 from our studios, in the heart of Silicon Valley, Palo Alto, California, this is a CUBE Conversation. Hey, welcome back everybody, Jeff Frick here with theCUBE. We're in our Palo Alto studios today for a CUBE Conversation, kind of an interesting conversation around trying to connect big enterprises who are always trying to be innovative with small companies who are usually innovative if they don't necessarily have the connections into the big companies that have a little bit more resources and might be interested in the things that they're working on. And really doing that through podcasts, which is a really growing venue. It's been going on for a while, but we're seeing a big uptake and I think the consumption of podcasts and who's doing podcasts, the Brands Behind Podcasts are really happy to have them all the way from Texas. It's Aaron Greger and Sia Yasatorat, the co-founders of Innovation Calling. So welcome. Thank you for having us. Thank you for having us. Absolutely. So did I get the description right of Innovation Calling or give everyone kind of your overview of what you guys are up to? Yeah, so Innovation Calling was developed with the fact of there's, being in Dallas, we've got a lot of large corporations with Innovation Labs, they're trying to stand out, they're trying to connect with great talent, but a lot of these people, everybody's got an Innovation Lab and we've talked about this before. If you're in the Fortune 500, you are a tech company, whether you like it or not. And so we just saw this potential to highlight these companies to be able to hopefully get talent. And then on the other side, enterprise companies are trying to connect with startups, established startups, not ideas, but established. And there's a lot to sift through. So hopefully the goal of the podcast is to highlight these companies and help with that sifting and help with the talent pool and really connecting the creators with the companies that are trying to create. And what's kind of the objective of that matching? Cause clearly it's not a hiring, you're not a hiring service, you're talking about companies, not people. So what's kind of the objective? I mean, what's kind of your best case if this connection works? Well, so for us, our best case scenario is obviously we are at the forefront of innovation with emerging technologies today. Obviously Silicon Valley has a lot of talent, has a lot of corporations already in that space. When you think of the mid-tier, second-tier cities like Dallas, for example, you don't have as many tech workers but there's still need for that type of talent, right? Right. With podcasting as our venue and medium to communicate that, we also realized that there was a great potential for these corporations to leverage podcasting as a way to communicate and do their outreach. Again, around those mid-tier, second-tier cities where you might not have the plethora of folks here in the Bay Area. Right, right. But even if they connect with that company, is it, are you thinking that there's going to be some type of technical alliance, some type of partnership, an OEM agreement, or what, again, kind of, if you're pitching this to the small company, what am I like, yeah, you're finally getting, you know, I listened to your podcast the other day, we had a woman from Ericsson and I'm building some 5G, you know, widget. You know, what's kind of my anticipated outcome of participating and kind of following your funnel and connecting with Ericsson? So we have a couple different ways. First of all, we can, through us, we've actually made a lot of handshakes. It's what I love to do is help create the handshakes and we've done that personally. The other side is we are putting, we're taking the next step in doing live events. So that podcast that you talked about was a series of women in tech leadership where it's not just a live podcasting event but a networking event. So we're really taking the next step in creating these opportunities that you can be in the same room, more exclusive type room that we're putting together, a lot of invite-only perspective, but helping to make those connections where I see somebody from Ericsson's going to be there, I want to make sure, and now I can actually be in person to make that happen, too. Okay, in the wide podcast, how did you come to use podcasts as kind of your medium? So I think there's been a tradition in the last five, six years that podcasts does have the potential to blow up. Well, I think now in 2019, we've actually hit that threshold where there's actually consumer response. And with enough studies, what they've discovered is most podcast listeners are actually educated business professionals. They tend to lean towards technology. Yet you don't see a lot of technology-branded podcasts. And so we looked at the market, a lot of hobbyists type and personal-branded podcasts, but we think now is the right time for corporations to make the investment to understand that the medium of traditional advertising is actually evolving, and podcasts is leading that forefront. You're seeing a lot of huge investments. Actually, here, there's $100 million-plus investments for the purpose of growing the podcast community. And which one are you talking about? Is that for the infrastructure or is that for the actual talent in the community and the content generation? Yes. Yeah, that's what I'm talking about. That's everything. Exactly. Yeah, a company that does a lot of production but builds the community, too. So I listen to Malcolm Gladwas all the time. We get to interview him at QuickBooks Connect a couple of years ago. Really interesting podcast. Guys like Joe Rogan and stuff that obviously got a ton of great pub when he had a lawn musk on who smoked, though, not really a joint, but kind of a joint in that. But I'm curious on the business side, are there some kind of lighthouse podcasts that you guys see that you use either as an example for what you're trying to develop or as an example to show, I'm just going to keep using Eric's and just top of mind the one I just watched, to show them to say, hey, this is the type of thing that you guys should be trying to do. Who are some of your favorites? So I'm a big fan of hackable knack-a-feet that has rolled out. When you think of tech, Brandon, that is what we do focus on is technology-based corporations. We tend to lead towards speeds and feeds. That's kind of our, we're engineered background folks in general, right? But I thought hackable does a great job of pulling in some technology, but then using stories or using, you know, events of being