The D2Z Podcast

B2B Video Marketing - 146

• Brandon Amoroso • Episode 146

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In this episode of The D2Z Podcast, Brandon Amoroso speaks with Daniel Borba, CEO of Spark Portal, about the evolution of video marketing, the challenges of transitioning from a service-based model to a core offering, and the importance of authenticity in branding. They discuss the nuances of delegation, hiring the right talent, and how AI is reshaping the video marketing landscape. Daniel shares insights from his entrepreneurial journey and the strategies that have led to success in the B2B marketing space.

Here's What You'll Learn:
❗Transitioning from freelance work and agency services into SaaS.
❗The hardest part of delegation is learning who to hire.
❗Video on LinkedIn is currently a powerful marketing tool.
❗Authenticity in branding is becoming increasingly important.
❗Brand identity should reflect core company values.
❗AI is streamlining video editing processes.
❗Creative work in marketing is subjective and challenging to quantify.
❗Effective hiring requires understanding personality over just skill set.
❗Video marketing strategies must adapt to changing consumer behaviors.
❗The future of video marketing will leverage both high production and authentic content.

Timestamps:
00:00 Introduction to the Gen Z Mindset
00:30 Daniel Borba's Entrepreneurial Journey
01:17 Transitioning from Services to Core Offerings
04:44 The Art of Delegation
10:02 Hiring for Success
13:32 Overview of Spark Portal
16:54 The Evolution of Video Marketing
21:29 Navigating Brand Identity
26:40 The Impact of AI on Video Marketing

Daniel Borba:
Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/in/danielborba/

SparkPortal:
Linkedin - https://www.linkedin.com/company/spark-portal/
Website - https://sparkportal.com/

Brandon Amoroso:
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/brandonamoroso/
Web - https://brandonamoroso.com/
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/bamoroso11/
X - https://twitter.com/AmorosoBrandon
Scalis.ai - https://scalis.ai/

Speaker 1:

Hey everyone, thanks for tuning into D2Z, a podcast about using the Gen Z mindset to grow your business. I'm Gen Z entrepreneur Brandon Amoroso, the former founder of Electric and now the co-founder of Scaless, and today I'm talking with Daniel Borba, who's the CEO of Spark Portal, which is a video as a service platform for B2B marketers. Thanks for coming on the show.

Speaker 2:

Thank you, that's a great intro.

Speaker 2:

So before we dive into things. Can you give everybody just a quick background on yourself and your entrepreneurial journey? Yeah, so basically I started doing freelance work and time went by and I was like man, I want to see what I can do with this. I want to see if I can create something new. And obviously the natural route was to go to found an agency. But then I was like I'm not sure if I want to go the traditional route. So I said I want to create something new. And that's when I came up with doing a video as a service offering that is not limited to hourly rates or you know the traditional agency model. And we doubled down and we found a niche on software. And so that's where we came to be, how we came to be.

Speaker 1:

What has it been like transitioning from you know services and that agency model offering into software? It sucks.

Speaker 2:

It's probably the biggest. You know it's kind of like they say you know it's like trying to leave the orbit of the earth right. Once you leave the orbit it's like you know, easier the heaviest lift is in the beginning, trying to just leave behind old habits. And you know assigning work to other people, especially if you were doing the work yourself.

Speaker 2:

You know assigning work to other people especially if you were doing the work yourself, you know recently, and so, but that's probably the hardest part is to really find people that you can trust and have them kind of teach you how to let go, you know.

Speaker 1:

For that delegation process. I mean, how have you gone about being able to do it in a sort of cohesive and concerted manner, where you're still setting up your team members for success and you hand it off to them, but that you're also not still like trying to manage it? Because I've seen people who like they delegate but they don't actually delegate.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I would love to have my team here and have them answer for me, right? But I think, to be 100% clear and honest, I think there is no way. And you try and then you miss the mark, right, you're like I didn't do it the right way, I didn't feel comfortable, I still felt like I needed to kind of micromanage, and, and so then you try it again and you try again, and then over time, you know, you have a few, a few bruises, you might, you might go through a few employees before you learn how to really delegate, and because that that's what happens, you know. And, and then you just get good, you get really good at it over time, but you need to get some reps in, and, uh, and the the quicker you learn to delegate, the the you know, the better your business and the faster it's going to grow. Um, so it's been.

Speaker 2:

It's been a, I would say, a rough journey, but at the same time, I feel like we're, uh, isolating the different services that we provide and figuring out who is who will be the best fit for that.

