How Mazzella Changed Its Industry by Showing What Others Wouldn’t [Endless Customers Podcast Ep. 118]
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00:00:00:00 - 00:00:00:12
Mazzella
don't let
00:00:00:12 - 00:00:02:06
Mazzella
perfection get in the way of progress.
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Mazzella
Just do it. Just create it.
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Mazzella
Be consistent.
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Mazzella
it's okay to
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Mazzella
kind of suck at it at first and get better.
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Mazzella
doesn't have to be perfect.
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Mazzella
when you first start out, you'll get better, your team will get better.
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Mazzella
it's consistency. It's showing up every week
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Mazzella
getting
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Mazzella
couple videos out, get them published, start to build that brand authority.
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Mazzella
as you build up that library, you're going to start seeing the results. And it takes a long time.
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Mazzella
it's a slow climb until it hits and then it's a steep climb.
00:00:27:02 - 00:00:45:21
Bob
You're listening to the Endless Customers podcast, brought to you by the team at impact! Ellis customers is the proven system to become the most known and trusted brand in your market. You want to start to learn the principles of endless customers and how you can implement them in your business. Pick up a copy of Endless Customers, a national bestseller wherever books are sold.
00:00:45:23 - 00:01:03:01
Bob
Ready to start implementing endless customers in your business? Talk to impacts about how our coaching program can help you implement Ellis customers to success. And if you wanna experience endless customers in person. Do not miss our upcoming conference, Endless Customers Live in Chicago March 30th through April 1st, 2026.
00:01:03:01 - 00:01:04:16
Bob
Registration is now open.
00:01:04:16 - 00:01:06:05
Bob
And now onto the show.
00:01:06:05 - 00:01:07:08
Bob Ruffolo
Here's your host Alex
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Speaker 1
Today we're diving into what it means to create transparency in video. The kind of content that doesn't just tell buyers what you do, but shows them openly and honestly,
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Speaker 1
even when others in your industry would rather keep things hidden.
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Speaker 1
Since 2017, Mozilla has been leading the way in their industry with video. Their team has built the lifting and rigging channel into a go to resource by blending education with personality, filming on real job sites, and working with subject matter experts to make technical content approachable.
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Speaker 1
They've even built a studio and podcast base to keep producing authentic, consistent content for both their customers and their employees.
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Speaker 1
Joining me today are Mike Klose, corporate marketing and communications manager, and Ben Hanks, video producer at Mozilla.
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Speaker 1
We're going to explore how their team has embraced transparency and video, the impact it's had on their industry, and what other businesses can learn from their journey.
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Alex
Mike and Ben, welcome to the show.
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Mazzella
Thanks for having us. Hey, Alex. Thank you. Thanks for having us.
00:01:59:07 - 00:02:01:08
Alex
Yeah, we're excited to be talking to you both today.
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Alex
And we see the award front and center on the desk there. Congratulations.
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Mazzella
Thank you. Yeah.
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Alex
Well deserved.
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Mazzella
That was awesome. Thank you guys.
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Alex
Yeah. Well deserved. We got that from Impact Live in Hartford here.
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Alex
But we're gonna get into that in a minute. First off, I think a good place to start the conversation. And for us to just kick things off here
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Alex
is to talk a little bit about
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Alex
Marcella. So paint the picture of the company and then
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Alex
what each of you do,
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Alex
and your roles within the company, just to, like, set the stage for our
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Alex
listeners and our audience out there.
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Mazzella
Last year, in 2024, Marcella celebrated its 70th anniversary.
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Mazzella
So it is a,
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Mazzella
privately held
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Mazzella
company. We are in the overhead lifting and material handling space. We are on our third generation
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Mazzella
of Marcella
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Mazzella
family members that are now running the business. So it was started in 1954 by Jim Marcella senior.
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Mazzella
Tony Marcella is the CEO today.
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Mazzella
And then his son Matt is the president of Marcella's Lifting business. And then his son Adam is the president of New Tech Machinery and Sheffield Metals, which is,
00:02:53:01 - 00:02:55:16
Mazzella
involved in the metal roofing industry, kind of a separate,
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Mazzella
subdivision of the business.
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Alex
That's incredible. Wow. And it's a family run business. I love that and
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Alex
I've had the chance to meet Tony and you guys over the years. And you have
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Alex
Really, really great team.
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Alex
Mike, can you tell us a little bit about your day to day and what you do, like your role in the company?
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Alex
And then Ben, we're going to do the same thing with you too, buddy.
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Mazzella
yeah. I'm the, corporate marketing and communications manager.
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Mazzella
I've been here with Marcella for,
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Mazzella
over eight years. I started in 2017, and really, I started when we were
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Mazzella
kicking off our they ask you answer endless customers journey.
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Mazzella
So I was brought in to,
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Mazzella
write articles for our website for a learning center,
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Mazzella
and was partnered with a video producer.
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Mazzella
couple of years after that, I was, lucky enough
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Mazzella
to start to manage the content creation teams here at Marcella.
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Mazzella
I've been in kind of that manager role and kind of
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Mazzella
the content strategy, content creation strategy ever since.
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Mazzella
know, Ben joined us a couple of years ago as our video producer.
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Mazzella
Yeah. So I've been here for about
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Mazzella
almost four years now, three and a half years,
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Mazzella
I'm the
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Mazzella
third video producer that we've had, third host of the lifting and Rigging channel. So when I came, I was already pretty deep into they Ask you answer.
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Mazzella
the foundation was kind of already built for me
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Mazzella
my day to day is scripting videos, shooting videos, editing videos,
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Mazzella
interacting with
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Mazzella
our community and the YouTube channel, posting to WordPress, things like that.
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Alex
very cool guys. Thanks for paying the picture. And I love the studio too. This is a new set up, right? Is this a new studio for you guys?
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Mazzella
Yeah it is,
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Mazzella
we've been in here about what, 7 or 8 months? Yeah.
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Alex
Yeah, I'm loving it. I'm looking at Austin over here like, hey, we got a
00:04:15:15 - 00:04:19:03
Alex
we might need to do some rearranging over here and step our game up a little bit.
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Mazzella
you know, having a dedicated space for the video team to come in and do their shoots or
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Mazzella
do some pre-production. I mean, it's just awesome. These guys, we're spending so much time
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Mazzella
with set ups and tear downs, and having that permanent space has
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Mazzella
really been great. And at any given notice,
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Mazzella
if Tony or Matt Mizell or Adam Marsella want to jump in here,
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Mazzella
record an update, you know, we've got it already set up and ready to go.
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Mazzella
Yeah, it's
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Mazzella
much like a flick of a switch. You can just walk in and
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Mazzella
get it going.
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Alex
Start creating content. That's great.
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Alex
I love that quick flash bang as we say.
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Alex
is a good segue to because
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Alex
we're going to talk a lot about video today. Obviously. You guys are
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Alex
very well seasoned, well trained. And they ask you answer now endless customers and
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Alex
everything that goes along with video, including the selling seven big five.
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Alex
So
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Alex
we talk why transparency is so important in video and
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Alex
how that plays into the content you create on a daily basis at Mozilla?
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Mazzella
we work in the field of safety
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Mazzella
people have to know how to do things safely or they get hurt.
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Mazzella
And that's like really the big thing that we want to get out there. We don't write the rules, we don't come up with the rules, but we like to be the ones that can
00:05:17:12 - 00:05:21:10
Mazzella
explain what the rules are, whether it's popular or unpopular.
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Mazzella
Just so people know
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Mazzella
how they can do things safely.
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Mazzella
And then on top of that, you know,
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Mazzella
all of the other big five, you know,
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Mazzella
No one else is really doing that in
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Mazzella
our space. So it's nice to be
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Mazzella
the trusted face of the lifting industry.
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Mazzella
Yeah. I mean, almost everything we do can be broken down into the safe care use and inspection
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Mazzella
of overhead lifting and
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Mazzella
material handling equipment.
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Mazzella
So whether that's
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Mazzella
a crane,
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Mazzella
a hook or a shackle that you're connecting to a crane hook the sling, that's actually
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Mazzella
piece of equipment that's lifting a load.
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Mazzella
All of your operators have to be trained on how to properly use that equipment,
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Mazzella
care for that equipment, and inspect that equipment.
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Mazzella
that's not just Marcella saying that that's that's law and standard that comes from OSHA.
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Mazzella
So,
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Mazzella
there can be a lot of,
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Mazzella
myths or, you know, some gray areas that people think about certain things. And we're kind of here to to show people the way of, you know, how they can be safe
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Mazzella
and compliant in their operations
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Mazzella
when they're using this type of equipment. And it's complicated.
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Mazzella
It's a pretty complicated industry. You don't really realize that,
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Mazzella
as an outsider, you see a crane, you think, oh, you hook something up to it, picks it up, puts it down.
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Mazzella
It doesn't seem like there's that much to it, but there really is. There's a lot of rules and there's a lot of danger.
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Mazzella
having a source that people can go to to find out what those rules are or find out
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Mazzella
a safe way to do things, you know, find out if there's a better way
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Mazzella
that they could be doing things.
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Mazzella
I think it's really helpful to the industry.
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Alex
Yeah, absolutely. It's got me thinking too. It's
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Alex
really fascinating because you guys obviously are in the lifting and rigging space, but you're also educating everybody else, which is definitely a disruptor in the industry. You were saying no one had really done that before. And I think
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Alex
you guys certainly own that space nowadays. And your journey,
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Alex
you have the studio, you have all these videographers on your staff and you have a really dialed in now, but
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Alex
can we go back to like the beginning, like you said, you were there when you first started implementing.
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Alex
They asked for answer or you were just starting
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Alex
your job there. What was it like going from not knowing?
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Alex
They ask. You answer, reading this book
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Alex
and starting to learn about all this stuff and how you've built it out
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Alex
over this time, because it's come a long way and it's really quite a journey.
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Mazzella
Yeah, I mean, I we have kind of a saying on the team,
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Mazzella
we actually prefer that we bring people into the content positions that are not from the industry,
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Mazzella
because you don't come in with that kind of that bias, that curse of knowledge of, you know, oh, well, that's that's a silly question. Everybody knows the answer to that.
