Today nearly every company in the world is a digital product design company. And yet there are few resources for teams large and small to learn best practices from experts. That’s where InVision’s award-winning Design Better podcast, now in its fifth season, comes in. With all of the immense challenges facing the world right now, in the most recent season of the Design Better Podcast we wanted to bring on guests who can share their wisdom—not only about how to build better products—but also how to navigate challenges in your career, and discover opportunities in the face of adversity.
Hosted by design luminaries Aarron Walter and Eli Woolery, InVision’s Design Better podcast began as a question: Why are there no podcasts that share insights from product design leaders at the top of their game? Digital product design and development is a process that’s messy even in the best of circumstances. There is no playbook, and as this emerging industry takes shape, there are a myriad of tools, styles and techniques that connect and clash before a final product is shipped. Those who do it well have valuable lessons to share, and many want to level up. The Design Better podcast serves these listeners with compelling interviews from the world’s top product leaders and designers, on topics spanning from design culture and diversity to scaling teams, business thinking, sprints, retrospectives and digital transformation.
Getting to 1 million listens of the Design Better podcast was no easy task. Behind-the-scenes, our team worked to uplevel our practice at nearly every stage, by making it easy for our guests to share our podcast with their own organizations and networks; by bringing in new talent on our team, such as a professional sound mixer and content strategist; and by maximizing key insights from each episode to reach new listeners across platforms. As our podcast has matured, so has the design industry, and the connected workflow remains a front-and-center topic worth covering.
These days, we’re thrilled that talent, from John Maeda and Brian Chesky of AirBnB to the directors of the new Home show on Apple TV+, approach us for the opportunity to be part of our podcast. We never take this interest for granted. Podcasting is a long game and persistence is key. We knew having an existing brand name would help a bit up front, but it took time to attract our listeners and fans. Three years later, we’re so proud of what we’ve built and the amazing reception and growth we see with each consecutive episode
Since launch, the InVision Design Better podcast has featured Google’s Irene Au, founder of IDEO David Kelley, and New York Times bestseller Jake Knapp, to name just three great product design leaders. In our most recent season, launched in February, we took a closer look at how teams can work better together for greater impact, forming coalitions, and seeing the business through a design lens. Interviews featured NASA’s Steve Rader and Amazon’s Joanna Peña-Bickle. We were thrilled when the season was nominated for a 2020 Webby. The podcast is currently in the top 1% of all podcasts in the U.S and has been downloaded over 1 million times.
Taking a page from design principles, everything we do provides value to our existing listeners, helping them address their challenges and find new solutions. Even though we surged past 1 million listeners, we are relentlessly focused on improving our podcast, and launched season five earlier this fall with incredible interviews, a new ongoing release cadence, and some fun surprises, too.
