This week, Bill talks with Izak Smith, who leads the 50 Motion video division of the 50 Family of Brands, to explore why video has become one of the fastest ways for manufacturers and industrial B2B companies to build trust and earn authority with AI search tools. Izak shares how the 50 Motion Content Create Experience turns one or two days on site into a year of usable video content, why a conversational interview style gets even camera shy team members to open up on record, and how a website, LinkedIn, and YouTube presence work together to earn citation share in AI answer engines. Bill and Izak also cover the business impact beyond marketing, including sales support, recruitment, and company culture.

Bill: Thank you for joining the Missing Half podcast, where we're discovering what's missing in manufacturing, B2B marketing, and today AI and video. I'm joined by a very special guest today, Izak Smith, who is leading our 50 Motion division and helping us solve problems for our clients around how they communicate with the market. Izak, thank you for joining us.

Izak: Thank you, thank you.

Bill: So let's start with the problem we're actually trying to solve, because everybody likes to talk about their products or services, what they do. But let's talk about how we're trying to solve problems in the market around, you know, and there's a lot of moving pieces today. We've got AI changing the way people find products, people find services online, the way they evaluate companies. We talk about, you know, SEO is not performing as well. Maybe the ad channels aren't performing as well. And when we think about video is kind of that way to tell a story that's authentic, organic, real, and from the company and their people's point of view. Let's talk about how we're using video to solve that problem and how we've really determined that that's, that’s a thing.

Izak: I think video in itself. While yes, it looks good, yes, it looks pretty. It gives you an extreme amount of credibility within it. You can go to any website and it can look pretty. You can see a website with photos, and you can kind of get a glimpse into what is being sold or who's selling it. But the second that there's a video, you have a connection and instantly feel attached to, whether it's a product or a company or a service, and they now have credibility in your eyes and a connection that is worth you holding on to.

Bill: And we're still living in a moment where faking video is harder. I mean, we're starting to see AI is producing videos and we can all laugh at the funny little characters that they make on parodies. But when we think about video where we're trying to, and let's talk about the goal is like, communicate with our market, let's communicate with those buyers, help them through their buyer's journey, is very, very difficult to fake B2B video because people see through it really, really quickly.

Izak: I think AI has a lot of a lot of power within video, but the second you try to overdo AI, it will never get you anywhere. And it's, one step forward and a thousand steps back. I think implementing AI to, like, super basic, help you with numbers and speed of things, but it cannot hit record and it cannot, fake that authenticity connection.

Bill: So we've been doing something new with 50 Motion for, well, new, several years. Where we're going out and we have our Content Create Experience and maybe talk a little bit about what we do there, how we're, what we do and what problems we're trying to solve. When we go out to the client's place of business, spend those day or days and really engage them and just capture so much content at one time.

Izak: So with us going out to a client and getting to capture content, not only does it, just it's super quick. It's either a day or two, and it allows us to gain so much of that inside look that we can portray to any customer that's wanting to come in and purchase from that client or get a connection with that client. We're able to come in, spend that day or two like I just mentioned, and capture so much footage that it can last for six months to even a year before we even have to think about coming back and trying to see another, deeper look. So it allows us to just capture so much to then give to potential clients for months on end.