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Mazzella
Like, we bring people in intentionally that are so
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Mazzella
passionate about what they do. So whether that's video design work, writing, if they're, a content specialist or a content manager,
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Mazzella
we have an inbound marketing manager that just she's all about HubSpot. So really bringing those people in that love what they do and that are curious
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Mazzella
and that are willing to learn, which is most important.
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Mazzella
But
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Mazzella
yeah, I mean, when we started, it was like, you know, I didn't know anything about the overhead lifting and rigging space.
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Mazzella
You know, my video partner at the time, he didn't know anything either. Like, we all had to learn it together. But that really helps you teach it. It it brings a really unique perspective, because if you don't know,
00:08:09:08 - 00:08:12:21
Mazzella
you know, chances are good that there's other people out there that don't know
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Mazzella
or, you know, maybe they're new in their career, or maybe they're in a new role with a company.
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Mazzella
And it's
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Mazzella
it's not something they've had exposure to. So, you know, that's the biggest thing is just, you know, trying to avoid that curse of knowledge, working with your subject matter experts.
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Mazzella
We also had really, really good buy in
00:08:26:13 - 00:08:26:23
Mazzella
from
00:08:26:23 - 00:08:46:04
Mazzella
the very top from Tony Marsella. You know, he's he had seen Marcus Sheridan at some Vista events he bought into that system, realized that was kind of the missing piece on the front end of our sales process of how we get new leads, how we become that trusted leader in our space, and really having that support from the very top
00:08:46:04 - 00:08:48:03
Mazzella
made it possible because we knew that,
00:08:48:03 - 00:09:01:05
Mazzella
he and his leadership team would be pushing it down into the rest of the company, making sure that people were making the time to share their time with us, share their knowledge and, you know, that's really what I've always said about being here at Mozilla is everybody
00:09:01:05 - 00:09:01:17
Mazzella
is always
00:09:01:17 - 00:09:04:15
Mazzella
so generous with their time and their knowledge.
00:09:04:15 - 00:09:17:08
Mazzella
They're always willing to give us that time on the front end when we're looking to create a new piece of content on the back end, when it's time to kind of review it and approve it, that it to make sure it makes sense and then share that knowledge with us and our customers along the way.
00:09:17:08 - 00:09:25:22
Alex
Yeah, that buy in from the top down is really the difference between people who have great success with endless customers and companies that don't. And we've seen that time and time again.
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Alex
and Tony definitely is a big believer in this. And you guys come to all of our events.
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Alex
we call you the OGs
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Alex
of
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Alex
impact today.
00:09:32:04 - 00:09:32:10
Alex
So
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Alex
can you also tell us a little bit. Right. So when it started out it was you and a videographer. Was
00:09:36:22 - 00:09:38:10
Alex
there a content person to. So like,
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Alex
can you just kind of paint the picture of like maybe there are 3 or 4 of you? And now how many of them are you? Like, just
00:09:43:12 - 00:09:44:09
Alex
how's it grown over time?
00:09:44:09 - 00:09:45:14
Alex
And then obviously again, I want to hear
00:09:45:14 - 00:09:48:14
Alex
like you coming in three and a half, four years ago, what that look like for you as well.
00:09:48:14 - 00:09:51:01
Mazzella
when we first started this in 2017. So,
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Mazzella
I was brought in to, to write the articles for our learning center. So I started as a writer.
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Mazzella
We hired a video producer to create the videos,
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Mazzella
There were only three other full time,
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Mazzella
people on the marketing team. We. Bill Franz, he was the VP of marketing.
00:10:03:05 - 00:10:04:03
Mazzella
Mike. Sally,
00:10:04:03 - 00:10:08:16
Mazzella
who's still here? He's the director of marketing. Pat Driscoll. He's still here. He's our corporate brand manager.
00:10:08:16 - 00:10:14:16
Mazzella
So there were really five of us, and then we had, like, a, kind of an intern that was working a couple days a week.
00:10:14:16 - 00:10:18:17
Mazzella
Today, we're at over 20. I think we're at 22 people on the team
00:10:18:17 - 00:10:20:05
Mazzella
each of our dedicated businesses.
00:10:20:05 - 00:10:36:01
Mazzella
So new tech machinery, Sheffield Metals and Marcella all have their own teams, kind of a core team, which includes a designer, a content specialist and a video producer. We also have a video editor that floats and helps across all the different company projects
00:10:36:01 - 00:10:42:16
Mazzella
we have. Jayla, she's our inbound marketing specialist. I mentioned she really helps with the HubSpot strategy across all the businesses.
00:10:42:16 - 00:10:47:10
Mazzella
We have a web developer that works across all the businesses, and then we even have a vinyl
00:10:47:10 - 00:10:49:01
Mazzella
print technician. We started our own,
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Mazzella
in-house print company, where we're doing vinyl decals and graphics for cranes and for some vehicles and other pieces of equipment and machinery to bring that in-house. So we can kind of control that and not have to outsource that.
00:11:02:04 - 00:11:05:02
Mazzella
Wow. And the internal team as well. Oh, and then the internal team. Yeah,
00:11:05:02 - 00:11:11:20
Mazzella
entire, strategy. They ask and answer strategy that we're using in-house as well for recruiting and for
00:11:11:20 - 00:11:15:09
Mazzella
building team culture and educating team members about things like
00:11:15:09 - 00:11:20:02
Mazzella
it. And in HR, you know, benefits, health and wellness, all of that type of stuff.
00:11:20:02 - 00:11:24:15
Mazzella
So there's video, graphics and content on that side as well.
00:11:24:15 - 00:11:34:08
Alex
That's incredible. Really incredible. Then what was it like for you coming into the organization? And had you heard about endless customers, or have you read the books before, or was it all relatively new to you?
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Mazzella
So everything was new to me. I knew how to make videos, coming in. I didn't know anything about lifting, rigging at all. I didn't even know that there was overhead cranes. I thought all cranes were overhead cranes. I didn't realize there was a special kind
00:11:47:10 - 00:11:49:10
Mazzella
ask, answer.
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Mazzella
When I read the book, it seemed like the most obvious thing, and it just made so much sense.
00:11:55:11 - 00:11:55:15
Mazzella
How
00:11:55:15 - 00:12:01:23
Mazzella
can you build trust? How can you get your name out there? You know, answer the questions that everyone's looking for.
00:12:01:23 - 00:12:07:04
Mazzella
yeah, coming in, it was really great to already have that foundation and, have
00:12:07:04 - 00:12:08:15
Mazzella
the equipment and everything like that.
00:12:08:15 - 00:12:11:08
Mazzella
Like there's had already been quite a
00:12:11:08 - 00:12:12:12
Mazzella
road driven that way.
00:12:12:12 - 00:12:18:03
Mazzella
And then it was really exciting for me to kind of come in and bring my own personality to it, so I could jump into
00:12:18:03 - 00:12:21:09
Mazzella
the lifting and rigging channel and start creating content
00:12:21:09 - 00:12:26:09
Mazzella
for that, especially someone who doesn't know anything. You know, it was really helpful to,
00:12:26:09 - 00:12:34:13
Mazzella
have the questions that everyone else might already know the answers to and be able to ask them myself and learn.
00:12:34:13 - 00:12:37:19
Mazzella
And then, you know, go out and teach it on the channel as well.
00:12:37:19 - 00:12:39:20
Alex
absolutely. And I love your content,
00:12:39:20 - 00:12:48:22
Alex
you guys create some really incredible videos and you make lifting and rigging, which could potentially be a dense subject. You make it fun and interesting and educational. So
00:12:48:22 - 00:12:51:07
Alex
can you talk a little bit about how you do
00:12:51:07 - 00:12:51:19
Alex
that and
00:12:51:19 - 00:12:59:11
Alex
like the process of how you come up with these scripts and ways to make your videos engaging and to educate people, and to really get them excited about watching your videos.
00:12:59:11 - 00:13:03:22
Mazzella
Yeah. So like you said, it's it's dense. I spend a lot of time reading
00:13:03:22 - 00:13:10:05
Mazzella
Asme standards and OSHA standards, and they're really boring and they're horrible, and I hate reading them.
00:13:10:05 - 00:13:18:09
Mazzella
So most people do also. Yeah. So I like to try to make something where it's like, hey, how can I get this information to you without having
00:13:18:09 - 00:13:19:13
Mazzella
to subject you to that?
00:13:19:13 - 00:13:21:10
Mazzella
Right. So, right. We try to
00:13:21:10 - 00:13:22:07
Mazzella
make it fun
00:13:22:07 - 00:13:25:21
Mazzella
we have some great subject matter experts who really know things. And then we also have some
00:13:25:21 - 00:13:32:10
Mazzella
big personalities. And I think that really helps. We have some great people who you can bring in and they are great teachers.
00:13:32:10 - 00:13:36:14
Mazzella
And then I can come in as the proxy for the audience who has questions
00:13:36:14 - 00:13:41:23
Mazzella
or who doesn't know things. And I can ask these people and they can teach me. And while they're teaching me, they're
00:13:41:23 - 00:13:45:06
Mazzella
teaching everybody else. And then I can go take it back to the edit and I can
00:13:45:06 - 00:13:46:19
Mazzella
goof it up a little bit. I can
00:13:46:19 - 00:13:48:06
Mazzella
add a little bit of comedy.
00:13:48:09 - 00:14:00:16
Mazzella
I can add a little bit of, you know, maybe some excitement, put some rock music in there or something, you know, to just try to spice it up a little bit so it's more palatable when you have to learn.
00:14:00:16 - 00:14:01:15
Alex
Absolutely.
00:14:01:17 - 00:14:01:23
Mazzella
The
00:14:01:23 - 00:14:03:05
Mazzella
other thing too, is, you know,
00:14:03:05 - 00:14:04:18
Mazzella
it is a dance industry, but
00:14:04:18 - 00:14:06:02
Mazzella
the products that we sell
00:14:06:02 - 00:14:10:09
Mazzella
are being used in some of the coolest applications in the world.
00:14:10:09 - 00:14:12:04
Mazzella
you've got our products being used in some
00:14:12:04 - 00:14:14:14
Mazzella
of the largest automotive plants in the world.
00:14:14:14 - 00:14:17:14
Mazzella
they're part of the equipment that's building and assembling rocket ships.
