Creative Design for Innovation - a Think Billions Experience Guest

 The hardest part of it need to start it again.
 We're listening to the Radcast.
 If it's radical, we cover it.
 Here's your host, Ryan Alford.
 Hey guys, what's up?
 Welcome to the list edition of the Radcast.
 We're still here rocking it.
 I think millions of them.
 We got health, wealth, and mindset.
 We got more great founders, including my good buddy here, Mario Mirabella.
 What's up, brother?
 What's going on?
 Nice to be here.
 Hey man.
 I'd like to have him, you man.
 Thank you.
 It's nice having somebody else in the, you know, understands agency business.
 Oh yeah.
 Founder of MSM Digital.
 We've both been in the business a while, and you know, it's been nice getting to know Mario
 and a lot of people.
 It's a really quality event.
 Oh, absolutely.
 Yeah, I mean, just all sorts of levels here.
 Yeah.
 Just amazing, the experience and knowledge that's in this room.
 If you want to say multiple rooms of this palace, that's going right, I mean, you know,
 but it's, it's amazing, you know, the experiences and, and, and just the, the victories across
 the board of all these people in all different industries too, you know, that wealth of knowledge
 that bring it to the table.
 I mean, you just overloaded every day, you know, because you're picking out bits and pieces
 of everything that people are speaking about.
 So, you know, it's priceless.
 I mean, every person, sometimes you do events and it's not that you don't respect
 who's on stage, but it's maybe you something you've heard or like, and you're like, oh,
 I've heard that or whatever.
 I mean, every single speaker, I've pulled two to three nuggets.
 Oh, yeah.
 Oh, absolutely.
 It's like, if not ten.
 Yeah.
 Oh, for sure.
 I know.
 It's just that you just constantly learn.
 I felt like just being a sponge because you have to be, you have to be, you have to
 be, you know, it's the value out of these things.
 That's absolutely, absolutely right.
 So, it's been a star-studded lineup, you know.
 I know.
 Speaking of stars, Mario.
 Stars been a line in for, what, 22 years?
 What's that?
 Yeah, 23 this year.
 23.
 23.
 Yeah.
 That's my favorite player.
 MJ.
 Oh, yeah.
 23.
 The goat.
 Oh, yeah.
 That's it.
 Yeah, that's right.
 That's right.
 Talk to me about, let's paint that founder's story for me.
 We know it's ups, downs, rounds, uh.
 Everything sideways.
 Yeah, I know.
 Yeah, it's been a fun run.
 I mean, you know, uh, starting in 99 technically, uh, when launching the agency, originally
 as MSM designs, um, we were a creative agency and it was built straight out of my bedroom
 as a hobby, you know.
 So a fun fact, Ryan, back in 96, I sold my turntables and I bought my first computer
 man.
 I played in a game in a computer game, but that's what I did.
 My precious, cherished technique, 1200s, man, I used to cut up, I make mixed tapes in high
 school, man.
 On it, there, there are, I miss them.
 I miss them.
 The mixes, everything.
 I used to have 218 subs in my room, you know, yeah, knock the base.
 But, um, you know, uh, discovered that computer, discovered the internet for the very first
 time and was completely hooked, um, and just took a, a, just a passion love for, for
 the creatives.
 I taught myself Adobe, taught myself how to code, uh, in notepad at the time, you know,
 before I kind of graduated a little bit the front page and I said, oh, it's not for
 me.
 I went straight to Dreamweaver, which was like crazy hard at the time.
 Oh, God.
 And I lived in forums, man.
 I just, just taught myself action scripting back in the day because I loved flash and
 I loved everything, animating transition effects, music, loved it.
 And, um, I got tremendous help with coders in the forums during those days.
 But it was all a hobby, you know, I didn't think I was doing this.
 I have actually a degree in criminology.
 I, I wasn't supposed to be here, you know, in this area, it was just more of a love and
 a passion.
 And I said to myself, um, when I did start the company, well, maybe I could do this, you
 know, maybe I could do this.
 Um, but I had no idea of how to do it and maybe to even obtain clients at the time.
 So I pretty much was just doing free work just to build a portfolio.
