The Charleston Marketing Podcast

Inside SC Competes: Fostering Technological Growth w/ Jamie DeMent

• Charleston AMA • Season 3

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Step into the dynamic world of South Carolina's technological revolution with Jamie DeMent, Director of Technology and Cyber Initiatives at the SC Council on Competitiveness. In this illuminating conversation, Jamie reveals how Charleston is transforming from a tourist destination into a vibrant tech hub where innovation thrives alongside historic charm.

The collaborative spirit driving South Carolina's tech growth takes center stage as Jamie explains how SC Competes connects entrepreneurs, established companies, and educational institutions to create meaningful economic impact. "If we're doing our job right, we're putting the right people in the right room for the right conversation to make things happen," she shares, highlighting the power of relationship-building in a state where social capital creates collective strength.

Discover surprising developments reshaping the region, from pioneering AI curriculum in eighth-grade classrooms to Charleston's emergence as a leader in electric vehicle battery technology. Jamie's insights reveal a technological ecosystem that has matured significantly over two decades, now offering a complete entrepreneurial pathway that keeps talent in South Carolina while attracting outside investment and innovation.

The conversation explores how growth has created opportunities for small businesses to thrive, the critical balance between leveraging AI tools while maintaining human authenticity in marketing, and why residents should become ambassadors for the state's technological achievements. As Jamie notes, "I want you to have the same amount of facts in your back pocket about our economic successes in technology and aerospace and life sciences as you do James Beard winning award restaurants."

Whether you're a tech entrepreneur seeking connections, a marketer navigating new technologies, or

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Title Sponsor: Charleston American Marketing Association

Presenting Sponsor: Charleston Media Solutions

Sponsor: ‪SCRA; South Carolina Research Authority

Cohosts: Stephanie Barrow, Mike Compton, Rachel Backal, Tom Keppeler

Produced and edited: RMBO Advertising

Photographer | Co-host: Kelli Morse

Art Director: Taylor Ion

Score by: The Strawberry Entrée; Jerry Feels Good, CURRYSAUCE, DBLCRWN, DJ DollaMenu
Studio Engineer: Brian Cleary and Mathew Chase

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SPEAKER_00:

Welcome to the Charleston Marketing Podcast, brought to you by the Charleston AMA and broadcasting from our friends at Charleston Media Solutions Studios. Thanks to our awesome sponsors at CMS, we get to chat with the cool folks making waves in Charleston. From business and art to hospitality and tech. These movers and shakers choose to call the low country home. They live here, work here, and make a difference here. So what's their story? Let's find out together.

SPEAKER_07:

Welcome to the Charleston Marketing Podcast. This is Mike Compton, and I'm here with my co-host, Stephanie Barrow.

SPEAKER_04:

Hi guys, what's up? Uh Stephanie and Barrow here. We are recording in the Charleston Media Solutions studios. What? Big supporters of a CAMA. We got to give a shout out to Charleston's favorite DJ, DJ Jerry's Feel Good. Jerry Feels Good with the beats. I'm Stephanie Barrow, founder of Stephanie Barrow Consulting, a digital marketing strategy agency here in Charleston. And I'm one of your past presidents. Yes.

SPEAKER_07:

Oh, that's right. I'm current president. You are.

SPEAKER_04:

You are.

SPEAKER_07:

We're making waves here, and we've got a special guest today. And it jives so well with our um, what are we calling it? Our theme this year, which is a theme. Martech is our initiative. How about that initiative? So this woman is leading Charleston's initiative on the state side. Uh her name's Jamie DeMents. She's the director of technology and cyber initiatives.

SPEAKER_06:

Roll off the tongue. Wow.

SPEAKER_07:

That's pretty cool. That is a title. Of SD Tech at the SC Council on Competitiveness. Yes. Yes. Just go ahead and help me out with that.

SPEAKER_05:

So we shorten it to Director of SC Tech with SC Competes because the marketing in all of us was like, we got to be able to talk about it quickly, but we're celebrating 20 years of doing the work we're doing for South Carolina.

SPEAKER_07:

Why does that sound like a long time?

SPEAKER_05:

Because you know it is a long time. And we started in logistics and then we're able to add in aerospace, and now we do applied um research through the uh Fraunhofer uh association, and now we have uh SE Tech. It's gonna go on for about six years now. So as a sector gets competitive in South Carolina, um our agency or organization, I should say, steps in and is able to help kind of through the nonprofit work that we do as leading kind of the business piece, the business voice along with the education, applied research, and government entities. Someone called us the nexus of a government, education, and industry voices. That is a big job. Yes, and I absolutely love it. How long have you been with this business? Correct. Two years in September. Okay. So, yes. So fairly still new, kind of, you know, when you're working for a state organization or even a state nonprofit, you're kind of always drinking out of the fire hose because you're taking on so many new things, but I don't think I'd have it any other way.

SPEAKER_07:

No, I love it.

SPEAKER_05:

But you're from the Charleston area, correct? I don't think they would claim me quite yet. Okay. I moved here in 2004.

SPEAKER_04:

So I think once you've hit the 20-year mark, you're pretty much a local, right? No, no.

SPEAKER_05:

My best friend's born-raised Isle Palms, her dad's born-raised Sullivan's Island, and they won't they won't let me say. But you have a child. I have a child. I feel like that grandfather's you wouldn't.

SPEAKER_07:

You're just trying to find a loophole. You're not gonna ever gonna be from you. You know.

SPEAKER_01:

If I live here for the rest of my life, I'm definitely a local.

SPEAKER_07:

When did you move here again, Steph?

SPEAKER_04:

Uh like it held as my child. 2014.

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah, okay. All right, I'm 2019.

SPEAKER_05:

So Clemson brought me south, and I always like to say Charleston brought me home. I love that.

SPEAKER_07:

Oh, there you go. So you grew up here in Charleston. No.

SPEAKER_05:

No, but I say it's really my home. I grew I was born in an Air Force Base out in Colorado. Um, ended up spending a lot of my time when my dad retired in in West Virginia, Wheeling, West Virginia. So I'm a huge Pittsburgh Steelers fan. Okay. And then uh Clemson, like I said, brought me down south, and then coming down to Charleston for the first time, getting on the boat at Isle Palms with my friend. Yeah. And I'm like, why would you go anywhere?

SPEAKER_07:

That's what we all say here.

SPEAKER_05:

I was hooked immediately.

SPEAKER_04:

That is what exactly what happened to me.

SPEAKER_07:

So vacation and then I moved. What's your first job here?

SPEAKER_05:

So funny enough, my uh first job was in the building that we are in right now. Amazing. So I Paul? Um Paul was. No, Paul was later. Um John Hakum, Linda was here, if you guys are familiar. But I um I was working as an intern in Greenville at the radio station up there, spent about a year and a half doing promotions, came down here and was able to kind of take on a promotions job as well down here, um, and absolutely loved it. So funny story is I was just talking to John Hacum, and we were laughing about the fact that I'll never forget the day, and I still talk about it often of when he walked in the room and said, We need websites, Jamie. Stop what you're doing and learn how to build us websites. Oh wow. So I stopped what I was doing. I think I was doing party on the point, probably. Um, and uh started working and teaching myself using Lydia.com, which shows my age, um, how to code a website and launched kind of four or five websites that year.

SPEAKER_07:

What year was that?