00:14:17:14 - 00:14:21:10
Mazzella
And in aerospace applications, you've got
00:14:21:10 - 00:14:30:01
Mazzella
steel mills. You've got underground mining, you've got some of the biggest construction projects, you know, new stadiums, new bridges, all this really cool stuff. And we always try
00:14:30:01 - 00:14:33:19
Mazzella
to, you know, kind of spotlight and highlight that as well, that
00:14:33:19 - 00:14:36:18
Mazzella
not only are people involved in that, but, you know,
00:14:36:18 - 00:14:38:18
Mazzella
you think of Mike Micro and Dirty Jobs.
00:14:38:18 - 00:14:42:22
Mazzella
There's so many cool jobs across the country and in the world that are using this equipment. And
00:14:42:22 - 00:14:45:20
Mazzella
that's what's really cool too, is just to see where some of this stuff ends up.
00:14:45:20 - 00:14:52:07
Alex
That's a really great point. It is all about perspective. And I hope you know, when I say dance, I, I'm trying to make it relatable for other industries out there because I think,
00:14:52:07 - 00:14:53:19
Alex
you know, people that are in insurance
00:14:53:19 - 00:14:54:14
Alex
or people that are in
00:14:54:14 - 00:14:55:20
Alex
some medical fields or stuff,
00:14:55:20 - 00:14:57:08
Alex
they say the same things, but they're like,
00:14:57:08 - 00:14:58:06
Alex
this isn't really fun.
00:14:58:06 - 00:15:04:13
Alex
Content to like or like fun subject matter to make content around how do we do that? And I think it comes back to what you said. It's
00:15:04:13 - 00:15:11:20
Alex
the perspective and how you tell those stories and how it affects other people. It's not just about the types of metals that make the rigs, you know what I mean? Like,
00:15:11:20 - 00:15:11:23
Alex
there's
00:15:11:23 - 00:15:13:10
Alex
a lot more to it and there's layers to it.
00:15:13:11 - 00:15:15:11
Alex
And you guys have really found a way to communicate that,
00:15:15:11 - 00:15:17:01
Alex
I think is just fascinating. It's really cool.
00:15:17:01 - 00:15:24:21
Alex
I have a question here, that I think is really interesting. You have a lot of vendor relationships that have shifted over the years from competition, where maybe they
00:15:24:21 - 00:15:27:19
Alex
weren't so happy that you're putting out all this transparent content or
00:15:27:19 - 00:15:32:09
Alex
whatever the case was, and they've turned into collaborators now and I've turned into
00:15:32:09 - 00:15:33:05
Alex
friends.
00:15:33:07 - 00:15:37:08
Alex
Can you share some of those stories? Because I think that's a really cool evolution, and I'd love for people to hear that.
00:15:37:08 - 00:15:48:12
Mazzella
you know, we've got great partners all throughout the industry. You know, Ben alluded to it before. I think we were really on the forefront of creating some of this content and
00:15:48:12 - 00:15:55:12
Mazzella
being open and transparent about what we do and how we do it and and what affects the cost of certain things. And,
00:15:55:12 - 00:15:57:23
Mazzella
we've built this audience on our
00:15:57:23 - 00:15:58:16
Mazzella
YouTube channel
00:15:58:16 - 00:16:03:14
Mazzella
you know, this awareness throughout the industry that, hey, is putting out this content and,
00:16:03:14 - 00:16:06:21
Mazzella
we've really invested, like I said, we've quadrupled the size of our team.
00:16:06:21 - 00:16:09:15
Mazzella
We've invested in all this equipment like the studio here.
00:16:09:15 - 00:16:11:04
Mazzella
And I think others in the industry
00:16:11:04 - 00:16:15:07
Mazzella
see that, and they look at that as something that they can leverage with, especially if we're partners. Right. Like,
00:16:15:07 - 00:16:18:20
Mazzella
you know, they could be a supplier for us. We could be selling their product as a distributor.
00:16:18:20 - 00:16:24:10
Mazzella
So we're able to work with them and kind of get this awareness out when there are things like new product,
00:16:24:10 - 00:16:26:14
Mazzella
launches, you know, we can help support that.
00:16:26:14 - 00:16:28:17
Mazzella
It helps support them, but it also helps support
00:16:28:17 - 00:16:31:19
Mazzella
us and our sales team and getting awareness out to our customers.
00:16:31:19 - 00:16:36:03
Mazzella
we partner with a lot of people within the industry who are experts when it comes to the industry
00:16:36:03 - 00:16:47:19
Mazzella
standards that have kind of that technical knowledge. Maybe they're on the actual committees that are writing these rules and regulations and and they can help bring that unique perspective of why things are changing or why they're not changing.
00:16:47:19 - 00:16:51:11
Mazzella
you know, there's so much great knowledge within our industry, not just within Mozilla, but,
00:16:51:11 - 00:16:57:16
Mazzella
you know, there's we just realized that there was such a big opportunity to kind of expand our network of subject matter experts
00:16:57:16 - 00:17:00:09
Mazzella
and really bring in the best people,
00:17:00:09 - 00:17:05:13
Mazzella
to cover a topic when we, you know, decide we're going to move forward and do an article or a video on it.
00:17:05:13 - 00:17:07:07
Mazzella
And usually it starts small,
00:17:07:07 - 00:17:15:12
Mazzella
you know, their team comes to us and they ask us like, hey, we love what you guys are doing. Is there anything that we can do with you guys? Do you have any ideas? And then we'll pitch on
00:17:15:12 - 00:17:16:19
Mazzella
some ideas. And sometimes,
00:17:16:19 - 00:17:19:05
Mazzella
we're surprised at what they agree to.
00:17:19:07 - 00:17:22:22
Mazzella
And, you know, one of our bigger vendors, Crosby,
00:17:22:22 - 00:17:25:21
Mazzella
we pitched in the idea of us going and, you know,
00:17:25:21 - 00:17:29:11
Mazzella
showing their entire process of how they make a shackle. And
00:17:29:11 - 00:17:34:06
Mazzella
they surprisingly agreed to let us do that. And that video was,
00:17:34:06 - 00:17:38:17
Mazzella
really big in the industry. You know, a lot of people saw it, a lot of people, you know,
00:17:38:17 - 00:17:40:09
Mazzella
it sparked a lot of comments.
00:17:40:09 - 00:17:40:23
Mazzella
And,
00:17:40:23 - 00:17:45:22
Mazzella
people being like, this is really cool. This is great stuff. This is good for the industry.
00:17:45:22 - 00:17:46:12
Alex
So and
00:17:46:12 - 00:17:47:16
Alex
does that typically because
00:17:47:16 - 00:17:53:12
Alex
they try to keep that close to the chest. Like they don't want people to know the secret sauce is that sort of the mentality behind
00:17:53:12 - 00:17:54:05
Alex
100%.
00:17:54:05 - 00:17:56:08
Mazzella
Yeah. Yeah yeah. Everybody's like that. Yeah
00:17:56:08 - 00:18:03:19
Mazzella
you know honestly we struggle with that ourselves sometimes. You know there's certain things I think Ben and I would love to do and it's like, yeah, we can't, you know, we can't show that. So
00:18:03:19 - 00:18:07:13
Mazzella
we still have some ways to go to even internally in terms of like,
00:18:07:13 - 00:18:08:23
Mazzella
what are we comfortable saying?
00:18:08:23 - 00:18:17:18
Mazzella
What are we comfortable showing. And I think we keep getting better and better and we keep breaking those walls down more and more as the years go on. But yeah, absolutely. I mean,
00:18:17:18 - 00:18:19:01
Mazzella
we went into
00:18:19:01 - 00:18:22:00
Mazzella
a, a massive forging facility
00:18:22:00 - 00:18:25:00
Mazzella
where they were taking raw pieces of steel
00:18:25:00 - 00:18:34:10
Mazzella
heating it up and pounding it with these giant hammers that are just generating so much force and they show the entire process of how it ends up into that finished shackle,
00:18:34:10 - 00:18:35:04
Mazzella
which is used.
00:18:35:04 - 00:18:36:09
Mazzella
I mean,
00:18:36:09 - 00:18:39:18
Mazzella
anywhere that anywhere you're performing an overhead lift, there's a shackle involved.
00:18:39:18 - 00:18:46:15
Mazzella
Construction, steel mills, automotive. It's it's one of the most universal pieces of rigging equipment that's out there. Right?
00:18:46:15 - 00:18:48:00
Mazzella
Yeah. Now it's it's kind of
00:18:48:00 - 00:19:00:19
Mazzella
spawned a whole group of other videos are watching other people, you know, doing the same thing, that they're doing it with their products, or they're going, you know, some of our competitors are going into some other vendors and doing the same thing.
00:19:00:19 - 00:19:01:08
Mazzella
It's kind of
00:19:01:08 - 00:19:03:04
Mazzella
people saw it and they're like, wow, this is cool.
00:19:03:04 - 00:19:04:22
Mazzella
Why don't we do that? Yeah. Why didn't we think?
00:19:04:22 - 00:19:08:12
Alex
And that's exactly what you want. That's the reaction. You want people to be like, why didn't we think of that?
00:19:08:12 - 00:19:08:23
Alex
But it's interesting
00:19:08:23 - 00:19:10:11
Alex
too, because that when you show the
00:19:10:11 - 00:19:11:00
Alex
process
00:19:11:00 - 00:19:16:14
Alex
I'm not an expert by any means. So correct me if I'm wrong, but when you're showing the metal being made and how it's
00:19:16:14 - 00:19:23:22
Alex
stamped and pressed into this object like that plays into the quality of that piece, and you may overlook a shackle because you use it every day and you see it all the time.
00:19:23:22 - 00:19:24:10
Alex
But it's like,
00:19:24:10 - 00:19:28:13
Alex
that's a major component of lifting and rigging that, if it's not made correctly,
00:19:28:13 - 00:19:30:06
Alex
could have catastrophic results.
00:19:30:06 - 00:19:32:19
Alex
it could really hurt people or could really cause damage. So like
00:19:32:19 - 00:19:35:13
Alex
painting that picture makes people, I think, appreciate what goes into
00:19:35:13 - 00:19:38:11
Alex
part or a piece like that, which is just really cool to see.
