Speaker 1: 0:00

Welcome to the Cut the Tie podcast. I'm your host, thomas Helfrich. I'm on a mission to help you cut the tie to whatever it is holding you back from success, and I hope you define that success for yourself, because if you didn't, you're chasing somebody else's dream, so make sure you do that. Today's guest, don Mangling Lee. I did it intentionally so you could repronounce it, so we get as much marketing as possibly. But you're a maniac? I doubt it.

Speaker 2: 0:22

You're a maniac, thank God for asking your name correctly, so we can really get the marketing effect of repetition. So the name is pronounced Don Manigly.

Speaker 1: 0:37

That's Manigly not Man-ing-ly or Man-gely. I mean, I've heard it. Well, not time, we'll have our seven. We'll have our seven, Manigly.

Speaker 2: 0:43

Got it. Most people think I'm related to the uh, the famous baseball player and coach, they, they think they think it's Mattingly and I'm, and I have to correct them. I said no, no, no, it's not Mattingly. There's no relation there.

Speaker 1: 0:55

I wish I had his money and fame, but all right, before we get into the details here, someone has hey, here's a million dollar check to hire you. I just just absolutely love your uncle baseball player. Are you going to be like me too, and you're just going to let it go at that point.

Speaker 2: 1:14

I mean, at that point you're throwing a million dollar. Check my way. I just have to go legally change my last name.

Speaker 1: 1:21

I would just be like, listen, and I'm so glad that you trust us to do your video where editing a boathouse pictures, because, you know, regardless of my background, just make it very clear that you're hiring me for what we can do, not just because of my name. And he says yes. Then you're like, hey, I, I subbed that up legally. You were hiring us for our talent, not, you know, just throwing that out there. Um, um, take a minute to uh, just, uh, just quickly introduce yourself, your company and what it is you do well.

Speaker 2: 1:49

I'm don managley, vp, director of creative development at boathouse pictures. We are an independent motion picture studio. We specialize in film and tv production, and that's narrative and documentary projects, and we also work on the marketing and advertising side. So if you have everything covered from a production perspective but you're still looking to market your project and distribute it, we are the company to talk to. We've been in existence now for 13 years, if you can believe it, and honestly, there's no stopping our momentum. We've gained a lot of ground in the last two years. We're very proud of it.

Speaker 1: 2:31

So I think something you said there is unique, that you actually have the distribution side on it too. So I think the marketing you're referring to is getting on the prime video, the bigger channels. It's one thing, just to film it, then it's a now, what right? And we could dive into that here in a short. But I think from, and the next question is always like hey, why, why pick you? Let's say you're as just good as anybody. You just you know table stakes for video. Let's just say that was the case. Having the distribution ready to go is a huge value, and if you're listening to this you may not understand that, so I'm going to have Don explain it. Why is that so important?

Speaker 2: 3:05

It's something that many independent filmmakers and I'm an independent filmmaker myself, so I get it Many independent filmmakers don't think about it. They just think about I got to get the movie made and I got to put it out there. And, yes, you can do that. You can make the film and you can submit it to film festivals or just put it up on YouTube and maybe you'll get a lot of traffic. But wouldn't it be nice if that hard work actually brought some money back into your pocket at the end of the day? And that's why you've always got to think about marketing and distribution. You know, it's one thing, like I said, to make it, but then how am I going to get it out to the biggest audience possible? How am I going to extend my reach? It's a very important part of filmmaking.

Speaker 1: 3:49

I'll give you an analogy that came to mind and when we started talking, just so everyone's aware, we've done an interview before, but I wanted to catch up with Don on some cool things they're dealing with, on the cut the tie idea that I think is really relevant to the audience. But let me set up what he's just saying just from an analogy. Let's say you live in a small town, outside of a large town that you can see. Let's say you can see LA, but you're far enough away or you're still in a small little town. That's impossible. But let's say that You've now said I'm going to go buy a Ferrari because I want to get some attention, I want people to notice me.

Speaker 1: 4:20

You buy the Ferrari, you don't get it out. You're like, oh well, I'll go put it on just YouTube myself or post on LinkedIn occasionally. So you just drive it around your little town. Few people who know you see it. Some are impressed, some are like show off whatever. To get it bigger, you're going to have to make sure you time the event in the big places where people are. Drive it in front of the right people so they actually know the people who care that you have it. Otherwise you just spend a lot of money on a Ferrari that might as well just sit in a garage so you don't kind of make those around you jealous. And I think you got to get out there and you got to know did you even need a Ferrari first of all, could you just? But I think the idea is, if you have something really of a high value asset that's like really awesome to look at and you just stick it in the garage or you don't know where to go drive it, you've wasted your money.

