Episode 460: Shannon Almeida and Priyanka Vazirani of Volv
You'll Learn How:
Building a Tech Platform Without a Tech Background: Priyanka and Shannon discuss how they successfully built Volv, a tech platform, despite not having a traditional tech background. They highlight the importance of hiring young talent and being resourceful.
Understanding and Meeting Audience Needs: The founders emphasize the importance of understanding their audience's habits and preferences, such as short attention spans, and designing their app to meet these needs with nine-second reads.
The Role of AI in Content Creation: They explain how AI is used to create concise, factual content while maintaining the essence of their communication style, and how it has evolved from their initial manual content creation process.
Navigating the Challenges of Social Media: The episode explores the idea that social media is often filled with noise and unimportant content, and how Volv aims to provide a more efficient way to stay informed without the endless scrolling.
The Importance of Community and Mentorship: Priyanka and Shannon share how finding a supportive community and seeking mentorship has been crucial in their journey, offering valuable feedback and guidance.
Adapting to Change and Staying Resilient: The founders discuss the importance of being adaptable, breaking down big ideas into manageable steps, and maintaining the stamina to keep going despite challenges.
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Finding Your Community and Building a Business That Aligns with Your Values
Shannon Almeida: Find your community. If you're building in clean tech or, you know, agritech, it doesn't matter. Like news or whatever, Find where your people are. Find that community. Talk to them. Peers are so important, it doesn't matter. Even if they're competitors to you. You know, people start from one point and they end up somewhere else completely. So it doesn't really matter. There is enough room for everyone to sort of thrive in that industry. So I say, like, number one, find your community. Find peers that you can talk to.
Fiona Killackey: Do you love your life as a small business owner? Let's be real. Sometimes we just don't. It's my hope that this, the My Daily Business podcast, helps you regain a little of that lost love through practical, actionable tips, tools and tactics, interviews with creative and curious smart business owners, and in depth coaching episodes with me, your host, Fiona Killackey. With more than 20 years experience in marketing, brand content and systems, and having now helped thousands of small business owners, I know what it takes to build a business that you can be proud of and that actually aligns with your values, your beliefs, and your hopes for the future. So much of our daily life is spent working on and in the businesses and the brands that we are creating, and so it makes sense to actually love what you do. So let's get into this podcast and help you figure out how to love your business and your life on the daily hello and welcome to episode 460 of the My Daily Business Podcast. Today it's an interview with two incredible co founders. One of them, I think, was in London when we were talking, the other was in India. They, they have a business set out of the US and they're just doing incredible things. And if you are, interested in AI, if you're interested in how social media is going to be changing all those things, then absolutely stick around. It was such an interesting conversation. Honestly, I could have kept talking to them for like hours. And I'm really interested to see where they take this whole philosophy that they have, whether it's with this app or other things that I have no doubt that they will continue to create. Before we get stuck into that, I want to let you know that if you are interested in AI, I am developing a monthly chat about AI. At the moment it is only open to people who are already working with us in a coaching or group coaching capacity. But we will be opening that up in the new year. So we are meeting every single month. We're going through some of the best AI tools, how to use them, how to get your head around certain things, which parts you should be embracing, which parts maybe are still in the kind of beta testing and need a little bit more time to kind of iron out the kinks. If you're interested in that, you can sign up@mysdailybusiness.com Aichat or lowercase, that's Aich 80 and you can work with us in that capacity. If you are already a client, then look out for an email that you should have already received about this and when it's starting, as I said, we are starting this year with people that we're already working with and, and next year we'll be kicking off with anyone else who wants to join it. So again, the URL for that is just mydailybusiness.com AI. The other thing of course, is I want to acknowledge the traditional owners and custodians of the beautiful land on which I talk to people, work, play, have my life with my kids, my husband, all of that. And for me here in North Wurondite, those are, the Woburung and Wurundjeri people of the Kulin nation. And I pay my respects to their elders, past and present, and acknowledge that sovereignty has never been ceded. I have talked about it before, but if you're in Australia, we have just passed a year since the referendum and I think everyone needs to go and read as much as they can on what they can still be doing, especially if you voted yes. There is an incredible and super helpful piece of content, a blog article from Clothing the Gaps, which we will link to in the show notes. You can also just Google Clothing the Gaps still S T I double L or I think the actual article is called it's still yes to. It was published at the end of September this year, 2024. So if you are in Australia and you voted yes, or even if you didn't vote yes and you are like thinking, what else can I be doing? Go and cheque that out. And if you are First Nations, I know that this must be incredibly painful to have gone through the referendum last year and then to have the anniversary this year and, and I hope that you are getting support. If you need support, you can reach out to 13 yarn. This is help for mob by mob. And we'll link to that in the show notes as well. All right, let's get into today's interview episode. I am really excited to bring you this interview that I did recently with Priyanka Vazirani and Shannon Almeida, who are good friends and also the co founders behind Volvo V O L V, which is a super cool app that is really changing the way that people consume content. And particularly they're really trying to hit, you know, high performing individuals, people who don't want to spend hours and hours and hours and hours of time or don't have the time literally because they're out doing more incredible important things than scrolling social media. But yet those same people do want to know what's happening in the Zeitgeist, what's happening in popular culture, what's happening in politics. But like give me all that content pretty quickly so I can consume it. I understand it and I understand the key points, but I don't need to be on social media all the time. So what they have built is this app, Vulv, which really gives you nine second pieces of content. So content that you consume within nine seconds and they talk about how they came up with that in today's chat, but it gives you content that is factual, that is non biassed and is really giving you the key points that you need. So it's, it's just like the stuff that would stop you scrolling if you're on social media, but it's just that stuff and it's not all the other crap and the fluff. So you can log on to your valve app, open it, get all the stuff and then you're done. Even their tagline is smart people are done with social media. So it's really about getting the most interesting viral and kind of breaking stories in nine second articles. And I have to say since I started using this, I have actually massively reduced just my inclination to go to TikTok. Now I already have limits on my TikTok and Instagram. But I've noticed since I've been using this for maybe a month or so now that I feel like I've got the stuff that I need to know. And so I can not have to Keep tapping open TikTok or wherever else. And so many of us do now get our news from social media. And so in today's chat we talk about why they built this, how they built this, how they got backing from Snapchat as well as, you know, mentorship from Mark Cuban. But, but also why they needed to build this. And it's really interesting because this is not the first thing that they've built together. They actually built an incredible social enterprise called Benefactory and the idea of that was to really get people to be able to give to crises, to donate to things that were happening in Real time as quickly as possible. They got some huge celebrities on board for that. But what they realised is that so much of the media out there, so much news is completely biassed and, you know, you only need to look at Western media in particular to see all of the issues with it. And we're seeing that more and more. And as somebody who studied journalism, you know, it's really sad to see how much truth telling is taken out of media. And so we talk about all of that, we talk about how they have built this. Neither Priyanka nor Shannon actually were working in tech when they started coming together as co founders. And I think Priyanka has a finance background and has worked at all sorts of incredible places like JP Morgan and, you know, Chase Morgan Stanley. And Shannon comes from a, you know, management consultancy sort of background and executive board member at Boston University Consultancy Group.