 So do you need a website or a friend of a friend starting his travel age?
 You need a website and that's how it started, man, local restaurants.
 And, um, and then all of a sudden, I was like, well, how, you know, I got to start making
 money here.
 And that's what happened, man.
 And it just, it started in to, to take off.
 I actually left my full time job then in 03.
 I was working for a software company and, and I never looked back, you know, at the
 time, I never looked back and, um, I laughed though because I made the move and it wasn't
 real.
 I was one year into being married at the time.
 And I made the move and my wife was like, so you're not going to go look for another
 job.
 Like what's going on here?
 You know, I says, I got to give this a try.
 And that, and then it just propelled me into that life, um, and just pretty much just
 kept going and started to build the company, uh, with talent in areas that I knew I didn't
 have that skill set.
 I didn't have the train and say, maybe complex databases, ecom brought in, brought in the
 talent to really, uh, develop the company and to allow us to grow until, um, I was able
 then to open up locations.
 And then of course, um, we, we got more in-house staff and, you know, and it took on more, um,
 but it's been a great ride.
 I mean, I've seen it all, you know, the technology's coming, go to the birth of social media.
 As you know, you know, because you've been around, you know, similar years, right?
 So it's wild to see how it, uh, you know, really transformed and you have to stay ahead.
 If not, you're, you're in this industry, you're, you're just done.
 Yeah.
 So you got to keep re-inventing.
 And that's how we came to today with MSM Digital is that we're no longer, we haven't
 been probably in the past decade.
 We haven't been a creative agency.
 I mean, it's always the backbone to polish and brands, make them look good, they're online
 presence, but, um, but we're doing much more now to get them on the map, um, build awareness,
 graphic leads, all that type of stuff.
 And I figured, um, you know, if we're going to set the stage to do even more, put ourselves
 in front of a bigger audience, the name needs to really translate that.
 So we're not maybe counted out as maybe, oh, they're just maybe a creative agency.
 So that was the, that was the reason for the move this year to MSM Digital.
 And it's, it's been a good run.
 Yeah.
 Is, uh, how is, I know you've had and you're about to, I know we talked, you know,
 a pretty episode about scaling and things like that.
 We'll come back to that.
 But like, what's the biggest, maybe let's take it from two angles, like as an entrepreneur,
 and, you know, that journey and owning your own business and putting the skin of the game
 and the risk and all that.
 It's like been the biggest surprise over the years or, I don't know, maybe just something
 you just didn't expect.
 And then, you know, specific to the ad agency and there's a two-part question there.
 You know, like maybe industry specific, you know, like if there's, if there's one or,
 one A or one B there, as far as, you know, building a business in, in the advertising
 world.
 Yeah.
 Well, you know, I never thought in my wildest dreams that I was, I would be able to take
 the agency to where it is today.
 Just never had that, you know, I guess that foresight.
 Yeah.
 You know, again, this was like a hobby, you know, but thinking, hey, I could do this.
 But in the first month, I'm like, oh, wait a minute, I'm starting to make more money
 than my full-time job.
 I said, so hold on a second, you know, that's something here.
 So that's a big surprise, right?
 Yeah, all right.
 Yeah, I just think that, you know, being able to grow to those different heights and,
 and constantly, you know, reinventing yourself at the same time, you know, still kind of surprises
 me in, in how we are as a company.
 How my team continues to evolve.
 You know, from a client standpoint, it's just, I guess it comes down to, you know, the
 ability where we work with all industries.
 And I think that, and that's something I may ask you about because I, I like the diversity.
 And a lot of times people ask me, do you focus on one niche, one industry?
 And I thought about that at times, you know, be the guy for X, Y, Z, yeah.
 But it's hard to turn down projects in different industries.
 It's just, it's hard to do that.
 And it also gives us, in my opinion, the ability to be more creative and to also like continue
 to think outside of the box with these other types of projects and industries.
 Maybe if you found something, you know, when one didn't industry and say, you know, what
 I could be creative here and try it over here, you know, it allows us to do that.
 We're not a one trick pony.
 Yeah.