SPEAKER_05:

2005.

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah. Yes.

SPEAKER_05:

So and it was great. I mean, talk about your trajectory changing in one moment. I was doing events and I loved, you know, radio and being on at all the events and doing that, and then drastically changed to doing digital marketing, became a graphic designer and a web designer and a photographer.

SPEAKER_07:

Just became these things.

SPEAKER_05:

Just became these things because of John Hakeem telling me he needed four websites now the next day.

SPEAKER_07:

But um For those of you who don't know, John is the VP of sales here. Yes, business development. I don't know his exact title.

SPEAKER_05:

No, I mean it was sales back then, but yeah. Does it feel weird to be back in this building? It does. This room is majority back. Is this a specific room? Oh yeah. Yeah. So my husband, um, he had a part-time job here doing you know, traffic and different promotions, and you're in here.

SPEAKER_07:

Before he was your husband.

SPEAKER_05:

Uh before he was my husband.

SPEAKER_07:

Stephanie's a sucker for a love story. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05:

Well, we met in a cappella groups at Clemson. Oh, that's even cooler. That is even cooler.

SPEAKER_07:

You met in what now, acapella groups?

SPEAKER_05:

He was in the all boy acapella group, I was in the all-girl acapella group. Okay.

SPEAKER_07:

So what did you study in college?

SPEAKER_05:

Communications.

SPEAKER_07:

Sure.

unknown:

Okay.

SPEAKER_05:

So it makes sense. Yes, in history.

SPEAKER_07:

I was telecommunications, but that's the same.

SPEAKER_05:

It's the same thing. They never thought, you know, digital marketing wasn't a thing back then. Yeah, it's insane. Right? Go into the talk about AI in a minute, right? Well, let's talk about how crazy.

SPEAKER_07:

So SC Competes. I want to know more about that and how our audience can, you know, find more information and gather more resources from you guys. And like, what is what do you guys do for the perfect.

SPEAKER_05:

Yeah. So if you want to learn more about us, I'll start there and just SE Competes.org. Um, definitely follow us on LinkedIn and follow me on LinkedIn as well. I'm really passionate about posting about our technology ecosystem from Charleston to Greenville and everywhere in between. Um, but really at the core of what we do is, um, and me specifically with SC Tech, is we bring the industry voice to the table through work in education, applied research, and um industry conversations.

SPEAKER_06:

Yes.

SPEAKER_05:

So um, if you've been in a meeting with me, you've heard kind of my personal tagline is if we're doing our job right, we're putting the right people in the right room for the right conversation to make things happen. I love that. That's great.

SPEAKER_07:

The Who Not How. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05:

So yeah.

SPEAKER_07:

So I brought it up again, Stephanie. Who not how it's never gonna die.

SPEAKER_05:

It's on my desk, but not right again.

SPEAKER_07:

Do you know what I'm talking about? I don't know. Yeah, it's a book called Uh Who Not How by Dan Sullivan, and it's all about instead of figuring out the problem and just beating your head over the table constantly, find somebody else that knows how to do that.

unknown:

Yes.

SPEAKER_07:

And then you are now part of their connections and their world, so you know your world grew even more, and then just putting the right people in the right place. Right.

SPEAKER_05:

You know, collaboration, social capital is is is key, especially in in a state like South Carolina.

SPEAKER_07:

Um, utilizing those relationships and it's like we're not big enough to be competitive, I don't feel like you know, we have to be able to do that.

SPEAKER_05:

There's enough work for all of us too. Yes. Right? We all bring something to the table.

SPEAKER_07:

If we're collaborative, then we make ourselves look bigger. And I think that's what you guys' really mission is.

SPEAKER_05:

Yeah, 100%. You know, when my job really is to do is I travel the state, I I meet with different technology companies, CEOs, tech talent, tech educators, uh, and really kind of see how we can make sure they're all collaborative and and connecting and working together. Um, and I had a webinar a couple of days ago with different capital resources throughout the state, and I kept telling all the people in the on the call, you know, it is a small enough state that if you're in Charleston and you're looking for capital or relationships or clients, don't be afraid to get in the car and travel to places like Aiken or North Augusta or Greenville. It's a small enough state that and there's enough connections that you can you can meet new people and and and really kind of help your business soar. And so that's a lot of what I'm constantly doing is just making those relationships, meeting with people and hearing their needs. Um, and then we are able to bring that industry voice to the room when we're helping create K through 12 curriculum.

SPEAKER_02:

Oh, say more.

SPEAKER_05:

Say a little bit more about that. Oh, so um, yeah, uh, I can't take, you know, uh too much credit for it. I get to work with the industry leaders, but Kim, Chris, and Bunny Ward lead both of our education programs through Transform SC and then just our workforce initiatives. Um, but we have been amazingly blessed to be leading some of the curriculum for uh AI with the South Eastern Regional, I guess Southeastern I say it right, Southeastern Regional Education Board. Oh. And so we will be launching a test bed of this education curriculum in about 30 schools at eighth grade. I love this this this fall.

SPEAKER_07:

What grade?

SPEAKER_05:

Eighth grade. Eighth grade, okay. To see, and it's bigger than just I think when some people talk about AI curriculum, they immediately think it's about coding the AI or but uh this is much bigger than that. It's how we can diversify our viewpoint of how AI is used, um, from ethics of of AI to how is AI sitting in everything from agriculture to media and marketing to manufacturing to life sciences? Yeah and how does it going to how can you be a part of that as it develops and changes the world really in how you have access to it? This the smarter we make kids now, right, the stronger and more competitive our state is going to be.

SPEAKER_04:

Did you do a case study to pick the eighth grade? How did you pinpoint that grade screen?

SPEAKER_05:

That is a Kim Chris question. I'm not gonna I will not make a comment. So I will, you know, if anyone has any questions, you can reach reach out to her. But it's been really, really exciting. And we've done programs like this forever. Our logistics program does a um a lemonade stand in in elementary schools to help teach them the idea of logistics, right? So the beginning, middle, and end of what logistics and supply chain is. And so we've really been lucky with SE Competes to be a part of uh education from K through 12 to higher education for the 20 years that we've been working.

SPEAKER_07:

Because especially in the high school level, even in across the eighth grade level too, we have to have these kids come um, not just college ready, but career ready with and able to use these tools that are being made every day.

SPEAKER_04:

That's the technology is constantly changing.

SPEAKER_07:

Technology is only changing, constantly changing. I'm gonna do a little plug. We just interviewed Anita Huggins. Oh, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_05:

She is doing a phenomenal job, by the way.

SPEAKER_07:

Amazing. So she sat where you're sitting um for the Building Business Podcast for the Mount Pleasant Chamber. You can check that out, our sister podcast. Uh and she crushed it. She absolutely crushed it. And I asked her one of the questions about AI and what we're doing to, you know, um, you know, combat, not combat, but like uh protect our children with AI and how what are we doing to, you know, help them learn the AI as well. And so you're you're doing that.

SPEAKER_05:

Yeah, 100%. You know, I it's really interesting where you have to be able to say we have to allow kids to take on AI or we'll be immediately behind, but not take away their ability to have critical thinking. Right. So I think if we work through, and we're doing that simultaneously right now with SE Competes, the work through Transform SC is working um with a lot of our CTE schools, which if you're not familiar with is our career in technology education schools.