Bill: So I think the problem we're trying to solve there and it's working is the traditional video construct is the video team goes in, shoots a shot, a video about a thing, a product or service, initiative. That's what they get for the day. It's relatively expensive. And then they go out, six weeks later, we have a produced video, and then the old model is then you rinse, repeat that cycle to build out your video portfolio. The and on the flip side is you can have that organic candid, what do you call it, social media stuff you do naturally with iPhones and stuff. Companies can largely source that and produce that on a regular basis. But I feel like the the needle we're threading here is capturing good quality content that can be used in a primary setting, but then also repurposed across the entire. And then we'll talk about this a little bit, the multimodal distribution of content, so that we're activating and training AI to recognize this company as the authority in the space. Maybe we should back up a little bit and talk about the planning. So when we show up, that's like day 30 or 40 in our process, right? Because when we show up and actually turn the cameras on, lights, camera, action, we've already been very, very focused in our work. We've worked with the client, we've developed the topics, and usually we talk about, you know, we want to shoot who we are, where we are, what we do, who we who, we do it for, what we do. Mission, vision, values, want to capture culture. We want to capture as much of the core essence of that business, from soup to nuts, and put it into videos and placed online. So we prepare these and let's talk about in our preparation, one of the things I’ve found interesting, and we've seen a tremendous feedback from our clients on this, is we do not put people in their businesses under the spotlight and make them feel like they have to be a trained broadcast journalist, and it's, you know, light camera action and go, we, provide an interviewer, someone who talks just like this. So it's a natural conversation. It’s not deer in the headlights, where they're staring at the camera and they become catatonic. We take folks who are not used to being on the camera. We have the interview style to elicit those conversations. And that, I feel, has been one of the breakthroughs in accelerating this process, because before, we saw a very high failure rate, when we would go in, let's say, interview 20 people at a business, you may get likely to get 15 to 30 seconds for each of those 20 minute interviews because people just weren't great at delivering lines. But when we're having a conversation, we can get the most timid, the most, introverted and shy person to all of a sudden come alive talking about their portion of the business. And they're passionate about it. That comes through. And that's like authentic content gold. So maybe talk about how we've we've kind of flipped the way we do that to solve that problem in a different way.

Izak: I think instead of setting up 20,000 cameras, a big spotlight, and like you said, having that person stand right there who doesn't really want to be on the camera, but their boss said they need to. So they're gonna try to build up the confidence. And like, I mean, we're not going to tell them we could see all the sweat coming off their face, but there's, they’re sweating and they're nervous. Our team is so good at coming in, and those people who show us their Apple Watch and it says their heart rate’s at 150, and they're shaking just a little bit. They start getting excited. You can hear it in their voice, you can see it in their eyes. And then after the fact, they tell us how, oh my gosh, I completely forgot that there was four other cameras, or just as we're going with it, they’re like, it’s super easy. I don't even know why I was so nervous. That one comes across every single interview. It's just because the team is so good at that personal connection, being able to portray it to whatever we may end up getting to create with the content after and just feeling comfortable rather than in danger and relaxing. And just like you said, having a conversation in which I get to get passionate and you get to just say yes and then help provoke more questions. So it’s very good.

Bill: They say that that fear of death is only, like eclipsed by the fear of public speaking. Right. And that's really, I think the problem we're solving, the problem we're solving is allowing these people to get out of their own way to overcome that fear, and then, and this is, I think, the second part of it, I have always heard for years in my career, that if we could just get more people to come and visit us at the factory, visit us at the facility, whenever they visit us, we close so many deals. They get to know us, they see our quality, they see our performance, they see our care, etc. Overcoming the fear of public speaking. And then we're also creating an evergreen engine of bringing their potential clients to that facility. Get to know those people, know the product, know the service, know the values, know the culture. So we're solving that problem as well. So the thing that's been really interesting about this, for me in my career, is when we started to, the question we received from our clients was we need video. We need YouTube, our website’s stale, we don't have any videos on our website. And then transitioned to oh, we need social media content and video performs better. So the first question became one of like doing the thing and now it feels like it's morphed where we engaged video, and now we're solving so many problems along the way that, I mean, it's a really exciting space to be in. We're running a lot, which is great. It's great to spend time with our clients in their places of business, on their factory floors, in their, facilities. But I think solving all those problems is really what’s dynamic. And what's helping us change what we do for the industry. Izak, when you think about those moments, you're interviewing or we have that person there, I've often seen it. I want to get your feedback. There's these aha moments where we've worked really, really hard on script guidance, because there's no scripts per se. They're just prompts and ideas and questions we're going to ask so that everybody's very prepared and comfortable. But there's moments in each interview where we surface things that, even ownership or the executive leadership team did not think of. It's kind of like that organic upswelling of more refinement to the unique value proposition, more refinement and explanation of the culture that is way better than the CEO or CMO could ever come up with. I feel like that, to me, is very rewarding when we're bringing those, I don't want to say performances, but those elements out. Have you have you experienced that and what's your feedback on this?

