This week we explore the power of authentic, organic content in manufacturing and B2B marketing. Discover how 50 Marketing’s unique "Content Create Sessions" help to uncover the true essence of a brand, translating its values, vision, and promise into engaging, relatable content delivered through the words of real employees.
Learn how these sessions can create the emotional connections that drive results - plus, see it in action through footage from our own session, featuring Andrea Sanner, Ryan Collier, and Ethan McDowell.
Whether you're a marketing manager or an executive, this episode offers valuable insights into producing effective, genuine communication for today’s marketplace.
Bill: Welcome to the Missing Half podcast where we're discovering what's missing in manufacturing and B2B marketing. I'm Bill Woods. Today we have a special episode where we're going to pull the curtain back on a service we provide to our clients. We call it our content create session or our content create event. This is where we get together with our clients and spend a day or two and take a deep dive into developing their content through video.
What are content create sessions about? It's about getting to know you, the client, and making sure that we're capturing who you are, what you do, and where you do it. Capturing the passion of your people around your products and services, and making sure that we're understanding your promise, your brand promise that you deliver to the market, and making sure we're communicating it in a candid and organic way.
So many companies in the past have really relied on overproduced and too polished of content, right? What works today is candid. What works today is organic and natural communication to your target audience. They want to see your brand promise delivered by the people who are going to actually deliver the brand promise. And that's the people on your team. So when we look at these content create sessions, we really take the time to explore your organization and give them a vehicle, give them a platform to communicate to your intended audience.
Whenever we execute the content create sessions with our clients, it allows each employee and each team member who participates in the process to really infuse their passion and their authenticity, their own personal experience into the production. These are very low pressure situations. They're interviews that occur in a conversational format, similar to a podcast format, so that we take away the pressure of the green screen, take away the pressure of the cameras and the microphones and allow each person to really communicate the way they would to someone who is sitting across from them experiencing that company for the first time.
And why organic content? Why this authentic content push? Well, it's no mystery in the marketplace that authentic and organic content is more effective than produced content. Whenever we have a paid spokesperson or the most polished person in our company deliver the message, that's great. And it gives a certain quality to productions that may require that. However, on a day-to-day basis, if someone is on that buyer's journey, 86% of the buyer's journey that happens online before someone contacts a company, they want to hear it from the people that are actually going to deliver it.
And certainly, if you look at your competitive landscape and the industry leaders, they're most likely doing this. And if you look at those companies you're competing with on a day to day basis, the ones that are getting ahead, the ones that are making more progress in their marketing are the ones that are leaning into organic and authentic content.
And what we're not talking about is just capturing the employee luncheons and the holiday celebrations or the camaraderie events. Those are important and they add color to the culture of your company. They add color commentary around your business and the people that are there. But this is really about communicating your brand promise to the market, communicating the who we are, what we do, where we do it, why we do it, our mission, our vision, our values, and really making sure that the brand promise is communicated to the market effectively.
And why are we doing this? Why are we trying to communicate authentically and organically? When we're trying to become brand aware in our market, meaning that we want the intended buyer, the intended audience to understand our brand and think of us as an authority in the market, we need not only information transfer, but we need to create an emotional connection with our audience around that problem and the solution we deliver.
So whenever we look at the research, whether it's in HubSpot or Sprout Social or Gartner or Forrester, according to HubSpot, authenticity resonates more with audiences than produced content. When we look at the studies that surround the idea of emotional connection with our intended audience, we know that there's a lot of research out there, but let's just be honest about our own experience. We've each had relationships with potential clients that have allowed us to move beyond just price, beyond that commoditization or that race to the bottom and communicate our value proposition. The value proposition can't just be dollars and cents. There has to be some type of emotional connection. There has to be relatability. And there has to be the belief that you are an authority and that you will follow through on your brand promise.
This is what we're trying to deliver with the content create sessions where we're able to extract that core of what your organization is. We're able to extract who you are and give not only that the solid information that features, the benefits, the facts, the value from a financial standpoint, but also the human element. And we're able to communicate the value of your team and the differentiation that they add to your value proposition.