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah, I just got my CTE certification actually. Did you? Yeah, yeah. Just yesterday. Oh, perfect. Yeah. So I'm gonna be a substitute teacher. Oh, that I love that. Congratulations. I'm happy for you. Yeah, that's really great.

SPEAKER_05:

We need more of that, but yeah. And so there's the soft skills or the success skills, varying on who you talk to, and you combine those with the understanding of how you use uh AI to use critical thinking opposed to taking away your thought, right? We didn't all become dumber um when we had calculators. Maybe some of us did, but you know, we're all still able to do, you know, basic math. Yeah. And it's given us time back to do more, right? And I think that's how I personally look at AI in the sense of being in classrooms and being in our day-to-day. Um, and I I can speak a little bit more to that once we get into the marketing aspect of thing of of storytelling and authentic authentic authenticity. Yes. Say that word three times fast.

SPEAKER_04:

So you have a lot going on. I do. You're at the forefront of all the tech stuff. What do you think is going to change the landscape here in Charleston? Because I know that's been constantly been changing. What do you think the next couple of years are gonna look like? Because I feel like every couple of years it's just a new boom of businesses here.

SPEAKER_07:

And we're gonna hold you to it. So don't be wrong.

SPEAKER_04:

No, no, no, no, no, no pressure.

SPEAKER_05:

So before I worked where I am today, I spent 10 years with the Charleston Regional Development Alliance, and my entire job there was creating marketing, collateral websites, um, content to uh support the recruitment of um technology, aerospace, life sciences, and logistics companies to the area, um, tech talent being specific as well. So I've been in this, I give that background just to kind of show that I've seen kind of our ebbs and flows of the technology sector in Charleston. And I think we're at a phenomenal position right now. And I because of we have a bedrock that's strong enough to build on.

SPEAKER_04:

Yes.

SPEAKER_05:

Um, with the first, you know, group of black bods and benefit focuses and boom towns having their success, um, coupled with um new blood from COVID. You know, I don't want to say there's anything positive from COVID, but some people here complain about all the people that moved here. I kind of love it because we kind of love it. I kind of love it too. New, new passions, people here that are just kind of new and like want to be a part of this ecosystem, and then along with some of the people that have been here from day one, you know. Um, and that connection, I think, has given us this energy that we that we haven't had in a few years that is just making things almost easier to like really start to grow the conversation and get the marketing, if you will, the the talking points out. Right, right. Um, and so that's kind of you know, it's a simple kind of answer, but I think it's also a an important conversation. It's just all of us are collaborating and working together and and the work you guys are doing, um, you know, to promote the technology sector is is gonna be huge as well. Yes.

SPEAKER_07:

That's great. It's great to hear that we're in the right direction. Um, and we're in the the like-minded folks and and the whole collaboration thing. I I can't stress that even more.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, one of my favorite things about the going to the the digital corridor and all that kind of meeting all the other people it's just mind-boggling how many people are coming to Charleston, partnering with Charleston organizations, and you probably meeting people on the daily do you work primarily in this area or all over the whole state?

SPEAKER_05:

I'm all over the state. So that is so neat. Yeah, I'm here, you know, the most because I I I live here, but um, you know, just last week I was I was in North Augusta and in Aiken and was talking about the cybersecurities through through the Savannah River National Lab work that they're doing. Um, there's a great startup community there um that's kind of working off the concept of no no boundaries, right? Because Georgia and North Carolina, I mean, uh Georgia and South Carolina can work together more in in that area right there. So I mean, it's really fun, you know, to be able to travel the entire state and and see the passion everywhere.

SPEAKER_07:

What beautiful country it is up there, too. North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, meet. Oh, yeah. It's just amazing. The mountains and the lakes.

SPEAKER_05:

It's so cool. No wonder why everybody, I mean it's only what three, four hours away. Oh, yeah, yeah. Greenville is just stunning.

SPEAKER_07:

Greenville is Greenville with the bridge and the whole thing there, downtown. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05:

I lived in Greenville in 2004, and you know, it was beautiful then, but what they've done up there has just been absolutely fantastic.

SPEAKER_07:

You want to know something weird, Jamie? We're big in Charlotte.

SPEAKER_05:

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_07:

We get a lot of downtown. Hey Charlotte, how are you doing? I know. I know exactly.

SPEAKER_04:

I went to Greenville a couple years ago for like a Facebook conference, and they were all these tech leaders for across the state and through the the Southeast, and it was just really cool. There's some good stuff happening all over.

SPEAKER_05:

Yeah, there's a code conference happening up there in a in a week or so that's gets gonna be really exciting up there. They're doing a lot.

SPEAKER_07:

We need to know more about that type of stuff too, and the AMA and our members really are are thriving and needing more events and more connection.

SPEAKER_04:

More professional development in general.

SPEAKER_07:

Well, yeah, but especially like just knowledge and access.

SPEAKER_05:

Yes, well, SE competes can be that for the state. You know, you've I think like you've said you're gonna be stepping into that in the low country, but you know, I'm I'm really hoping that SE competes can kind of fill that need of wanting to know what's happening in the state when it comes to innovative and technology work because there is so much happening and it can almost be overwhelming, right? And so logging it, understanding it, connecting, and who's here is is a lot of what we're gonna be leaning to in the 2026 kind of marketing world for us. How do you get your messaging out to the masses?

SPEAKER_07:

Websites, websites should she develop from Linea.

SPEAKER_05:

Right? Firefly. I will say um in my newest career, I don't have to do as much of the hands-on, which I I love and miss at the same time, right? Um You seem very passionate about the marketing piece of it, which I love. Yeah, it's hard to leave after 20 plus years. It is when I first took the job. Adrian is listening, she'll laugh at me. I literally had to say, just tell me to shut up because I first event I was like, oh, the mic. Oh, and I was like, oh, do you know if you want to move? And I was like, oh, she's wanting to kill me. I couldn't, it wasn't my job anymore to have to worry about this and that. And and I I still to this day can't shut it off because I love it. But um we have an amazing marketing team with SE Competes, led by Adrian Beasley, and um we work a lot through storytelling um via our website and and social media. Um, but really we're we're a nonprofit, so we can't have that large SEO exist like kind of that I'd love for any non-profit.

SPEAKER_07:

Thousands of dollars on Google SEO, you're not gonna do. That's fine.

SPEAKER_05:

But you've been SAKP's have been around a long time. We have been. We have in networks with a lot of the SEO. A thousand percent. So we don't have to put the dollars in there, which I think is really valuable. I mean, I remember when I was leading Palmetto Moon's um marketing and that I can see being an expensive lift.

SPEAKER_07:

Yes, right?

SPEAKER_05:

Like how much are you gonna spend for Costas on SEO, right? That thought process. I am a frequent shopper at Palmetto Moon. Think between that. Yeah, exactly. So it was definitely a different mindset going from there to economic development, whereas like, oh, I can lean on my community and I can lean on my leaders. And so instead of going, oh, I need SC competes or you know, CRDA or Palmetto Moon needs to be the one posting everything, I need my top leaders, my top colleagues that are working to repost and to put their own content out there. Um and I think that is what we lean a lot into is that we get to all of our directors um get are lucky to get to like travel and meet new people and we all post and we all push that out there.

SPEAKER_07:

That's a good reminder they're bored. We need to post these uh podcast episodes. Repost.