hacked, for example, something that audience can relate to. And it's a storytelling. And that's the story arc that I think in general, we're helping corporations understand the value of storytelling. It's not just about a product. It's not just selling it, you know, a cup per se, but the story around it. How good that cup of coffee will feel when you drink it or, you know, the experience or memories that you have that evokes. So how far are you long on your journey? I know you have a number of podcasts up already on your site. Are you the first inning, the third inning, or, you know, is it still kind of early days or where are you in your development of this, of your concept and your company? Well, we have a, I can't, a couple of different components to our business. So the podcast has what I was telling you about too. We have a network component. We've got a consulting services. Our goal for innovation calling was, let's first prove the concept. Let's plug into a network. Let's make sure we will be the test case, essentially. And we've proven that. So from that perspective of that component, we're hitting, we're almost at 100,000 downloads of our podcasts. You know, we're doing pretty well with that. And now as we build, it's the next components we're bringing on a couple of customers from a consulting basis. And we help not just with the production, but with the promotion. So we spoke earlier about, I always kind of look at if the tree falls in the forest, but no one was there to hear it. Did it actually happen? I feel that same fits with a lot of corporate podcasts. They're out there, but no one knows they're out there. So are you going to continue spending that kind of money on production and time with your employees if you're not going to do anything to promote it and no one knows it exists? So we help on both sides of that scale. So on your podcast, which has been the women in tech theme, or is that kind of the theme you're going to continue or is that kind of a launching theme and you're going to turn into other themes? Well, that's just a component. So innovation calling, there's men on the actual podcast, but we started that specific series to, yes, talk about the technology perspective of women, but how did you get there? You know, what's your story of growing? So that's just a segment of that podcast. Again, to bring in, to really theme the live events to help grow that community on a segment basis. So as that grows, we'll probably, our goal is to do a couple of different other types of segments. We're talking about a channel. Idea, yes, an event yesterday with a client. So we want to actually like take the bigger part of innovation calling and niche it down bit by bit on the live event scale. Okay. And then on the event side, how often are you doing them? You know, kind of what's the format? How many people, frequency and, you know, what's the, I guess the format. See, it's ready. Let me tell you. She's ready to go. She's ready to go. I'm ready to go. No, for events, well, first off, there's one in order. So if we can't wind you and down you, I suppose. But now really, again, we're about building a community first and foremost. The Dallas-Fort Worth area is making great strides in the entrepreneurial side, big investments to get major corporations to come into the area. So we think there's a great opportunity for these folks to come together. A lot of folks from outside of town who are looking to build their network, again, because they've been relocated. And then, you know, our themes, women and technologies are first thing because quite frankly, we're sort of biased a little bit towards that, right? Well, it's a good theme. Gotta help our people. But again, it is a very casual format right now. It's interview-based. Is it 100 people, 500 people? We actually started and we want it to be intimate because we want the value of the network to actually make genuine connections as opposed to if it gets too large, I feel like some individual might be left off the side. Right, so we actually started off, our very first one that sold out was 40 people and we did not want more than that in the room. Quite frankly, then it gets claustrophobic. And what about frequency? Once a month. Once a month. Yeah, once a month. Our goal is to keep those sides about to 75 to 100 of those, max out at 100, but make sure to see his point and keep them in an intimate scale. And then what about geography? So obviously you guys are based out of Dallas, Fort Worth area, you're here in Silicon Valley. What's kind of your geology or geographic play? How do you see this kind of evolving? Absolutely, we would love to share this across the United States. Again, we want to make sure Dallas is viable, proves a point, it is a second tier city versus something like the Silicon Valley area or Chicago, New York, et cetera. We are not trying to create a brand new women in technology group, if you will. We're actually working in collaboration with existing women technology groups. We're just simply leveraging the networking opportunity through live podcasting. Again, growing the podcast medium. Yeah, I would say by early 2020, our goal is to come out here and be able to have an audience to do a live event. We actually had drinks with someone last night about that collaboration. So we'd love to grow it on a perspective and be able to do it in different communities because I've been podcasting for about five years through other businesses and the live event is just, it's really, I mean, you do live interviews, you do live events, but there's just something special about that connection and then being there live to do the interview, it's a really fun format. So do you have any upcoming guests you can plug or share with us today on your next couple of podcasts? Yeah, well, so our next event is actually April's. Ninth. Yeah. Oh my god, the day is going away. April ninth and we're going to have Crystal Christensen, VP of tech support at Sonicwall. So we're very excited to have her on board and we're still in confirmation, but we're going to be expecting folks from Salesforce, HPE and Facebook. Okay, great. For our next events. And where do people go to listen to the podcast? Innovationcalling.com. All right. We'll see you, Erin. Thanks for stopping by. Hopefully you had a good successful couple of days in Silicon Valley and safe travels home. Thank you. And what you're having is Jeff, appreciate it. She's Erin. She's C. I'm Jeff. You're watching theCUBE. We're at our Palo Alto studios for a CUBE conversation. Thanks for watching. We'll catch you next time.