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Straight Into 14 Hours of Business and Content | DailyVee 559 Recap

Even though Gary had a same day flight from Qatar, he still found the energy to drop some valuable gems about money and happiness.

Gary pulls through a 14 hour day and hosted an #AskGaryVee with his childhood hero Joe Namath, held a meeting with his company one37pm and…

1:51 Gary tells the story of how his mom knitted him a NY Jets jersey.

3:09 Gary and AJ explain how if the wine industry wasn’t heavily regulated, VaynerMedia wouldn’t exist

4:11 The power of free work and how it builds exposure and leverage

7:56 Money doesn’t change you, it merely exposes who you actually are

11:38 Gary gives an insight about how creating an unusual product can grab attention

13:39 “Watch what I do, not what I say”

14:55 Gary explains the system he has in place to post on IG

17:04 Gary and Dave East meet for a Wine and Pizza Q&A

19:28 Gary answers: “How do you balance between patience and ambition at a young age?

One of the key themes that he brings up is the notion that money simply exposes who you really are to the rest of the world – just like social media does. Most people don’t see the connection of the similarity that money and social media have, even though money is highly valued and social media is heavily demonized.

Watch the full video here:

If you liked this video, you may also like…

Chasing Happiness versus Chasing Money – Let’s talk about it

Smart things to do with your money | DailyVee 214

Stupid Things to Do With Your Money | DailyVee 488

Why You Should Work For Free

The post Straight Into 14 Hours of Business and Content | DailyVee 559 Recap appeared first on GaryVaynerchuk.com.

Brands that Have Permission: What if BMW Made Headphones and Apple Launched a Sneaker?

When I look at an established business strategically for the first time, I try to think of ways they could deploy their IP or brand in a different category.

For example, the reason I have a signature sneaker with K-Swiss (even though I’m a businessman, not an athlete or a rapper) and the reason many companies have permission to enter different categories comes down to one thing: 

Brand. 

Brand gives you permission to not have to stick to one product category. 

It’s what gave me permission to sign a deal with K-Swiss and have a sneaker. It’s what gave me permission to have a wine brand (Empathy Wines). It’s what would allow me to create other products in the future that reflect my persona if I chose to – like energy drinks or hot sauce. 

The reality is, big brands have personas too. And those personas give them permission to enter different categories than what they’re typically known for. 

Think about it… 

Nintendo started off as a playing card company. 

A lot of people don’t know this, but Nintendo started out creating playing cards. They launched in the late 1800s as a company that made card decks. 

Over time, they experimented with different products in different categories until they eventually started selling toys. Then entertainment. Then electronic video games. 

Today, they’re an iconic video game company, but they didn’t start out in that singular space.  

No one thought that Sony could be a video game company, until they were.

Sony’s another great example. They started out as an electronics shop making tape recorders and radios. 

Eventually, the reputation they built for production quality in that space allowed them to move into building the PlayStation and becoming a major player in the world of video games.

A similar thing happened with Microsoft and the Xbox.  

What if BMW made high end headphones? What if Mercedes made an Amazon Alexa competitor?

Brands like BMW, Porsche, and Mercedes have built up such a huge reputations around their names that they have permission to move into a ton of different sectors. They’re all luxury brands known for engineering and quality, so they can attack different categories through that “lens.”

For example, if I were the CEO of Mercedes, I would’ve considered making a competitor to Amazon Alexa a couple of years ago. Mercedes has permission because of their reputation around engineering high quality products, and they could’ve potentially leveraged their brand to create the next big voice device that people had in their homes. 

Same thing with BMW. They could compete with headphone brand like Bose or Beats and enter a completely different market. If they leveraged their reputation for engineering to make headphones that worked better than anything else on the market, people would take their product very seriously. 

What if Nike competed with Gatorade?

A big reason to enter a new product category is to service your current demographic in a different way. 

When you think of Nike, what do you think of?

For most people, it’s athletics, sports, or training. That reputation gives them permission to potentially come out with workout drinks and compete with brands like Gatorade.

See where I’m going here?

What if Apple launched a sneaker and competed with Nike and Adidas? 

Another great example is Apple. 

I think if they made sneakers a few years ago, I believe they could’ve completely crushed. 

Here’s why:

Apple is a cool brand that has penetrated culture with the iPhone and Mac. It’s almost like a status symbol to have one. I think that reputation allows them to penetrate the sneaker market as well, from a design and technology standpoint. 

For example, a few years ago, Nike came out with “Back to the Future” themed sneakers that laced themselves. In 2019, they’re going on sale to the public.