Speaker 1: 5:08

And I think that is so important because when you and I were talking, I was like I have this idea for this. You know this, uh, reality show and you're, and I was like I'm just planning on making it part of my youtube channel. And you guys were like that's one place. What about you know amazon prime? What about netflix? I'm like never thought of that was possible. And so you know Amazon prime. What about Netflix? I'm like never thought of that was possible. And and so, uh, I, I, I can't stress, you know that is such a unique piece to have both of those equations when they work with you. That it's. And this listen, this is a free podcast. He's not paying to be here. People are funny. Uh, did my knowledge hold true or did I miss something?

Speaker 2: 5:51

No, I think, I think you're totally right about that. I mean it's you know, when you think about the value that you bring to every project you work on, it's like don't let that value go to waste. It's like why limit yourself as far as how you're going to get it out there? It's like just go big or go home.

Speaker 1: 6:01

I say Well, you have one life to live. Go big or go home. I say, well, you have one life to live, and the people that are on Netflix you've never seen before, that are now household names that have made their thing. They did that. They just said screw it. I'm going to be that person and I've seen other brands where I'm like they're selling this stuff around this and you're like, oh, he's so cool. Anyway, I'm not going to say the name, but the point is I'm like I had no idea who that person was until you contacted me, which is interesting. He's like oh, he's actually pretty interesting, you presented it.

Speaker 1: 6:28

Anyway, I'm not referring. I'm referring to a very specific person, a persona that has made a brand for themselves and now is selling a bunch of stuff around the brand. You could do the same thing as well, all right, so tell me about Boathouse a little bit, so you guys target who's kind of like. Well, first of all, people are listening, so you can go stalk Don properly. Tell them how to get a hold of you. You know, shameless plug kind of time, so they can at least stalk you while they listen to you talk. Sure.

Speaker 2: 6:54

Yeah, we're on all major social media platforms, so you can find us on Facebook, instagram, twitter or X, whatever it's called now LinkedIn, our website is wwwbhpicturescom, and we also have our sister company, spruce Hill Partners. That's sprucehillpartnerscom, and that's specifically if you're looking for commercial marketing and advertising on that website. But no, but no, but I mean, basically, you know, what you said before, thomas, was really important because it's like a lot of people don't? They certainly don't know what the next step is after they film something. And the reality is that in the industry, there's a lot of content aggregators out there and they'll say to you, you know, you know, submit your film to us for a small fee and we'll, we'll put it out on all these different platforms. What they don't realize is they still need to market their product or market their market their film or their series. It's, it's just a part of the process. You've got to put the work in, you've got to, you've got to get eyes on the, on the, on the final product. Yeah, Right.

Speaker 1: 8:06

So what we're going to talk about today a little bit is on the challenge of sales growth and, specifically, you guys have a really good product, you guys put up great the struggles, uh, you know, on that that you're you're facing right now. So set up the journey a little bit and we're going to talk about that specific tie you're trying to cut. You know the metaphoric tie.

Speaker 2: 8:36

I need to get past this yeah, I mean, the biggest struggle with being a production company is that there's so much competition. There's a lot of independent production houses out there, so it's like, how do you differentiate yourself from the competition? How do you, how do you show, showcase how unique you are, what your services are, that you offer? And, like I said, the way of doing that for us is well, the little, the little bit of crossover between boathouse pictures and Spruce Hill partners, not just focusing on the filmmaking but also on the marketing and promotional and distribution side. But it's a challenge because consistency is key. You can have social media platforms to showcase your work and showcase your services, but if you're not consistently hitting up that platform with new ads, how are people going to learn about you? So that is one of the keys right now frequency and consistency.

Speaker 1: 9:36

And dive into this just a little bit with me. You guys have a cool reoccurring service you do to help people make stuff. How did you get that? So you have a big client? We don't think the client. We have a big client. Talk about a little what you're doing for them and the way I'm going to go with this is this you're going to talk about, this is the ideal client and scenario we have. Talk about how you got that big client and what you're kind of doing for them first.