SPEAKER_05:

Yeah, it's huge. I mean especially in the LinkedIn community. LinkedIn 100% LinkedIn community. The tagging portion of it where you're tagging everyone on the board is very important. Yes, yeah. I'm I'm pretty passionate about it. So that's a big piece of of what we do. We we have conferences, um one or two conferences a year. Our fall summits coming up. I think by the time this airs, it'll it'll have happened and I can breathe again. But um What does that entail? So our fall summit is uh going to be really focusing on AI and how AI sits in logistics, aerospace, manufacturing, um, government, and you know, kind of the storytelling of that and the needs. Um we'll everything from day one being an education full day to day two being your traditional um kind of conference with speakers from Siemens, Google, DC Blocks, UPS.

SPEAKER_06:

Yes.

SPEAKER_05:

Um and our third day we'll um is more kind of hands-on, talking about all the issues that came up the day before, right? Sure, right. Cybersecurity and AI. Um, how do you handle the next kind of cityscape of 2050 through the lens of AI and VR and have our leaders sit at a table and really talk about those and hopefully come up with some some action items for us and others in the next year? So exciting to hear that. Now, is this summit open to the public? Yes, yes, please do. Definitely open to the public. Yes.

SPEAKER_07:

Um, it's exciting to hear that these big brands are coming here to do that. And that's what we we need that legitimate, you know, that legitimizes. Legitimacy of having the what what's our um Silicon Valley? Silicone Harbor?

SPEAKER_05:

Silicone Harbor is what someone threw out, oh, the harbor 15 years ago.

SPEAKER_07:

Silicone harbor.

SPEAKER_05:

Silicon get behind that.

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05:

It was funny when it first got pitched, it was a magazine. That's how long we've been around. I've been doing this. And people were immediately like, no, because that's when everyone was like, silicone corn maize in Nebraska and Silicone, and I was like, people were almost over it, and now it's kind of coming back because again, the energy is so great. People want a name for what's happening here. And I've noticed people are liking it again and getting a little bit of traction.

SPEAKER_07:

And and that just shows that people are my buddy and I were talking with JT White, you mentioned him earlier. Love JT. He told me that he came up with this Martech thing, and I thought he was I'm like, ding, ding, ding, ding. That's the theme. So I'm like, are we the only people that know about Martech? Because I've been asking other people, what is Martech? And they're like, what is the thing? He's on Chat GPT because literally, uh I'm like, somebody has a Martech podcast. Yeah, of course they do. Yeah. And it's a thing. Yes, right? Definitely a thing. We're not making stuff up. This is like legitimate thing that we're moving forward and this is what the future is headed.

SPEAKER_05:

And I mean, I might be biased being the leader of SE tech, but I don't think you're gonna have any sectors without having technology in it, right? So why would we think marketing would be any different? Right. Um but I I think the fine line is going to be making sure that marketers are the human part of marketing is never lost because there is a part of that authenticity that I said earlier that AI is never going to bring. Um, and so I always look at AI as a a tool, um, not a replacement.

SPEAKER_04:

I can easily look at someone's social media and be like, that pulled strictly from Chat GPT. Yes. All the drop downs, all the emojis. Oh, the emojis makes me want to.

SPEAKER_07:

I ask it not to do the emojis. I'm like, don't do the emojis. No, right?

SPEAKER_04:

Prompts are keeping it. Make it more conversational. Prompt engineer. If you're gonna use Chat GPT, you better log in and have like a long dialogue of what you've done over the past. Like learn, literally learn your voice, because otherwise it's just a thousand percent right hard.

SPEAKER_05:

Sometimes, I mean, I think we're all lazy sometimes, and I'll post things where I'm like, ooh, it actually works really sounding and it gets to my point, and I'll slap that up. I'll be there. Then other times I'm like, I gotta rewrite it.

SPEAKER_04:

Be like, give me 15 headlines for this newsletter that I already wrote.

SPEAKER_05:

Here's the newsletter, give me the headline. A hundred percent. It's just it's smart utilization. Yes. Um, yes. And knowing that there's enough people around you to help you be better at all of it and asking each other how to like utilize things correctly, I think is where we also continue to add the human element to to what AI and tech is in the world of marketing. Yeah, I love that.

SPEAKER_07:

You've seen some growth, haven't you?

SPEAKER_05:

Seen some growth.

SPEAKER_07:

Can you talk about it a little bit?

SPEAKER_05:

Yes, I think again, I mean, people are going to complain about growth, right? But um We're not.

SPEAKER_07:

I'm part of the or the AMA.

SPEAKER_05:

I mean, everybody, I think, in the sense of growth, should look at the fact that you now get to go to a local coffee shop. Yeah, and 20 years ago you couldn't. Like look at things little things like that. I didn't know that was the case. There really wasn't any local coffee shops 20 years ago. That's one of my favorite things.

SPEAKER_04:

He knows that I love Mount Pleasant.

SPEAKER_05:

That's one of my favorite things I love about Mount Pleasant.

SPEAKER_04:

There's not a lot of chains here. The chains don't make it here.

SPEAKER_05:

Yeah, but there wasn't.

SPEAKER_07:

Cracker bear closed down.

SPEAKER_05:

Yeah. I love that one. That was that was been more news than it was, but I don't know. I didn't really kind of sit on that, and I'm like, it's because it's our growth is given the opportunity for small businesses to really shine. For sure.

SPEAKER_04:

I think we've all bought into shop local too. We want to support local, we live local. Because they're our neighbors. Yes.

SPEAKER_07:

You know, but uh the same thing with these founders of these tech companies, so they're our neighbors. Right. We all might not know that, but there's so many. Well, you're doing a great job showing everybody in the state, but locally, I feel like we need to do a better job uh showcasing the local tech companies. There's hundreds of local companies that are doing really good.

SPEAKER_04:

Well, I think what she does is so interesting because she gets to be familiar with everyone. Everyone in the state.

SPEAKER_07:

That's a big picture.

SPEAKER_05:

I mean, when I started with CRDA, I think our three county population, Dorchester, Berkeley, and Charleston County was high six hundreds. And now it's eight hundred and seventy thousand. We have forty plus people moving here a day.

SPEAKER_07:

What am I so high? Forty.

SPEAKER_05:

That's about the around the highest we've been in the in the 15 years I've been kind of doing what I'm doing. Um 32 was uh was there was a kind of a median for a very long time. Um but hey, you know, during COVID, New York City was hemorrhaging 500 plus a day. Crazy.

SPEAKER_04:

I can't tell you how many people live on my street who like work with Tesla or these Silicon Valley companies, but they you know they live in Dudes West. Right.

SPEAKER_05:

And it's they're they're these are the type of people, if you're listening, find them and put them on your board. Yeah. Um, you're right, yeah, we've done that. There's there's such wins here. And and talking about the three county too, right? Like um the wins of having a Thorn and a Volvo and an SHL Medical all kind of develop um, you know, in in our backyard, um, and get wanting to try to get them more involved in the startup community, right? Um that entrepreneurship where these companies use you know tech talent that's in their own backyard. We didn't have enough strong companies 20 years ago to really kind of build off that, I think. And now we're we do. I think we have enough enough companies that we can spotlight them, get them in front of funds, we can get them in front of contracts and business leaders, and they're not going to probably leave for maybe a big win, right? But for a long time, if you really wanted to grow, you might take that kind of access to capital in Atlanta or New York, and you're kind of like, that's fine, I can get out of Charleston. But the people that are doing it now, they want to be here. They're not going anywhere.