Fiona Killackey: And all of these.
Fiona Killackey: So they come from, I mean, they have an incredible understanding of the world and finance and business, but they didn't come from a tech background. And so they talk about what it's been like to create an app that so many people are using all around the world and that has had, you know, you know, huge backing, like I said, with Snapchat, but they didn't come from that. So how did they build it? How did they have the confidence to go and do that? Where did they find people? How did they get them on board? All of these things we talk about, as well as, where is AI going? How do you can you best utilise AI as well as where do you think social media is going to end up? I mean, so many people, especially in small business, put everything, all of their business, they build it completely on social media.
Fiona Killackey: So where is it going?
Fiona Killackey: Where do they think it's going to go? There's just so many fascinating points of today's conversation. Massive thank you to Priyanka and Shannon. Both of them were in very different time zones to me, so, you know, I just love that we all made it work and I love this podcast and that we can come together and meet people from all over the world. So here it is, my interview with Shannon and Priyanka from Volvo.
Fiona Killackey: Priyanka and Shannon, welcome to the podcast.
Shannon Almeida: Thank you so much for having us.
Priyanka Vazirani: Thank you.
Fiona Killackey: I'm excited for this. How are you both feeling about life right now?
Shannon Almeida: Life's great work is fun and difficult at the same time, and I think that's kind of like the founder dichotomy that we all face all the time. But, yeah, it's awesome. Because you get to work on new products and more opportunities. So it's always good, but so difficult at the same time.
Fiona Killackey: Yes. And Priyanka, what about you?
Priyanka Vazirani: I mean, literally, the same thing. I feel like every founder is honestly like always on a roller coaster. So someday you're just like, you know, like, wow, everything's great and then next thing you're just like, freeze, falling down.
Fiona Killackey: So, yes.
Priyanka Vazirani: It's so full on right now. It seems like we're going through like, right now it's all good. We're exploring different things, so it's exciting. So, yeah. Excited about what's coming up. Okay.
Fiona Killackey: And I'm excited to have you both on. So tell us about Volv and also how you two even came into business together. Are you friends? Where did you meet? And then what is Volv and why the name? I always think that's really interesting. Like, where did that come from?
Priyanka Vazirani: So, it's kind of a long story, but sure. So Sharon and I are actually best friends since high school, actually. We both went our different paths. You know, Shannon went to Boston, she studied consulting. I mean, she was working in consulting and then also law, and then I worked in finance after I went to LA and studied business and economics. And then like fast forward a lot of things, a lot of like internships, first jobs, everything. And a lot of deep conversations about life goals, you know, we ended up launching a social tech startup, driving impact for urgent crises. Again, we face like this really big problem about like most people not, not even knowing what's happening in the world and what issues are even happening, you know, so if you think about it right now, like, traditional media doesn't reach our generation. Digital traffic to the top publications has just nosedived. The median age of news readers today is like 54 years old, way above any of us. 31% of websites the users only visit once a quarter. So, you know, like, traditional media is definitely out, but you obviously think about social media. So yes, that's there. But again, that's broken the content on social media. If it's not juicy or clickbaity or scandalous enough, it's not going to spread. And so even we're trying to talk about our campaign, the world just wouldn't get out. So because we were so adamant on solving this issue, we actually hacked the system and got celebrities to champion the cause for us. And, Kerry Washington, Ilana Blazer, Prabhalkarun, they all posted on Instagram and the conversation changed. So that just made us realise that our generation can't be reliant on celebrities to hear about what's happening in the world. And so we just realised we deserve better. And it became really crystal clear that we needed to build a platform that we wanted to use. So we emulated the social media format, scrolling and we cut the length of all the articles to suit our short attention span, which is literally nine seconds right now. And so that's how Volvo's Boss, it's basically an app that gives you, or actually better way to think about it is like a personalised digital magazine with nine second reads. And we've kind of redefined what news means for our generation. It's not just, you know, like politics and finance, what our parents would think it is, but for us it's like, what's trending in culture? What's everybody talking about on TikTok and Reddit, even though you're not on TikTok and Reddit, and even what's happening in Israel and Lebanon in real time, not until the next day. So, yeah, you get everything in a few swipes in nine second reads and with every swipe you kind of get smarter instead of feeling guilty. So that's about it.
Fiona Killackey: Wow. I love that concept because, yeah, I work with small business owners and the amount of time that is wasted on social media and it comes up every single time I talk to somebody because they're like, yep. And then I get stuck on Instagram and then suddenly an hour's gone. Or now I'm trying to figure out TikTok and I just spent three hours there last night and I should have been with my kids or I should have, you know, xyz. So I love this. When you had the first venture together, I mean, I get that you're friends and you'd worked with stuff, but how did you try and kick that off, even very initially? Did you. Did you know that you two would always work together or did you go, hey, I've got this idea, I've got this idea. Oh, it's kind of similar, let's do it. Like, how did you get that first social enterprise off the ground?
Priyanka Vazirani: The funny thing is we actually didn't plan to start working together. It just happened because we realised the same goals, to be honest. Like we just really cared about making an impact and initially, oh my God, there are a lot of bad ideas that we talked about, tried. We're never ever going to say it out loud. But, it just basically was a trial and error process and we had to rule out a Lot of bad ideas until we figured out a problem that we could actually tackle. And so this was something that we thought we could scale enough and it was convenient enough for our generation to participate in. So which is why basically, Benefactory, which is, which was the name of the previous startup we just created like this technology that allowed any campaign to go live. So if there's an urgent crisis, we could literally go live today with a bunch of our, partners, like online websites, any kind of, like online delivery apps, anything like that, so that anybody who's like, hearing about any kind of urgent crisis, they can actually, like, donate the campaign and the money would be used immediately. So it was all about efficiency, all about convenience. And, you know, a lot of times you want to make an impact, but you just like, feel like somebody else is going to do it or, like, okay, I'll do it another time, okay. Like, you know, you think about, like, okay, not now, or technically are a bit lazy. So it just, we just like, thought from the consumer point of view and built from that how the consumer would want to work on it.