 So, and I didn't know how you really feel about that, but that always remains, you know, kind
 of it surprises us to see how we adapt, not only in you working with the different industries,
 but also the team is constantly learning, they're constantly remaining sponges as to what's
 going on, you know, in the marketplace and new techniques with, with marketing.
 So we try to focus on that and, you know, talent is the key, continuing to surround myself
 with, with great talent.
 My team is excellent.
 I always tell them, you know, I'm as good as my team.
 So, yeah, I could sell you on something, but if it's not executed properly, my saying
 is, I write checks all the time that my team caches.
 Yeah.
 There it is.
 You know, but I wouldn't write them if I didn't know they could.
 Right.
 Right.
 They don't bounce, but it's because they're good.
 Right.
 Right.
 Right.
 That's the way it goes.
 You got to have a team.
 Yeah.
 And do you feel the same way when it comes to industries?
 Yeah.
 I was going to answer that.
 Right.
 That's a great topic in general with agencies and everybody says riches in the niches, right?
 And I think for some things it is.
 And don't get me wrong.
 I see why companies do that.
 And if you want to scale if it's one industry and you become a specialist, there's probably
 a faster track to growth there.
 But I agree 100% and I've fought that specialization with radical because I think it
 makes us more skilled dealing with different things.
 If you do something the same all the time, you have one trick.
 Right.
 Exactly.
 I think we're more creative and more, I think our ability to think and actually sometimes
 applying something that's worked for B2C to B2B makes us unique in revolutionary versus
 or maybe something that I picked up in text styles that moved the needle that could work
 in manufacturing or work in some other industry.
 And we turn it a little bit.
 And I think if we were purely a B2B manufacturer agency, we wouldn't have that foresight.
 We wouldn't be able to provide that pivot, a little bit of fresh thinking.
 So I agree and I fought it.
 And I think I probably could have grown radical faster, quicker, niche down, but I also enjoy
 the variety.
 Yeah.
 And so I've done well enough and we have good clients and yeah, I mean, all y'all want
 to scale some more.
 But like sure.
 But I enjoy the variety.
 Our team enjoys the variety.
 I think it also is hard to hold on team.
 If you have really talented creative people and they get put in a two small of a box all
 a time, you're not going to keep them all.
 You're not tapping in, right?
 You're not tapping into their talents.
 You know, when you just talked about utilizing something that worked maybe for B2B into B2C
 or vice versa, whatever, I have a good example of that and thinking really outside the
 box.
 So years ago, we had a client that specialized in men's formal wear and they were pretty
 big player with major brands that they carried and put out and they needed a new online presence.
 Very long story short, we set up those site designs like you typically would for men's
 formal wear because they were they were selling.
 And it's that typical style kind of catalog type of look, you know, it was a nice layout.
 But the the sons of the owner who was taking more of an interest in the company, it was
 just striking out with them.
 And I was like, wow, you know, we we're not nailing it's like we always do something
 and so off something's off.
 And I was relying on my designers and I said, you know what, I have another meeting with
 them and I stayed up.
 I don't know what time was it 2 a.m. or something 3 a.m. to get it done.
 I did it myself and I said, you know what, I'm not going to think as them as men's formal
 wear and design like that.
 I'm going to take the mentality that I would for a photographer, videographer for that
 that shoots weddings.
 The lifestyle images, and this was like 10 years ago, the lifestyle images, that vibe
 of showing groomsmen in in the settings, having fun out there, this and that and brought
 that into the layout and home run at 3 a.m.
 You know, so it's sometimes you got you can't be that one track mind and just be creative
 and you're utilizing maybe your ideas from different industries that you worked in and
 you tie it in there like, wow, you know, this is not really, we're not seeing this in our
 tuxedo type of industry.
 And so we worked, you know, so that's just an example of kind of cross pollinated, right?
 You know, so I think it, you know, it's a lot of ways to skin the cat and I mean, but
 I've gone down a similar road and I just think, I don't know, it's, we, the one central
 point we kind of rally around is human to human.
 That's kind of our, like whether we work with B2B or B2C, we promote ourselves as being
 a very human agency and we always ground our clients back in a human voice.