SPEAKER_04:

And you can tell things are booming because we're constantly adding air, like different air air travel routes to go to Seattle to Silicon Valley.

SPEAKER_07:

A big theme that I've been finding out uh through our journey here in the podcast and talking about Martech and and that type of stuff is um we wanna we want to do this for our kids. Yeah. So they don't leave the market to go somewhere else. Selfishly we want them at the college. Jobs, they can find jobs that they want here. Right. And so I uh that would that dates back to our conversation with Ernest.

SPEAKER_05:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07:

Uh of Digital Corridor. You know, and and did you the he was big in developing the economy?

SPEAKER_05:

Oh yeah. I mean, he's an OG of the technology system.

SPEAKER_07:

Oh my god. Sam Patrick Bryant ever since that episode, I'm like, that's our North Star. Our North Star is this tech movement, and we need to be helping this.

SPEAKER_05:

Yeah, I mean, it's you know, we started with you know, Blackbot, benefit focus, boom town, and then to see that some of those have been either acquired or at the point where they're, you know, they're they're on Nasdaq, right? They are. Now I think it's truly time with companies like Gnosis and and K Status. Um, you know, we have another round of really successful companies that have started here and are growing, and I think are gonna, you know, be the next round of those. And and that's the ultimate goal, right? Yes, create an actual ecosystem where you start at a Harbor Entrepreneur Center, you get big enough to move to another building that's beautiful in Mount Pleasant or Charleston, and another small company moves, and you you truly have a technology ecosystem and and everything in between, and and and people like Matt Brady at the town of Mount Pleasant. Beat me to it. Yeah, he's doing such great work.

SPEAKER_07:

I love that guy. Uh, we also do a podcast with Matt Brady. Yeah, he's a doll. The the the maid. We do an economic update every month through the through the chamber. I love Matt. Well, so that I was gonna bring Matt up because the town, which is really a city, but the town of Mount Pleasant is 100% putting their eggs in that technology basket, um, helping fund H E S C and everything else. So they really are kind of doing what you're doing as well statewide, but we're doing it here locally. How are you able to bring funding here? How are you helping with that? I feel like trying.

SPEAKER_05:

Um yeah, so I think storytelling, marketing is and I think I leaned into what I know. Um, so first year of what I was doing, um, just meeting with I meet with anywhere from a hundred to three hundred companies a year, virtually or in person. Um, and for my first year, I was having these fantastic conversations, but the thing I kept hearing was I'm just not quite sure what is out there for me as an entrepreneur when it comes to everything from funding to wraparound resources to accelerators to co-working. Um, we have a lot more here than people realize. So we created a program called Cap Carolina, um, just a play on words of Capital Carolina. Um, but we did a two-part webinar series last summer and then we just finalized, just ended our last one this week, um, where we have speakers that talk about how they're giving support through either financial funding, through um, you know, grant funding, or any other type of resources. And the reason I think it's actually been a successful thing is by only give them five minutes each to talk on a webinar. So it's five minutes next. Next, five minutes next, five minutes next. So these startup entrepreneurs that have no time to put their head up only have to kind of give an hour and a half of their time to learn about 10 plus resources in the state. And then we ended up taking a lot of these resources and putting them on our website. And we have a whole landing page now called Cap Carolina. So that's one way that is just talk getting people together. And all these people were so great. They put their information in the a lot of people feel like capital can be a little bit unaccessible. And they all put their email addresses in there. They all said reach out to me. And so hearing back from these tech companies, going, Finally, I feel like I had someone to talk to, and they they replied back and was just kind of a huge win for us. And then we're going to continue doing that through just storytelling and letting all of the capital people around the country know about what's happening here in the state of South Carolina and technology.

SPEAKER_04:

So you you partner with these businesses and then these and you give them resources throughout the year. Yeah, so we have a touring.

SPEAKER_05:

Yeah. So our business model is as a just kind of a nonprofit, is we have partners that come on and they help us do what we do. And we're and then we also have um some MOU money through different organizations through the state, and then you know, whether or not we can get grants. So the Cap Carolina piece of it is just something that we're able to do um and create kind of conversations around well who's here. Okay. And we're looking to see what we want to do next with it, right? You know, we've had the success with the webinars and now the landing page, and to your point, is it mentorship is next? You know, I don't I don't know. I feel like that's just other people, yeah. Yeah, mentorship skills next. Next, you know, so is it in-person something? Um, so we actually had Maesty Tech partner meeting yesterday and we were kind of brainstorming some ideas, but yeah, so if you're listening and you got great ideas, you can reach out to me and and talk about it. But um I'm always kind of looking at the as if you need more work on your plate. Yes. Well, ideas though.

SPEAKER_07:

Ideas are priceless.

SPEAKER_04:

Be my chat GBT. Exactly. You start talking about the aerospace industries and you know, the logistics, and it just made me think of like civil engineers, and you probably partner with a lot of different organizations outside of just tech too.

SPEAKER_05:

Oh, a thousand percent. So we work with and I think that's one of the reasons why I love our organization for technology companies is because we have a very large network of aerospace leaders and logistics leaders. And at the end of the day, a tech company needs business, they need revenue. And so the fact that we're able to connect them directly with these aerospace and logistics companies to say, hey, like you tell them your pain point as a logistics company, right? And then I'm hopefully gonna put you in front of two tech companies that are actually based in South Carolina and hopefully they can connect. And and I get to do that on that level, but I also get to do that in the industry leaders are telling us, I'm struggling to find X type of talent. What what are you guys what's going on in the state and how do I and we can bring them to the table to say, here's what we need, here's what we're gonna need the next 10 years, and we have the ability to connect with the USCs and Clemson's and College of Charlestons of the world and talk about what you know their curriculum was looking like and really create conversations that you know tend to actually lead to something, which is not always the case.

SPEAKER_07:

Right, you know, um it comes to states, you know, like government funding.

SPEAKER_05:

States state and education sometimes moves like you know, changing a large ship, and we're trying to bring speedboat actions to the to that type of world, right?

SPEAKER_04:

Someone needs to be doing that, yeah. Glad it's you.

SPEAKER_05:

Yeah, so it's no fault of education or government, it's just how it is, right? But a lot of minutiae, a lot of red tape. I live in the low-hanging fruit world. Yeah, right? Because people sometimes don't give enough credit and victory wins to low-hanging fruit. You got to. I like that. That is awesome. You got to.

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah. Oh crap. What was I gonna say? Go ahead. Seth, you got something else?

SPEAKER_04:

No, I'm just it's just very intriguing. I I would love to just spend like a week in your shoes because I'm so always whenever we have it sounds like a lot though. I don't know. I mean, every time we have a guest on Camcast, and they're telling me about you know some work they're doing in our state, it just makes you so proud to be here. It does. And it makes you excited for the future, right? Of our state. It's amazing. Exactly. And to hear about stuff firsthand, the success stories you probably hear on the daily. Oh, yeah. How inspired are you?

SPEAKER_07:

Can you share one? Do you have one on top of putting on the spot?

SPEAKER_05:

I know, right? Um, gosh, there's a ton of success stories. I mean, there's oh, let me think about it. You think about it.