Speaker 2:

And and, yeah, I mean it's just, I mean it's been a challenge for sure, but it's been great to finally get to that place where we're. I'm not involved heavily in the servicing of the clients and and one more, one more point on that is that for me was it was very difficult because I started on the creative side, and so what happens is I used to work with other designers and animators first, and then I started hiring more sort of senior managers, sort of executive leaders, and so then that transition from managing actual executioners right, like actual designers, animators, you know, writers it's a different ballgame than managing people that are actually making, you know, decisions for the business. And so that's where probably the biggest sort of biggest difference in management style. So but I think we're there, I think we're there. So it's been very liberating to get to that place where you're having people take your vision and kind of executing against that, instead of just saying, hey, I want this done this way, you know, and giving micromanagement directions.

Speaker 1:

Do you have an example of a time where you delegated and it went really well and then, maybe more interestingly, a time where you delegated and it did not go very well?

Speaker 2:

So, yes, the biggest one, the biggest, biggest this is the first time that happened to me where I successfully handed off a project to somebody that knew more than me and that had to just trust them was when we designed our pitch deck for the first time. And I know that that applies to your audience, because a lot of founders struggle with that, because they look at their product or their service or their offering with this like crazy amount of love, but they don't want to let go. And so what happens is I had to learn to say, hey, this person has a vested interest in me and I'm paying them, so I should learn to let go. And so I said I created sort of a brief for me. I said, hey, I want this, I want that, here's what I'm struggling with. And then I asked him too. I said what do you think I'm missing here? And also, what do you think how can I let this go so that you can do your best work, so that I don't have to, like, micromanage you, but I still be involved. And so then you know, it was a beautiful experience, because you know, he created a sort of a summary, he gave me a timeline, and so then I was like, wow, this is amazing. That was one of the first experiences where I was like this is huge, this is huge. And so that was a good example. Right now I'm going to give you a bad one.

Speaker 2:

So when I first started hiring a project manager, I didn't even know the skills that I needed, the type of personality that I was hiring, and that has a huge impact on the success rate of this new person, of this new hire, whether you're talking a contractor or actual employee, right, but I hired this person with a strong personality and he had a strong creative background but didn't have a strong sort of organizational background, and so we butt heads all the time. He didn't get the vision and it just didn't work. And so then, every day it would be an issue and he just wouldn't get it. He would want to do his way. Every day it would be an issue and he just wouldn't get it. He would want to do his way, and part of it is me that I didn't let go properly, but at the same time, you know, the other half was not even trying to help me on that right. And so, but I take my responsibility right, like I take my own responsibility.

Speaker 1:

I probably could have made it work better, but yeah, that's a big L that I take with me for the rest of my life. Yeah, I think to your first example, like putting the ownership in the team members' hands, like that's always worked very well for me. I'm assuming they have that in them to begin with. But, like it truly is, they're the stakeholder, they have full ownership over it and you're just there to help, guide and to sort of support where needed, but you're not dictating from the top down. It's more like you know, the way I like to phrase it is I hired you for for you. If I hired you to just go execute a bunch of tasks that I already know need to be executed, I mean you could have like a robot do that, or literally somebody who doesn't have the creative prowess or strategic thinking that you have.

Speaker 1:

And that seemed to always work pretty well.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, that's awesome to hear. Yeah, I think the hardest part is probably to come up like learning who you need to hire, because oftentimes it's not so much about the skillset as it is the personality and the point in time in their lives, right, because sometimes it's not so much about the skillset as it is the personality and the point in time in their lives, right? Because sometimes it's more about the right opportunity rather than the right skillset of the person, because if you look at skills only, eventually that person is going to become obsolete for the business, right. But if you're looking for a person that is looking to lead and looking for a company to grow, maybe they've been burned by past bosses, so now they're looking for somebody to actually give them the ownership of something, and it's just the perfect time. Just the perfect time If you can find a way to figure out what that is, what that looks like for you or for this new person.

Speaker 2:

Boy, you have a great, great opportunity there, because it's a good opportunity for you as a business owner, but it's also a good opportunity for them, and that means you're going to have that person go help you for the next three or four or five years instead of just nine months, six months or a year and a half, which is a huge problem because any strategic hire, it takes them like six months to a year to really come in and understand everything there is to understand about the market, even if they have market experience. If you're really trying to do something new or big or bold, it's going to take them. Even the best of the best. It's going to take him at least six months to really be able to bring new ideas that are really impactful and applicable to what your vision is as a founder. I don't know what you have you seen the same thing in terms of timeline? Or what have you experienced in terms of seeing them like, oh, fulfill the actual role, uh, as you envisioned in the first time?