Izak: I think there's definitely many, like, aha moments, whether it's like the person we interviewed, or the interviewee, so if it's me provoking questions, trying to get an answer and then that super shy person, you just kind of see them relax and start answering perfectly. It's like, there we go. Or for that person, they, that's, the aha moment is when they think of a system or think of something that they could have done better when telling me about what they got to do within XYZ project. They're, they're able to then go and implement that, but also look back at the footage and just go, wow. And then I think a big thing for another aha moment that we tend to forget about. And you mentioned it at the beginning of the question was, clients love when people come into their facility because it allows for that connection and it allows for just, not necessarily more sales, but just a deeper connection in which you can have a business relationship. And I think doing these interview-style videos within a business allow for someone who's not at that moment, not at that facility, CEO, whoever, to look at that, feel that connection with that coworker and go, oh, like, I know what's happening at this facility. And I love this person, and I love how they talked about that. That's so great that they realize it. So there's so many aha moments in so many different ways, just because of these interview-style videos and the work that we get to do.

Bill: And I feel like that's also really flies in the face of where we are with technology today. Because with AI now, we don't even have to go to the internet per se to search for things. We can just prompt our, our, LLM of choice, or agent or whatever we're using to go and find products and services. And here we can kind of fly, it's kind of, it's, we're creating dissonance. I feel like we're we're creating, break breakthrough moments or we're creating some type of a pattern disruptor against some of the digital where it's not just, here's our products, we're great, buy from us, but let's let's tell you our story. Let's connect. I love that word connection because I think we are, we're eliciting emotional responses, which is important in the buyer's journey. And we're creating authority for our company. The other thing that’s so amazing about this. So let's, let's recognize that but then let’s recognize that we do live in a world full of technology. And one of the jobs we have for our clients is to make sure that, however AI is interacting with their business. And AI search, whatever you call it, AEO, GEO, LLMO, whatever the acronym is of the day that we're going to choose, the the issue that we run into is we have to train the algorithms to recognize our company as an authority in that space. We want to be referenced. We want to be surfaced as one of those citations in the answers around our, money keywords that are by keywords that are very technical in niche, and the freshness component is very important. So the, there was an article, I believe, by Neil Patel where he said are seven times more likely to be shown if your content was produced in the last 30 days. Well, that is a ridiculous expectation for companies to like, we can't go into a company every 30 days and shoot brand new content because budgets, resources, their people, that need to do their jobs, not sit and talk to us like every 30 days. But we've been able to, do these content creates, not only have a full YouTube channel with amazing product, service, who we are, mission vision values, all the things, have a website that’s fully interactive with every landing page almost having a landing page video that talks about this stuff, but then we're able to continuously post clips and post other micro cuts on LinkedIn, for their social media, on other platforms if appropriate, but primarily for B2B, we're looking at LinkedIn, and then we can rework the film to say different things to different audiences and that keeping it fresh. Like, have you been surprised at how how long we can continue to use what we shoot? I mean, we have one client, we did a two day shoot two years ago, and we're still living off of that shoot. And the thing that's amazing is it still looks fresh, When I see it. Like I saw the video the other day from the team and I was like, has the 50 Motion team gone back there? Like, I was like, I was like, had they gone back and reshot and like, no, no, we're still using that from the... So what is your, feeling and how how are you perceiving that evergreen content that just, it's like it's like that jelly of the month club. It just keeps on giving.

Izak: I think. I think it's insane how like 50 Motion is able to do that aspect, because, I mean, like we started off talking about how we spend months planning, then one day a video shoot, to 3 or 4 days a video shoot, one piece. We do the same thing except for like you said, we get piece on, piece on piece, short form, long form interviews, testimonials. Like you can do so much with that content for so long, whether you went to look like this, AB and then throw in C later, or just show C, there's so many ways to go around it and like like you said, like rather than talking to us every single month and starting that whole process over, and then one video. You're able to be with us for X amount of time. We come in, nail it, use that content for a very long time. If we need more, that's when you talk to us. We figure it out, come down one day, get a bunch more content that we can continue to use, and it's just truly just a snowball that never melts. You know? We can just keep on going and going and going and taking from.