So today we're going to have some conversations with our team and we were going to show you about a little bit of our content create session that we did for 50 marketing and give you a sample of what that could look like. One of the interviews we conducted with our team during our own content create session at 50 Marketing was with Andrea Sanner, one of our Client Success Representatives. And we asked her to communicate in her own words, the process that we use and what it's like to work with clients and what they can expect so that they could understand our brand promise, not from what our website says or our UVP statements, but directly from one of the people who delivers it every day to our clients. Let's tune in.
Bill: We've been on this journey together of doing marketing now for a while, and, it has changed a lot what we've been doing. So maybe talk a little bit about your journey and where you kind of started and where you're going to, and that'll get us kick us off.
Andrea: Oh, boy. Okay. Yeah. Pulling back in the history books.
Bill: Don’t tell them the years.
Andrea: Gloss over that. Yeah. So I just got my start, right out of college. Basically, I went to a pretty technical school, studied graphic design management. So that was the background there for studies and then, straight into the newspaper business. It seemed like the, the local thing to do. So it was a local business out of Myers Dale, P.A., Maple City. Okay. So, yeah, it was really just started, add layout, magazine layouts, you know, basically, or anything they needed there, for graphics. I covered that.
Bill: Yeah, that background, I, I've worked in a lot of, graphics professionals in my career, and I think working, and we're probably losing that experience because that it just isn't available anymore because newspapers are basically gone. But the ability to produce under pressure for a graphic designer, that where they see that in that newspaper space, I think is one of the most important skills that then translates into agency experience. Right. Because we got to move. Yeah, we we've got to keep things moving. And so I don't want to hijack your story, but I really appreciate that, that background that you have because I think that's such an important skill. And for young people, if they come out of school, don't they should never look down on that opportunity because they'll learn to be creative quickly as opposed to drawing out a process that doesn't get them results.
Andrea: Yeah, yeah. I mean, just to reiterate on that, I mean, you were just basically thrown into the fire. Oh, you know, newspaper business is like deadline driven, so very rapid production and getting it out there and improving and all, you know, the whole work. And it’s fast. Yeah. So from there, I went to another, newspaper business a little bit more, upscale. So went from a weekly paper to more of a daily paper. So, yeah. That was an interesting, you know, juxtaposition, from weekly deadlines to now. Hey, every day you need to get stuff done and and get it processed. And then from there, it came to 50 Marketing. So similar role. Design and actually web design. So, I was brought up to speed training-wise of how to do web, web, work because I had not had that experience before. So that was, interesting and fun. And a lot of creative work like, you know, was kind of where I had landed after school and I liked, and then I got the opportunity to work more with clients and build those relationships. And then, you kind of offered me, hey, you want to be in that client services type of avenue? So that was probably a little over two and a half years ago that I made the transition to what I'm in now, which is Client Success Manager.
Bill: Yeah. And I think, Andrea, when you look at that, certainly what you're doing now is different, but there are some similarities in that. We're still interacting with clients. Whether, you know, when you started your career, was interacting with clients to develop graphics and creative to help them accomplish a goal. Now, for better or worse, and you, you'll probably be kind to me and not tell me which one it is you're looking at communicating with clients and delivering across the entire spectrum of services that we offer here at 50 Marketing. And really, I think that's interesting how you and the other CSRs, Client Success Representatives, have to juggle a lot of information, priorities and projects to execute for the client.
Andrea: Yeah, yeah, it can be a lot, but, we've got the process is in place, and we've invested in project management tools. Other team members, as you said. And, you know, that we really rely on those processes and tools to keep us in line, help us meet deadlines and keep the client happy.
Bill: I think we take for granted here at 50 Marketing how streamlined our project management system is. And, you know, maybe some people think that's a given, but we have a lot of associates and colleagues in this industry that I think are still operating marketing and creative agencies kind of in that, creative atmosphere and space, a little more loosey goosey. And we love creativity. We love to, to to push the envelope on that side of it. But we like to get things done and stay on project and stay on plan and meet and exceed our deadlines.
Andrea: Yeah, I just couldn't imagine a scenario where we were just loosey goosey because I would drive, it would drive me crazy. I like to be creative, but I also like to be task oriented. So, that's, I guess, like a unique aspect of my personality. So yeah, the, we're, we're in the world that we built with the project management tools and the processes that we've developed, heretofore and, I couldn't, you know, ask for it any other way because, like I said, it would just drive me nuts.