Fiona Killackey: Wow, I love how you're both just saying this so nonchalant. Like, oh, yeah, we just, we saw this and then we just did it. And you think about, like, even at the moment, you know, I donate to a few causes and sometimes it is really clunky the way that you're donating or you do see something on social media and you're like, oh, well, who's the best person to donate to? And then you've got to try and figure it out yourself. Like, oh, well, these people doing it, is this legit? Is this the best way?
Fiona Killackey: Will it actually get used straight away.
Fiona Killackey: Or will it just go into a pool?
Fiona Killackey: And.
Fiona Killackey: Yeah.
Fiona Killackey: And so then with Vol, how do.
Fiona Killackey: You even try and build a tech platform? Did you look at media companies and you're like, which ones are the best media companies? And then you said you looked at social media. Were you like, okay, how does TikTok work? How can we get that to work? Where did you come up with nine seconds? I mean, that actually frightens me. I love how you're like, our, generation. I'm a lot older than you guys. You're being very kind when you said, oh, the median age is 54, which is so much older. It's only 10 years older than me.
Priyanka Vazirani: It's still 10 years older than you think you.
Fiona Killackey: 10 years older. But that nine seconds. I used to be a journalist and I used to write feature articles for, you know, the Sunday Paper in the UK and the United Arab Emirates and, and then here in Australia I had a column. And when I think nine seconds, you know, like a, feature article is 3,000 words and you're wanting people to read all of that. And I get now that people don't read as much, but where did you come up with nine seconds? And then also, what were the actual steps to building Volv into the tech tool that it is now?
Shannon Almeida: So I think nine seconds was really more about. We realised that our attention spans were just down to nine seconds. It was really as simple as that. And when we were working on benefactoring and we had noticed that a lot of our friends weren't aware of the problems that we were trying to, you know, focus on, like to raise donations. We were like, they are looking at, you know, trending headlines on social media versus things that needed to be actually that needed attention. And that was really, you know, down to the fact that a lot of, you know, for our friends and, you know, our peers just weren't reading enough. And then we got down to, we realised like, okay, cool, like our attention spans are just like so low today. And so we needed to figure out like, how do we get them to read more? And so we really approach the problem from the aspect of like, okay, cool, if we made it a nine second read, you know, before they lose their attention span, they read what they need to read. And so it was a lot of like, you know, building it in such a way that it would make it really appealing to millennials and Gen Z. So it was, that was like the number one factor. And then the second one was, you know, we wanted to mimic social media in a way, but not really. So our first inspiration was really Tinder. It wasn't even TikTok. And back in the day it was like you swipe left and right. And we really love that idea that how people can get hooked on like a swiping kind of like mechanism. And you know, Instagram was there, but it wasn't really our inspiration. But we were inspired in the sense that we were like, okay, it needs to be scrolling up and down, but like in the same card format. So that's why Valve is a card format and you can spot it up and down instead of left to right. And so, we decided to really like, pull in all these elements that made social media successful. And we had to like, look at it from another angle of like, how do we adapt to this generation? And so that's kind of when we came up with this whole concept of nine seconds swipeable news. But yeah, ah, that, that, you know, like when we first started off, we were, you know, Priyanka and I are quote unquote, like non technical founders, which is this really annoying term that tech loves to use for people who can code. So we were very aware of that when we started off and we conceptualised ball that we needed to hire people to help us build the product. And we knew that we wanted it to be so different from other news apps out there because for us, the experience was really important, like the UI ux, like, the feel of the app. so what we basically did was we kind of like pulled out like, you know, cnn, Fox News, all the traditional media news apps. And then we were like, okay, we are going to do everything the opposite of what they've done. And while we knew that the UI UX is not really a reason for an app to scale, it's not a reason for anyone to be like, oh, you know, like, their swiping mechanism is so good. Like, I'm going to go back and read more news. Like, no one's going to do that. But we knew it was adding this really important foundation of what we were building at Valve because it's just like an added branded layer. Because like today when people are talking about, well, they're like, oh, it's a really cool news app. It's not just a, like a news app that they were getting on like smart news or like, you know, Apple News. And so that was kind of the goal. And so when we had to start building it out, it was like, we literally went to colleges and we, we didn't go to like, you know, five years experience kind of devs. We were into like someone who just graduated college and he worked on some apps for his college project. And it was like, we looked at the interface and we're like, okay, cool. You look like you can do something cool with an app. So like, join us. And then we hired an intern who had worked primarily on like video graphics. And then one day he was like, oh, I can actually make your website design better. And then he was like, one day I'm going to make your. I can just code the entire front end for you. And then one day he was like, you know what? This UI needs to be way better on your app. Look, let me do it for you. And then he was like, let me code the front end. And like today he's our head of design, you know, and so we really went like, we didn't you know, because we bootstrapped the entire company from day one. So it wasn't like, you know, we had like tonnes of funds that we were like, okay, let's just go and like, get the best developer out there. It was more about, like, let's go get like some budding talent where we know that they really have what it takes and they're going to do things differently versus someone who's been in the industry for long is going to tell us, like, this is how it's done. We wanted to do things so different and so we really went, you know, grassroots on that and we just got people from college and, you know, told them to work with us.
Fiona Killackey: So cool. And so I've been using it since we've connected. I'm like, using it and I've told a couple of people about it and I'm like, it's really good. And as someone older, I hope that. I hope that doesn't sound bad, but I'm like, yeah, I don't have to be on TikTok and I will still get the vibe of what's happening.
Fiona Killackey: But how do you decide?
Fiona Killackey: Or is it you're using AI? So when I studied journalism at uni a long time ago and one of the things that we learned about was like the printing press and, you know that you always had to have the synopsis of the whole article in the first paragraph. And the reason was that, if the printing press broke down, that people could kind of get the vibe from the first thing that was printed. I mean, I'm assuming it's some sort of AI, but how do you pull. This is important and it's within nine seconds. Especially if it's like, let's say. I mean, you would hope that most people could understand what's happening in Lebanon at the moment or have some understanding of things, but let's say it's some new political thing that people don't have a large understanding about. How do you get the information that they need within nine seconds? Or even like a celebrity, like, let's say Beyonce has put out a new album and everyone's going to say, it's amazing. Is it literally Beyonce's put out a new album and that's it, and it's very factual, or does it have any kind of nuance to it or this is why you should listen to it, or any kind of opinion? I guess not opinion so much.
