series had been listened to more than 2.5 million times, reaching nearly 400,000 unique listeners per season. Still, maintaining engagement year-round was a challenge. The team’s goal in the programme was to build continuity: expanding production from one to four podcast series per year, doubling total listens and establishing audio storytelling as a pillar of their reader-revenue model.
Building capacity and infrastructure
“Expanding from one to four series per year was a big step”, says Nesterowicz, “so it was important to set the groundwork”. The team hired new staff, brought in an external consultant with expertise in podcast production, and recreated workflows for year-round production.
At the same time, Pismo rethought its approach to distribution and marketing. They refined Pismo do słuchania (Pismo for listening) on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and YouTube, transforming the audio content into a near stand-alone product. While still grounded in Pismo’s reputation as a fact-based, independent media organisation, the podcasts now reach a broader audience that may not regularly engage with the magazine’s written content.
To support growth, Pismo introduced a freemium model: the first episode of each series is free, while subsequent episodes are available to subscribers. Editorially, the stories now extend beyond investigative reporting, and explore people, places and issues that are often overlooked – from culture and technology to health or minority rights. The latest season, for instance, examines “psychowashing”: the harm caused by self-proclaimed gurus and influencers who offer unqualified therapy advice on social media.
Listening to listeners
Perhaps the most important outcome of Pismo’s accelerator journey, as the team itself points out, has been learning to listen to its audience – and, specifically, to “listen to understand”. Guided by coaching during the accelerator, the team conducted qualitative interviews not only with subscribers but also with former listeners who had churned. These conversations helped them understand listening habits, subscription behaviours, and what keeps the audience engaged. They also confirmed an important hypothesis: that a single series per year was not enough to sustain ongoing engagement and subscriptions. Unfortunately, the costs of producing multiple series a year proved to be untenable.
“You can’t leave long gaps between audio content”, Nesterowicz emphasises, “you need to keep the conversation going.” Its audio library now exceeds 800 hours, including new stories and pieces from the archive, which together maintain a continuous connection with listeners.
3000 new subscribers for a sustainable future
For Pismo, the podcast strategy is as much about mission as sustainability. Reader revenue already makes up about half of the organisation’s income. However, it would have to attract 3000 new subscribers over the next three years to cover production costs for the podcasts. In the current fundraising landscape, shaken last year by Donald Trump’s cuts to USAID programmes, the organisation, under new management (with Urszula Kifer, „Pismo” editor-in-chief as a new CEO), had to pivot and focus on its core product – the monthly magazine available in three formats: print, online and audio. But the process itself – listen, test, listen again, fine-tune – is already making a difference.
The Transition Accelerator is part of the Media Innovation Europe programme (MIE), made possible with the support of the European Union.