Bill: Let's talk about client meetings and the different types of client meetings that we have. And maybe let's start with the strategic meetings.
Andrea: Sure. Yeah. So strategic meetings with clients usually, kind of look like, you know, you're involved, usually in those strategic meetings where we sit down and we're developing a scope of work, we're really determining with them what what they want to hear, like what goals they want to hit. It's more consultative in our approach. We're really partnering with them and building that relationship and kind of putting the the goals and the outline together, as part of that process. And then separate from that, you're probably going to go into more of the CSR role and transitioning out of the strategic into, to do meetings and, check check-ins.
Bill: So I think, just to kind of put a bookend on these strategic meetings, one of the things we really try to make sure is that we aren't just checking boxes. We're not just doing things to do them. Do we understand the goals? Are we working towards those? Are there results that are occurring from our activities that are working towards those goals? And those strategic check-ins sometimes are monthly, sometimes are quarterly, whatever, is required and is necessary to make sure that we're doing the best we can to meet and support that marketing manager and their team.
Bill: Another interview that we completed was with Ryan Collier, another one of our Client Success Representatives, and he talked not only about what it's like to work with the client, but then we also asked him, in his own words, to describe why we approach video the way we do and what is what it means to him to see that come together for our clients.
So, Ryan, over the past several years, we really made a lot of progress in producing video, not only for ourselves, but for our clients and you've been there through that entire genesis and now the evolution of where we are today. So it's been exciting to see that change.
Ryan: Yeah. For sure. So I started the job about four years ago now. You know, initially brought on as just an editor. But, you know, in that time, I, I had the privilege of taking a more hands-on role on becoming the Video Production Manager and really seeing that, seeing our Motion department evolve into something, which is unrecognizable to what it was when we first started or when I first started the role, you know, a client would simply ask for a video. There was no rhyme or reason. It was just like, okay, that's just one one of the pieces in the puzzle that we have to provide to a client. But there were there was no real rhyme or reason to it. So we as a team have been developing the why. I mean, why does a client need a video? What does that give them? And how can we provide the best content for them that has the best impact? Because there's no point in producing video that has no, no effectiveness.
So what we we've done as a motion team is to, build a package, a Motion package of lots of different types of deliverables to a client. So obviously we still have long form content, but we can't ignore the effectiveness of things like short form content, motion graphic videos, those kind of things that we see on social media day in and day out. So it's basically taken us down a journey of, of research, of what what is performing the best and how can we replicate those results for our clients and produce results? Because at the end of the day, a video is just a conduit to results. And that's what we do it for, to make our clients happy and to get them engagement and get them money. At the end of the day.
Bill: When we look at B2B and manufacturing, the word video like you talked about is thrown around. I feel like it was something where executives were reading about it in Forbes or Wall Street Journal, or in whatever industry magazine they're reading. Oh, you have to do video. So they would go to their marketing department and they say, hey, we need video. And I think a lot of marketing managers didn't even really know what that meant. They just knew that someone on the board in the C-suite somewhere was like, we need video.
And so clients were coming to us saying, we need video. And that's such a big word. That's like the internet, that's like social media. It's just so, it's so encompassing. I think, Ryan, what I've really appreciated is the way we've started to break that down, because video is so much more than just a word. There's so many components to it that really make up a successful video strategy.
Ryan: Yeah, and by breaking those, by breaking those videos down into segments, we can really start to explore, what's what's best in a particular situation.
Bill: So how do you how have you seen that journey going from where we take a client from the word video to like, really, let's let's start at the beginning, breaking it down and figuring out, yeah, target audience. What's the message? And then where are we going to deliver it? I mean, those are probably three primaries we want to ask right away to make sure we're developing a plan that will deliver what the client is looking for and accomplish their goal.
Ryan: Yeah. 100 percent. And, we I think it started when, we were looking at the ineffectiveness of long form content. So long form content definitely has its place in the mid to lower funnel. But I saw its prevalence in, you know, high funnel marketing. And it confused me because no one has the time to watch a three, five, five minute long video. It's just not going to happen. So what we started to do is deconstruct these videos. So, we use the term 50 Marketing repurposing content. We use it every single day.