Priyanka Vazirani: We don't try to include opinions, but at the same time we do definitely try to include context because you Know most times when people read like or want to read something, they look at the headline and say, okay, I'm done. And we face that ourselves. I think most people on Twitter, when Twitter was popular, would do that. They would just like look at the headline, think it's interesting, share. And again, everybody in the comments was looking at the headline but not really reading the article. So in general we realised that it can't just be the headline, it has to be like a little bit to give you just enough information for you to answer like, you know, the important questions. So we try to tackle like, you know, the who, what, why, those kind of major questions. Yes, journalists. But yeah, we try to include that. And the funny thing is that when we started we actually didn't use AI in creating the summaries. So we always had the vision that you know, AI is going to do it for us. But that time again, we hired like these really young people right out of college and said okay, like figure it out. And this is pre chatgpt, right? So we did not have the right AI in place to like summarise the content and condense all of this amazing content into nine second reads. So at that time we actually had an entire like content team who was actually sitting down and summarising the content. And fast forward now like, yes, we have AI, but the thing is, the AI is only as good as the data it's been trained on. And so because we had so many articles from earlier where we had humans write it in our style, our tone are giving the right kind of context, including quotations, including statistics, et cetera, et cetera that ChatGPT, for example, tries to avoid. We've come to a point where we do a fairly good job. And even though we're using AI now, we're pushing out a lot more content very quickly. But at the same time the essence of how we try to communicate has remained the same.
Fiona Killackey: That's so important. I work with a lot of business owners and we're talking a lot about AI. And it's so true. The prompts and what you give it and what you input is so important. And I think people are seeing like.
Fiona Killackey: Oh chatgpt, I can just put something.
Fiona Killackey: In and then all of my work is done and it's all just going to sound exactly the same as each other if it isn't given that sort of really good data to start with. The Volv message of smart people being done with social media is an interesting one. Can you explain how that works? And Even before, when you were saying social media is broken, what do you mean by broken?
Priyanka Vazirani: When it comes to social media, the most random and the least important things tend to go viral. So, you know, like, there's so many random people out there who've suddenly, like, hopped to a girl. Like, why do we all know about her today? She has like one of the top 10 podcasts today. So, like, there's literally no logic behind that. Right. So when it comes to important things, because it's not as scandalous enough or not very catchy enough, it doesn't tend to spread. And so that's what we realised with the previous startup too. Like, the important things aren't being picked up and a lot of people are not being informed about those things. So when we started Valve, we had a very clear focus. Like, yes, we're going to give you a lot of other things, like, you know, entertain you and, like, give you all the scoop on celebrities and like, conspiracy theories and this and this. Yes. But at the same time, like, you're going to know what's important of, like, what's happening in the day. So when we started creating Valve, the funny thing is that we didn't narrow down the target market. We just said, okay, Gen Z and Millennials, again, huge flag, like red flag, do not do this. If you're some business owner just starting out, like, have a very targeted niche. But we just had it like just Gen Z and Millennials. And so later on, when we started talking to a lot of users, our super users, and we had like a list of questions we wanted to ask them, the funny thing is that they started bringing up the message that the day I left Social, Valve became my go to or like, my finger goes to vulv instead of like Instagram or like, you know, I just want to scroll. So between meetings, like in a few minutes when I'm bored, I go to Valve or just like, because of Valve, I don't use social anymore. Like, I'm done with social. And so we realised that a lot of these people, C suite executives, founders, engineers, product managers, our core market, they're just kind of like done with social in a way that they can't be bothered doom scrolling for hours trying to find like the signal amongst all of the noise. And so we realised, like, that's technically our super users. So yes, like, there are a lot of people using bulb instead of social media and that's why we have the messaging. Like, smart people are done with social, they use VULV instead. But at the same Time there are people, like, even us, we're on Instagram.
Shannon Almeida: Yes.
Priyanka Vazirani: For our friends and like, you know, following what's happening in other people's lives and stuff that we care about. But at the same time, we use Vault because social is like entertainment in a way, like catching up with people, messaging, people you want to stay in touch with. But Valve is more for, like, knowing what's happening and just staying updated in one place really quickly. Because right now you have so many different platforms to get content on, it's just literally becoming extremely overwhelming. You have Instagram, TikTok, Reddit newsletters, podcasts, YouTube, and the list just keeps increasing. The clubhouse and all these different things that come and go. Right. So the number of platforms keep increasing. And as like somebody who just wants to stay updated, like, you just want one place, one platform that you go to and you get updated on everything. That's what we're trying to create.
Fiona Killackey: Oh, yeah. It's exhausting even thinking about all of the different platforms, like just how many new ones are coming up all the time. I'm just putting you on the spot. But do you think social media will have a place in like 10 years? They'll just be different types of platforms, or do you think more people? Because what you're saying, and it's mirrored in so many conversations where people are like, I've deleted Instagram off my phone, or I deleted at 7 o'clock and I put it back at 7 o'clock the next day, or I can't even.
Fiona Killackey: Be bothered with TikTok.
Fiona Killackey: I was so excited two years ago and now I just. It's just a waste of my time. Do you think in your generation that people will eventually just have a real backlash to it? Or do you think, no, they'll still be there, they'll just be all different ones. Or do you think more platforms say, like, Volv will be popping up?
Shannon Almeida: So it's really interesting that question, but I think that in the next five to 10 years, I think the way I look at it is more like today social media exists because sort of like Steve Jobs came, he created the iPhone, and because of the iPhone, he created this thing called an app. And we were able to create different apps. And then social media came, took form. And so the way I look at it is like the software that we are seeing today, which is social media is really downstream of hardware. And so I think that in the next five or 10 years, I think when the hardware changes, eventually we're not going to be relying on handheld phones, necessarily. I think that's when we're going to see software change and essentially like the idea, the sense of social media is going to evolve with it and we're going to have different forms of social media that we can't even anticipate today. But, yeah, I do think that it's an important milestone that's happened in technology, but I do think that it's going to evolve so much in the next 10 years in ways that we can't even imagine. And it just really depends on, like, what kind of technology we're using in the next five or 10 years. So it's going to exist, but in a very different form. Basically.
Priyanka Vazirani: Yeah.
Fiona Killackey: It's so. It's so crazy and it will sound really crazy. I went to uni when the Internet had just sort of started and so. And not just started, but people started having it in their homes. And I went to uni a few years later. So we still predominantly use library books to, like, do your essays and do all of that. And it's so crazy now, looking at social media and looking at my son's education, he's almost 12 and thinking about, like, where is he going to go? And even he's so aware of the damaging effect of social media and he hears all about it and yeah, just.
Fiona Killackey: It's just.