Bill: So I think the other hidden cost in video production is, the sunk costs of the company being distracted. So when we do that in a day, that's significant because when you think about their downtime, if there is any and there doesn't have to be, but in some cases we're a little bit disrupted before getting a like part of their manufacturing line for safety concerns. You know, we have to work with safety and the plant manager and make sure we're not in the way and all those things, but when we can do all of that in a day, that is really significant. And I've never run the math. But if you're thinking about the old model where we're in there, you know, every month shooting all this stuff and it's a big production and you get one video, whereas we're really minimizing disruption. The other thing we've seen, and this has been kind of rewarding as well, is companies are treating this as like a team building day. A lot of the companies will have a nice lunch and like it's the time for the team to kind of kick back. And when they're not being interviewed or they're not part of the process they're sharing, they're, having sidebar watercooler conversations in a low pressure environment and supporting each other, which, it's not like a ropes course. We don't dangle anybody from high places because that's not safe. But, it's one of those things where everybody can feel really good about the momentum that's being created. And almost to a person, when we've been talking with these companies, they’re like, yeah we really feel like, our company’s missing this. We are not doing what our competitors are doing or what the, certainly not what the market leader is doing. But even, you know, people we aspire to be like today or, you know, we want to aspire to be like in a year or two. They're not showing up in that way. So I feel like that has been, interesting to think about one cost reduction. But then we can also see other benefits that the company can enjoy by team building. Bringing everybody together. You've experienced that. Maybe talk through some of those, without naming names. We've had some good barbecue. We've had some amazing sandwiches with these folks and really got to know them and hear some crazy stories and some amazing stories. It's you just kind of go with it, all kinds of things you hear, but, maybe talk about that.

Izak: I think there's two different things I think of when you say that is one, when you take photos of someone, you say, smile and you take a photo and that's it. With video you, our goal is for you to forget and then you're smiling throughout it. That same process of the camera. But then after, like you said, that team building aspect. Oh my goodness, I felt so nervous. But it wasn't that scary. Or I didn't know how to answer this question. So we just moved on. And it's really it's watching that smile rather than being that one moment for a photo. The video while recording and not recording, that smile and those conversations just keep on going. And what's really cool, and we've gotten feedback from this once we leave a shoot, so many people got to sit here and have a conversation. They want to hear their own voice, and they want to hear how it gets to impact the company because they truly care about it. So I think that's like, that's exciting. And then with us gathering so much content and there's one, two days, we are, we're a speedbump in their process. We're not stopping them from doing what they need to do, whether it's a big manufacturing company or just whatever it may be, they're not stopping, they're not pausing. We are working around them. We're we're not trying to have them go around us. And with that, because we're not there that often, rather than coming in every single month for new content, completely stopping production, you're ultimately saving money in that aspect, too. If you look at it that way. It's it's a big old coupon.

Bill: Absolutely. So let's switch gears a little bit here and let's talk about the numbers, because we’ve talked about the problems we're solving. We've talked about some of the outcomes that are a little softer, like employee engagement and those type of things. Those are softer numbers. But let's talk about multimodal content distribution for AI. Because when we think about why are we doing this, the new world is that AI is searching for or being prompted to find solutions. And whether that's a long RFQ where they're prompting very, very specific niche things and requirements and asking AI to compare and contrast vendors and products and services and all those things. And AI is going to go and grab the average of the answers available and the information available on the internet. Our goal is to train AI to recognize the client as the authority in, with their unique value proposition around that product or service, and get them cited as often as possible. Currently we are achieving approximately 40% citation share in AEO, which would be Google's answers engine optimization with the AI overviews. And we're starting to see real aggressive growth in the other platforms. I mean that's ever changing. So it is a dynamic environment. But one of the things we've learned with multimodal content is if SEO was a search engine driven world where it would find the links on a website, AI is now looking at everything fast, so you need to have the website and it needs to be tuned up. But then AI for B2B, one of the second most prominent sources is LinkedIn and then YouTube. So when we think about kind of the holy trinity of where we need to be, it's, we have to be on the web, we have to have LinkedIn and we have to have video. And then the beauty is video can support the LinkedIn, it can support the web because there could be landing page videos. We can clip stuff, reference it on LinkedIn. So we kind of create this, ecosystem of multimodal distribution to earn citation share for our clients. And obviously that's evolving, right? Like we're, whenever this episode is published, probably everything I've just said has been wiped out by a new version of AI that's been launched, but probably not. We've we've been studying this now for two years, and it seems to be a trend worth investing in. And, and I think so those are some of the numbers about why it's so important. But the other thing we focus on is not only servicing new clients and bringing them on the journey, it's sales enablement and support. So if a salesperson is out there in the field, having a conversation, they get a question. It's great when they answer it, but then it's also great when they follow up with an email to a link that has a video of the lead engineer or the quality control specialist, or the,, whoever is the subject matter expert for that specific answer in the company also reiterating the same point. And we've surfaced a lot of those comments when we've interviewed. I think the last one we did, we had 17 people over, two or no, it was more than that. Anyway, it was a lot. It was a lot. And I'm blacking out, because it was like, we have to repress some of these memories because there's so much work in those two days. But you've seen those different experts answer questions that one, they're passionate. It's with detail that, let's be honest, no company should ever expect their sales person to be able to communicate it that way. Maybe talk about what you've seen with some of those answers from some of those people.

