The stock market provides investors with more options than we can possibly keep track of. There are more than 4,000 publicly-traded companies on US exchanges alone. Keeping up with that many companies is simply not an option (at least if you ever plan on sleeping again).

One option is to just buy everything. S&P index funds allow investors to get ownership in the market’s largest companies. It’s a popular way to get the stock market’s broader-based returns without putting in very much effort.

For those willing to put in a bit more thought, another option is to selectively invest in the market’s pockets of innovation. By putting money into the most promising new trends, investors get access to a handful of companies who are a step ahead of others in defining the future and capturing its profits. For the Wayne Gretsky fans out there, this is “skating not to where the puck has been, but where it’s going to be.”

But this “basket approach” strategy also has challenges of its own. Since we never know what the future holds, how can we know which trends are indeed the most promising? And even within those trends, which individual companies should we be buying into?

To answer those questions, we’ve brought in technology enthusiast Evan Knowles. Evan wears several different hats, including the co-founder of Symba (a real estate CRM), the host of the Middle Tech podcast, and more generally as an ambassador of startups all across the country.

In an exclusive interview with 7investing, Evan describes why “enterprise software”, “consumer-focused platforms”, and “developer tools” are the three categories he chooses to invest in. He explains his thesis for each of these segments and reveals actual companies he’s investing in.

Evan also describes how real estate can offer a hedge against growth-style investing and why data moats are something that investors should be keeping an eye on.