Fiona Killackey: It just blows my mind, as does AI. And as I said before, I'm super interested in AI, but I feel like, and you hear it all the time, that whenever some new technology comes along, humans think it will make them smarter and we'll have more time, and then we just inevitably find something else to fill our time. So even if we have AI tools that can do XYZ in our business, we will just fill that space with another thing that needs doing as opposed to going, actually, now I have more time with my kids, or now I have more time on my health or anything like that. Do you think that people are using VOLV like you said before, just like, in between meetings, or do you think that they will literally be able to use it in place of other things and then have that time back for something else? Is that part of your message or it's like, not. That's not really. That's not really our person because they're. They're trying to make 50 different, you know, things happen at the time?
Shannon Almeida: Yeah, I think it's definitely part of the vision that we have. Like, we're still so early on in the game, but I think the way we've always imagined it for the vision of the company is more like, say you are interested in venture capital as a venture capitalist. You are following so many people on Twitter, you are following, listening so many podcasts and so many newsletters, and you're just consuming an intense amount of information. And so right now, obviously, Valve is not the level where we can literally tell people you don't even need to listen to podcasts anymore or read newsletters anymore. We're still on the early on stages where we're trying to, like, build habits with people of just like getting on the app. But it's definitely like the vision is more like eventually all of those, you know, summaries from any kind of platform in your specific interest will be available on Ball, where you will need to spend one hour listening to that podcast and, you know, take out time to read that newsletter. So I don't know how much people are going to be utilising that time to do more creative work or, you know, spending time with family. But it's definitely the goal that we can be, you know, to be able to save hours versus just like, you know, 15, 20 minutes that we're able to save today. Right. So I do think that the scope is much larger. It's just that it's going to take time before we're able to take everything from the Internet, you know, because today there's just so many sources of information. So, you know, it will take time, but that is definitely the goal. It'll just take us a while to get there, for sure.
Fiona Killackey: Yeah. It's so interesting, that whole changing behaviour. I, used to work at audible in 2012 in the UK and that was like. We just couldn't. We were like, how do we get people to start listening to audiobooks? How do we get them to, like, get off their Kindle and, like, not think that it's just for elderly or vision impaired? And now, you know, so many people are like, oh, I only listen to audio books. I'd never listen.
Fiona Killackey: I never actually read a book.
Fiona Killackey: I just listen to the audio and it's like, okay, it's really interesting to watch that over the last 12 years, that completely evolved. But when you said before, there's so many sources of information and there are, there's just so many. And what we're seeing more and more is just like people in their bubbles and they, follow people that think like them and they read media that thinks like them. And even the media, I mean, there's an incredible journalist in New Zealand who just won one of the young Journalist awards of the year in Canada. And he had an incredible speech and he was saying, media has never been as unbalanced as it is today. And when you look at things like AI, it is often mirroring the biases that exist in the world and things like racism, ageism, sexism, all of the stuff.
Fiona Killackey: And so how have you worked to.
Fiona Killackey: Ensure, especially as you're. I get that you've, you've put in a lot of great data into the information that the AI is pulling from, but how do you make sure that Volv, as a news, giving news and giving information isn't leaning further, into this where we just segregate, you know, people are just, I'm right, I'm left. And it's just such thinking like that because you look at a lot of media and it's. As someone who did study journalism, like, it's disgusting how biassed it is in so many places. So, yeah, how have you worked on that?
Priyanka Vazirani: You know, the funny thing is that when we started Valve, we literally started Valve as like the unbiased news app. And while everybody talks about like, yes, I want an unbiased news app and I want unbiased news, we realised that people weren't sticking around. Our attention was absolutely terrible. And we also noticed after talking to a lot of people that they actually just want to go back to their own biases. Because right now in the whole Israel, Lebanon thing too, like, I feel like a lot of people have made up their minds on what side they're on and so they just want to be on that side and they want news that like, you know, supports that side. But we decided that we had to, like, you know, change things up. So we have made a very, we've been very cognizant of the fact that like, our news needs to be more neutral. And so when you're on board, you realise that most of the headlines, or actually all the headlines, it'll never say something that, you know, Trump is right or Kamala is right or one is better than the other. We'll always just mention what happened and leave it to you, the reader, to figure out what, you know, you want to think of it. Because when you think about like the 9 second read, it also doesn't allow us a lot of space to give you opinions of like, okay, this happened, but this person is so right. Like, we don't even have space for that. So we have this like, you know, policy at role where most of the content is, the content is neutral. And then it's also the preferred way for Gen Zs and millennials today. Like, they all just want to know, like, okay, tell me what happened and I'm going to decide what I want to think about it. If you tell them what to think, they're not going to be happy about that. So this way is working for us. And again, you mentioned AI. It is very tricky because when it comes to data and creating AI, you feed it based on for evolve. We track how many seconds you spend on a certain article versus another, so we know what you prefer. And so that automatically gets used for the recommendation engine. But we have spoken to a lot of people in the industry and they've been giving us advice. And so, yes, a lot of times, you know, the news is going to give you more of what you're reading, but we're trying to integrate at least. This is like, what we're working towards is that you will also see the contrarian version. Like, yes, you see whatever is pushed out, but also the other side. So that kind of like, opens up your thinking and allows you to see the other side. Even if you want to believe it or not, that's up to you. But, like, that's where we're trying to go.
Fiona Killackey: Yeah. Which is so important. Like, I'm not a Trump supporter. However, when he was being elected last time, I purposefully went and followed a bunch of people that were super fans because I was like, I can't understand this, but I will definitely go and follow. And now, you know, I have my own thoughts on different political things that are happening, but I follow a bunch of people who are absolutely the opposite to my thoughts. And sometimes, you know, I've had friends be like, oh, my God, you're following. Like, that's like, gross. Like, you're following them.
Fiona Killackey: You're a fan.
Fiona Killackey: I'm like, no, I'm following them because I actually don't understand how they could think like this. And I do think that we have to follow people we disagree with because.
Fiona Killackey: Otherwise we do end up in this.
Fiona Killackey: In this tiny little bubble. So I think that is incredible. You guys mentioned before, we are non tech tech founders. and that, you know, you dislike that idea of, you know, oh, we don't code it ourselves, which I agree with. So both of you have come from totally different backgrounds. But also when you said your bios before sound very accomplished. Both of you, like, oh, then she.
Fiona Killackey: Did consulting and I'm in finance and.
Fiona Killackey: Law and all of that. What has been the most significant kind of learning moment as co founders with this app do you call it an app? Is that an offensive thing to say?
Priyanka Vazirani: No, app is fine.
Shannon Almeida: You can call it an app, go for a pica.