Izak: Because we get to interview so many experts and CEOs and even just people who are working on the line, when it comes to AI and video, your website is a lot of words. It needs to be short and sweet. When you add a link that goes to a video that explains something in detail, whether it's baby steps and gets deeper and deeper, it it allows AI to take every single word, put it in its memory, put it in its pocket. So that way when someone comes across, random or not, looks something up, it it knows that there's a company X, y, z that talks a lot about this. We give AI a lot of feedback on this and the appropriate information is able to be pulled out and help someone else. So I think AI is able to grab those videos, grab that website, grab these experts and ultimately show it to new faces and faces that want to gain more knowledge and information, whether they're stuck or not. I know that every single person I've ever met and I'm very confident on this, is very tired of those AI generated, like, if you get on a phone call, you need help, like press one for this person. I just want speak to a person. Please do this. Please. This videos allow you to instantly get that feedback. Watch it. Scroll through. See the transcript. This is the point I need. It's all sectioned off because of video work and because of the knowledge that AI has to direct you where you should go. I think ultimately just creates a smoother, happier process.

Bill: The other thing we've heard in feedback from our clients is sales team members or customer service team members will get a call from a client and the call goes something like this. Hey, I was watching a video about this, and I wanted to ask you a little bit more about the topic. I mean, you have someone who's engaged, informed, has already identified your company and your people as the authority, and they want to take a deeper dive. And certainly we can't cover everything, and we don't cover proprietary information in these video interviews or, you know, cover intellectual property. And we can't cover every use case for the client. So we obviously need those salespeople to take that baton and continue running with it. But that's solid gold as far as a response that we're looking for from the market, where they recognize the work we've done as foundational to their decision-making process, and then they're ready to take that next step in the journey. And I think that's been very rewarding to hear that feedback as well. Let's switch gears to culture, because when we think about companies, there are some things that you can differentiate at a product and service level. But at the end of the day, people also want to know that when they buy from you, you've they've got, you know, you've got their back, you’re good people to deal with, high integrity, like all the values that are core to whatever your company champions as your, culture and value system. We're able to capture the culture and communicate it consistently, which I don't know if it's, I mean, Fortune 500 companies have tremendous campaigns and spend millions and millions of dollars that's not available to us in mid-market. So we have to do what we can really quickly. And I'm not talking about when you post on Facebook that your company had a luncheon or that you had a, whatever your, fundraising thing is, if you do Habitat for Humanity, all good things, like all amazing team building things, but that shows an activity. That doesn't show your heartbeat. And we're able to capture the cultural heartbeat of these organizations and communicate them authentically. When is, as you've gone into these companies, you're younger in your career. So you haven’t, we're we're not going to talk about how long I've been around, but going into some of these companies and having a perception before you spend those two days or one day, is it, what has your perspective been on how much you've learned about them, about their heartbeat, not just about what they do?

Izak: I think going, before we even go into a company or whatever it may be, we obviously do our work, we do our research, and outside of the calls that we get to have, a lot of times I don't know what the heartbeat is or I can read about it and go, okay, I see why they would put that in there. But the second I get there and see the people, get to just be a shadow and capture the footage and content and have these conversations that allow me to gain a deeper inside look, I get excited because I know that here, in X amount of days, in a month, that I can go on this website of this company and know that I will now have an inside look, get to see that heartbeat, get to see how things are ran, and get to put names to faces that I can eventually interact with or see that they took the time of day to have this conversation with me through the website. So I think it ultimately allows you to see the heartbeat and just get to have, once again, that connection to that company, product or client.

