PART 2: SouthFound Media latest Jonathan Patrick initiative
(EDITOR’S NOTE: This is the second article in a two-part series updating readers on the activities of Knoxville’s Jonathan Patrick and his corporate and entrepreneurial pursuits.)
By Tom Ballard, Chief Alliance Officer, PYA
Those who know Jonathan Patrick would probably describe him as an enthusiastic person who is passionate about whatever he undertakes and committed to making everything he touches better.
Whether it was helping craft the “Line 12 Micro Fund” in 2014 to provide another source of capital for entrepreneurs or one of his more recent undertakings to share the stories of start-up Founders, there’s a consistency about Patrick’s efforts to help the local ecosystem.
SouthFound Media is one of his latest undertakings, and it was launched as a result of a happenstance conversation with Doug Minter of the Knoxville Chamber.
“We were at a meeting of the Board of Directors of the Fairview Technology Center, and we started talking about the fact that many start-ups were not good at marketing,” Patrick said. So, instead of just lamenting that reality, he decided to take action six months ago and launched the new company.
“At SouthFound Media, we are evangelists specializing in helping Southern entrepreneurs, start-ups and companies get noticed,” Patrick proclaims on the company’s website. There’s a combination of offerings . . . from networking via a dedicated Facebook page to a “Start-up Toolkit” offered to subscribers and an on-going series of podcasts.
“I’ll cover anybody who has a good story and interview them,” Patrick says. “This is clearly a passion, not a business.”
There are 17 podcasts or episodes now available, the latest being a conversation with John Lanahan, Launch Tennessee’s new Director of Capital Formation. Each runs 15 to 30 minutes, and three more are planned to round-out the initial set of offerings.
“We’re using the first 20 to see what kind of play they get,” Patrick says. He hopes to produce 40 annually.
The first set is mostly local and includes people like Dave Williams from the University of Tennessee, Alicia Caputo of Avrio Analytics, Dan Close of 490 BioTech, Austin Church of Closeup.FM, Ming Qi of Peroxygen Systems, Bryan Crosby of FunLPro, and Tony Bova of Grow Bioplastics.
The initial package also includes Minter talking about the Propel Program, Chris Marr discussing content marketing, Eric Dobson under the title of “Fuzzy-haired scientist turned angel investor,” and David Morehous discussing due diligence.
Patrick says he records interviews via Skype and Ecamm and posts podcasts on the SouthFound Media website as well as YouTube.
Have a good candidate for an upcoming podcast? Click here to submit the name.