 And so that's kind of our, I don't know, lane.
 Yeah.
 Yeah.
 Well, you were talking about that before.
 Yeah.
 And it makes sense.
 Like, would you was saying people don't want to be sold to?
 No.
 And that's, that's, you got to understand that.
 There's an insight there.
 Yeah.
 That's a thousand.
 It's like, okay.
 Yeah.
 No one wants to be sold.
 Right.
 But it means that you need to market accordingly.
 Right.
 Yes.
 And, and that's the, that's the human side of it.
 And it's, it's so key.
 If you think along those lines, you know, they go, they'll pay attention more.
 You're hitting pain points.
 You're like, you know, you put yourself in their shoes and such.
 And they're going to relate to that.
 They're going to gravitate to that content.
 Yeah.
 So that was, that was key.
 Yeah.
 You mentioned that.
 You mentioned something else too when it comes to, you know, the human voice and the
 element.
 But, um, I think that's, that should be the approach now.
 You know, what was that thing you were talking about, the friction and, yeah, you got
 a real friction.
 Right.
 I mean, you know, Amazon has changed the game for everything.
 And so you've got to make the path to purchase super narrowed, super folk, super easy.
 Right.
 You know, like the best creative, you know, excuse gist in a way, coin base, you know,
 doing that thing.
 And then they're server crashed.
 They weren't ready for it.
 They weren't ready for it.
 You know, you have, yeah, a half a billion people watching the Super Bowl.
 You need to, uh, assume 25% we're going to hit your website.
 Right.
 I know.
 Yeah.
 All you do is create friction for them trying to come see who you are.
 That's right.
 Yeah.
 We're moving friction.
 Those are, those are my, those are the, uh, offered playbook that's given and friction
 removal.
 Oh, that's awesome.
 Get them out playbook.
 Man, what happened with your team today?
 All won.
 2721.
 All right.
 All right.
 Okay.
 Clemson's won the, they have the largest home winning 76 in a row at home.
 Are you kidding me?
 Clemson.
 Yeah.
 And so they're playing at home today.
 Sircuses up 21 10 1 1 half.
 Oh.
 Clemson scores 17 unanswered.
 21 21.
 I didn't shut them down to like negative 10 yards.
 Really?
 Oh.
 Wow.
 Stoppable.
 Like a brick wall, man.
 Yeah.
 Oh, that's good stuff.
 Sircuses is good.
 Yeah.
 I mean, you're number 12.
 You know, I'm not, I'm not that historically and you're good grade every year.
 But, right.
 Do you know how I'm playing good?
 So, yeah.
 Oh, that's good stuff.
 Yes.
 So sidebar for those of you out there.
 Yeah.
 But, you know, everybody, everybody loses, it regularly knows I'm a Clemson guy.
 Yeah.
 We had to bring it up, man.
 We had to bring it up.
 Yes.
 Yes.
 Yes.
 Mario.
 So, where's it all going?
 We want to scale.
 Yeah.
 I mean, side hustles.
 I mean, what else we got cooking?
 Yeah.
 I guess, you know, we want to scale, but I think for the first time, what I'm starting to
 do is separate myself a little bit to build my own personal brand.
 Yeah.
 I think that's important.
 I think it's been long overdue.
 You know, the amount of experience at the moment, you know, 23 years under my belt.
 The industries I've worked in, I mean, we had great recognition over the years as well.
 So it's been, it's been a really great ride for the company.
 But today, it's all about that personal brand and how you're tying that back.
 The perfect example of what you did with the chart there of, you know, between your
 podcasts and the personal brand and then leads back to the company.
 You know, that's so important to build in relationships now and it's key.
 And now that that's really been programmed in my mind this year, I'm speaking that way
 to clients.
 When I see that there's opportunity for them now, making you an authority in that industry,
 you know, and I'm making them realize, like, especially building up their social presence
 in their brand voice.
 At the end of the day, I need to make you an educator and an expert in your industry.
 That's my job, right?
 So sometimes then now we're taking away that owner of the company and saying, we need
 to concentrate on your personal brand a little bit too, because the more good stuff you're
 putting out there, people are going to pay attention.