Speaker 2: 9:59

So one of us, so one of our big clients, is this company and if you go on our website, you could see the, you could see their logo listed there a company called Quick Show, and they're based in suburban Pennsylvania, not too far from Philadelphia, and they've been around for a good while now. They primarily make winter weather products, but they also do some for the summer, and the way we found out about them was through a personal referral, which is why it's really important to build your network, because you never know when someone that you're just friends with might suddenly know a business that needs marketing. And oh, wait a second, I know a marketing company. Let me refer you guys to spruce hill partners, slash boathouse pictures. So that's how this relationship started and now they're they're retainer client for us. We partnered with them and we've also partnered with a major uh major media company as well to get a lot of their video ads out there.

Speaker 2: 10:57

Uh. We've helped them a little bit with uh, with updating their website so that the so, the so, the links will take you directly into where you can purchase their products. It's there's a lot of steps in the process, but it's been a great relationship We've. We've had it going for several months now. It's a. It's going to continue throughout the year as we get into the summer months and then transition back into the winter and it, you know, it's just been a great relationship to build.

Speaker 1: 11:24

And so so what you had was a referral situation, effectively, and and and I think that's important for people to understand.

Speaker 1: 11:30

So that's something that's hard to get, typically, when you're um, uh, new, or you're trying to get new business, so it becomes something that's uh, that's, that's, that's the, what we're gonna talk about. So to get to that point, sometimes you got to start building trust on different products and sets, and so you guys do production, um, and we had a conversation the other day about like, hey, like I see all these production houses selling this stuff, and I've seen some of your guys as, why aren't you selling this? And, and it's like that tip a spear to build the initial relationship with people who can afford maybe your services or what you're doing. Uh, you know, after our conversation, we decided to come on here and talk about this, talk about maybe that piece from a sales standpoint of, oh, I think this was our problem or I think this is the nail on the head, kind of thing back to what I said before about, uh, about consistency and making sure that you're utilizing all of your resources to their fullest extent.

Speaker 2: 12:34

You know, if you want to, for instance, uh, find more referrals through through, through LinkedIn, I mean, you know one of the things I've learned, just personally, through making connections there is, uh, you, you, almost. When you want to get your business out there, it's very easy to find somebody in a particular industry and suddenly you're like, ooh, this seems like a good opportunity to make a pitch. But it's not that simple. You need to build the relationship first. You need to find out about them and their business and maybe get an idea of what some of their business needs are, and then maybe you'll start to identify a way that you can get your businesses foot in the door and you can kind of build a relationship that way.

Speaker 2: 13:13

And suddenly, hey, we're doing marketing for the, we're doing marketing for this business. We're, uh, we're pushing their video ads out there. We've, uh, you know they've become sponsors of our company. You can see their logo on our website, which takes you into their and takes you into their sites. Uh, it's a. There's so many different steps involved and it's not just as easy, as I reach out to somebody and I make a quick pitch and we're off to the races.

Speaker 1: 13:40

Exactly, and so it takes time. And then you have the other piece. So this is the tie to cut is scale. And in the scalers, if you're doing it all yourself, you'll always get grinded down to the relationship, development and new business. And you've hit that right. You've hit that point. You're like we've got to get scale and new opportunities coming in. And how are you guys thinking about that a bit right now? Because this, I mean lots of companies hit this right Like you get these peaks and values of revenue and you have a whale client, effectively right Like you're a really good client that pays the bills and things like that. But if man, that one drops, we are so screwed. And right Like in that in lots. I'm in that spot with my company at times, and I know others are. What are you going to do now different that you didn't do last week?

Speaker 2: 14:27

Well, I mean one thing thing, one thing that we're we're just going to do differently, like I said, is to.

Speaker 2: 14:33

You know it is to, is to is sort of a expand our, expand our reach a little bit.

Speaker 2: 14:39

Not just not just sort of focus on, kind of like, small to medium-sized businesses, which is what we were kind of, uh, focusing on from the very beginning.

Speaker 2: 14:48

Because, if you think about it, small to medium sized businesses are going to have a limited budget and you know, not to sound greedy or anything, but in order to not just keep the lights on, but in order to, as you said, scale your company, you've got to think bigger and you've got to say, all right, well, we've got to.