00:19:38:11 - 00:19:55:11
Mazzella
And it establishes trust. Like, yeah, you know, people look at that and they go, hey, wow, I trust my life to this thing every day. And I'm really glad to see the amount of effort and quality that's and goes through the number of hands that are involved in the process from start to finish is incredible.
00:19:55:11 - 00:20:02:05
Alex
think it's just great because people don't know. And when you lift the veil, it's it's amazing what what can happen. So can we talk a little bit about you had mentioned
00:20:02:05 - 00:20:04:02
Alex
shackle video did really well. Do you have
00:20:04:02 - 00:20:07:19
Alex
some metrics or some videos that you could share as examples of videos that have just
00:20:07:19 - 00:20:13:07
Alex
had huge numbers or had great, engagement for you guys or things that were just really successful overall for you and the team.
00:20:13:07 - 00:20:18:03
Mazzella
Yeah. So that video that I had like 250,000 views and still climbing. Wow.
00:20:18:03 - 00:20:22:10
Mazzella
know, that's a long video. It's 17 minutes and people are sticking around watching through
00:20:22:10 - 00:20:29:06
Mazzella
almost all of it. And then we put out a couple other ones, some we didn't have any idea that they were going to blow up
00:20:29:06 - 00:20:29:23
Mazzella
as big as they did.
00:20:29:23 - 00:20:30:18
Mazzella
One of them was,
00:20:30:18 - 00:20:34:16
Mazzella
lifting and rigging myths that are kind of perpetuated in the industry.
00:20:34:19 - 00:20:35:16
Alex
Okay.
00:20:35:18 - 00:20:37:12
Mazzella
And we knew that it would probably be successful
00:20:37:12 - 00:20:41:13
Mazzella
because we would be saying some things that were unpopular to
00:20:41:13 - 00:20:48:17
Mazzella
people who actually use the stuff saying like, hey, you know, everybody says you're allowed to do this, you're not allowed to do this.
00:20:48:17 - 00:20:53:11
Mazzella
and we brought in an expert from another vendor, you know, who's one of the manufacturers.
00:20:53:11 - 00:20:59:20
Mazzella
So they can sit there and they can tell you, you know, this is why we say that you can't do this. These are the rules and the reasons behind it.
00:20:59:20 - 00:21:03:05
Mazzella
And we knew that it would spark a lot of debate. You know that
00:21:03:05 - 00:21:10:07
Mazzella
video we split into two parts. It's gotten over 30,000 views between the two long form videos.
00:21:10:07 - 00:21:17:01
Mazzella
And then we broke it into shorts. And, you know, one of the shorts had 2 million views on Facebook, 2 million views on Instagram.
00:21:17:01 - 00:21:20:04
Mazzella
Wow. A million and a half views on YouTube.
00:21:20:04 - 00:21:28:06
Mazzella
And then all of them had consistently gotten, you know, 40,000, 50,000 views in their short forums as well. So it's just stuff where
00:21:28:06 - 00:21:32:13
Mazzella
you're watching people, you know, really engage sparks a lot of debate.
00:21:32:17 - 00:21:35:14
Mazzella
People are battling back and forth in the comments.
00:21:35:14 - 00:21:35:23
Mazzella
there's a
00:21:35:23 - 00:21:49:23
Mazzella
ton of engagement with those myth videos because they are controversial. You're going against what people think is the right way to do something, and then it's not us. It's not Mozilla coming out and saying it. It's actually the manufacturer of the equipment
00:21:49:23 - 00:21:53:23
Mazzella
that we're talking about was our subject matter expert that's on camera saying, no.
00:21:54:01 - 00:21:55:00
Mazzella
And this is why.
00:21:55:00 - 00:22:04:17
Mazzella
So yeah, lots of comments, lots of arguments back and forth. Yeah. A lot of people, I think, too appreciative of actually, you know, dispelling some of the myths and, and making job sites safer.
00:22:04:17 - 00:22:04:21
Mazzella
Yeah.
00:22:04:22 - 00:22:05:05
Alex
It's like
00:22:05:05 - 00:22:08:05
Alex
debunking some of the, the urban legends or whatever that are
00:22:08:05 - 00:22:09:13
Alex
in the industry. Yeah. Wow.
00:22:09:13 - 00:22:19:05
Mazzella
Very cool. And then you'd be surprised that the other content, the sense of used to like just really, really basic content, one of our best performing videos is one where I just read definitions into the camera of,
00:22:19:05 - 00:22:22:21
Mazzella
basic rigging equipment and stuff like that. And, and that one does extremely well.
00:22:22:21 - 00:22:24:10
Mazzella
just which type of shackle should
00:22:24:10 - 00:22:25:02
Mazzella
you be using?
00:22:25:02 - 00:22:29:01
Mazzella
Which type of hook should you be using? These all do really, really well.
00:22:29:01 - 00:22:33:08
Mazzella
they're really basic. You wouldn't think that most people would be interested in that.
00:22:33:08 - 00:22:39:20
Alex
how does that play into your content creation process? Like how much data are you guys looking at and how much do you look at?
00:22:39:20 - 00:22:42:07
Alex
Engagement and at different metrics and go like,
00:22:42:07 - 00:22:45:04
Alex
wow, this is really working and we should lean into this more versus like,
00:22:45:04 - 00:22:48:07
Alex
we experimented with a video and it didn't work so great, and we should cut that like,
00:22:48:07 - 00:22:50:10
Alex
what's that look like behind the scenes for you and
00:22:50:10 - 00:22:50:20
Alex
team?
00:22:50:20 - 00:23:05:07
Mazzella
it's a challenge. When we talk about Mozilla and the lifting business, we have 13 business units that fall under that business. That could all be their own standalone company or focus.
00:23:05:07 - 00:23:15:05
Mazzella
That's one of the advantages of working with Mozilla if you're a customer, is that you get access to all these different product and service offerings in one company,
00:23:15:05 - 00:23:16:06
Mazzella
but it does make it a
00:23:16:06 - 00:23:21:06
Mazzella
challenge for us and our team because we're competing against companies that do one thing and one thing only.
00:23:21:06 - 00:23:28:00
Mazzella
So we have to support all the business units, but we also have to try and go deep enough to where you're getting past. You know,
00:23:28:00 - 00:23:33:10
Mazzella
we always kind of call it the low hanging fruit. You know, a lot of that stuff was covered before Ben joined the company.
00:23:33:10 - 00:23:37:18
Mazzella
He never really had that advantage of being able to tackle some of the easy questions right out of the gate.
00:23:37:18 - 00:23:54:13
Mazzella
But, you know, we have to support all of our business units. We we map out the content that we create to see where it falls, under which different business unit. So maybe it's fall protection. It could be about warehouse racking. It could be about overhead cranes. It could be about our service or inspections programs.
00:23:54:13 - 00:23:55:17
Mazzella
Just kind of keeping track of that.
00:23:55:17 - 00:24:01:04
Mazzella
But yeah, like you said, you know, we do pay attention to what works. And then we say, okay, well, we did that for this business. Could
00:24:01:04 - 00:24:08:02
Mazzella
we do something similar for cranes? Could we do something similar for our training offerings? And kind of leveraging,
00:24:08:02 - 00:24:10:10
Mazzella
that success that we might have with a certain business?
00:24:10:16 - 00:24:17:12
Mazzella
Yeah, we kind of break it down into two different types of videos. I guess there's the ones that we know are going to do well and we're going to, you know, put
00:24:17:12 - 00:24:23:06
Mazzella
certain amount of videos that we know are going to do well, you know, they're going to be good for the brand, they're going to be good for the channel.
00:24:23:08 - 00:24:24:14
Mazzella
But then we also look at other
00:24:24:14 - 00:24:38:05
Mazzella
videos of being like, well, we know that this isn't going to get a ton of views, but this is something that can be used in the sales cycle. And this is something that's going to be it could be really important to one person and that one person. It's going to help push them into, you know,
00:24:38:05 - 00:24:38:21
Mazzella
their buying
00:24:38:21 - 00:24:39:17
Mazzella
decision.
00:24:39:19 - 00:24:42:08
Mazzella
So we'll look at it that way like, you know, cost videos.
00:24:42:08 - 00:24:44:21
Mazzella
they don't get a ton of views because it's very
00:24:44:21 - 00:24:48:23
Mazzella
specific. You want to be looking at what is the cost of this? I am very curious,
00:24:48:23 - 00:24:54:11
Mazzella
but they're extremely helpful. If you're in that buying process and you're shopping for, you know, one of these inspections.
00:24:54:11 - 00:24:54:20
Mazzella
So
00:24:54:20 - 00:24:57:22
Mazzella
yeah. Yeah, I would say to we've, we've been very,
00:24:57:22 - 00:25:01:03
Mazzella
it's easy to kind of fall into that trap and want to just keep creating content that
00:25:01:03 - 00:25:06:06
Mazzella
you think is going to go viral. But we try not to do that. Like Ben said, where I think
00:25:06:06 - 00:25:16:15
Mazzella
we would much rather have the right piece of content that gets in front of the right person at that exact moment that they need it, that can influence their decision of whether they're going to move forward with us or not.
00:25:16:15 - 00:25:20:20
Mazzella
then trying to focus on just getting views and likes and comments and all that.
00:25:20:20 - 00:25:25:01
Alex
Right. So it's just really being strategic with what the purpose of the video is. And some is
00:25:25:01 - 00:25:29:15
Alex
set up more for the selling seven and for people on their buying journey versus stuff. That's more for
00:25:29:15 - 00:25:33:00
Alex
knowledge and transparency and maybe even virality a little bit.
00:25:33:00 - 00:25:33:21
Mazzella
Yeah.
00:25:34:00 - 00:25:34:11
Alex
Very cool.
00:25:34:11 - 00:25:40:11
Alex
want to bring you back. You had talked a lot about how Tony and the team on leadership level was brought in to
00:25:40:11 - 00:25:43:14
Alex
this ideology of implementing the ask me answer and endless customers.
00:25:43:14 - 00:25:47:05
Alex
How does that trickle down into the organization? And can you maybe talk a little bit too about,
00:25:47:05 - 00:25:50:08
Alex
coaching and training from an accountability piece and how that plays into your,
00:25:50:08 - 00:25:52:02
Alex
you know, you're planning in your day to day?