So what we started to do was we would go to a client, we would discuss what their message is, what they want to say. That's the most important thing out of everything. Like we need there needs to be a clear message of what they want to say. And then we would go to the client, shoot the video, we would have a director's cut. So a five minute long video, which we, we, we can use on their website for, you know, mid to low content, you know, in the funnel. And then we would begin then repurposing that content into multiple different deliverables.
And this is, this is the the fantastic thing for a client is that they don't need a video team rocking up every two months to shoot, you know, this, this long epic video production. They don't need that. They just need us to get get us in the door to shoot, shoot this video, and then we can repurpose that video into multiple different things.
Bill: So we did some of our own content, create sessions and learned a lot. And we have more of that, which will be available on our YouTube channel shortly for the 50 Marketing agency and where we'll be able to learn and you'll be able to see a lot of our who we are, what we do, where we do it, why we do it, our unique value proposition and those things.
But we also interviewed one of our summer interns, Ethan McDowell. And Ethan was a trooper, he was on some of these content, create sessions with our clients, was available for one of our most epic events this summer where we in one day did 14 interviews in one day. There were a number of hiccups in that process as we had to actually do the interviews. There wasn't someone from the company who was part of that conversation. So we interviewed all of those folks went straight through no breaks.
It was an interesting experience, and it was really neat to hear how Ethan perceived that event, the experience we had, what he learned from it, as well as the value he could see available to the company and to that company's audience from what we were able to capture during the content create session. So let's tune in and see what Ethan has to say about this event.
Bill: Let's go back to like, thinking through the list of the interviewees who sat with us. What were your observations? I mean, we had I remember there was one lady who was just, she was a pistol. She was like, off the charts and she and funny and cracking jokes. And then we had others we really had to pull the conversation from. What did you observe in that process?
Ethan: I would say it's just different people's personalities that they have, maybe what their job entails. Or maybe they're in a camera in front of a camera more often. I mean, some of the people we interviewed would always sit behind the desk and really do like the behind the scenes stuff, like I was doing where you're not in front of a camera. So maybe that was the first time in front of a camera and they weren't really sure what to do, what to say. You know, maybe others were a bit more prepared than others, so.
Bill: So let me ask this. This is more of a content question. When you went through that process and you had the unfortunate experience of sitting there and listening to every one of you because that was your role in that while Will was doing B-roll and I was interviewing you were manning the fort and all the cameras, all the sound equipment, the lights, etc., checking each interview to make sure the quality was there.
What did you learn about that company whenever you were sitting through those interviews and hearing the stories and the different perspectives, like, and not so much that we want to get into the details of that. But do you feel that we were able to like you from what you heard, if you put that information out on YouTube on their social channels, that it would tell a story about that company and be able to help effectively communicate it to the market?
Ethan: Yeah, definitely. I mean, there were numerous, topics that we covered while we were interviewing them, and a lot of the topics that, you know, the questions you asked could have varied in answers, but the answers all seemed to be pretty similar and it’s not that they were even, like talking to each other. Like, okay, this is what we're going to say when he asked this question, it was completely off script, completely their own thoughts of what they thought about their own company.
And I think the way that they said the different answers, maybe they were different, but they all meant the same thing in the end. And I think anybody watching those videos will, you know, see that the company, you know, they'll pick out the topics, but all the answers, but they're all saying the same thing, which was kind of what that company would stand for in a sense.
Bill: Absolutely. I think it was shocking to the the owners and the C-suite there. That there were some things we like extracted organically from those conversations that were, it was very candid. It's very off the cuff and there were some themes that we were able to extract. And I think when we when we think about B2B and manufacturing marketing and we think about communicating a company to our stakeholders, and those stakeholders can be anybody from vendors and suppliers to potential new hires, to our clients, to, other vendors, like, but everybody was, investors, the communities of large where these factories exist and participate and look, when we think about all those stakeholders, I think we were able to extract very organic and candid information, which is what people want to see. People in your generation specifically. Not not so much my generation. I mean, we're very close in age, but people in your generation want that candid and organic and, authentic experience. They don't want to see the corporate fluff, the propaganda, those type of things. And so I think the content experience that we generated there would really, paint the right picture.