Priyanka Vazirani: So this is actually a tricky question. You know, the funny thing is, when you go to college, I mean, yes, you study journalism and you, you know, work as a journalist, I think that's one different thing. But, like, for example, I studied finance, and when I went to my finance job, I had to learn from scratch on the job, because when you're in college, they give you all the different, you know, the numbers that you just need to plug into a formula. But, like, at work, you gotta figure out what the numbers are. So the thing is, like, when you study, like, anything you kind of read to, it's not going to prepare you for the job. And I feel like with Valve, it's just been an extreme, like, learning experience. And it's like, you know, every day we're tasked with a new problem and it's just something that, like, I've never worked on before, but it's just like, it's a mindset. Like, I just need to figure it out. So the only thing that's kind of, like, worked in my favour is that before Valve, I was working in finance, but there was this one responsibility of mine which is all about, like, writing their publication that went out to, like, you know, their global audience different, under somebody else's name, that it was all me. And, that's when I first realised that the content was so heavy, full of jargon, so boring. I was really thinking, like, who's going to read this? But then when I started writing it, I kind of wrote it in a way that, like, my friends would also read it, you know, So I think that was, like, the first insight when it came to, like, okay, what would people like to read? How would they like to read it? And I feel like most of the times it's not really the problem that people don't care about the world or, don't want to know what's happening. It's more about the way that it's being communicated and also the way it's being said. So just from that perspective, like, the previous job experience in finance has helped in a way to, like, rethink how we need to frame different things and, like, work on the tone and, like, communicate, like, everything we're writing on vault. But apart from that, I feel like everything we've learned, we've learned on the job at Valve, everything has been an absolute learning experience from, you know, what, what kind of Stories people are interested in to, like, how exactly to communicate with them, to even the branding and the product, like, how are people using the app? And you have to think about from the user perspective, like, okay, like, think about the psychology, like, are they going to open this and see this for themselves? But no, people don't have time. So, like, I feel like everything is just, a learning experience on the job.
Fiona Killackey: Yeah, so, so true. And what about you, Shannon?
Shannon Almeida: I mean, I think it's like the best MBA that we could have gotten. You know, a lot of people go to MBA and learn these things, but we had to learn it the hard way, definitely. I think everything that she just said, like, you know, I think every founder is going to feel that way. Yeah, I feel like, you know, just working on problems and sometimes you don't have an answer, you know, and that's really when you're testing your capabilities as a founder, is like, when you don't have an answer to it and you have a team and asking what to do. and you're like, well, who are you going to go to? Right. So it's really about, okay, give me a few minutes. And then you're just, like, messaging, like, everyone that you know who could help you, like, give you advice, and you're trying to figure it on the go. And it's just that, like, every day, honestly, because, like, the number of things that come up, you know, the number of fires that are popping up every day are just like, well, I really don't know what to do. And it's just. It's been a really interesting thing to do. So, yeah, I always say it's like the best MBA that you could have ever gotten.
Fiona Killackey: Yeah. I think that nothing teaches you, like, experience. Like, you just need to get into it and do things. And it's so true as well, where you were talking about the delivery of content and that it's not like people don't want to learn. I don't know if you guys know Simran Kaur from Girls that Invest. She is incredible. And from New Zealand, which, you know, Australians always try and claim anything from New Zealand as their own. But, like, I think her ability to break down really complex financial stuff in really simple ways has done so well for her audience and people going, okay, you know, on this sort of thing and connecting with people through a way that they can come on board. Have you had any key mentors or books? Or do you have, like, mantras that you live by or quotes that you live by? I also saw that Mark Cuban. Cuban gave you some pretty good advice or gave you some advice. I don't know if it was good or bad early on, but yeah. Who has helped you guys most build this besides each other?
Priyanka Vazirani: So the funny thing is that initially we were very hush hush about the idea. We're like, you know, we can't talk to anybody. It's such a novel idea. People copy it. So like, let's just talk to each other and figure things out. And I think that was a huge mistake. And once we went live, we realised that we needed help with a lot of different things. And I remember sitting in the audience of, one like, event I'd gone to and the speaker there was like, you know, you should email people and like, so what is just a cold email? Like, take your risk, take your chances, this and that. And so at that point, Mark Cuban was talking a lot about the news, so literally just emailed him and said, hey, working on this, all the issues, this is why it's different. He actually responded within like five minutes, which was mind blowing. But, I think the crucial thing was that he hears a lot of like, solid feedback. The main thing being that the app looked too serious to AP News and the fact that if it needed to connect with a younger audience, it had to have younger content, more entertaining content. And so from that we pivoted into including, you know, like, what's trending on social, what's everybody talking about? Like a lot more entertainment. And so that was really, really solid advice. But in general as well, one tip. Instead of any book or any like specific quote, I think talking to people is so important. Like getting feedback from anybody who's done it before is crucial. And if you don't have mentors, get mentors or get like advisors early on we got advisors very late, literally like last year. And they have been really, really helpful because I feel like the problems that we think are so big, it's like something they've done very easily before. Right. So they just, they know exactly how to solve the problem or how to look at a problem in a certain way. So yeah, just having them is really helpful. So try to get as many advisors on board. Yeah.
Shannon Almeida: I want to say also, like, when we first started building Valve, we were completely kind of building in the dark, didn't want to tell anyone. And then one of our users actually reached out to us and was like, hey, we'd love to like give you feedback on your app. And I was like, that's really nice to even hop on a call and he was a founder himself, so I think he really understood that that kind of feedback was really important. And I ended up talking to him for a while and he was like, you need to be on Twitter. And I was like, what's on Twitter? And I was like, I really don't know. And he was just like, no, you guys need to be on Twitter. So we created a Twitter account, both of us. I mean we had one, but it was like five followers, you know, it was like so bad. And so we got on it and then that's kind of when we found this entire community of, you know, tech founders. And I think that really changed a lot for us because not only are they, you know, people that you can, you know, you know, who are our friends today, but more than that, you know, when we were just starting off, like it was this entire world that we didn't even know existed because like, as, you know, like, we came from finance, consulting, law, we didn't come from the tech industry. So we didn't really have peers who were going to be like, you should be using this platform or like, you know, this is where you can get your first thousand users. We didn't have access to any of that information. And so when we had launched and then when we got on Twitter and we're seeing people post like, you know, these are growth strategies, this is where you can build, you know, user feedback forms from or like use this kind of like platform. And so it was just like so mind blowing to us that, you know, founders out there, operators out there, VCs out there were telling us like, oh, this is a great deck. This is how you do it. We didn't know that existed on Twitter, like so that was like completely a game changer for us. And then once we discovered it and we started like, you know, talking to people on the platform, you know, we started joining like smaller communities and you know, a lot of them are like tech founders today. So they were able to provide us a lot of hands on help. So if today if I'm like, I get in touch with this person and you know, I can just like reach out to them, be like, I see you're connected with them. Can you intro me to them? You know, and so I think that's just been really helpful to not like one single person, like just, just like not one person. There are like many people who have helped us today to get where we are and it's all because people have been like, you know, we really believe in what you girls are like Building. We're going to like, intruder this person. We'll intrigue this person. So it's really been this network effect of, help that we've gotten from the entire tech community that's, you know, led us here today.