00:25:52:02 - 00:25:53:05
Mazzella
from the get go,
00:25:53:05 - 00:25:54:18
Mazzella
when I started,
00:25:54:18 - 00:26:04:03
Mazzella
my second week with the company, we flew a couple hundred people down to Orlando, Florida, and had a national sales and marketing meeting. And Marcus Sheridan was the keynote speaker. So,
00:26:04:03 - 00:26:09:22
Mazzella
that was cool because it wasn't, you know, Mike close having to tell everybody what we're going to do and why we're doing it.
00:26:09:22 - 00:26:11:05
Mazzella
It was Marcus. And
00:26:11:05 - 00:26:12:19
Mazzella
think that would be similar to what you guys
00:26:12:19 - 00:26:14:14
Mazzella
are doing today with the alignment days.
00:26:14:14 - 00:26:15:01
Alex
Exactly.
00:26:15:02 - 00:26:19:20
Mazzella
Getting all the key stakeholders together. Yep. You know, rolling out this new program,
00:26:19:20 - 00:26:26:05
Mazzella
getting past, you know, objections or, you know, some of that uneasiness that people might have about a new,
00:26:26:05 - 00:26:29:09
Mazzella
sales and marketing strategy and really just kind of addressing all
00:26:29:09 - 00:26:32:11
Mazzella
that upfront and getting everybody on the same page, that was really critical.
00:26:32:11 - 00:26:35:12
Mazzella
We also had one of those, again the following year where Marcus came back.
00:26:35:12 - 00:26:42:15
Mazzella
We were able to look at some of the wins that we had. He was able to kind of reinforce the importance of what we were doing and why we were doing it, and staying the course.
00:26:42:15 - 00:26:47:04
Mazzella
that's really been critical. And then from day one, we've partnered with,
00:26:47:04 - 00:26:50:12
Mazzella
you guys and we've, we continue to get coaching
00:26:50:12 - 00:26:54:19
Mazzella
and that support from impact as we bring new people on to the team and we're onboarding them.
00:26:54:19 - 00:26:55:07
Mazzella
They learn
00:26:55:07 - 00:26:58:00
Mazzella
why we're doing things the way we're doing,
00:26:58:00 - 00:26:59:12
Mazzella
which, you know, can be a special.
00:26:59:12 - 00:27:09:01
Mazzella
For like video. You know, we bring in a lot of people that may have been in freelance roles before, and you're really putting them into this very structured format of how they're going to operate day in and day out.
00:27:09:01 - 00:27:12:20
Mazzella
And, you know, they kind of get the benefit of the coaching. They get feedback from
00:27:12:20 - 00:27:18:16
Mazzella
somebody who's not part of the organization, can kind of has that critical eye of how you can do things differently or better.
00:27:18:16 - 00:27:25:21
Mazzella
But yeah, I mean, we we use you guys for, like, like higher level coaching for the managers. It's more strategy and planning.
00:27:25:21 - 00:27:35:13
Mazzella
We're still doing content coaching with several of our team members. We do some website coaching, we've done SEO training, we've done eye training.
00:27:35:13 - 00:27:38:20
Mazzella
just had a marketing offsite, about a month or so ago.
00:27:38:22 - 00:27:41:10
Mazzella
And Brian did a whole session with our full team
00:27:41:10 - 00:27:50:05
Mazzella
about AI and integrating AI into your content. And what you should know and what you should be doing to make sure that you know your content showing up in front of these these new AI engines.
00:27:50:05 - 00:27:56:19
Mazzella
I've been here for, you know, less than four years and I've seen Marcus speak to Marcella twice like
00:27:56:19 - 00:28:05:12
Mazzella
outside of impact events like it's, you know, Tony brought him in specifically because he wanted his message to get to the sales team.
00:28:05:12 - 00:28:09:22
Mazzella
Yeah. And we've we've grown significantly as a company since 2017 as well. I think we were
00:28:09:22 - 00:28:15:21
Mazzella
maybe around 700 team members at that point. And today we're, I think between 1100 and 1200.
00:28:15:21 - 00:28:17:12
Alex
That's incredible growth. Yeah.
00:28:17:12 - 00:28:19:00
Alex
It's really been monumental.
00:28:19:05 - 00:28:22:17
Alex
it's cool to hear that you bringing outside people in. And I totally agree with what you're saying because
00:28:22:17 - 00:28:28:17
Alex
Marcus says this all the time and I'm going to steal it from Marcus. But he says you could be preaching to the world, but when do you go home?
00:28:28:17 - 00:28:29:02
Alex
Nobody,
00:28:29:02 - 00:28:30:02
Alex
listens to you
00:28:30:02 - 00:28:30:15
Alex
quite the same way.
00:28:30:15 - 00:28:31:14
Alex
So when you're in your house,
00:28:31:20 - 00:28:37:13
Alex
you might not be able to have the same effect as having some experts come in and having some people come in and really help influence and just get everybody
00:28:37:13 - 00:28:41:08
Alex
excited and bought into that idea. So that's really cool that you guys continue to do that.
00:28:41:08 - 00:28:43:12
Alex
And it's clearly been paying off for you.
00:28:43:12 - 00:28:49:14
Mazzella
you know, and there's an accountability piece to it too. You guys keep us accountable. You know we rely on you to keep us up to date
00:28:49:14 - 00:28:52:13
Mazzella
on, you know, new trends and best practices, especially
00:28:52:13 - 00:28:56:23
Mazzella
with everything getting turned on its head with, I mean, Brian and the team have been awesome
00:28:56:23 - 00:29:01:15
Mazzella
and working with us to to figure out what that means for us and our content strategy going forward.
00:29:01:15 - 00:29:05:00
Alex
that's a big piece too, because these principles are there like the fundamentals. But
00:29:05:00 - 00:29:08:06
Alex
technology changes all the time and it's AI right now. But
00:29:08:06 - 00:29:15:20
Alex
in the video space, you know, cameras are every single year there's a new camera, there's a new editing tool or some new. So like you have to constantly be coached
00:29:15:20 - 00:29:17:09
Alex
and have training and stay up with it.
00:29:17:09 - 00:29:18:08
Alex
Because if you don't, you get
00:29:18:08 - 00:29:20:09
Alex
left behind. So that's a really, really valid
00:29:20:09 - 00:29:20:15
Alex
point.
00:29:20:15 - 00:29:27:00
Alex
All right. So now I want to talk a little bit about this award you have front and center here. So can you tell us about the Trust and Transparency Awards.
00:29:27:00 - 00:29:28:11
Alex
and just give us a little background on
00:29:28:11 - 00:29:30:06
Alex
what you guys won and well deserved.
00:29:30:06 - 00:29:32:04
Mazzella
And so we put a submission together.
00:29:32:04 - 00:29:38:13
Mazzella
Kind of outlining some of the content that we had been putting out between 2024 and 2025.
00:29:38:13 - 00:29:40:01
Mazzella
Just to showcase
00:29:40:01 - 00:29:41:16
Mazzella
how we try to build trust
00:29:41:16 - 00:29:44:00
Mazzella
with our customers, with our vendors.
00:29:44:00 - 00:29:48:12
Mazzella
For instance, one of those videos was a podcast on tariffs when,
00:29:48:12 - 00:29:54:08
Mazzella
all the tariffs just started and everyone was feeling so confused and they didn't know what was going to happen.
00:29:54:08 - 00:29:59:04
Mazzella
We kind of got ahead of it. We did it on our side. And then they also did it on the metal side.
00:29:59:04 - 00:30:00:07
Mazzella
our experts coming in, our
00:30:00:07 - 00:30:02:11
Mazzella
buyers coming in and explaining, hey,
00:30:02:16 - 00:30:11:09
Mazzella
this is what is happening. This is going to be the results. You know, we were probably the first people to say, hey, our prices are probably going to be impacted by this, so
00:30:11:09 - 00:30:12:05
Mazzella
get ready for that.
00:30:12:05 - 00:30:19:05
Mazzella
We don't know what the final outcome is, but we know that our suppliers are probably going to raise their prices. So we're going to have to probably raise our prices.
00:30:19:05 - 00:30:20:22
Mazzella
we got a lot of well, Mike, you
00:30:20:22 - 00:30:23:05
Mazzella
heard about all the feedback that we got.
00:30:23:07 - 00:30:27:15
Mazzella
Yeah. I mean, it was another piece that I think made its way through the industry pretty quickly.
00:30:27:15 - 00:30:28:19
Mazzella
there's a big industry event
00:30:28:19 - 00:30:31:21
Mazzella
that, our senior leadership teams go to,
00:30:31:21 - 00:30:41:19
Mazzella
we used, our in-house director of supply chain as our subject matter expert. I mean, just really knows what's going on. He understands import buying.
00:30:41:19 - 00:30:43:09
Mazzella
He understands domestic buying.
00:30:43:09 - 00:30:48:14
Mazzella
Really had a good grasp on what was causing the tariff implementation.
00:30:48:14 - 00:30:53:22
Mazzella
what the, timeline was for when things were going to be implemented and then what, what the results were going to be.
00:30:53:22 - 00:30:55:17
Mazzella
we put that video out, they actually
00:30:55:17 - 00:31:02:20
Mazzella
when he was at this big industry event, they actually asked him, Jim, if he would speak to the entire audience.
00:31:02:20 - 00:31:11:22
Mazzella
They were going to add a session to the agenda, specifically on tariffs. Wow. And wanted Jim to do it. And ultimately, I don't think he was able to end up doing it due to some travel schedules and logistics. But,
00:31:11:22 - 00:31:16:11
Mazzella
pretty cool. I mean, you know, because everybody saw this video that we put out and that he was featured
00:31:16:11 - 00:31:17:17
Mazzella
as our expert and it was
00:31:17:17 - 00:31:18:21
Mazzella
just like this, just.
00:31:18:23 - 00:31:24:03
Mazzella
Yeah. Ben and Jim sitting at the table. Yeah. And asking them questions and just simple, straightforward answers.