I think if Apple had come out with something like that (i.e. a well-designed shoe that laced itself), it would’ve been a total gamechanger. People would’ve been stunned and more importantly, they’d be thinking of how Apple was going to innovate next.

What if the New York Times started the greatest marketing agency in the world? 

The New York Times has built a brand around being a major media and publication company.  That kind of infrastructure and reputation could translate really well to building an agency that serves big clients that want to do something similar. 

More brands should ask themselves, “why not?”

If you build a strong brand, you have an incredible range options when it comes to innovating in various product categories. 

Most people see Nike as a shoe and clothing manufacturer. I see them as a brand that could serve athletes with everything from shoes to clothing to sports drinks and more. 

People used to see Sony as an electronics company, but they used electronics to expand into different areas like music, video games, and more. 

Look at my own brand. I’m building a fast growing marketing agency, and I ran a liquor store before I entered this space.

This is one big game of “why not” and “what if.” Brands who ask those questions will innovate much faster than those who don’t.

The post Brands that Have Permission: What if BMW Made Headphones and Apple Launched a Sneaker? appeared first on GaryVaynerchuk.com.

6 Garage Sale Flipping Strategies to Make Extra Money

One of my biggest ambitions with my garage sale video series “Trash Talk” is to show people the ridiculous amount of opportunity that’s just sitting at garage sales all over the country!

This article breaks down the bigger takeaways and learnings from Trash Talk Episode 5:

1. Search for town wide garage sales by median income

When you try to find garage sales, Google “town wide garage sales” — you’ll find a bunch of garage sales in the same area so you don’t have to keep driving to different parts of town. 

Another hack is to search neighborhoods by “median income.” 

Hitting up neighborhoods with high median incomes will help you find neighborhoods where there might be more expensive items being sold off at a discount.

2. Silence is an effective negotiation tactic

People often miss out on good deals just because they never think to ask for lower prices.

I got these mugs at two for $5 (projected sale price is $20 a piece) just because I took two seconds to clarify what the price was. I immediately got a better deal.

Silence can also be a great negotiation tactic.

In the first garage sale, I asked if the gentleman would be okay with going down to $5 for a Vintage Budweiser light he priced at $10, and he said “no.”

Then, I just went silent.

In that silence, I gave him time to re-think his decision and whether he really wants to get rid of the item or not.

Finally, before I left, I offered to buy it for $8 and he said “yes.”

This item is the kind of product you put on Facebook marketplace and wait for a collector to come by and purchase it. I bought it for $8 and re-listed it for $80

How An Insurance Company Got Clients By Building Brand

VaynerMentors is a program part of The Sasha Group, a small business marketing agency I started dedicated to helping small businesses outgrow us. We do that through education, consulting, and marketing support. VaynerMentors is a crucial part of that process.

It’s our way of taking everything we learned working with big businesses at VaynerMedia, and using that knowledge to help smaller companies unlock their full potential.

In this case study, our team interviewed Doug Jones, Fernando Alvarez, and Luis Gazitua from JAG Insurance Group — a boutique insurance company that built a giant brand in their space after VaynerMentors.

Here’s a clip from one of our meetings that could shed some light what they got from the experience:

What did you expect when you joined the program?

At first, we didn’t fully understand what the VaynerMentors program was about, or the real value in it.

And frankly, we were pretty skeptical. We didn’t know much about social media or branding when we started, and we figured that our industry was different. We’re in the insurance business, and we didn’t think that our customers would really care whether or not we acted like a media company on social. We didn’t see the value in it.

But after talking with the VaynerMentors team, it became clear pretty quickly that the program was more than just “taking a selfie with Gary.”

We knew it had the potential to fundamentally change our business.

Was there anything in the program that surprised you?

The biggest surprise was that you guys weren’t afraid to get us to do things that we weren’t comfortable doing.

The program itself depended on us getting outside of our comfort zone. For example, putting our faces on camera and talking was a stretch – it’s just something we’d never done before.

The VaynerMentors team helped us embrace that and because of that, we’re seeing ridiculous growth after going through the eprogram. When we were done, we knew we’d grow way, way more than expected even 3-5 months out.

What kind of impact did you see in your business after VaynerMentors?

Before the program, we had virtually zero social presence. No educational content, nothing. We figured our industry was different and that since we were in the “insurance” space, social media wouldn’t be as relevant to us.  

We were dead wrong about that.

The VaynerMentors team helped us grow our brand on social in a big way – everything from the logo to the tagline, colors, content pillars, and more. They helped us craft our identity, and solidified who we are as a company.

This helped in a few ways:

As we started putting out more content aligned with our brand, our impressions, engagement, and follower growth exploded.

