Life Uncut producer, Keeshia Pettit, describes the podcast’s audience as “a big group of friends talking to each other,” with a highly engaged group tuning in to follow the lives of Brittany Hockley and Laura Byrne.
Winning the On-Screen – Producer award at Mediaweek’s Next of the Best Awards, Mediaweek caught up with Pettit to speak about the trajectory of the Life Uncut brand and what she’d be doing if she wasn’t in media.
The awards have been judged by an all-star line-up, what does it mean to you to be recognised by this group?
It means a lot because the group of judges are so experienced in different areas of media, and they seem to have a lot of lived experience in different aspects of the media world. It feels as though they recognise the progressive side of media more than other types of awards nights.
What is the Life Uncut audience resonating with in 2024?
The story of Britt getting engaged has really resonated. Her story is a bit of an example of finding love later in life than what a lot of women think they will. She met her partner at 35.
Lately, our audience question-answer style episodes have been our biggest. We are lucky enough to have a hugely engaged audience (this includes the Facebook group) and it feels like a big group of friends talking to each other about what’s going on in their lives and what they’d like advice from everyone else about.
Life Uncut is always growing, and is now expanding out of the podcast world with live shows and a book. What’s it like producing for a brand on this trajectory?
It’s exciting. I think it’s encouraging knowing that there are different avenues that we can go down and not feel as though we’ve necessarily got to stay in any lane. It can feel a bit daunting at times trying all of these different things, but it’s very cool to be adaptable.
If you weren’t a producer, what would you be doing instead?
I actually have a background in medical sciences. I finished an honours degree in biomedical science so I think it’s likely I’d work around the field of behavioural neuroscience, human genetics or embryology if I hadn’t found media!
Being Next of The Best – what can the industry expect next from you?
How bad is it if I answer I’m not sure yet? I’m not really a ‘five-year plan’ kind of person, I’m more of a ‘have a creative idea and implement it almost immediately’ person. I think they call it impulsive.
For now, we are going to try and grow our YouTube presence and see what potential opportunities could come from that. We would also like to do a regional tour next and hit some of the smaller cities in Aus.
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Top image: Keeshia Pettit