00:31:24:03 - 00:31:25:13
Mazzella
You know, the industry kind of was like, whoa,
00:31:25:13 - 00:31:34:11
Mazzella
Marcellus knows what's going on. And it was great for our sales team to have that in their back pocket, too. If customers were feeling uneasy about things and it's like, look, here's what we know today.
00:31:34:12 - 00:31:35:14
Mazzella
We know this is going to change,
00:31:35:14 - 00:31:38:08
Mazzella
here's where things are today, here's where we think they're headed.
00:31:38:10 - 00:31:39:03
Mazzella
And then
00:31:39:03 - 00:31:43:01
Mazzella
other videos that we submitted as part of this, you know, talking about edutainment,
00:31:43:01 - 00:31:44:11
Mazzella
always look at myself as the dumb one.
00:31:44:11 - 00:31:45:11
Mazzella
I'm the dumb guy in the room.
00:31:45:11 - 00:31:51:05
Mazzella
will get the subject matter expert and ask him the stupid questions, and hopefully it's going to be useful.
00:31:51:10 - 00:31:52:19
Mazzella
One of the videos that we did was,
00:31:52:19 - 00:31:58:03
Mazzella
wire rope clip installation. So we've been hearing that there's been a lot of accidents in the industry lately
00:31:58:03 - 00:32:04:21
Mazzella
people installing these incorrectly. And, you know, if you install things incorrectly and lifting and rigging
00:32:04:21 - 00:32:05:22
Mazzella
dangerous stuff happens.
00:32:05:22 - 00:32:07:14
Mazzella
So stuff drops. Yeah.
00:32:07:14 - 00:32:11:15
Mazzella
got one of our subject experts to fly down to Cleveland with us. We went out in the shop.
00:32:11:15 - 00:32:18:19
Mazzella
He's an expert in how to install it, but we don't do installations out in the field ourselves. So we got out there and we were doing the installations ourselves.
00:32:18:19 - 00:32:22:03
Mazzella
We were struggling with the tools. We put all that
00:32:22:03 - 00:32:22:17
Mazzella
out there,
00:32:22:17 - 00:32:28:11
Mazzella
so people could laugh at us. But, you know, we made it entertaining so people could learn and, you know, learn how to do it right.
00:32:28:11 - 00:32:34:13
Mazzella
I dumbed down to, you know, make it real easy for them to remember the proper ways to do things.
00:32:34:13 - 00:32:42:14
Mazzella
And that was just another one where it's kind of, you know, made it fun to watch. We made it, you know, the edutainment aspect of it.
00:32:42:14 - 00:32:46:19
Mazzella
We had the expert who knew the rules, knew the processes, and knew how to do things.
00:32:46:19 - 00:32:50:17
Mazzella
And then, you know, people got to laugh at us at the same time because, you know, we've
00:32:50:17 - 00:32:50:20
Mazzella
you've
00:32:50:20 - 00:32:54:16
Mazzella
got people in polo shirts out in the shop trying to figure out how to install these things.
00:32:54:16 - 00:32:56:16
Mazzella
Yeah, I think my favorite was Ben.
00:32:56:16 - 00:32:59:05
Mazzella
we did one with, heavy equipment fabricator
00:32:59:05 - 00:33:03:20
Mazzella
and, their expert who was on camera with us had this acronym for magic.
00:33:03:20 - 00:33:08:11
Mazzella
and he used that to describe the process of what was it? Inspecting.
00:33:08:13 - 00:33:09:13
Mazzella
Yeah. Inspecting clamp.
00:33:09:13 - 00:33:15:19
Mazzella
How to inspect clamps and Ben ran with this whole magic theme. And we had Harry Potter type music floating in and out and
00:33:15:19 - 00:33:22:00
Mazzella
just that's amazing. It's just it's fun when you see one of his edits where he's really kind of taking that creative freedom. Yeah.
00:33:22:00 - 00:33:23:03
Mazzella
And I'm going to make some.
00:33:23:05 - 00:33:24:03
Mazzella
Magic under watch.
00:33:24:03 - 00:33:24:12
Alex
Yeah, I'm
00:33:24:12 - 00:33:29:08
Alex
going to check that out. And for everybody out there listening and watching, if you haven't checked out Marcello's YouTube channel, it's
00:33:29:08 - 00:33:31:22
Alex
worth checking out for sure. But I also want to say
00:33:31:22 - 00:33:34:16
Alex
I really respect the humility that you guys have
00:33:34:16 - 00:33:40:20
Alex
the whole, tariff situation, there were a lot of people on either side saying that they knew what was going to happen and how this was going to do this.
00:33:41:01 - 00:33:44:14
Alex
And I think the truth was, nobody knew what the heck was going to happen. And
00:33:44:14 - 00:33:46:02
Alex
I really know. And I
00:33:46:02 - 00:33:47:16
Alex
think to say that you do
00:33:47:16 - 00:33:52:17
Alex
kind of discount or discredits you and and at least from my perspective. So to be honest and to say, hey,
00:33:52:17 - 00:33:56:14
Alex
this is what we know, this is what it looks like, it's going to happen, but we don't really know.
00:33:56:14 - 00:33:59:01
Alex
And this is, this are a couple options of which way could
00:33:59:01 - 00:34:03:23
Alex
go. And hopefully we can update you when we have more information. I think that's just an amazing,
00:34:03:23 - 00:34:06:09
Alex
route to take. And I think a lot of people don't do that because they want to be
00:34:06:09 - 00:34:07:18
Alex
that expert. So they just kind of
00:34:07:18 - 00:34:09:21
Alex
go with their gut or go with whatever instinct they have.
00:34:09:21 - 00:34:10:02
Alex
And it
00:34:10:02 - 00:34:12:06
Alex
doesn't always work out because they're not always right. So
00:34:12:06 - 00:34:13:17
Alex
I just think that's a really great piece that
00:34:13:17 - 00:34:16:22
Alex
guys did there. And congratulations on the award. It's very well deserved.
00:34:16:22 - 00:34:18:08
Mazzella
Thank you. Thank you very much.
00:34:18:08 - 00:34:22:09
Mazzella
to hear our name and, you know, see our logo up on the screen there at the event. And,
00:34:22:09 - 00:34:26:12
Mazzella
I think it's a testament to all the hard work that this team has put in over the past eight years. And
00:34:26:12 - 00:34:27:04
Mazzella
it's really cool.
00:34:27:04 - 00:34:27:13
Mazzella
Yeah.
00:34:27:13 - 00:34:29:21
Alex
You guys come to every event that we, that we host.
00:34:29:21 - 00:34:31:12
Alex
it's great to see you there and,
00:34:31:12 - 00:34:33:05
Alex
rub elbows and to spend some time together. But
00:34:33:05 - 00:34:36:09
Alex
why do you always come to the events? What's the value for you and your team?
00:34:36:09 - 00:34:39:00
Alex
Just so that everyone else that maybe hasn't been to an event that's listening,
00:34:39:00 - 00:34:40:15
Alex
get a little bit out of why you come.
00:34:40:15 - 00:34:46:05
Mazzella
we do we go to both events, twice a year. We've been doing that for at least five years, I think.
00:34:46:05 - 00:34:46:08
Mazzella
Yeah.
00:34:46:08 - 00:34:47:13
Alex
And you bring a good amount of team
00:34:47:13 - 00:34:51:08
Alex
to like, you always have a full table of people. It's not like just a couple of guys. It's like
00:34:51:08 - 00:34:53:01
Alex
at least 8 or 10 people
00:34:53:01 - 00:34:53:10
Alex
every time.
00:34:53:10 - 00:34:53:18
Mazzella
Yeah,
00:34:53:18 - 00:34:57:17
Mazzella
number one, it's great for new hires. So whether they're at this time
00:34:57:17 - 00:35:01:08
Mazzella
we had three new, not new, but newish to their roles,
00:35:01:08 - 00:35:03:23
Mazzella
sales leaders that attended for the first time.
00:35:03:23 - 00:35:06:13
Mazzella
Tom Horton, who's our chief revenue officer, he goes every
00:35:06:13 - 00:35:07:09
Mazzella
time, which is
00:35:07:09 - 00:35:10:03
Mazzella
really cool because he's he's got a busy schedule.
00:35:10:03 - 00:35:12:06
Mazzella
He's got a lot going on, but he makes that investment.
00:35:12:06 - 00:35:16:16
Mazzella
like you said earlier, it's it's really helpful, I think, for people that are new to the team
00:35:16:16 - 00:35:22:18
Mazzella
to hear and understand what we're doing as the revenue team and to hear it from Marcus and,
00:35:22:18 - 00:35:29:16
Mazzella
different coaches and people that you guys put up on the stage and some of your partners that are there like to really hear that and understand that,
00:35:29:16 - 00:35:33:15
Mazzella
to see all the people that are there, I mean, hundreds of people in that room that are all
00:35:33:15 - 00:35:35:05
Mazzella
invested in this strategy.
00:35:35:05 - 00:35:40:19
Mazzella
that's the biggest thing is just it's great for newer people to our company to really learn and understand. But
00:35:40:19 - 00:35:44:03
Mazzella
also like, especially now with AI, so much is changing that,
00:35:44:03 - 00:35:48:16
Mazzella
this one I was a little bit because it was so close to Chicago and I was like, I don't know.
00:35:48:21 - 00:35:50:18
Mazzella
The agenda looks really similar, but like
00:35:50:18 - 00:35:55:19
Mazzella
the way that you guys incorporate it, I into every session, it was very different than the one that you put on even just a
00:35:55:19 - 00:35:57:23
Mazzella
couple months earlier, because so much has changed.
00:35:57:23 - 00:35:58:13
Mazzella
you always have
00:35:58:13 - 00:36:02:11
Mazzella
that light bulb moment while you're there every single time, like
00:36:02:11 - 00:36:07:21
Mazzella
something goes off or you're like, we're not doing that. We need to do that better. We need to get this done.
00:36:07:21 - 00:36:15:23
Mazzella
And I think that's always helpful to kind of like, you know, come back and you have your focus for the next six months of like, hey, these are the things that came up
00:36:15:23 - 00:36:16:13
Mazzella
that we
00:36:16:13 - 00:36:20:06
Mazzella
aren't doing very well, and let's figure out a plan on how we can get it done.