Before, our brand’s design and positioning were all over the place…

Now, we have consistent “pillars” of content that we put out on a daily basis:

People also got to know who we were really quickly. That first impression made a BIG difference when we walked into meetings with influential people, and they already knew about us. We also have people coming up to us all the time saying they’ve seen our content online, and it’s been a big help in getting business without having to “ask” for it.

Each one of us has also taken huge steps to building the Jag brand through ourselves – through podcasts, video content, and more.

We’ve grown from virtually nothing to 8,700 followers on our Instagram page and our LinkedIn is growing exponentially. Fernando is helping promote the business through his podcast, The Transition: Life After Sports .

New employees are coming in with a deeper understanding of who we are and what we stand for, which has led to getting great talent. We have top tier talent from the biggest companies in the world – people leave “stable” jobs to come work with us because they get pumped up from the brand.

With greater brand awareness comes a greater “respect” factor which helps in so many different ways.

When you look at the business overall, how has it grown after VaynerMentors?

We’re incredibly committed to this. We’ve invested more money in brand building than we’d ever imagined, and we’re selling more insurance than ever.

We’re spending more because we believe this is a marathon. We’re okay with “eating shit” (as Gary says) for a few years and make less money ourselves because we know it’s going to catapult us long term.

We’re already in the big leagues now with other top insurance companies. We’re everyone’s boutique choice, and the crazy thing is, we’re only six months in. Can’t wait to see where we’ll be at a few years from now.

What was the experience working with the team?

This was the most impressive part of the entire process. Mark Evans (SVP at The Sasha Group) Sid Astir (Brand Manager for Gary Vaynerchuk), and James Orsini (President of The Sasha Group) were all amazing. Everything you guys said you were going to do, you did it. Our expectations were exceeded every time with every meeting.

In addition to helping us with execution, you also helped us feel like we can actually do this. You made us feel like putting out content and being “personalities” wasn’t just for people like Gary Vaynerchuk.  

It was very clear to us that you guys a first class institution – Gary’s the face of the brand, but VaynerMentors brings such a deep level of expertise.

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Stop Demonizing Hard Work

Before I get into this article, I want to make sure I create clarity and context so no tone is lost on my POVs about hard work and success. Please watch this short video first:

Ultimately, how much you should work is a conversation of “one.” It’s a conversation you need to have with yourself.

I have no interest in imposing my will on anybody. I love working, but I also don’t want to push people to work super hard because they might have different goals. Working hard might not make them happy or fulfilled.

At the end of the day, my vlog and my content is about sharing my journey and perspectives as an entrepreneur. As someone who loves working, I’m just sharing what makes me happy and what works for me.

And at the end of the day, that’s what I want for other people – I want them to be happy.

If you’re complaining about working a job you hate, I think it makes a lot of sense to give up a little bit of short term leisure to try to solve your problems (by building a side hustle you’re passionate about) instead of escaping them through Netflix or something else.

That being said… I notice a lot of people pushing back against hard work in the recent months.

There’s this concept that you can accomplish enormous things by working “smart” without working hard.

There are a few things I have to say about this mindset…

When you’re doing what you love, work doesn’t feel like “work”

A big part of why people don’t want to work hard is because we hear stories of older people feeling regret for spending “too much time” in the office. Many people look back on their lives and wish they didn’t work as hard.

Totally respect that. I completely understand where people are coming from in that regard. I get that people have their own perspectives on what they should or shouldn’t have done, and I don’t want to judge that.

What I will say is, many of those people who spent years working for money might have enjoyed their work more if they worked hard on something they loved doing.

When you love what you do, it’s not as difficult to work hard.

For example… on this AskGaryVee episode, I took a call from a woman who was asking me how to deal with burnout from her job:

After talking to her, I quickly figured out that she wasn’t actually “burnt out”, she just hated her job and wanted to do her dog walking side business full time.

Older people today who regret working their whole lives didn’t have the internet when they were in their prime. It wasn’t nearly as practical to build side hustles back then, so it might have made sense for some people to “work less” overall to have a happier life.

But today, we have incredible options. It’s practical to use your free time to build a side hustle around something you’re passionate about and turn it into an actual business over the course of 10-11 years.

Take your two hours a night and start your baseball card business. Start your Lord of the Rings Podcast. Start your Instagram account. And work for a decade around your favorite thing.

Working hard at something you love can lead to enormous happiness over time.

Fake environments: The reason for burnout that no one talks about

Fake environments are a huge problem not too many people are talking about.

A “fake environment” is a situation where someone’s surroundings “subsidize” their success. For example… if your parents are paying for your lifestyle when you’re well into your 20s, then you’re in a fake environment. If you’re raising millions of dollars for your startup on the back of an idea, you’re in a fake environment.