Priyanka Vazirani: Yeah.
Fiona Killackey: And what do your parents and your family think of this? Because you started in different careers and obviously I get, you know, especially today, people don't stick around in a career their whole life, you know, but like, I'm from a family of four, and when I wanted to quit, I had an executive role. I was paid very well. I was head of marketing for a really big company. And yeah, I said to my parents, I'm going to quit and start my own business. And they were like, are you serious?
Fiona Killackey: You've just bought a house, you've got a child.
Fiona Killackey: Do you want another child? Like, what are you doing? And my, my sister's a doctor, my brother's a lawyer, and my other brother is a, ah, professor of psychology and a psychologist. So they're very like, you know, that's your job and you're paid well and et cetera. Yeah, but, yeah, it was a real, like, I remember having arguments with my mom and then she, you know, came around. But your family is just like, yeah, cool, that's great. You've, you've gone from law or finance to this or how's that been dealt with or managed?
Shannon Almeida: Yeah, that wasn't. So I didn't really tell them what I was doing. I just sort of like, started doing it. And then one day the conversation came up like, oh, you're not, you know, gonna work at the law firm anymore. And I was just like, oh, I've been working on this idea, so I just kind of want to see how it works out. So it wasn't even like, hey, I'm quitting it. I never had any of those conversations. It was more like I was just always, saying like, oh, I'm just seeing how this goes. I want to try this out. And luckily, luckily, they were very supportive of that. They were like, oh. You know, because, like, I think it was more of like, for me, the way I looked at is their twenties are the time to like, really experiment and really see what's out there in the world versus, like, just going down like a traditional route. Because, like, I do come from a family of like, professional visitors. Doctor. My dad's a pilot. And so it was more like, you know, like, I think in their heads, it was more like, you need to have a 9 to 5 job. But coming, from that perspective, I think they were pretty okay with the fact when I said, like, oh, I'm just going to see how this goes. I think in, you know, I think they had read enough, you know, to know that, like, if you are working in the tech side of things, if you're a founder, there's a lot of scope. And so they never pulled me back even once. They were like, okay, you know what? You can try it out. But I never have that conversation. So I think I, like, just, like, cascaded by it for the longest time. I was just like, I'm just gonna, like, not talk about it. So. Yeah.
Fiona Killackey: And, do they use a platform now?
Shannon Almeida: Yeah, yeah. Like, all the time.
Fiona Killackey: Yes. And Priyanka, what about you?
Priyanka Vazirani: For me, it's kind of different. So I come from a family full of entrepreneurs, so they were very, very supportive, like, right from, like, childhood. I feel like my dad's always been like, you know, push harder, go for bigger things like this and that. So. But at the same time, like, you know, when things are really, really challenging, and I'm always like, oh, my God, things are not going as planned. This and that. Again, they're very supportive. Like, things take time. Like, stick with it, keep going. So I think that's been a, really good, like, support system. So, yeah, I think that's been really helpful, to be honest.
Fiona Killackey: Yeah. And so on that or in that kind of similar vein, what advice would you both give to someone who's listening to this, who's like, wow, that's. That's really awesome, and I'm trying to innovate in my own world. Whether they're in their 60s or in their 20s or whatever, what advice would you have? If they're thinking, I want to have impact, I want to do something meaningful, but it's just a bit hard. It's too hard.
Priyanka Vazirani: Yeah.
Shannon Almeida: I would say, like, two things for me, completely change everything. For us. I would say it's like, number one, find your community. Find where, you know, if you're building in clean tech or, you know, agritech, it doesn't matter. Like, news or whatever. Find where your people are. Find that community. Talk to them. Peers are so important. It doesn't matter. Even if they're competitors to you. You know, people start from one point and they end up somewhere else completely. So it doesn't really matter. You know, there is enough room for everyone to sort of thrive in that industry. So I say, like, number one, find your community. Find peers that you can talk to, mentors, obviously, and the last thing I would just say is that ideas seem so big, but the minute you start breaking them down, it seems so much more attainable. So not letting that, you know, the prospect of, like, oh, it's so big getting to you. The minute you start, like, step by step, I think that's when it starts being, you know, you just start working on it, and then, you know, you're three months down the line. You're like, I already did that. And you're like, oh, I wouldn't have thought I could have accomplished that. So I think, like, just breaking things down, you know, really small steps, really helps, and it goes a long way.
Priyanka Vazirani: Totally apart from those two, I think the two more things, the first thing being, like, just having that mindset or that stamina to keep going because things are going to get hard. And especially in the beginning when you have, like, when everything is like a question mark that you need to answer, like, it gets very, very daunting. And, you know, initially you're going to have, like, a lot more challenges as well, and the challenges are going to seem a lot bigger. So I think initially you just have to, like, literally keep going. Just, like, keep pushing. So that stamina is very important. The other thing is you can also be scrappy and get things done. I feel like a lot of people we have spoken to, they think that you need a lot of money to get started. We bootstrapped, like, very far. And we also, like, you know, hired people right out of college, like, had interns working for us in terms of, like, doing a lot of important things. And so that allowed us to, like, not only build the mvp, but also, like, get to a stage where, you know, Snapchat looked at our product and was like, we've been trying to do that. We couldn't do that. It's amazing how you guys have done this with absolutely no budget. So I think, yeah, being scrappy is totally fine. And there are a lot of tools today to allow you to get your product out with the bare minimum resources.
Fiona Killackey: Oh, my goodness.
Fiona Killackey: This has been so inspiring, and I'm aware of your time. And so as we're finishing up, what are you both most proud of so far from your business journey?
Shannon Almeida: I would say what I'm most proud of is building an entire product finding legitimacy in the industry that I didn't really have experience in, you know, and I think that has been the most rewarding. Didn't think that someone from finance or law could, you know, get into, you know, the news media industry, but I think that if you set your mind to it, everything is attainable. Yeah.
Fiona Killackey: Oh.
Fiona Killackey: Oh, my goodness. I have, like, she was my. My first book is dedicated to my mom because she used to say that both of my parents passed away, but she used to say that exact thing. You can do anything you put your mind to, like. Yeah, I could not agree with you more. And, Priyanka, what about you? What are you most proud of?