00:36:20:06 - 00:36:22:06
Mazzella
That's a great point because we went to,
00:36:22:06 - 00:36:23:08
Mazzella
It was Hartford in
00:36:23:08 - 00:36:23:23
Mazzella
2024.
00:36:23:23 - 00:36:32:09
Mazzella
We came back, we built two self-selection tools. That was the biggest thing that we identified of, hey, we are not doing this. We went to Chicago in the spring
00:36:32:09 - 00:36:38:06
Mazzella
and Ben was really amped up about we don't have pricing pages. We got to build pricing pages, and we're in the process.
00:36:38:06 - 00:36:39:23
Mazzella
In the next two weeks, we'll be launching
00:36:39:23 - 00:36:43:14
Mazzella
all of our pricing pages for all of our services. There's, what, 5 or 6 that we built.
00:36:43:14 - 00:36:44:07
Mazzella
In five year.
00:36:44:07 - 00:36:47:03
Mazzella
So yeah, I mean, it gives you that kind of that kick in the teeth and it kind of
00:36:47:03 - 00:36:49:08
Mazzella
humbles you a little bit when you go and you're like,
00:36:49:08 - 00:36:52:17
Mazzella
We still a long way to go. We've got a lot of work to do and that's good.
00:36:52:17 - 00:36:53:07
Mazzella
You need that.
00:36:53:07 - 00:36:55:10
Alex
And to have those key takeaways that you can go right back
00:36:55:10 - 00:36:57:20
Alex
to the office and get after it. And start putting in the work.
00:36:57:20 - 00:36:59:21
Alex
that's really great to hear. That's what it's all about. So,
00:36:59:21 - 00:37:00:15
Alex
yeah. Thank you for sharing
00:37:00:15 - 00:37:04:06
Alex
that. So this is, my favorite part of the show. We're getting to the the one thing.
00:37:04:06 - 00:37:13:06
Alex
We covered a lot of great, territory today, a lot of great conversations. What would you say to people out there that are trying to create transparent videos? And they're just starting out on their journey? Like
00:37:13:06 - 00:37:16:17
Alex
What would you say is the one thing they should be thinking about? As they move through that?
00:37:16:17 - 00:37:19:11
Mazzella
Just do it. Just create it. Be consistent.
00:37:19:11 - 00:37:20:20
Mazzella
You can look through
00:37:20:20 - 00:37:26:20
Mazzella
all of our videos. You can see when we first started to where we are now, you know, quality's changed.
00:37:26:20 - 00:37:28:02
Mazzella
the equipment's changed.
00:37:28:02 - 00:37:29:19
Mazzella
looks better. It
00:37:29:19 - 00:37:33:07
Mazzella
not that it looked bad before, but you can tell it was, hey, this is new
00:37:33:07 - 00:37:37:06
Mazzella
we're not experts in this yet, so it's okay.
00:37:37:06 - 00:37:39:10
Mazzella
that content still does really, really well.
00:37:39:10 - 00:37:41:13
Mazzella
So it's okay to just
00:37:41:13 - 00:37:46:18
Mazzella
kind of suck at it at first and get better. Yeah, just try it. Just do it. Be consistent. And
00:37:46:18 - 00:37:52:12
Mazzella
you know, as you build up that library, you're going to start seeing the results. And it takes a long time. You know when I started we had
00:37:52:12 - 00:37:54:13
Mazzella
5000 YouTube subscribers.
00:37:54:13 - 00:37:55:04
Mazzella
We've got
00:37:55:04 - 00:37:56:11
Mazzella
40,000 now.
00:37:56:11 - 00:37:59:13
Mazzella
it's a slow climb until it hits and then it's a steep climb.
00:37:59:13 - 00:38:05:06
Mazzella
So I would say just be consistent, build your library. And as you get that library, you're going to start to see results.
00:38:05:06 - 00:38:13:06
Mazzella
embed nailed it I mean it's consistency. It's showing up every week getting your your couple videos out, get them published, start to build that brand authority.
00:38:13:06 - 00:38:17:00
Mazzella
it's like Ben said to, you know, don't let perfection get in the way of progress.
00:38:17:00 - 00:38:18:23
Mazzella
You know, it doesn't have to be perfect.
00:38:18:23 - 00:38:22:19
Mazzella
As soon when you first start out, you'll get better, your team will get better.
00:38:22:19 - 00:38:23:06
Mazzella
You'll start to
00:38:23:06 - 00:38:26:00
Mazzella
see some success. You know, you can budget for new equipment,
00:38:26:00 - 00:38:31:23
Mazzella
the next year, and you can upgrade your cameras and your lights and your microphones and all that stuff over time. Like just start
00:38:31:23 - 00:38:33:08
Mazzella
doing it, and do it regularly.
00:38:33:08 - 00:38:35:11
Alex
Great advice guys. I couldn't say it better myself.
00:38:35:11 - 00:38:38:19
Alex
We do the same thing here. We practice that every day. Progress, not perfection.
00:38:38:19 - 00:38:39:03
Alex
really
00:38:39:03 - 00:38:44:16
Alex
appreciate you guys sharing the story, spending some time to be on the show with us today. It's been awesome catching up with you
00:38:44:16 - 00:38:47:06
Alex
really great. So Mike and Ben, thank you so much for your time.
00:38:47:06 - 00:38:47:21
Mazzella
Thanks for having us.
00:38:47:21 - 00:38:49:05
Mazzella
Thank you Alex, this was awesome.
00:38:49:09 - 00:38:51:23
Alex
Absolutely. We're gonna have to have you back on the show at some point in the future.
00:38:51:23 - 00:38:52:04
Mazzella
Yeah.
00:38:52:05 - 00:38:52:19
Alex
Sounds great.
00:38:52:19 - 00:38:54:14
Mazzella
Do it live at the next event.
00:38:54:19 - 00:38:57:12
Alex
Oh, I love that. Let's do that. That'll be that'll be great.
00:38:57:12 - 00:38:58:03
Alex
I want to come check out
00:38:58:03 - 00:38:59:23
Alex
your studio too. So I'm going to have to get some
00:38:59:23 - 00:39:01:06
Alex
tickets to Cleveland and come check it out
00:39:01:06 - 00:39:01:22
Alex
anytime.
00:39:01:22 - 00:39:02:18
Alex
All right. Awesome, guys.
00:39:02:18 - 00:39:05:08
Alex
Well, for everybody out there watching and listening, this is endless customers.
00:39:05:08 - 00:39:08:09
Alex
I'm your host, Alex Winter. And we'll catch you on the next episode.
Have you ever wondered what happens when a traditional, behind-the-scenes industry decides to go completely transparent?
What if showing the raw, unpolished side of your business could actually build connections instead of hurting your brand?
That’s the question Mazzella, a 70-year-old family-run company in the lifting and rigging industry, decided to answer for themselves. And the results have been remarkable.
In this episode, I sat down with Mike Close, who leads Corporate Marketing & Communications, and Ben Hengst, Video Producer, from Mazzella to explore how video helped them do exactly that: turn honesty and courage into a marketing advantage. What started as a few simple videos about safety and equipment has grown into one of the most trusted and recognizable voices in their field.
But it’s not just about the videos. It’s about the mindset behind them. Mazzella used the Endless Customers System™ (formerly They Ask, You Answer) to completely rethink how they communicate with their audience. They stopped chasing polished, corporate messaging and replaced it with something far more powerful: transparency.
By opening their doors, showing their people, and talking openly about the hard stuff (the mistakes, the process, the reality), they didn’t just change how customers saw them. They changed how their entire industry thinks about marketing.
What does transparency in marketing really mean?
The beauty of Mazzella’s story is that nothing about it feels forced. There was no big rebrand or marketing overhaul. No expensive agency campaign. They didn’t wake up one morning and decide to “start doing video.” It began much simpler than that, by listening.
They realized people in their industry were asking the same questions over and over again. How do I inspect a sling? What happens if a shackle fails? What does “load testing” actually mean? Instead of treating those questions like customer service tasks, Mazzella saw them as opportunities to teach.
As Mike put it, “We realized people were searching for answers, and we had the experience and they just needed us to share it.”
That mindset shift changed everything. They stopped thinking like a manufacturer and started thinking like a teacher. And that’s when the magic started to happen.
This wasn’t about slick production or flashy editing. It was about being willing to show what others in their space preferred to keep hidden: the factory floor, the noise, the sweat, and the people behind the machines. “If we wanted to help people understand what we do,” Ben explained, “we had to actually show them what we do.”
One of Ben’s favorite examples was a video filmed inside their shackle manufacturing process. It wasn’t glamorous. The lighting wasn’t perfect. Machines were roaring in the background, steel dust hung in the air, and every surface looked like it had seen decades of hard work. But viewers loved it.
Why? Because it was real.
“People don’t want the polished version,” Ben said. “They want to know what’s actually going on.”
That video didn’t just perform well; it built credibility in a way no brochure ever could. It showed that Mazzella wasn’t afraid to lift the curtain. It proved they were confident enough in their process to let the world see it, flaws and all.
Transparency doesn’t need a marketing plan; it needs courage. And that courage is what sets Mazzella apart.
They weren’t trying to be perfect. They were trying to be honest. And that’s what buyers remember.
How do you build momentum with video marketing?
Of course, getting to that level didn’t happen overnight. When Ben first started at Mazzella, he was a one-person video team. “It was me, a camera, and a tripod,” he joked. “Sometimes I’d get someone to hold the mic if I was lucky.”
But consistency turned that small effort into a movement. One video led to another, then to a YouTube channel, and eventually into what’s now known as the Lifting & Rigging Channel, a massive content hub helping thousands of professionals around the world. “It snowballed,” Mike said. “Every time we answered a question, we found three more we needed to tackle.”
They didn’t wait for perfect lighting or a new camera. They just started. “Don’t let perfection get in the way of progress,” Ben said. “You’ll get better by doing.”
That’s the secret no one talks about. You don’t find momentum; you build it, one imperfect video at a time. Now we’re talking.
How do you make technical content engaging?
Let’s be honest, lifting and rigging isn’t exactly dinner-table conversation. There aren’t many people out there saying, “Tell me more about that synthetic sling inspection procedure.” But somehow, Mazzella makes it interesting. Actually, more than interesting, they make it engaging.
