FORMER UNIVISION EXECUTIVE AND MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL PLAYER HEADS SPANISH-LANGUAGE PODCASTS COMPANY

As a former Major League Baseball pitcher, Jack Hobbs knows how to mix up his pitches, but these days he’s mixing up a variety of Spanish-language podcasts.

Jack Hobbs is a former Major League pitcher

Hobbs is the president of Dallas-based reVolver Podcasts, which means “to mix it up” in Spanish. He launched the podcast last year with the goal of targeting the Hispanic population.

PODCASTS HAVE LIMITED COMMERCIAL INTERRUPTON

The podcast offers audio from 30 different shows for free, on-demand with limited commercial interruption. True to its name, reVolver offers a wide variety of popular names in Hispanic entertainment, news and business.

Big names include El Show de Piolin with Eduardo Sote, the Carolina Cadillo Show and Tu Dinero con Julie Stav.

“We’re trying to reach out to an audience that hasn’t really been catered to or addressed,” said Hobbs. “It’s there when they count on it being there. It’s no different than the boys at Hulu and Netflix.”

They’re able to track the number of downloads from both iTunes and the Google Play store and bring that to advertisers.

“We try to find the commonality between the advertiser and the vertical.” – Jack Hobbs

“We try to find the commonality between the advertiser and the vertical,” Hobbs said. “The content of the program should also reflect or at least have a thread of what the advertiser is all about.”

Hobbs is a pioneer in the podcast realm from his days as an executive at Univision, where he launched a Spanish-language podcast in 2006. That was in the days before accurate analytics allowed them to track downloads or demographics.

“We really didn’t know what we had,” he said.

Technology evolved over the next few years and so did the data Hobbs could take to advertisers.

So, how did a Philadelphia-born baseball player get involved in Hispanic media?

The former MLB left-hander credits his time in Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic and Venezuela playing winter baseball for immersing him in the language and culture.

Also of note, when Hobbs first broke into the Twins organization his roommate was infielder Ron Washington, who would later be the manager of the Texas Rangers from 2007 to 2014.

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