SPEAKER_07:

I had an idea too when you just said when I just said, What did I what was I gonna say? I was gonna say, um, on the American Marketing Association side, just last night we had a cohort for all the presidents. You know, you've been on this call before, Stephanie. Well, the president, CEO, was on the call too. Um, super nice guy, and they're talking about looking for a CRM and some kind of you know tech to keep track of all their, you know, everything, right? Yes.

SPEAKER_04:

Um You're talking about the national level. Yeah, on the national level. There you go.

SPEAKER_07:

So I'm in my head, I'm like, I'm I need to talk to that guy. Yeah, because we have a lot of great talent right here. And actually, I just talked to Bob from Code and Trust yesterday, too. All this is all coming at once. It's crazy, right? Serendipity. And he's like, I we'll help you with that. And we were just talking about a local side. I'm like, yeah, I need help on a local side. And then I go on this thing, and they're like, they're needing help on the national side. Well, what a great thing to do. They bring you.

SPEAKER_04:

You should present that to the national conference.

SPEAKER_07:

Well, I'm gonna try to present it to the guy in an email here in a minute.

SPEAKER_04:

But then in the national conference. In an email and like baby steps.

SPEAKER_07:

So that's it. I love that. That's that's the same type of thing that we're all working kind of parallel for the, you know. Yeah. But you're in the higher level parallel, not you're like up there.

SPEAKER_05:

And I think just finding that bridge of recruitment and development is what the key has been set successful for for South Charleston and South Carolina and continuing to do that. To not be afraid to recruit the next big technology headquarters, because that actually is a win for our technology sector. The more that we can have the Red Hat or Black Hats or Microsoft DevOps shops in our backyard is going to create another piece of the ecosystem that is a definite need. So I say that if you're somebody listening to this going, please know that actually is a win for us, right? Especially in the technology. We're we don't have a lot of space left to do another large potential, you know, factory per se. Correct. But we do have room and we have very well-educated talent in Charleston to bring in, you know, especially with all the people that have moved here from all over the country and are fallen in love with this place naturally and want to stay here. And and I think the longer they stay here working for a remote company, the more they're kind of going, I'd like to maybe work for someone local.

SPEAKER_06:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05:

Um, and be here. So I I say that in the sense that I I think there's just all the right elements for for our technology sector in every piece of it to really grow and thrive.

SPEAKER_07:

You kind of have to be local to know about it though, right? And that's the that's the hard part. That's where we struggle, is because we're trying to get to that national level. Nobody really knows about us on the national scale.

SPEAKER_02:

That's why she's coming.

SPEAKER_07:

You know, and so you're fighting that battle, right? But uh, for example, I didn't I did a lot of research in Charleston when I moved down up here from Tampa, and I was pleasantly surprised about the economy here in Mount Pleasant. Yeah, you know what I mean? But I had to be here to s to to really live and feel it. So I'm not saying that you know you have to, but it's just like how can we market us better nationally? How can we talk about our low-hanging winds more?

SPEAKER_04:

You mean outside of the Charleston?

SPEAKER_07:

Outside of the Charleston things and to attract the the the you know the investors. I think hosting big companies. Attract the big companies.

SPEAKER_04:

Like, you know, when they have these different organizations, like she's having a fall summit in Greenville. Yeah. Are you doing one in Charleston next year?

SPEAKER_05:

We did one already in Charleston this year. Okay, perfect. It was recent. How does it go? We did battery kind of, it was battery and technology based, but yeah, it was we had about two hundred and battery and technology.

SPEAKER_07:

What the heck does that mean? So, you know Charleston soccer?

SPEAKER_05:

No, no, no, like batteries, battery development. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So um like the Charleston, the different kind of we're really leading battery um production.

SPEAKER_07:

What do you mean we're leading? Okay, talk about that. What does that mean?

SPEAKER_05:

Um, so you know, batteries that go in electric cars.

SPEAKER_07:

No, this is another vertical that I didn't know about. Yeah, we didn't know about this.

SPEAKER_05:

Nexus is a huge SC tech grant that we went, the commerce one um that's really looking at kind of where energy and batteries for the future of that is, and where do we stand? You know, is it going to be uh power grid, nuclear, um, and all that came because of the you know the really big wins that we've gotten in the couple with Scout being naming their headquarters here in Open Columbia and oh my goodness, Megan Anderson, you're gonna kill me that I'm forgetting the name of the one that landed in our three counties. Oh it was a part of Tesla, yeah. It was a former see one of the former Tesla and all electricity. Yeah, so batteries is a really big deal cool in South Carolina right now. So that was what we were focusing on um through our faculty. I was unaware. Yeah, so look it up, look up SC Nexus from Commerce's website, um, and then also go to our website and check out the kind of the battery work we're doing through applied research. Um, but yeah, it's been exciting. But I wanted to go back to your other one because I have a good answer for it.

SPEAKER_06:

Well, go ahead.

SPEAKER_05:

So you were talking about how do we talk more about what's happening here and get it out. So other than podcasts. Right. Ten years at CRDA. Um, I would help companies like Blackbot and they would say I need a resources to not just, you know, about what's happening. And then I would to give them to them and I would see them talking to someone that came to their table at a conference in in, you know, California or something like that. And usually you would hear these companies talk about them the whole time. But if somebody's gonna move here to Charleston from a California or Boston, if they don't love the company that they're landing for and they don't know that they have the opportunity to work for another company, that they won't move here. So we have to make sure that as a company and as an industry leader and as someone here, you're talking about the whole ecosystem, all the 1600 companies that are in the three county region for technology. Um, let them know that, you know, um, a former colleague of mine once said, if you get lost your job in the research triangle in North Carolina, you wouldn't have to change your parking spot. Right. So, how do we reiterate like that type of conversation here? So I always like to tell people, I would like you to leave when you leave the state on vacation or a conference. I want you to have the same amount of facts in your back pocket about our economic, economic successes in technology and aerospace and life sciences as you do James Beard winning award restaurants.

SPEAKER_06:

Yes.

SPEAKER_05:

And if you can do that, you have become a perfect marketer for the growth of those ecosystems.

SPEAKER_04:

That sounds like your next website project.

SPEAKER_05:

So I actually have had made that for CRDA. I don't know if they're using it as much anymore, but I had to create almost like a 200-page PowerPoint presentation for a company that wanted to know everything about what it would be like to move here, and we turned that into a website. It was a relocation website that you could go to and it told you everything about Charleston. That is an excellent resource. Yes. And so I don't know if it's live anymore. I I've been with the company for two years and it was kind of my baby. Um that I real estate agents, if you're listening, here's the link. The USC loved it, a handful of um real estate agents. But we just if you're on the you know, on an airplane, you're on your airplane and you're sitting next to somebody, and all you're talking about is the food, the hospitality, and historic beauty. Rainbow Row. That's great. I mean, that's why we all love it here. Exactly. But it's gonna keep you here. But what's gonna say, hey, like, you know, but also do you know you can work, you know, at Boeing, in Volvo, and SHL Medical and Thorn, you know, organizations and companies here, and for or you could be a part of this phenomenal startup community with people like Query, you know, and and other great companies with Grady down at the Harbor Entrepreneur Center. And you could you could have a whole you have so many choices here.