Their videos walk that fine line between education and entertainment. They’ve found a way to make industrial topics feel alive by infusing them with personality, humor, and a genuine sense of care for their audience. It’s not forced or gimmicky. It’s just people who love what they do, sharing it in a way that others can understand.
Ben laughed as he described their approach. “We’re not making viral videos,” he said. “We’re helping someone lift a beam safely or choose the right shackle. That matters.”
And that’s the secret: focus on helping, not performing. Each video feels like a conversation with a trusted coworker, not a sales pitch or safety lecture. You can almost picture the viewer watching on their lunch break, nodding along, thinking, Finally, someone who explains this stuff in plain English.
The Mazzella team knows their audience. These are people who work with their hands, who deal with real risks every day, and who care deeply about doing things the right way. So, when the team adds a little humor, a quick quip, or even a splash of rock music to keep things moving, it works. It feels authentic because that’s who they are.
You’ll see moments of lighthearted banter, inside jokes, and genuine laughter between team members. That human touch turns what could be a dry technical tutorial into something approachable, even fun. “We always say, if we’re bored making it, people will be bored watching it,” Mike said.
That single line says it all. The videos work because the people behind them care about how they make others feel. They don’t chase trends or copy competitors. They just show up as themselves and teach what they know in a way that keeps people watching.
They’re proof that you don’t need to be flashy to be engaging, you just need to be human.
How transparency built buyer trust
Transparency isn’t just a talking point for Mazzella; it’s the backbone of how they operate. It shows up in every video, every topic they cover, and every conversation they have with their audience. They don’t just talk about honesty; they live it.
One of the best examples came during a particularly tense moment for their industry: the steel tariffs. Prices were fluctuating, customers were nervous, and many companies were avoiding the topic altogether. Talking about costs publicly? That’s something most manufacturers would never do.
But Mazzella didn’t hesitate. They turned on the cameras and hit record.
In the video, Mike and the team broke down what the tariffs meant in plain language; no spin, no jargon. They explained how it could affect pricing, why it was happening, and what customers needed to know to plan ahead. They didn’t sugarcoat it, and they didn’t try to hide behind corporate statements. They simply told the truth.
“It wasn’t comfortable,” Mike admitted. “But people appreciated it. They trusted us more for being upfront.”
That single moment showed their audience something rare: leadership through transparency. While competitors stayed quiet, Mazzella stepped forward and said, Here’s what’s happening. Here’s what it means. We’re in this with you.
As Mike and Ben explained, they started hearing the same misinformation over and over again. Ideas had been passed around job sites for decades. Things like, “You can use this piece of rigging in that situation,” or “Everyone does it this way, so it must be fine.” Instead of letting those misconceptions go unchallenged, they decided to address them head-on.
“One of them was about lifting and rigging myths that just keep getting repeated,” Ben told me. “We knew it would probably be successful because we were saying things that were unpopular. We were basically telling people, hey, you’re not actually allowed to do this, even though everyone thinks you are.”
And they didn’t do it alone. Mazzella brought in a subject matter expert from one of their vendors, a manufacturer of the very products they were discussing. This wasn’t marketing spin. It was education from the source. “He sat there on camera and explained, here’s why you can’t do this. These are the rules and the reasons behind them,” Ben said.
The response was massive. The comments section became a real conversation. People debated, argued, questioned, and shared their own experiences. “There was a ton of engagement,” Mike said. “People were battling back and forth in the comments. But that’s what we wanted. People were thinking differently.”
By sparking that debate, Mazzella did more than create viral content. They made their industry safer. They educated people on best practices straight from the experts. In doing so, they built a level of credibility that only comes from telling hard truths.
What struck me most about that series was how unpolished it felt in the best possible way. No overthinking. No overproduction. Just a camera, an expert, and a willingness to say what others would not. And that is what buyers, and viewers, want.
Transparency isn’t about showing off. It’s about showing up. Every time Mazzella turns on a camera, they’re proving that honesty isn’t a marketing strategy. It’s a habit.
The importance of coaching, leadership, and consistency
Behind every successful company story is leadership that doesn’t just approve the vision; they live it. Mazzella’s success with video didn’t come from a clever campaign or a lucky viral hit. It came from leaders who believed so deeply in the mission that they made it part of the company’s DNA.
As Mike shared, the turning point came when leadership gave their full support to video. “They didn’t just say, ‘Go make content.’ They said, ‘Let’s make this who we are.’ That made all the difference.”
That kind of buy-in changes everything. When leadership treats marketing as a priority instead of a side project, it gives the whole team permission to go all in. Suddenly, video isn’t just a “marketing thing”; it’s a company-wide initiative. It becomes something everyone participates in, from engineers and safety trainers to the folks on the shop floor.
And that alignment is exactly what fuels Mazzella’s consistency.
Of course, consistency doesn’t just happen on its own. It’s built through structure, clarity, and accountability. That’s where coaching came in. Working with Marcus Sheridan and the IMPACT team, Mazzella adopted the Endless Customers System™ to create a clear framework for their marketing and sales alignment.
It was about creating a culture grounded in transparency, education, and ownership. They learned how to plan, how to measure success, and how to keep the entire company focused on the same goal: showing their buyers everything they needed to see to feel confident in their decisions.
When you pair the right mindset with the right structure, that’s when transformation happens. Endless Customers gave Mazzella a roadmap they could follow, even when things got messy or momentum slowed. It kept everyone pointed in the same direction.
And what’s remarkable is how far that consistency has taken them. What started as one videographer with a camera has grown into a 20-person marketing and communications operation producing hundreds of videos, managing multiple channels, and driving measurable revenue growth.
But if you ask Mike what the secret is, he won’t talk about software or production value. He’ll just say, “We kept showing up.”
That’s it. That’s the magic formula.
It’s easy to start. It’s hard to stay consistent. But when you make consistency part of your culture, that’s when everything starts to change.
And that’s exactly what Mazzella has done; day after day, video after video, year after year. They didn’t just commit to transparency. They built it into who they are.
What can every business learn from Mazzella's approach
Radical transparency through video isn’t reserved for manufacturing giants or companies with huge budgets. It’s possible for every business, in every industry, at any stage. You don’t need a film crew or a massive marketing department to make it happen; you just need a willingness to start.
That’s the real story behind Mazzella’s success. They didn’t wait until they had the perfect setup or the right equipment. They grabbed a camera, hit record, and started answering questions. Over time, that small act became a movement inside their company, a commitment to showing the truth, no matter how unpolished it looked.
And that’s something any business can do.
If you’re standing on the edge of starting your own video journey, here’s what we would tell you:
- Start before you’re ready. Waiting for the perfect moment never works because it doesn’t exist. Your first videos won’t be perfect—and that’s the point. The magic happens once you begin.
- Focus on showing, not selling. The best videos teach first and sell second. Your audience doesn’t want a commercial; they want clarity.
- Say what others won’t. The uncomfortable topics are where real authority grows.
- Keep showing up. Creativity is great, but consistency wins. Every video, every article, every moment you publish adds another layer of trust with your audience.
Mazzella didn’t wait for permission to start. They just started, and they never stopped.
That line might sound small, but it carries weight. Because the truth is, most companies don’t struggle with knowing what to do—they struggle with doing it consistently. Mazzella proves that the secret to growth isn’t talent or technology. It’s discipline. It’s showing up, week after week, even when you don’t feel ready or confident or creative.
At IMPACT, we talk a lot about Endless Customers, and the idea that when you educate, empower, and show your audience what they really want to see, you’ll never run out of the right customers. Mazzella is living proof of that philosophy in action. Their videos don’t just sell products. They build relationships. They earn loyalty. They create what every business leader dreams of: customers who trust them before the first sales conversation even happens.
And that’s the heart of it. This isn’t just about video. It’s about a mindset shift—from hiding to showing, from controlling to teaching, from selling to serving.
It’s easy to think transparency is risky. But once you see what happens when you lead with honesty, you realize it’s not a risk at all, it’s a responsibility.
That’s not just good marketing. That’s leadership in action. That’s what happens when a company decides to stop hiding behind polish and start showing the truth.
How do I build a strategy like this?
If you’re wondering how to bring this level of transparency and consistency to your own business, our team at IMPACT can help.
We’ll walk you through the Endless Customers System™, the same framework Mazzella used to align sales and marketing, build trust through video, and create a library of content that generates leads 24/7.
Talk to our team today to see how Endless Customers can work for your business.
Connect with Mike Close and Ben Hengst
Mike Close leads Corporate Marketing & Communications at Mazzella, guiding a multi-channel content program that serves the lifting and rigging community with practical, safety-focused education. From the Lifting & Rigging Channel on YouTube to in-depth articles in the Mazzella Learning Center, Mike partners with engineers, trainers, and product teams to translate complex processes into plain-language resources that pros can use on the job. His work emphasizes transparency, hands-on demonstrations, and real-world application, helping customers understand inspections, gear selection, standards, and safe practices. Mike’s byline appears throughout Mazzella’s educational library, and he plays a key role in shaping video, podcast, and written content that the industry relies on every week.
As a Video Producer at Mazzella, Ben Hengst brings the factory floor to viewers with transparent, step-by-step education on lifting and rigging. He plans, scripts, shoots, and hosts videos for the Lifting & Rigging Channel, focusing on practical demonstrations and clear language that demystifies inspections, hardware selection, and safety procedures. Ben also co-hosts The Safety Factor podcast, where he interviews practitioners and leaders about standards, training, and real-world lessons that keep crews safe and projects on schedule. His work champions authenticity over polish so buyers and technicians can see what good practice looks like in the field.
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FAQs
How long does it take to see results from video marketing?
Most companies start seeing measurable engagement within 6 to 12 months. Consistency and clear messaging help results accelerate over time.
Do I need a full marketing team to start using video?
No. Mazzella began with one person and a camera. What matters most is consistency and a commitment to transparency.
What if our industry isn’t exciting?
Buyers in every industry have questions. If you answer them honestly, they’ll listen, especially when your competitors stay silent.
How often should we publish?
Aim for at least three high-quality videos or articles per week. Regular publishing builds authority, brand recall, and organic search visibility.
Posted On:
Oct 15, 2025
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