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The Situation

When Slobodan Manić joined Megan Dougherty on the Business Podcast Spotlight, he was closing in on 200 episodes of the No Hacks Podcast – a show that had helped him build a strong professional network and connect with industry leaders. But after years of focusing on interviews, he was ready to shift the spotlight. Slobodan wanted to start showcasing his own expertise, bring more structure to his content, and explore how the podcast could better support his growing business and tools like Podpacer, all without losing the authenticity that built his audience.

About Slobodan Manić

Slobodan Manic is an entrepreneur and conversion expert who helps marketers and digital professionals optimise their online performance. He’s the host of the No Hacks Podcast, where he’s interviewed nearly 200 industry leaders, and the founder of Web Performance Tools, home to Podpacer – a podcast prep assistant designed to make guest research and post-production content easier. With a background in web development and a passion for smart workflows, Slobodan’s work bridges the gap between content creation and real business results.

What’s Happened So Far

Slobodan has put in the work – nearly 200 episodes of the No Hacks Podcast, most of them interviews with industry leaders in CRO, SEO, and digital marketing. He started the show during the pandemic as a way to connect, learn, and build a network. And it worked. The podcast helped him grow professionally, get known in his field, and stay top of mind with people doing exciting work in the same space.

But as his business has evolved – especially with the launch of Podpacer – Slobodan’s goals for the podcast have shifted. Interviews helped open doors, but now he wants to highlight his ideas, frameworks, and approaches more clearly. He’s interested in experimenting with solo episodes, mixed formats, and content that directly supports his role as a founder and thought leader.

He also wants to make better use of the content he’s already created. Podpacer can help with that, pulling insights and clips from past interviews to enrich new episodes and deepen relationships with past guests.

So the question now is how to shift the podcast into something that still feels like No Hacks, but does a lot more heavy lifting for the business.

Which of course leads to more questions you’ll need to answer:

• How do you make the transition without alienating your audience?
• How do you repurpose past content so it continues working for you?
• And how do you keep showing up consistently — without doing everything alone?

Here’s what Slobodan is planning…

The New Plan

As you heard in the conversation, Slobodan is ready to take the No Hacks Podcast in a new direction – one that puts his expertise more clearly at the centre while still keeping the spirit of connection and conversation that’s worked so well up to now.

Rather than launching a completely separate show or overhauling the format all at once, the plan is to start weaving in solo episodes and shorter, narrative-driven content alongside the interviews. This gives him space to share his process, test ideas, and make the show more strategically useful without losing the audience he’s already built.

He’ll also be using Podpacer to pull relevant moments from past interviews, letting older content do more work in new episodes. This not only keeps relationships warm with past guests but makes each new episode richer with layered insight and lived experience.

To support the shift, he’s experimenting with Substack as a community and engagement hub – offering written reflections, bonus content, and easy ways to keep the conversation going. It’s a low-effort, high-impact way to stay top of mind and deepen connections with listeners who are most aligned with his work.

It’s a flexible, repeatable model that lets him build authority and stay visible – while keeping time, effort, and overwhelm in check.

How to Use This Strategy

If you’re thinking about shifting your podcast from a pure interview show to something more focused on thought leadership, here are a few things to think through:

• What topics or frameworks do you want to be known for?

• Do you already have episodes or guest interviews that touched on these areas you could reference or reuse?

• What kind of solo or narrative-style content would help showcase your expertise and make it easier for people to understand how you work?

Start by mapping out a few core ideas or processes you want to highlight. These can be short solo episodes or mixed with clips from past guests to add context. If you have a tool or service, think about how your podcast can introduce people to it naturally without sounding like a sales pitch.

If you’re not sure where to begin, your past podcast episodes are full of material you can build on. And if you’re already active on LinkedIn or Substack, use those platforms to test what people respond to – then bring that insight into the show. Little by little, you’ll have a podcast that not only builds relationships but drives business too.

If you’re looking for a partner to help you figure out and deploy a strategy that will work for your business, we can help! Book a call, and let’s talk!

How to Track Success

If you’re evolving your podcast into more of a thought leadership platform, here are the key indicators to track:

1. Do listeners reach out after a solo or hybrid episode – especially with questions, comments, or interest in what you talked about? That’s your clearest early signal.
2. Are you seeing any engagement on Substack or LinkedIn – comments, shares, or replies that reference the podcast content?
3. Are existing listeners sticking around as you shift the format? If your download numbers hold steady, that’s a good sign the transition is working.
4. And most importantly – are you hearing from potential clients or collaborators who found value in your insights? That kind of inbound interest is what turns content into opportunity.

Connect with Slobodan

Slobodan is already rolling out new solo episodes and experimenting with content that puts his expertise front and centre, and he’ll be back on the Spotlight in a few months to share how it’s all landing. In the meantime, if you’re a podcaster looking to streamline your workflow, check out Podpacer – it’s built to save time and keep you focused on the parts of podcasting that actually grow your business.

You can connect with Slobodan on LinkedIn and subscribe to No Hacks over on Substack to follow along as the show evolves.