SPEAKER_07:

This is um gonna air after Hustle and Flow, but we're gonna be at Hustle and Flow. Yes. Uh, which is a uh a networking um opportunity at uh the Harbor Entrepreneur Center. We're gonna have multiple networking opportunities at Harbor uh Entrepreneur Center. Um yeah, August. And then there's gonna be another one in October that we're collaborating with with HEC and Code and Trust and a bunch of other uh organizations that are part of that.

SPEAKER_05:

And then um Hackathon, uh Charleston Hacks, um Doug Hamilton, Dig South, Stanfield, Women in Tech.

SPEAKER_07:

Charleston Women in Tech. Yes, I need to talk to somebody in Charleston Women in Tech.

SPEAKER_05:

Yes, I'll connect to you.

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah, is Brennan in Charleston Women in Tech?

SPEAKER_05:

She's not on the group that I work with pretty closely.

SPEAKER_07:

She's on the she's she's gonna be uh interviewed. We're gonna talk to Brennan here um soon. Yeah, Katie Miller, Susie Rubicon. Katie Miller, she used to do one million cups.

SPEAKER_05:

You should definitely have Katie. Katie does phenomenal work with Women in Tech and does great work with Build Carolina, which is, if you're not familiar, another fantastic continuing education for technology. Ooh, love that. Yes, I can love it to Katie.

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah, I don't have her email. Yeah, yeah. Uh but yeah, that'd be great. It's all about connection.

SPEAKER_04:

It is all about connections.

SPEAKER_07:

Oh my gosh. 120. We have some time.

SPEAKER_04:

Yes, your fall summit is coming up, and but people need to fun about upcoming events.

SPEAKER_05:

Yes, on your website, on our website, yes, on um you know, social media, we're mainly on LinkedIn. Um, I'm a LinkedIn hog, I'll admit it. Yeah, that's how we met I definitely think everybody, if you're in marketing and you don't have a strong LinkedIn, I just yeah, I have a I will tell you to change.

SPEAKER_07:

Change my profile pic just now, actually. Uh yeah, change my profile pic because from our portraits that Amy Ingram Amy Ingram took.

SPEAKER_02:

Oh, I love Paul of Energy, she is another super talent.

SPEAKER_07:

Power couple, right? Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_05:

Um, you know, they're a perfect example of people that you know could have chosen to go anywhere. And they chose Mount Pleasant, South Carolina Harbor Entrepreneur Center to do super cool things, you know, and and make a difference in our growing ecosystem.

SPEAKER_07:

And Grady's doing such a great job over there too. He was so open to collaborate with us, uh, AMA, you know, as I we're doing this Mark Tech.

SPEAKER_04:

Computer Compton Comp communications hub, right? From the Harbor Entrepreneur Center. We'll see. We'll see.

SPEAKER_07:

I kind of like switch yards right now. Okay, I see.

SPEAKER_05:

But not a lot of people talk about switch yards, right? That's another great thing, though. Sorry, no, no, they cap at 250 anyways.

SPEAKER_07:

Okay, so um and they did a great job with their pre-marketing, and and so we signed up on that. This is a cool vibe. Yeah, you know, 100%. Go there and have meetings and pull over some roads trying to get your spot, right?

SPEAKER_05:

Had a couple of meetings there, so um there's a lot happening.

SPEAKER_07:

So there's so much happening, and and we love the fact that we get to kind of help with all the success and bring it and hopefully level it up a little bit, you know, and help you. Yes. How can we help you?

SPEAKER_05:

Oh, if you could help me in a couple of ways. I think the number one way is if you meet a cool person in tech, uh cool company. Send them your way. Send them my way. Um, so I can meet them and and and add them to kind of my my cue of connections. Um, and so that's that's one.

SPEAKER_07:

Watch what you asked for in that part. No, like so many new one every day.

SPEAKER_05:

You would be amazing. It's really like 80% of my job is to meet people. I love it. That's great. Right? And how do you keep all those relationships so close to the best? Like, how do you close to the best?

SPEAKER_07:

What do you mean? Yeah, I mean, like she just like relationship building?

SPEAKER_05:

Yeah. Um, I think finding your buckets of who who best fits where and how to can constantly connect those buckets is how I mentally kind of keep it um kind of going, right? Because really, every time I'm meeting with somebody, that uh all that I'm thinking in the back of my head is who could I connect you with that I think will help everything you're telling me you're doing. Um and so just kind of because that's mentally always going in the back of my head, it kind of never most of those people never fall out, right? Right, right, right. I mean, obviously I'm using technology like Monday.com and and Slack and what is Monday.com?

SPEAKER_04:

Um I use Monday.com too for one of my clients, well, one of my 12 clients uses Monday.com. Okay. What is it? It's kind of like um kind of like Slack where you can assign tasks and uh tag people and comments for approvals and you can upload documents for approvals. So it's kind of like a Slack or a sauna project program.

SPEAKER_05:

So for example, we have probably over 80 different boards. So one will be a board for the fall summit, and then I can create a tag for literally every single thing. So our marketing team loves it, right? Because instead of me going so and so, and we all love this as marketers getting the emails from all of your sales associates, and I have a one-pager by tomorrow. I can say, Well, that's great, but you need to put it in Slack as a task. And then you're definitely there, leave notes. I can approve it, and they can put notes and it's all it reminds me a lot of Asana if you're familiar with that. It's a very simple asana with in market and Monday would be competitors, yes. But uh interesting. Yes, that's how I get a lot of that close.

SPEAKER_04:

And so I think some of that would be good for AMA, honestly. I like Slack. We started the Slack channel.

SPEAKER_07:

We started Slack channel Monday. Okay, good.

SPEAKER_04:

Slack is good for talking. And then Monday is good for tasks.

SPEAKER_05:

Approvals, like press releases.

SPEAKER_07:

Do tasks and Slack, can't you? Monday just makes it so much easier.

SPEAKER_05:

Well, if you don't pay for Slack, a lot of it you can't get into and it goes away in 90 days. Yeah.

unknown:

Oh.

SPEAKER_05:

But Asana or Monday.com are definitely better.

SPEAKER_07:

All right, team. We're gonna start a Monday.

SPEAKER_05:

Hey, we're you know, you should listen to us for tips on Marcom. There you go. Marcom Tech, Marcom Tech. There you go.

SPEAKER_07:

Weird how that works out.

SPEAKER_05:

That's so funny. But uh yeah, I think so. Back to the yeah, connections and relationships, who should I meet, who should I know? Um, and then, you know, telling me what's going on, what's cool, right? Like what's what's the next thing in AI, what's the next tech, you know, keeping, you know, my job is to be a connector and convener and a marketer um and an economic developer in tech, but there's so many smart people that can kind of make me smarter. And so keeping me in the know of what's happening is is also really important to me. And um, you know, an important piece, for example, is just I had a great conference a couple weeks ago about cybersecurity and AI, and that not enough people are thinking about the cyber risks when utilizing AI day to day. And so that's a passion point that we're as an organization going to be really leaning into is AI cybersecurity for small businesses and making sure that you have a policy written and you're creating the right thing. Um if you don't, you know, if you don't bring in AI and policy to your organization, somebody will, and it'll probably turn into a cyber issue. Yes.

SPEAKER_07:

Oh my gosh, that's so important. I didn't think about that. You know, because you tell chat like everything. You know, it's got all this information on us.

SPEAKER_05:

Uh I'll tell you that if you don't have the paid version of Chat GPT, you should put it in absolutely nothing in the organization.