Speaker 1:

yeah, I think especially it depends on the stage of the business, like when I was first bringing on team members, the role was much less defined and the person joining had to be an active participant and actually defining the role and be comfortable with wearing multiple different hats and being able to sort of jump in where necessary, which is not everybody's strong suit.

Speaker 1:

Some people much prefer like clearly defined deliverables, but I always like to focus on the results and not necessarily the deliverables themselves. So when I'm bringing in a new team member, it's like these are the goals. I have ideas around how you could achieve them, but, like part of your responsibility is to come up with the actual deliverables that will lead to set goals. I don't like to set up relationships where it's completely deliverable based, because I mean you could do a thousand different things, but if it doesn't actually have the business outcome that we're looking for, the thousand things are sort of irrelevant, and so I think that was a big, a big component of it. And then in the hiring process itself, focusing more on nuance than necessarily like actual hard skill sets though it does depend on the role, Like when I'm hiring developers or engineers, you know pretty hard skill set that we're looking for.

Speaker 1:

If it's a, if it's a marketing hire. You know, maybe it's a little bit more around interpersonal skills and just the way that they think about approaching and solving problems. So I think it's very, uh, very role specific and also company size specific, whereas now, if it was a larger org, like we have clear holes that need to be filled and they're going to be reporting into somebody else already. So it's a little bit more, you know, well defined.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, yeah, I think I think I'm hearing the same thing from other people as well.

Speaker 2:

A lot of, especially nowadays, with so much technology being leveraged in different roles being leveraged in different roles and I'm only assuming that it's going to accelerate with AI.

Speaker 2:

But basically now, instead of putting your head down and focusing just in one skill, I mean that's important. Sure, you have to have your chops in something, but expanding beyond that it's crucial. Like, for example, learning how to have different stakeholders and be able to say, to talk one language with one team and then a different language and translate. That that's huge value. For example, the good old you know sales and marketing, creative and marketing, right, so the creative team is usually they're talking one language, the marketing team is talking another language, and so you can easily and I'm just giving as an example as a future employee you want to make sure that you're able to translate between these different teams what those things mean in order to achieve that result that you're talking about. And I've seen how it's detrimental to the business when, especially when you have leadership that doesn't understand how their decisions trickle down in the tactics, and it's really sad because revenue gets lost all the time. They don't adapt fast enough, and so it happens all over the place, all over the place.

Speaker 1:

As you've been growing the SaaS side of the business, I guess what would probably be helpful is if you could just give like a quick sort of overview around what it is that Spark Portal does.

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker 1:

And then I'll dive into some of the specific questions I have around it.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so what Spark Portal does is we're a video as a service solution for software companies, and so we create video content for software companies, usually between 50 to 1,000 employees, and we usually come in once. They have a marketing person doing some content, some initiatives, and they hire us to just kind of take what they've done and some of their initiatives that they have and we kind of inject video into the marketing strategy. And so what that usually means is a lot of video content for LinkedIn, a lot of explainer videos, solution-based videos for sales, ABM, that type of thing, LinkedIn ads, promo videos and so yeah.

Speaker 1:

So that's basically the bulk of what we do, got it. And then in terms of, like, I guess, ideal company size and typically those that you're working with, is there like a rough range that you typically slot in?

Speaker 2:

you know, uh, we're still fairly uh young, I would say but what we found is the marketing team size. There's a direct correlation. So if they have a person leading marketing even if they're not a CMO, like they're a VP of marketing or a marketing director if they already have some initiatives like, for example, they already have a budget for LinkedIn ads, they already have a budget for running some YouTube ads or running a few email campaigns, also with some type of organic content, like an email newsletter or something like that.

Speaker 2:

Usually we come in and we're able to leverage video content for those purposes, and so usually that means that for different companies it means different things.

Speaker 2:

So you can talk about revenue, you can talk about employee size, you can also talk about mentality, because a lot of marketers especially when they've already had a few exits, for example, they already know how to leverage video.

Speaker 2:

So even if they're early on, right outside of the less than 50 employees, let's say, they still believe in video and they just bring us on board, and so we also have a big corporation as our clients KeyBank and so they don't really fit that criteria.

Speaker 2:

So we have a wide range, but I would say the main range is between 200 and 1,000 employees, because we're really able to support them and be able to do what they couldn't do otherwise. Right, especially for a young startup. Usually they're willing to be on camera, they're all fired up, but once you start adding more and more employees the founders they just only get involved. Big picture, but they forget to be sort of the face of the company, right, and so content-wise, and so that's when they need a lot of support creating content that's not dependent on the CEO or the executive team, and that's where we also kind of help them, and so that's a long answer, but usually, like I said, between 50 and 1,000 employees, or if they have already a person assigned for marketing, that's when we come in and we inject a bunch of video content into all their initiatives.