 And like they always preach, you know, the no like and trust.
 And I believe in that.
 And that's kind of been like really ingrained this year.
 And so of course, I started to branch out from the company to put my own stuff out there
 just to build up my own credibility.
 You know, the right order, you know, and you know, I did the same thing, like, you've
 done it for 23 years, it makes it a lot easier to get out there because you already, you've
 got the credibility.
 Now you just need to amplify it, right?
 Right.
 Just to just say, right?
 And you got the personality for it.
 Right.
 Well, thank you.
 No, you do totally do.
 You know, it's fun speaking.
 It's fun getting on these things.
 I would love to do more of these things like this and get out there.
 You know, I started my Instagram channel and just, you know, putting out good content
 value.
 That's all it is is value and just how can we start collaborating, you know, start
 collaborating with people and that's like the name of the game.
 You know, I think you mentioned it before.
 If I'm not mistaken, I know Josh mentioned it too.
 I always had this very, very competitive personality years back, very competitive, right?
 There's plenty to go around.
 But there's, that's it.
 And I stopped them in town really long ago and I said, you know what, it's all about
 collaboration out there's more than enough for everybody to work together.
 There's money to be made.
 And no one's, no, I don't look at people like as competitors anymore, like, hey, how can
 we work together?
 You know, because you never know there's always could be a need or there could be somebody
 that says, you know what, I don't, this is not a fit for me.
 You want to talk to this client?
 Yeah.
 You know, and that's how things happen.
 So that's kind of been the change too.
 You know, just having them in tally, but the personal brand, that's kind of been my
 focus.
 I just got to get my ass doing more like reals and video and stuff, that's why I'm looking
 at all this equipment.
 I says, send me a list, man.
 Yeah.
 I'll get you a list.
 You know, but yeah.
 So that's kind of been our focus this year and what I would love to continue to do, you
 know.
 So, and I feel it all at the end, it ties back to the company, you know, I tell my staff
 all the time, so I'm doing what I'm doing is because it's, it's only going to make us
 stronger, you know, and they see that it's been, they've been highly motivated now by the
 things that we've been doing this year that, you know, that we never did.
 And I think it rejuvenates the staff, especially people who've been with me for 10 years
 plus.
 Yeah.
 You know, which and it's great to see.
 Well, you know, and I'll use Nick, you know, our producer's example, but Nick's been with
 me for the almost a long haul with Radical.
 Yeah.
 You know, I think he bought the vision at the beginning, but, you know, like, the, because
 at first, you know, you guess your, your buddies and you're doing things with the podcast.
 And like, I'm like, but Nick, let me tell you where this is going and, uh, and then Nick,
 we got here, uh, you know, yesterday or day before, whatever, and he goes started from
 the bottom.
 Now we're here.
 That's it.
 That's it.
 Perfect track.
 Yeah.
 Perfect track.
 I told him, this is what's coming.
 Yeah.
 And it's here.
 You know, like, it's it.
 Believe in the vision.
 Yeah.
 You know, it's important.
 You know, I, I almost, if I pull it up in my Slack channel to my staff when something happened
 recently, we got recent recognition and, um, I, I said that to them.
 I said, thank you for believing in, in my vision and, you know, and, and, and seeing, you know,
 what we're trying to do here, you know, and, and, and just coming along for the ride,
 you know, because look at what's going on, you know, so celebrate the wins, too.
 That's it.
 You know, we get enough hits, man.
 I know.
 You know, we get enough hits, man.
 Over the years.
 Like, no one gave me a playbook, man.
 You know, there is one.
 Let me tell you.
 Yeah.
 Right.
 I went for 17 years.
 Yeah.
 Watch.
 Yeah.
 I got to see it.
 And even they didn't have a playbook.
 And you, and you were down in Madison, right?
 So you made your agencies down there, right?
 And, uh, is that how all these big campaigns kicked off?
 Yeah.
 And the question is, you know, you worked on this massive joint campaign, the phenomenal
 success.
 And, you know, I was like, how does an agency obtain something at that level?
 Yeah.
 I mean, we pitched the business.