Priyanka Vazirani: The first thing is definitely, like, getting that, you know, seal of approval by something like a Snapchat. And I think, you know, them saying that, you know, we've been trying to build a product like this, but we haven't been able to complete. You guys have done this. I think that was a huge moment for us. Another thing is also running into strangers and realising they're your users. And that moment is priceless. So several times when you go to an event or when I go to an event, I come across someone and obviously you talk about, like, oh, what do you do? What do you do? And it's like, oh, appals. and they're like, oh, my God, you both ball. Like, I use it every day. That moment, whenever that happens, is so rewarding. So, yeah, that's the best.
Fiona Killackey: Oh, I love this. And also, I should ask. So it's been going how long, five years?
Shannon Almeida: A little less. Because, like, by the time we launched it with the MVPs, so a little less than that, but, yeah, I would say about, like, three, three and a half. Yeah.
Fiona Killackey: What is next for Volv? And if people are listening to this and thinking they're amazing, I need to connect with them. How can they do that?
Shannon Almeida: You can reach out to us on any social media platform. Instagram, TikTok or Twitter. Our handle is etvolve. Or if you want to reach out to me or Priyanka, you can just email us directly. First name, shannonallmedia.com or priyankaballmedia.com Amazing.
Fiona Killackey: Thank you so much for giving up your evening and morning, I think, in different parts of the world to be on the podcast. And I decided, yeah, I think what you're building is amazing and I love the meaning and purpose behind it. And, yeah, I can't wait to see it get bigger and bigger and bigger.
Fiona Killackey: And I'll be like, oh, my goodness.
Fiona Killackey: I met those people one day. But, yeah, congrats on everything you're doing.
Priyanka Vazirani: Thank you so much, so much.
Shannon Almeida: This is so much fun.
Fiona Killackey: Yes.
Priyanka Vazirani: Yeah, it's been great talking to you.
Fiona Killackey: Thank you.
Fiona Killackey: Oh, wow, that was such an interesting conversation and I just want to say massive. Thank you again to Shannon and Priyanka from Volv for just sharing their thought process, the things that they've gone through, where they're at right now with the app and just so much. I mean, there's so much in that, whether you are in the tech space or not, there's so many lessons and learnings from it. So massive, Massive. Thank you. And again, if you want to cheque out Volv, you can cheque out their amazing app where you get all this stuff in nine seconds at VolvMedia. V o l v m e d I a dot com and you can go on over to TikTok and follow them at getvolve. G e t V O L V as usual, I'm going to highlight two things that stood out amongst. Honestly, so many. I feel like I say that every single time, but honestly, there was so much in this. And, yeah, I just think it's fascinating and inspiring. Inspiring that people are starting platforms and so many incredible things like this. So the first thing that really stood out for me is this idea of absolutely meeting your audience where they are. And I know it's something that we've heard before and something I'm often talking to clients about. It's something that's been reiterated by previous guests, just most recently Lucy from the Design Files, really talking about that idea of having to meet your audience where they are. And I love so much in this episode, you know, Shannon and Priyanka talked about that, talking about understanding, even just the fact that their users may also be Tinder users. And so they're used to the swiping. And whilst that is not the number one reason that they're going to stick around and use this app, it just makes using it more intuitive and more in line with what they're used to. Also, the idea of really taking the way that we consume content through social media and taking elements of that in terms of the design and the experience and just being obsessed with that, being obsessed with creating an incredible experience, because then it becomes part of people's routine, part of people's habits. It's easier for them to pick up because they already understand the mechanisms. So I just love that. Really, really understanding your audience and meeting them where they are. And the second thing that I absolutely love that they talked about is that neither of them came from this tech background, but they could see this need for what it was that they wanted to create and they didn't let the idea that they don't have tech backgrounds. They are, not Coders, but they didn't let that stand in the way of them just starting, just getting going, and that they were able to find people that could help them bring this to life. And I love that. And I also love that they talked about we didn't have a big budget, so, you know, we went to, like, universities and people that are trying to get their foot in the door. And I've heard that before in, the Dinner Ladies podcast, which is coming out soon, which is such another great interview, they talk about somebody that started with them very early on as, a dishwasher and is now their manager of operations. Like, it's incredible when you can build something together from the ground up and then those people stick around and they're part of the family, really, that has contributed to build a brand into what it is. So that idea of just not telling yourself, not limiting yourself because you don't have a background. And I hear it all the time. I hear people that, like, I haven't got a degree in this, or I haven't worked in this space for a long time, or I'm up against peers that have, you know, a lot more experience. And it's like, yes, you may well be. There is always going to be people who are starting companies or in companies that have more experience than you, but they don't have your experience. They don't have your, you know, all the things that lead you to be who you are and why you started and what your why is in your business as well, and how you put that forward, that is unique to every single person on the planet. So I just love that they talked about that so much and really also doing things differently, doing it their way, and whether that was coming in without….But also that they looked at what was currently in the market, cnn, Fox News, and they were like, okay, how is news currently consumed and how can we pretty much turn it on its head and do the opposite? So, yeah, just so much in that. And again, I just want to say a massive thank you to Priyanka and Shannon. They were both in different countries to.
Fiona Killackey: Each other and to me.
Fiona Killackey: So trying to make the time work is always. It's always a fun thing. But we got there and I just want to say a huge, you know, hats off to what they're creating. I think it's incredible. And I can't wait to see how Vol evolves. So, as I said before, if you want to cheque them out. You can go to TikTok eTVolve. You can also cheque it out@volvmedia.com and we'll link to all of that in the Show Notes, which for this particular episode is at mydailybusiness.com podcast460. I wanted to remind you, if you haven't heard about it, we are now doing a monthly AI chat for small business owners. So you can join up and once a month we come together on Zoom Live and discuss an AI tool and how you can use it in your small business. So if you've been a little scared of AI, if you're like, I don't know how to use it, I don't know what to expect, I don't know if it's going to, you know, completely revolutionise my business or scare me or.
Fiona Killackey: Maybe feel like I'm not going to.
Fiona Killackey: Be in business much longer because of AI. Come and join the chat. You can join that at mydailybusiness.com forward/aichat. That's a I C H a T. We'll link to that in the Show Notes. Thank you so much for listening. I'll see you next time. Bye. Thanks for listening to the MyDaily Business podcast. For a range of tools to help you grow and start your business, including coaching programmes, courses and templates, cheque out our shop@mysdailybusiness.com shop and if you want to get in touch, you can do that by email helloydailybusiness.com or you can hit us up on Instagram @mysdailybusiness. You can find us on TikTok idailybusiness or find me Fiona Killackey on LinkedIn. I look forward to connecting.