SPEAKER_04:

Hundred percent. If you're not paying the the very most important thing, that's a news one to me there.

SPEAKER_07:

Okay, I gotta pay it. All right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

You know what is interesting? One of my clients, which is a home services client here, I've used ChatGPT so much to fact check. Like when people go to ChatGPT now in this area, they're like the top ranked. They'll be like, find me pest control in Charleston. They come up number one, probably because you use it to check all of the you know different things that I'm not doing. Interesting. It's interesting. They're using it more of like a search engine optimization tool. And it learns the same thing.

SPEAKER_05:

It does as a search optimization.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah. So the more you're inputting it, yeah. Maybe no one else in this industry is using it for that. So you guys know about hallucinations, right?

SPEAKER_05:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07:

Okay. No, what are you talking about?

SPEAKER_05:

So ChatGPT, the newest version 5.0, is is much better, apparently. I haven't tested it enough, but hallucinations are very much a thing. So that is just chat GPT being wrong. Just coming up with you better fact-check it. Because it's a predictive model, right? So it's not necessarily I mean, you get your chat GPT can actually get to the point where if you don't prompt correctly, then it'll answer you the way it thinks you want it to be. Exactly. I've noticed that. It's a predictive. That's all it is, is a predictive model. So if you are not kind of constantly saying, give me the prompt that's going to give me the right answer, it it might tell you what it wants to hear. For example, somebody said, you know, our school didn't come up when I asked for the top five cybersecurity programs and it and I asked it why, and it said, well, next time you tell me, and I might be able to, right? But because it couldn't find enough content online and it didn't predict that that must have been the right answer. But if you keep telling it, it should be the right answer. So you have to be unbearably cautious.

SPEAKER_04:

Definitely never take something produced from that and putting up as a fact like as a blog or anything like that.

SPEAKER_05:

Right.

SPEAKER_04:

Never do that.

SPEAKER_05:

Hence why you need the human touch in marketing. Yes. Yes.

SPEAKER_07:

God, that's a great note right there. This is what podcasts are made of.

SPEAKER_05:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

Definitely thank you for the speaker.

SPEAKER_07:

Taylor Swift's podcast with the new iPad. That broke the internet. Broke the internet. Speaking of the internet.

SPEAKER_03:

Uh you listened to it? I did I start listening to the floor. Why aren't you at orange? Yeah.

SPEAKER_07:

I'm not a 92%er yet. And I just finished it.

SPEAKER_03:

I have not listened yet. I just I saw the headlines.

SPEAKER_07:

But our episode Jamie, our episode's gonna be bigger.

SPEAKER_04:

Do you think that she is touring next year? Probably so. You listened, I don't know.

SPEAKER_07:

If we can get a new height level on this podcast, I mean very theatrical diamonds. Jason, are you guys listening? Oh Lord, hello. We're here for you. That is so funny. Um so exactly, but this is exactly what podcasts are about. Thank you, Jamie, for your time. Yes, I'm so excited. It's 1 30. We still have a little bit more time. Is there anything else that you wanted to talk about that we just didn't get to because we're just more of a freeform conversation?

SPEAKER_05:

So everyone needs to be following you on SD Competes. Everyone, yes, please, please do. Um, you know, follow your local economic developers. I I I really lean on that to tech companies. And when I meet with a tech company and they're like, what am I doing that I'm not? Um if you've chosen to land in your city or your state or your area and you haven't reached out to tell your story, that's an economic win, right? If it's you right now and you know you're gonna hire six developers tomorrow, well, you just, you know, 600% growth of a company, right? And um, so reach out to your economic developers, um, talk to your local marketers, make that kind of connections. I I think Grady says it best where collision happens at the heart of the city. Collision. Yeah. Um we have been a creative community for a very long time. And I don't think Charleston has gotten the credit it deserves for its creative community. And um I think there's a lot of future potential for the creative community and the technology community to really collide and go from there. Let's go. We're doing it. Let's do it.

SPEAKER_07:

Thank you for helping out with that. That movement. That movement's in your hands, don't mess with it.

SPEAKER_03:

No pressure. Get back to work, baby.

SPEAKER_07:

That's hilarious. We need you back at work.

SPEAKER_03:

That's so funny.

SPEAKER_07:

Um, but to your point, uh, listeners, Charleston hacks is a great resource. What's um Toby's uh Palmer's again?

SPEAKER_05:

His he's got a good So Charleston Startups, Charleston Startups, Chuck Town Startups, excuse me. But yeah, they're Doug and Toby are the example of new, just they've been in the market for a while, but just like so much excitement and passion, right? Um I think October 29th, uh, where all of our organizations that Doug's kind of brought us together are gonna have a big um Halloween. You told me about that at Frothy Beard October 29th. We're in the band is gonna be on board. Uh October 29th.

SPEAKER_07:

It's a costume thing, too. Yes, you're gonna love those.

SPEAKER_05:

I dressed up and then got handcuffed to a briefcase. I already have a helicopter. And they had to hack me out of the briefcase.

SPEAKER_07:

Oh, cool.

SPEAKER_05:

I went in blindly and let Chris, uh no, Mike, handcuff. He's like, Can you do you mind if I handcuff this case to you for a second? And I was like, sure. And then he goes, All right, now go hack. And all of a sudden, next thing you know, the head figured out how to hack the the I don't think my costume would jive there.

SPEAKER_04:

Nice. Yeah. Well anyway. We need a little bit of everything, so I'm gonna be a flying monkey. All right, perfect.

SPEAKER_07:

Why wouldn't it because full on calling?

SPEAKER_04:

If there is anybody that feels you, it's tech people. Okay.

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah, you can come as you are as tech. You know, the tech tech.

SPEAKER_04:

No one will know who I am. I know I'll be the flying monkey. I drew I dressed as a as a like a beer, a beer waitress because I love a frathy beer now.

SPEAKER_07:

There you go. Smart. Like a wicked, like a w uh a wicked, like a wizard of oz type of monkey.

SPEAKER_04:

Yes, the daughters are being in the the a flying monkey or like a monkey? No, like a fly, like a medieval one. Like I have a full-on like mascot outfit.

SPEAKER_07:

I'm scared already.

SPEAKER_04:

I will be walking last October 29th. I am scared Alphaba, Glenda, my husband's gonna be the wizard, and I am going to be a spooky monkey.

SPEAKER_07:

It's awesome. I'll show you later. Good for you. Can't wait. Um, but that uh Halloween is uh when is it again? October 29th. Cool, I love that. That's great. Yeah, we'll be there.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, we'll be there. That sounds fun.

SPEAKER_07:

That's just another um, you know, another showcase of of us collaborating together, of us coming together as a community and all sharing resources and and uh and that type of thing. And then there's one last thing that um uh just just kind of shows that the money is coming. We are getting a little bit of recognition. We are right. So there is a company called BMOC.

SPEAKER_05:

BMOX. So BMOX has been around for years. Um BMOC Capital just announced that they are doing a$1 million, they funded a$1 million pitch for technology and innovation companies in the Charleston region. Um, and that's that's game changing, right? So to for the longest time, access to capital uh came through, and we still have phenomenal resources like SCRA um and and other funding, you know, Venture South. Uh but to have a local.

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Mike Compton

Co-host
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Stephanie Barrow

Co-host