 Is that what it's, it's, it's like I pitch actively.
 I pitched for eyes in business in 2001 with an agency.
 Those are my first job.
 We got the business and, already, we got bought by one of the holding companies that pushed,
 put two lines of rising business together.
 And so that was my largest account for 10 years.
 But under Verizon, I worked on droid, the Apple iPhone launch, uh, the Razor, oh, wow,
 the every major major like named, you, you can think of that you remember the campaigns.
 Yeah.
 I worked on every single major.
 I, uh, smartphone release.
 That's unbelievable.
 But were you, I mean, obviously aggressive with the pitch, but were you more proactive
 or, oh, they were something out there with an RFP, uh, we had RFP, the original piece
 of business.
 And then once we got in the door, it was more just then you kept just campaigns.
 We kept it for 13 years.
 So yes.
 And then I was, but most of that stuff is RFP pitched at that level.
 And I was like, I worked on Budweiser and worked on, and that was a pitch.
 And then worked on bow jangles and worked on, uh, Samsung and worked on, I mean, that's
 actually, yeah, was involved in pitch.
 And I was a hybrid.
 I was creative strategy account guy, you know, yeah, yeah.
 And a rare breed.
 Yeah.
 For sure.
 In a New York agency.
 And they, but my, the owner of our agency got out of my way.
 The clients love me and I had big ideas.
 Oh, wow.
 There's a magical combination.
 Yeah, right.
 Sometimes you get the idea guys are lukewarm with the client.
 Yeah.
 You know, like they got good ideas.
 And so that's why they have a job.
 Yeah, yeah, yeah.
 They're not great with the client.
 Right.
 Right.
 Well, I was both.
 I've seen them a lot of money.
 Oh, I can imagine.
 You know, that's great.
 And so I learned a lot.
 I'm not like, sure, you know, I've learned for 17 years and then I applied it and that's
 you know, but I also got to work on things.
 Like if I had done, if I had started, no matter how smart I was, if I had started by
 agency, I wouldn't have gotten the experiences that I got, you know, because I've been, you
 know, as you know, like a now and now, you know, it matters what I've done, but they
 want to see radicals book of business.
 Right.
 Exactly.
 But I'm not, you know, Pepsi's leading agency, you know, I mean, and we could be, we should
 be.
 Right.
 I can walk it.
 I was 27 in the CMO of rising.
 I was asking me what I thought they should do.
 Well, I mean, you know, I mean, that's, I was an early riser.
 But so it's, I can walk on any floor with credibility, but you know, it's still what have
 you done lately.
 Right.
 Right.
 Sure.
 Offline stuff.
 We'll talk about it.
 Very interested in that, and that stuff and what you've done with, with that process.
 Yeah.
 But it's true, man.
 It sets the stage, man.
 And get you to where now, hey, I got my own gig, you know, highly successful, you
 know, and taking all of that experience, all of that type of, you know, ups and downs
 and, and, and client campaigns now, you know, ideas and adapt, you know, so it's, yeah,
 crazy business.
 That's it.
 Mario, man.
 That's been great.
 Have you on work here?
 If I keep up with you and your agency.
 So you can follow me on Instagram at Mario S. Mirabella.
 That's my Instagram handle, or even on LinkedIn.
 My website is still MSM Designs with a Z dot com before we transitioned MSM digital, but
 you could check me out.
 Even my company, everything's at MSM Designs with a Z with all the social handles.
 Yeah, be great, you know, and definitely follow up with you and see what's going on.
 It's been great.
 Yeah, man.
 I really enjoyed this.
 So, hey guys, give Mario a follow, go give him some love on social media and keep up.
 I'm sure he's going to be starting podcasts and everything else.
 I'm going to come on your show.
 Oh, yeah.
 I would love to have you, man.
 Yeah.
 Definitely.
 Yeah.
 So far, along, and, hey, go to the radcast.com, search for Mario, you'll find all the content
 from today.
 I'm at Ryan Allford on all the platforms.
 Ryan.
 Allford on TikTok.
 I'm verified everywhere.
 I'm blowing up on TikTok.
 So go hit me up over there.
 See you next time on the radcast.