Speaker 1:

How has video changed in 2025? So much emphasis on short form content, different platforms as well, versus your sort of tried and true channels. So what are some of the things that you're seeing in the market that are providing outsized returns for B2B marketing, which is obviously a lot different than how you'd approach video if you're a B2C company or B2C?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so the answer may be more nuanced, but some of the general trends is definitely video on LinkedIn. The cool thing about video on LinkedIn is that the video feed is all new, and so LinkedIn is putting a lot of impressions behind that. It's giving you a lot of free exposure and so if you continuously, if you make video very often, it's a great distribution channel right, especially if you can make it problem-centric. Usually that type of video performs very well on LinkedIn. Now, last year, even the year before last year, you know it was fairly new to create, grab a podcast and repurpose that content and put it on LinkedIn. Right, like, let's say, from a 30 minute interview, you can take I don't know eight different clips like one minute clips and put them on LinkedIn. Right, like, let's say, from a 30-minute interview, you can take I don't know, eight different clips, like one-minute clips and put them on LinkedIn.

Speaker 2:

But the problem with that is that, because it becomes so easy now, even with AI, now you have the problem that everybody else is doing the same thing. So how do you differentiate, right? So, in other words, how do you really make it stand out? Because everybody's doing the same thing and so you really have to go to the market with a strong opinion, with a strong point of view, and so, and that uh has more to do with the messaging, your positioning and uh, and how do you see your company, your product, your, your uh and yourself than really the medium itself.

Speaker 2:

And so, to answer your question, basically, linkedin it's a hot, hot, hot thing right now. Even large companies are leveraging it and they're seeing great success because it creates additional touch points, and more so than traditional channels like blogging or even email, you know, and so yeah, and salespeople love that, because all the salespeople are on LinkedIn and so once they have the company post videos, they use that to create their own touch points with their prospects, right, so it's almost like a sales enablement play as well. So, on LinkedIn, so that's really hot right now.

Speaker 1:

Video on LinkedIn yeah, linkedin's been investing some in like the short form content. I've seen a bit as well too. Um, I think all the all the platforms are trending in that direction, even like b2b marketing materials. In general, I feel like I've been getting more consumer-esque and a little bit less professional and polished. Yeah, and people are just looking for authenticity, um, so it's definitely a big change.

Speaker 2:

Huge. Authenticity is so big. And it's interesting because you have marketers like 10-year marketers, 10-year plus marketers, trying to see what they can do with video. But then you also have a two-year marketer right that just happened to attend a company event and they do a video of, like their booth, and that video performs better than what the 10-year marketer has been doing right before. And so that goes to show that the newer marketer sees authenticity as a vehicle to market right. And so it's very interesting to see that behavior change.

Speaker 2:

The 5 to 10-year-old marketer they want to make the brand look as good as possible, while the new marketer wants to make the brand as authentic as possible, and that often means that quality quote-unquote is not as good, right, or it's not on brand, but it's just a behavior that I think it's going to shift more and more and more. I'm not making the case that you shouldn't worry about quality at all. My point here is you need to be able to solve for all of it for the high production value stuff, able to solve for all of it for the high production value stuff, but also the stuff that is quick, down to earth and quote unquote low quality right. So yeah, that's basically my take on that.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I think brand is something that is so hard to quantify anyways, and that was going to be. My next question is when you're working with a new company. I feel like it's even more difficult with some of the earlier stage ones, where it might be in their head but it's not clearly articulated on anything Like. How do you deal with that? Because creative is subjective. It's not like it's only based off of hard data. The performance definitely has something to do with it when you're actually pushing it through a platform like linkedin. Um, but that was always my biggest pain point running an agency. Whenever we did any creative work was like trying to get inside the head of the person who was receiving the deliverable, because that was really the only thing that mattered it's?

Speaker 2:

yeah, it's terrible because, first of all, marketing itself. I so I come from animation, freelance animation background, so creative, but I landed into this, you know, b2b marketing, software space, and that when I, when I was early on this journey, I figured I thought it was like man, like marketers think they're all they all kind of think the same. I thought that I assumed that all marketers agree on the terms that they use. But then I quickly found, wow, there's a huge discrepancy in how they view all the terms that they use in marketing. I thought it was more of a scientific thing. They're like this means this for everybody, but actually, actually that's not the case, and so, uh, that was the first kind of like eye-opener thing for me, and even more so once you start adding the creative aspect of it. Right, meaning, what is a video like, what is an animated, what's an explainer video? I thought this was a demo video, a demo video, an explainer video, a social clip, and then you start getting into all the video styles and all it's like, wow, like you don't even know what. What is what, and so it could be, it could be very, very, uh, messy, and I think that's that's probably another uh reason why we've done so well is because we bring clarity to that world and since we've been able to niche down we've been able well is because we bring clarity to that world and since we've been able to niche down, we've been able to kind of define, predefine everything for them so that it's kind of clear for them.