Speaker 2: 15:04

We've got to scale upwards and try to and try to hook in some big fish here if we want to keep growing as a business. And the great thing is that if you can scale upwards and you can offer this really expensive program that the big time client is willing to pay, then suddenly, oh, wait, a minute, now we've actually got a budget to bring in more team members so that we can divide and conquer when it comes to this work. It's not just going to be, uh, you're going to fall on like a team of three to complete. Now suddenly we can expand to a team of six or a team of 12 or whatever the case may be, and that's, and that's kind of how you, how you scale you, just you have, you have to always be thinking upwards and bigger.

Speaker 1: 15:50

You have to, and I think that kind of realization that comes when you're like you see the opportunity, you see others around you growing and you're like, why aren't we doing that? It's when to take the risk too. So talk to me a little about have you been here before and you didn't take the risk, or you tried it and backed out. Talk about your journey a little on when to do it.

Speaker 2: 16:11

Yeah, I think for us in many cases it wasn't that we didn't want to take the risk, it's just we didn't think we had the time or the capacity to take the risk in philadelphia and we and we were basically helping them do their marketing to kind of like jumpstart this, this launch. But there wasn't so much that really came out of that one ad. It was kind of like a one and done deal and now, admittedly, that particular uh hotel group folded at that location and and so and sold it off a couple of years later. But while we should have struck while the iron was hot, as the saying goes, we should we should have kept that relationship going. We could have said hey, we helped you film this ad for this one location.

Speaker 2: 17:04

What about having us do some ads for other locations that you have? Because this was a, this was, you know, a global hotel chain. This wasn't just like, oh yeah, they were a local hotel group hotel chain. This wasn't just like, oh yeah, they were a local hotel group. So we should have kind of continued to push with that and said you know, what did you guys think of the final product? Were you happy? Would you hire us again? We'd really like to continue working with you.

Speaker 1: 17:27

For the marketing standpoint. You helped a hotel chain exit through ads, just didn't say how. But they did exit. It wasn't our effort that caused them to exit the way they did. All right, so moving forward here, tell me a bit about kind of I guess you know it's the how. What is the next step you're going to take to make this happen? Like you know, is it organization? Are you going to take to make this happen, like you know from is it organization? Are you going to change your, your offer, like, what's the how? Are you going to go find 10 clients that could become that next one that has retainer?

Speaker 2: 18:06

That is the ultimate.

Speaker 2: 18:07

The ultimate question is always the how for every company that's looking, that's looking to scale up, and and right now, in addition to using our, in addition to using our current network, we need to increase our visibility. And I think, going to more events in the future and I'm not talking virtual events, I'm talking like in person, as in let me talk to these people, let me give them my business card, you know, let me build that, let me build that relationship, because that's the only way you really build relationships with people are face to face. Only so much of a connection can be formed when you're, when you're talking to somebody, you know, through a video screen, it's like any business. So it's definitely going to more events. You know, I mentioned we're a film company, so you know, going to more like film festivals and film markets is another way to do that. Finding more conferences, you know, for people who work in like the technology and marketing space, that's going to be another opportunity for us. So, yeah, it's all about increasing that visibility is going to be the how.

Speaker 1: 19:13

I love it. Alright. Shameless plug time for you again. Who should get a hold of you right now and how are you going to be the how I love it All right. Shameless plug time for you again. Who should get a hold of you right now and how are you going to?

Speaker 2: 19:21

do it? Great question, no. So right now, on our film side, we're definitely looking for more independent filmmakers who have completed projects, who are looking for distribution, because we have a lot of connections in that space, whether it's on streaming, whether it's on broadcast linear TV or whether it's in theatrical space, definitely looking to expand our library of completed projects. And I would definitely say that businesses who are looking to scale similar to how we are looking to scale and you're trying to figure out your long-term marketing strategy they should reach out to us as well.

Speaker 1: 20:03

You guys are in the Philadelphia area. I would even say specifically local businesses who want to get their story out there in a very cinematic way should be out there talking to you, because it's really cool what you guys can do and it's high value and really high quality stuff and it's not like um I. I I've seen different studio houses. Some are better than others. I say it that way. You guys are very attentive to detail, so I love that. Uh Don, thanks for jumping in here today with me. I appreciate it. Happy to be here, thomas, appreciate it. Listen, get out there. If you're still listening and this is your first time here I hope you come back. It's the first of many. If you've been here before, thanks for being supportive of the show. Get out there, go cut a tie to something holding you back. Go define some success that you know you can go achieve and then go define something you don't think you should and go.