Something in the world of floating have you stumped?
Show Highlights
Graham and Ashkahn announce the final episode of the Daily Solutions Podcast which will also be a live call in show, happening November 29th at 3pm PST. Set it on your calendars and call in. More details to follow.
Show Resources
If you’d like to ask a question on our live show on November 29th at 3pm PST, go to floattanksolutions.com/dsplive
And as always, feel free to send questions in the form above or directly at floattanksolutions.com/podcast.
As for “proper” show notes challenges, there’ve only been 7 so far, out of all the episodes. 8 if you include this one. Ashkahn only realized about a month ago that anything he says will be referenced will get linked over and he immediately became drunk with power, but I get to make fun of him here so it all works out.
Listen to Just the Audio
Transcription of this episode… (in case you prefer reading)
Ashkahn: All right welcome. Welcome.
Graham: Got a little special episode for you today. Thought we’d do two in one.
Ashkahn: Yeah. We have a special announcement to make.
Graham: Yeah. But I guess before we get to that. It does actually feel strange starting with no intro.
Ashkahn: It’s weird having no intro. We should do just a quick little like a special announcement in the show.
Graham: Yeah. Jordan hit it.
Hosts: Special announcement.
Ashkahn: Yeah that’s better.
Graham: Yeah.
Ashkahn: It feels more comfortable.
Graham: And yeah. So our announcement is that we’re actually going to be winding down the Daily Solutions Podcast a little later this month.
Ashkahn: Yeah. We’ve been doing this every day.
Graham: For, what feels like a couple decades at least.
Ashkahn: Yeah. I think, I’m pretty sure I was like four years old on this thing.
Graham: Yeah. Since like the early 70s, which is a long run for any podcast.
Ashkahn: Impressive to say the least. So really though that, we’ve decided to kind of put an end date on this thing.
Graham: Which is sad for all of us. You, us. Jordan, our audio engineer. And we kind of knew getting into this, that we wouldn’t be able to do the daily solutions podcast forever.
Ashkahn: Yeah. Every day for the rest of our lives.
Graham: We also said that we were just going to do it forever.
Ashkahn: But, like all kinds of projects, you got to think about when to put a nice little bow on them. And this just has felt like the right time to us. And it’s based on both just our kind of own time and us having a lot of stuff on our plate. And always wanting to hop around and being kind of restless people that don’t ever like to do the same thing over and over again.
Graham: Yeah, and our goal was actually to not have to do the same thing over and over again in making this podcast. We get so many questions in from people all over the world and from the Float industry and part of the resource we wanted to create here was to have this nice database of answers to the most common Float questions that are out there. And if you’ve been listening to our podcast for a while then you know we’ve pretty much tackled that like the first 100 episodes. So the questions have really just been getting more and more specific and nuanced which is great, but to a large degree, we really did accomplish kind of what we set out to do at the very beginning.
Ashkahn: Yeah. We’ve answered every single possible Float question that could exist in any form.
Graham: That’s it. We keep going if you guys are better in sending question-
Ashkahn: There just are no more questions.
Graham: You have no one to blame but yourself.
Ashkahn: We’re approaching the kind of one year mark for this podcast. And we decided to just kind of give it a nice book end right there. So we’ll be doing 365 episodes.
Graham: And then plus yeah. Our episode 00 sort of our intro Secret Episode.
Ashkahn: Yeah. So there’s 366. That way if you want to listen to all these during a leap year, you’ll be able to still.
Graham: Done. And then yeah. We’re also going to be doing this final live episode where we do a two hour call in show. And so that’ll be I guess, the 367. But that’ll be really fun. It’ll give you a chance to actually interact with us live on the air. You can also just hire people off the street to interact with us if you want them to call in, that’ll be fine too. And we’ll be doing this at the end of the month. So it’s going to be on November 29th, make sure to mark that down in your calendar.
Ashkahn: Yeah. We’ll be doing it at 3:00 O’clock Pacific Time and will release the details in terms of exactly how to call in and kind of that sort of specifics as we go along here.
Graham: Yep. And if we’re responsible enough, it’ll just be down in the show notes.
Ashkahn: Yeah, but it may or may not be there.
Graham: And in the meantime, I guess if you have any questions that you do want answered, now’s the time to send them in.
Ashkahn: Yeah. This is your last chance.