Speaker 2:

But to your point, I mean it's just a mess. I mean it's just so difficult to quantify stuff like that. You know, that has to do with brand. And then one more thing about brand is to me, the way that I kind of look at brand is the values that the company stands for, right, so sort of. If people were to describe you in one word, they would say you know, tenacious, happy, you know all those words that we use to describe a person. Well, we should have those words, for that should be your brand really, and so.

Speaker 2:

But what marketers have done is they find a way to qualify that and say to quantify that and say, oh, like you know, market share and then all these other things. But in reality, if you really think about it, over time those definitions change because it makes sense, because that's why new companies, once they go to market, they solve these problems? Why? Because they have these values that the market is looking for in terms of associating themselves with those values and the company that was supposed to be serving or appealing to those values. It's no longer the case, because the new one just kind of crushed them.

Speaker 2:

And so my point here is brand is really the way that I look at them is the way that I look at brand is the core values that your company stands by and that you will fire people over not following them.

Speaker 2:

You would also make other people accountable, including clients and customers, and they should also describe you like that on a regular basis, not in every case, but generally. And there is no way to measure that other than just to maybe run some interviews and just figure that stuff out. And so that's a long-winded comment that I agree with you 100%. There's no way to measure it. There's no way to measure it other than just experience that brand. And, yes, do you agree that they are that way or not right? Do their products or their services actually stand by those descriptions or not? And it's really hard to capture that in a survey. And sure you can measure that with, with, with certain kpis and this and that. But at the end of the day it really comes down to proving and aligning those values and validating that with with the customers and everybody involved in the company right on each side.

Speaker 1:

yeah, it sounds like a lot of discovery, and then checking in along the way.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, yeah, there's no other way.

Speaker 1:

So one last question for you before we wrap things up how has AI impacted your process as an organization when it comes to rolling out software in and around video marketing?

Speaker 2:

Well, I'm super excited for AI because it's going to save us more time. It's already saving us time. A big, big, huge. Probably the the biggest impact it has had. It's on the uh short clips and video editing, like interviews, interview type stuff. Because now, before we as a as a video uh vendor right, we we used to have to look at the timeline and edit and listen to it and watch it to be able to edit. But now what we can do is we can edit it in a document format so it's much faster. An actual content strategist can read through the interview and the content and be able to quickly and quicker select things so that the editor can edit faster. Uh, versus before it was more like a creative process, now it's now you can marry the creative with the strategy aspect of it.

Speaker 2:

Um, but there's still a long ways to go because there are other areas for videos that probably need help. There's a lot of like what's that word? Is it hallucinating? It comes up with stuff so it's very difficult to replicate.

Speaker 2:

So, for example, if you want to say you know, give me a video with five, you know scenes doing this and that it'll do it, but then if you want to make an edit, it will just change everything else around it, and so now you no longer have that control of like uh, that you want and so um, and so it makes it very difficult because even a simple change can change the whole context and the whole scene right, and so, uh, we're probably going to see more that improve over time, but, as of today, the biggest impact has been on just like long form content, like talking head type of videos.

Speaker 2:

We are seeing also a lot of help on the strategy side as well, to help us explore different ideas for different strategies, different messaging angles, different ways, different hooks and things like that, and so that's exceptionally helpful when it comes to ads, but mostly for exploration purposes, not necessarily for, you know, actually producing client facing, you know, deliverables. It's mostly for exploration, faster exploration of different concepts, and that definitely brings up a lot of benefits in terms of efficiency for each role at a creative agency.

Speaker 1:

Got it? Yeah, it seems like it's still pretty early on, but there's still some ways that it's going to help augment some of the more manual processes or internal workflows that you had to go through, or coming through an extensive amount of data all at once, that you don't have to do it yourself. But the hallucinations are pretty funny. Yeah, some of the ones that I've seen. Yeah, they're pretty funny.

Speaker 1:

Well, I appreciate you coming on and sharing all these insights with us, but before we hop, can you let people know where they could find you and connect with you online?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, they can find me on LinkedIn, daniel Borba, or they can go to our website, sparkportalcom, and that's where I am Awesome.

Speaker 1:

Well, again, I appreciate you coming on For everybody listening. As always, this is Brandon Amoroso. You can find me at BrandonAmorosocom or Scalistai. Thanks for listening and we will see you next time.