A lot of startup founders these days are burning out because some of them didn’t start their career from a place of true “merit.” Some of them were able to raise a bunch of money for their startup because they went to Harvard or Stanford, not because they proved themselves to be great entrepreneurs.

So they end up in a situation where they’re “successful” on paper. They get rewarded for something that didn’t deserve a reward, so they think they’re more talented than they really are as an entrepreneur.

In many cases, it’s not actually the hard work that led to their burnout – it was the fact that they weren’t actually doing something they loved or what they were good at.

Hard work isn’t just about your leveling up your career.

Let me clarify something again:

“Hustle” isn’t just about working on building a business or taking your career to the next level.

It’s about going all-in on everything you decide to do – whether it’s the parenting of your children, the relationship with your spouse, and everything else that you deeply care about.

It just so happens that a big one for many people is figuring out how to do something they love. But it doesn’t have to end there.

It’s the only real “secret to success” to accomplish something truly meaningful and fulfilling in any area of life.

If you don’t want people to judge your work-life balance, don’t judge theirs

If you’re super happy working 9 to 5 and watching Netflix every night, that’s amazing!

But at the same time, it makes me sad to watch other people do the reverse – they try to suppress other people who genuinely enjoy hard work and try to tell them that it’ll make them unhappy long term.

This is all one big game of self-awareness. There are no universal formulas for what people “should” or “shouldn’t” do. There’s only what’s right for you.

Personally, I would go crazy if I had to sit on a farm in middle America – I love building businesses. I would go crazy managing a remote team like 37Signals – I love interacting with my employees in person every single day. But if being a farmer or running a remote team makes you happiest, then you should do that.

We need to collectively stop coming from a place of judgement and start coming from a place of empathy.

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The One Thing AI Will Destroy | DailyVee 556

In DailyVee 556, Gary talks about the impact of artificial intelligence on the world.

At the end of the day, technology eliminates commodity. That means that AI will “free” us up to do more meaningful work and things that make more of a difference, even if it does cause some short term pain. It’s all about perspective.

“Technology happens. I’d much rather be dealing with the pre-dawn days of AI than dealing with the black plague.”
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Gary starts the day holding some internal meetings in LA, then flies to Vegas for a keynote where he talks about his POV on AI and how it can improve our inefficiencies. You’ll also see his reaction to the NBA Draft Lottery, as well as an Instagram clip that you might recognize from his feed

99% of the Tests in School Don’t Matter | Veecap

Gary dropped some insightful gems on school and education in today’s DailyVee that set the theme for this episode:

If you’re stressing about tests in school, you’re more likely to grow up and stress out about other “micro” goals that just don’t matter. You might become the type of person who’s trying to win awards instead of chasing “macro” goals like happiness.

Becoming a successful human being is about going beyond the “micro” and into the “macro.”

“The sooner you stop stressing about tests in school is the beginning of you navigating a happier life.” – Gary Vaynerchuk

In DailyVee 555, Gary crushed a bunch of meetings in NYC fresh off the first Trash Talk of 2019. You’ll see some glimpses of Trash Talk 4 being produced, and some powerful meetings with some young entrepreneurs.

Here are some time stamps of fun moments you can skip to:

2:39: Why Gary doesn’t stop at yellow lights (life advice, not driving advice)

3:40: Behind the scenes moments from Trash Talk 4

4:36: The only thing Gary has done wrong

7:19: The value of authenticity, and what Gary really wants for his audience

9:47:  The real reason Gary loves baseball cards.

The post 99% of the Tests in School Don’t Matter | Veecap appeared first on GaryVaynerchuk.com.

4 Leadership Strategies of Great CEOs

As a CEO of a large organization that has grown quickly (from zero to $200 million+), I have a lot of POVs on leadership strategies that lead to strong internal culture and business results.

Here are a few concepts that I don’t see too many others talking about:

1. Look out for the “iceberg”

I stood in front of my entire company last September and rolled out a new vision for how we’re going to service clients, and 98% of them thought I was out of my mind. They didn’t believe in what I was saying at all.

Some of them thought I was like the “crazy founder” who has wild ideas on marketing opportunities that can’t actually be implemented in reality.

But I wasn’t upset about it. The truth is, if you have full, 100% buy-in from your employees, you’re in a dangerous spot.

There should be some sort of friction between a CEO or founder who sees everything that’s ahead and the people who are in the trenches. They both have different mindsets, experiences, and factors to take into account in their day-to-day.

The best analogy I can give is looking out for an iceberg.