Bill: So a content create experience, how can a brand like yours, how can a manufacturing company or a B2B service company use a content create session? And once we're done filming, what do we do with the content? So number one, whenever we do these content create sessions, one of the most important things to remember is there is a lot of work and planning that goes into these events.
Copywriters and researchers and client success team members work with our clients and work with our team to develop a list of topics that we wanted to talk about that made sure we were able to capture the brand and that we were talking about the communication points that were necessary based on our recommendations and the client's expectations to move the buyer along that 86% of the buyer's journey online. So there's a lot of work that goes into research, copywriting, and scripting for these events.
And then when we say scripting, none of the people who are interviewed actually read a script. We develop questions, sample answers, and then also give prompts to the folks who are going to be interviewed to make sure that they feel comfortable and move along this journey. To make sure they feel comfortable and move along this journey with us. So that's the pre-work.
The days of the shoot, the clients have to provide the people. And sometimes that takes a little bit of maneuvering at each company to get the folks available for those events, because not everybody's comfortable in front of the camera. I certainly wasn't comfortable when I started this process in 2023. It isn't natural to think that you're going to be online and be in front of the camera, but our team works really, really hard to make people feel comfortable. And usually about five minutes into each conversation, the participant forgets there's a camera and it really gets comfortable with the situation.
So we have the planning phase, we then have the execution and the capture phase, and then the question is, okay, we have eight or nine hours of footage, we have all these interviews, we've asked hundreds of questions across 10, 15, 20 interviewees, and the question is, what do we do with all of that content? Great question.
Number one, we look at long form content that we can post on your YouTube channel to move that buyer along that journey to fill in the gaps that may exist in allowing those touch points for your intended audience to self-service and move along that buyer's journey.
Secondly, we can cut up smaller clips that are more of an FAQ or an asked and answered moonshot or short videos that are two minutes or three minutes that are on a specific topic. So if let's say 10, 15 people answer a question about your quality, or your timeliness in delivery, we can stitch all of that together and compose it in a way that hopefully a buyer would recognize your commitment to quality, your commitment to customer service, timeliness, whatever those key points, those key brand promises that you have that you claim to deliver and claim to work on every day. We need to stitch those together so that we can communicate that consistently from multiple voices in your company to that audience.
Thirdly, once we have all this content, when you have seven or eight hours of film, there are many options for social media cut downs. And whether we're looking at shorts, reels, static posts with quotes, there's just so much content available to our team and your team to develop repurposed and distributed content so we can activate your social channels on a consistent basis.
Whenever you look at your market, you look at your competitors, and you look at the industry leader, and you look with those you kind of value yourself at the same level, and then those that are not up to your level of marketing communication, recognize that the industry leaders, the ones you aspire to be like, that have great, consistent social media and content marketing, that communicates
to their target audience on a consistent basis at the attraction phase, at the attention phase, at the interest phase, and at the action phase. The reason they have that is because it is well thought out. They have invested in these type of sessions. They've invested in developing content and video and then work to produce and distribute it in an efficient way. It doesn't happen by accident.
We've been very fortunate to develop this concept that is very efficient, that allows us to, with one content create session, get about six months to 12 months of social media and content that we can distribute on a consistent basis and really elevate the client's visibility and availability in the market to their ideal client profile.
And that wraps up today's episode. We hope you've enjoyed this behind the scenes look at a content create session, a content create event that allows us to capture what our clients are doing and allows us to capture what we're doing, who we are, what we do, where we do it, why we do it, our brand promise, our unique value proposition, and deliver that to the market effectively.
If you're interested in us bringing that same level of energy and execution to your organization, please contact 50 Marketing for that. We'll do a shameless plug for us on this episode. The first I've done in 30 episodes. And you can look at how we can help deliver that type of energy and that type of outcome to your organization. Well, that's a wrap for today. Thank you for joining the Missing Half podcast. We're about to kick off the next level of episodes the next round of episodes that are going to be more focused on interviewing marketing managers, marketing executives and experts to help provide value and help you learn what's missing in manufacturing and b2b marketing. Thank you very much like follow subscribe and we'll see you later. Thanks. Have a great day.