Bill: Well, and let's talk about one of the problems that solves that goes beyond sales. Everybody currently is facing recruitment challenges. Everybody's having trouble staffing, specifically in manufacturing, industrial, B2B and sometimes whenever we're approached by companies who want us to help them with that, my my knee jerk is like, okay, what's your culture? Do you know it? And are you communicating it to the market? Because you want to attract people who are going to fit your culture.
Because if you want to attract, recruit, hire, retain people, there is a process and there's going to be churn. But you can reduce churn by communicating upfront what you, what they're getting into so that there's a good fit. It's kind of like we don't do arranged marriages in this country anymore, right? Because we want to kind of figure out what's going on before we get married. Children picking their colleges. They don't just get sent there. They go and visit. And they have all types of exposition days and camps and interactions. Or now with the internship programs for trades and those type of things so they can try it out before they buy it for life. And I think when we we start communicating that culture, it’s not so much the we're going to fix the economic macroeconomic environment and the supply side of labor, but we are going to attract the right people who are going to fit, who are going to perform, and then who are going to be additive to that group so that the company becomes better. And then we have a better culture that attracts more people, as opposed to being silent about it and just complaining we don't have enough people. And so I think an added benefit of once we capture that heartbeat and we're communicating it to the market, yes, it helps with sales. Yes, it helps attract clients, all very important things and are primary, but is secondary is that we can aid in the recruitment challenges that are faced by businesses today and that are going to perpetuate, for who knows how long. But it seems to be a recurring theme. Whenever I go to these trade shows, that's what people are talking about. How am I going to staff or how am I going to automate. So that those are the things I think we need to recognize that there's so much value. And, so you're, young in your career. You've, you were on the job hunt. Whenever you think about the hardbeats that you're capturing at these companies, I mean, when you're trying to capture young people, they just don't. They want a paycheck and they want to do well, but they also care about the environment, the culture, the way people are treated, the way everybody shows up to work, like buying into the mission. Can you see how that heartbeat could really impact recruitment?

Izak: Absolutely. I think it's already, it's it's it's pulling teeth to have someone come in for an interview. At that interview that person walks out and goes, I think I could I think that was a really good conversation. I, I could see myself working. And then I can if they don't, if it doesn't work out that it doesn't work out. I mean, it's just a lot of, bleh, okay. And the hardest part is that pulling teeth right there to then have an unknown of bleh. Where video gets you truly behind closed doors. I can sit there, go to the recruitment tab, watch someone speak to me who wants me in on an intentional level and get to see systems and processes and the community and other people I may be getting to work with and how, just how it looks. And if I like that, because of the way that the video comes across and I hit like apply, there's already such a high potential that, that interview, I desire to be here, and I'm hoping that you like me and that I get that opportunity because I already feel a connection. So I think it just allows, it just expedites every single potential of having someone come in for just a simple interview. They desire to be there because they already know what they're getting into.

Bill: So we have a client that was at nine employees two and a half years ago. They have scaled up to 40 plus. I don't know the exact numbers lately, but they were over 40 last time I talked to their CEO. And we did, at about 35 employees we went and did another Content Create. This was the second one with this organization. And we were interviewing al lot of their people, and we didn't even, this was one of those like, you know, Easter eggs. A number of the new employees who were hired and we were talking about this, this. Oh, yeah. Well, we saw the videos on Facebook. We saw, some of the videos on YouTube. And one of my buddies forwarded me a video who knew I was looking for a job and said, you should check this place out. So it wasn't through the traditional job placement situations. It wasn't through the newspaper. It wasn't through, Monster Jobs or any of those platforms. It was relational social media referral and that video, and they came and, you know, these were employees that had then been there three months, were excited, were talking on the video about how they were so enamored with the place and really moving forward. So, well, Izak, this has been incredible conversation. I know we're going to have a number of other conversations, as we move this forward, but 50 Motion, part of the 50 Family of Brands is executing at a very, very high level. We have built a better mousetrap I believe, that we are solving problems. That's not only because we believe it, but because we're getting tremendous feedback from the market. We're getting reengaged by these companies over and over again. And we're getting a lot of feedback from other CEOs. I'm getting calls like, hey, how did you do that for that company? We're interested in that. So I think we're on to something here over the past several years what we're building. And I think the moment for the importance of it with AI is just accelerating that process a little bit.

Izak: Absolutely.

Bill: So. Well Izak, thank you for joining us today. I appreciate the conversation and looking forward to many more.

Izak: Yes, thank you very, very much.