Graham: If you have any intro songs that we haven’t done yet that you really want to hear a certain genre, go type those in. Where do they type those in, by the way?
Ashkahn: Oh. There’s this handy little website called floattanksolutions.com/podcast. I don’t know if you’ve heard about it, but.
Graham: Yeah. So go there, send us requests. We’ll take some of them.
Ashkahn: Yeah. Get them while it’s hot. Because after this we’re taking a vow of silence for the next year. So we won’t be able to answer and … A vow of still fingers so we can’t answer emails either.
Graham: A vow of still fingers. Very modern kind of communication value we end up taking these days.
Ashkahn: This is it better, you better get them in.
Graham: We are also thinking about switching to an occasional Solutions Podcast format. We’ll see if that happens as well.
Ashkahn: Because this has been really fun. We’ve been having a really good time doing it. I’m not sure if that’s been coming through. And we also have just been having a really fun time making music. So this may not be the end of us just making random music.
Graham: Yeah. There might be a little band coming out of this whole project.
Ashkahn: Our plan is also to release an album of just the intros at some point after this podcast wraps up. So you can look forward the cut of our first album.
Graham: If that sounds terrible and you’d never listen to an album of just our intros, go to floattanksolutions.com/podcast and let us know.
Ashkahn: Sounds like it’s a horrible idea.
Graham: Yeah, Figure out something else to do with those. I also wanted to just kind of give a huge shout out to a lot of people who have been contributing to this podcast who you might not know as much behind the scenes.
Ashkahn: Ashkahn. Really underrepresented in how much his contribution is.
Graham: That is true dark Ashkahn. Evil Ashkahn. Regular Ashkahn has been absent for a lot of recording. So right here in the studio we have Jordan Lamp who makes all of our intros with us.
Ashkahn: And a huge part of it.
Graham: Balances out all the spikes in our audio.
Ashkahn: Our intro was basically started with Graham and I just going like … and then Jordan turns it into the music that you’re actually listening to.
Graham: Magic. And of course also behind the scenes we have Juliet-Tango Mylan, who writes up all the show notes for us, goes through all of our transcriptions. Generally makes things look good in our website version of all of this. So the show definitely would not be as entertaining to read along with were it not for her massive efforts.
Ashkahn: And matches all of our show notes challenges that we put out there.
Graham: Yeah, we’ll put the number of show notes challenges that she’s matched so far in the show notes too, this one. And likewise behind the scenes, just the entire float tank solutions team. So Derek Wyatt does a lot of the marketing and advertising for us. And likewise if you found us through the Facebook ad, it was probably Derek Wyatt who put that up there and wrote the entertaining copy that made you click on it.
Ashkahn: He also reminds us that we have to keep doing this every day so we don’t forget.
Graham: Every morning. The 6:00 am call.
Ashkahn: Wake up podcast call.
Graham: Wake up podcast services been really, thanks Derek.
Ashkahn: Of course there’s the Mr. Jake Marty himself who’s been on a number of these and helps us answer the construction questions that he’s really the man for the plan.
Graham: Yep. Lays down some issues with this when he’s on.
Ashkahn: That’s right.
Graham: I guess as does Derek Wyatt. So thanks to both of them as well.
Ashkahn: And Juliet’s been on some intros.
Graham: Yeah, that’s true.
Ashkahn: And we’ve had some bands come and do intros with us.
Graham: Yeah. So there’s Agents of ECCO with Marshall and Matt who have come in been in the studio with us if you hear voices that aren’t mine and Ashkahn’s. Sometimes it’s them.
Ashkahn: There’s a Kevin and Natty from Flying Caravan, they’ve come and helped us out. And Kevin by himself many times. He’s just called us up and wanted to come and record intros with us.
Graham: The notorious Kevin Fisk. And then the other kind of on the ground Float Tank Solutions team. So our Float Tank experts, Frank and Brian who have been directing you, our listeners over to the show and give us questions that people ask them to kind of pass on to the podcast. And just in general Float Tanks Solutions wouldn’t really exist without them actually having conversations and kind of being our voice that we don’t have time to be anymore with so many people who are just getting started.
Ashkahn: And of course our biggest thank you has to go out to Ashkahn. He’s just been a really big part of this and I think we can all appreciate that.
Graham: I was going to say the audience but that was very selfish of you.
Ashkahn: Yeah, that’s true. No really, we just actually could not have done this with that everybody listening and then sending in questions. And then thank you for sending them in. They’re really fun for us to receive.