As the captain of the ship, I’m at the top watching for icebergs and letting everyone know what we should do to avoid them. But if my employees are downstairs, they’re not seeing the same thing I see and they might disagree.

Leaders need to understand what’s happening next. Employees execute on the current and overvalue the past.

That’s something that should be expected. If you’re a leader, it’s your job to communicate.

2. Understand you’re a parent, not a babysitter

This is a huge difference between great CEOs and ones that aren’t. Great CEOs understand that they’re a parent, bad CEOs think they’re babysitters.

For example, I let people in my company do their thing. I don’t micromanage. I’m just watching and supporting as time goes on. 

With my management style, my biggest vulnerability is creating entitlement. In other words, my ability to create top-line revenue and fix problems can sometimes give leaders within my company a false sense that they’re the ones executing and getting results within their departments.

As a “parent”, I always think a lot about giving people room to try, fail, and learn – but at the same time, helping them be capable of executing at high levels on their own so that they can still win without me.    

Great CEOs sometimes seek out difficult situations and make decisions that the organization isn’t ready for. They might even make decisions that they themselves aren’t ready for.

If you’re a leader, it’s your job to make those moves that you know are right for the company in the macro, even if it causes some tension with executives or team members in the micro.

3. Make your employees feel safe

This is the number one thing I try to do as a leader. I try to make people feel safe around me.

Safety helps create speed in business for a couple of reasons:

First, when people aren’t spending time thinking how to navigate a situation, they’re spending time executing. When they’re executing, the entire machine moves faster and produces higher output.

Second, people are able to get to the punchline much faster than they otherwise would which helps me save time.

For example, there are a lot of meetings I sit in that I know are just  “disguises” for an ask or a sale on the back end. When I feel that’s the case, I immediately try to make the other person feel comfortable asking me for what they want right away.

I don’t need people to spend 45 minutes on a “set up” for a sale – I need them to be honest about the expectations they have of me.

It’s on me to create a safe environment where they feel comfortable sharing their intentions up front.

4. Understand that you work for your employees, they don’t work for you

This one is hard for a lot of leaders to understand.

Most new managers think that becoming a manager is the “graduation.” Truth is, it’s the reverse.

Leaders work for their employees.

That means you have to understand what your employees want at a deep level. You have to be constantly adapting to their needs and what they want from the organization.

For example, one of my employees might want higher pay when he’s 24. But maybe he falls in love at 28 and decides he wants to spend more time with his family. Another might be more interested in a fancy title. Another might want to get access to me and build a relationship.

Another might want to go to one of our international offices and work there.

There are a million different variables, and it’s on you as a leader to adjust to reality as it changes.

When you go from being someone who “executes” to someone who’s managing a team, you go from trading on IQ to trading on EQ. You go from doing the actual work to listening to employees, catering to what they want, taking blame, and being the bigger person.

The best managers are actually the best mentors.

Please share this article on Twitter if you got value from it!

Check out this 71-minute business consultation I gave to CEOs and marketers at Vayner4Ds:

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My New Show for Kids: “The Adventures of Lil’ Vee”

I’ve always believed that “scratching your own itch” is the best business model.

When I was a little kid, I watched Saturday morning cartoons, and I loved them. I loved the excitement of looking forward to Saturdays to watch those shows.

I’m excited to announce the first episode of “The Adventures of Lil’ Vee”, which is exactly the cartoon I would have watched from 1981 – 1988 as a kid who loved selling stuff.

This announcement is for anyone who has young children in their family, or teachers with a classroom of young kids.

Over the years, I’ve gotten a lot of emails and messages from parents and teachers who wish they could share my content more.

The biggest thing I’m trying to do through my content is show people how it’s possible to be a successful entrepreneur while being a good, kind person at the same time. I’m trying to put positivity, empathy, kindness, and optimism on a pedestal for the next generation.

I’m aware that my content isn’t always the most conducive to kids because of my cursing, but I really want to be able to share my message with them in a relevant and contextual way … aka an animated YouTube kids series.

The show is inspired by the sorts of things I did as a kid (like selling lemonade and baseball cards), but contextualized for the modern world.

For example… in the first episode, Lil’ Vee gets an idea to make slime and sell it in school. He goes through the process of figuring out how to make something that people like and sell it to other people.

The Adventures of Lil’ Vee is built to entertain kids first, open their eyes up to what’s possible in business (especially if they’re showing some early signs of entrepreneurial talent), and show them how empathy and kindness can be cool.

The first episode is a pilot to get as much feedback as possible, dying to hear your thoughts

Announcing the GaryVee 004

If you’ve been watching my vlogs recently, you’ve probably seen me rocking a new pair of K-Swiss sneakers…

Today, I’m excited to finally talk about it