Graham: Even the really fun for us to make fun of as well. You go.
Ashkahn: We’re going to get this whole like back and forth communication and figured out.
Graham: I was going to say the same thing. Yeah, we really got to get that nailed in.
Ashkahn: It’s been cool.
Graham: We love you.
Ashkahn: Yeah, we do. We do love you and you’ve been asking some questions that stump us or difficult or make us think about things in different ways. We’re used to-
Graham: We just sweep those under the rug.
Ashkahn: Thanks for all of you send them the softballs over. That’s made this podcast a lot easier.
Graham: No, it has been a total pleasure and just because we’re not doing the podcast doesn’t mean you can’t ask us questions. So reach out anytime and we’re here to help again, on or off the air. Yeah, I just feel like I just want to keep saying thanks. Like this has been a blast.
Ashkahn: It has been.
Graham: Thank you.
Ashkahn: Thank you.
Graham: Thanks.
Ashkahn: Thanks.
Graham: I’m bittersweet. I’m happy but I’m also bitter.
Ashkahn: We can tell, yeah.
Graham: All right. Thanks for listening to our special episode everyone.
Ashkahn: Yeah. Thanks everybody and we’ll see you on the 29th. I mean and tomorrow too. But-
Graham: Yeah. But definitely tune in for the call in.
Ashkahn: But we get to hang out.
Graham: That’s the big thing.
Ashkahn: Yeah.
Graham: Live episode.
Ashkahn: Yeah. It’s going to be fun. It’s going to be a blast.
Graham: Popcorn for everyone. If you let us know where we are, we will send you popcorn.
Ashkahn: At least a small handful of popcorn.
Graham: All right. Bye everyone.
Ashkahn: Right.
Recent Podcast Episodes
Funding your center through Kickstarter – DSP 119
Crowdfunding has made so many projects possible that would otherwise not exist. It seems perfect for niche ideas, concepts that would otherwise never see the light of day, and passion projects that just need to happen. This sounds perfect for float centers, but there are some caveats.
Crowdfunding is time intensive and there’s not guarantee of success. Aside from that, there are some issues with it that complicate things for float centers that other crowdfunded projects likely won’t face. Graham and Ashkahn talk about the successes of float center crowdfunding and the not-so-successes as well.
Don’t Build Your Own Float Tank! – DSP 118
For anyone considering a DIY float tank, give this episode a listen first. This isn’t a discussion on the merits of doing things one way versus another or expressing an opinion on one side and playing devil’s advocate for the other. Graham and Ashkahn know painfully well from personal experience the pitfalls of falling into the hubris trap of thinking you can build your own float tanks. They built two large open tanks in Float On and even years later they still cause headaches.
What’s more, they’ve spoken with dozens of people who’ve also gone through this themselves and heard their horror stories after they didn’t listen to the advice of not doing it.
The perception that it can be a cost-cutting measure or a more reliable way to get an operating float tank in your center by going DIY is generally pretty flawed. There’s so much to it that you just can’t consider before the fact.
Should Your Float Center have a Blog? – DSP 117
This seems like a good idea on paper. It helps with SEO stuff for Google. It gives you an outlet to write about floating and share information about the industry. And it seems to fall in line with something that other businesses do, right?
So what are the downsides? How much time and effort does a blog really take? What sort of impact does it have for a float center? Graham and Ashkahn lay out the pros and cons as well as things you may not initially consider about the responsibility of having a blog.
Thoughts on Buying Yelp Ads – DSP 116
There are lots of businesses that experience the dogged persistence of Yelp sales people calling them. Float On has done both buying Yelp ad space and living without it and Graham and Ashkahn break down exactly what that experience was like.
They also go into exactly what Yelp ads mean and how it impacts your float center (or doesn’t, as the case may be) as well as how well Yelp stacks up in comparison to other ad sources.
When is it Time to Open a Second Float Center? – DSP 115
Okay, so… Float On only has one location (not counting Float On Hong Kong) and there’s certainly a reason for that. Graham and Ashkahn have toyed with the idea of opening up another center multiple times throughout the years but something else always came up. As they’ve met more people in the industry, they’ve seen some of the pitfalls and successes from people opening additional locations, franchises and whatever else. They share their thoughts on when they think it’d be best to open and why they say to wait a little bit.
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