Gary Vaynerchuk's Blog, page 49

2017 Key to Small Business Social Media Marketing

Here’s my 2017 New Year’s resolution to you: I want you to focus on your organic social media reach for the next year. As we wrap up 2016, I’ve been reviewing my core strategy for my personal brand and why it matters for all of my clients, small business friends, contemporaries, and others putting out branded content. Over the past year, I got really serious about putting out content on YouTube, Facebook, Snapchat, and, most recently, Instagram as they introduced new platform features.

Take a look at this Google Trends chart:

This is what you see when you type in “Gary Vaynerchuk.”

A lot happened this year with my personal brand. But, what’s most fascinating to me is the minimal amount of money I put behind paid advertising. Yes, I put money behind some YouTube pre-rolls and paid for the amplification of some Facebook video, but not to the levels of what the majority of you spend (or would spend) to see big results.

When you start to really understanding what social media is today (in 2016) and where it’s going in 2017, you start realizing that social media is just the slang term for the current state of the internet.

Here’s the key statement: In 2017, if you are a business or organization of any kind that wants to be heard in the world, refocusing on the content you put out on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, YouTube, Linkedin, Medium, and whatever else has the market’s attention at the time, is a huge factor.

For the last two to three years, people have dismissed organic content because of the rise of paid advertising. And yes, paid social media has enormous upside and incredible and, in my opinion, is the best deal in all of advertising (aside from advertising during the Super Bowl). However, what has emerged in the paranoia of everyone thinking social media only works when you spend money, is a lack of hustle and a lack of understanding that great content, especially when amplified in subtle ways, can be unbelievably effective.

What I mean by “amplified in subtle ways” is that, for example, if you just start using the proper hashtags on Instagram, you can easily start being discovered over time. Whether you’re a local pizza shop or a car dealership, or an artist, or rapper, or a Fortune 500 B2B company, using hashtags is an unbelievably organic way to hit discoverability and create amplification for your content. And if you have paid media dollars, even just spending $100-300 a week on the amplification of your YouTube and Facebook video content, it can make your content explode.

Here’s the thing: no amount of paid media is going to turn bad creative into good content. It’s the same way that no amount of VC money is going to save a bad product. That’s why you need to invest in the long-game of improving your brand’s content (and you do that by creating a lot of it).

Basically, here’s my overall belief: if you’re a small business, you want to focus on spending your time, money, and effort on creating great content (and a lot of it). You should be spending $85,000 a year on creating quality content and only another $35,000 on paid amplification—not the other way around. It excites me to no end to think about the fact that most small business (and even A-list personalities) waste $250,000-500,000 a year on tactics like websites, PR, direct mail, or paid media when they could have just gone all in on organic social content and a small amplification budget to achieve more valuable results.

The biggest thing people don’t understand is that quality content is so important to marketing to anyone under the age of 40 right now. Anyone in that demographic discovers a business for the first time by either: (A) Google searching or (B) finding their content on social media. If you are not crushing it and focusing on the content that you put out on the most important social platforms, you’re going to become mute and obsolete in the modern day of doing business. That’s why organic reach is so important because the impression you get when someone comes directly to your page is a much more qualified lead and potentially a more valuable customer than someone you got through an ad buy.

No amount of paid media is going to turn bad creative into good content.

There’s plenty of different paid tactics (Facebook Advertising, Instagram influencer marketing, YouTube pre-rolls, Snapchat new ad product, etc.) that will help grow your audience, but the opportunity to get very serious about the content that you put out in an organic way on social networks matter. Why? Because it is the most natural and current state of the internet. While the supply and demand shift for paid media becomes more saturated, it leaves an incredible opening for the brands that make great content to grow the right way.

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Why I Started the #60SecClub

If you missed my Facebook Live this week, you probably missed my announcement for my #60SecClub!

Here’s the deal: over the next year, I want to reward the hardcore fans of my community. It’s just another way I want to give back and reward all of you who devote their attention and care about my content.

How it Works

For all of 2017, I’m going to be doing random giveaways to my community. What can you get? Here are just some random ideas:

Concert tickets
Phone calls with me
Signed books
New tech like: Snapchat Spectacles, Google Pixels, iPhone 8
Getting to see me film Planet of the Apps
Pairs of Yeezys
A car (definitely probably a car)
A house?

Basically, anything that’s hot and in the moment. And yes, if it’s going somewhere the flights will probably be included…

Document, Don’t create: Creating Content that Builds Your Personal Brand

If you want people to start listening to you, you have to show up. What I mean by this is there are a lot of you out there who aren’t producing enough articles or videos or pieces of content that you should be produced to build your influence. Too many “content creators” think that they only have one at bat—they have to make the one, most beautifully created video or image or rant on Facebook.

But what they don’t realize is that their hunger to make the perfect piece of content is what’s actually crippling them.

It’s true that if you want to be seen or heard on social media, you have to put out valuable content on a regular basis. You should be doing a YouTube vlog or podcast or some sort of long-form audio/video series at least once a week. You should be posting on Instagram and/or Snapchat stories at least 6-7 times a day.

Now you’re probably thinking: “Whoa, that’s a lot. How do I create 6-7 meaningful things a day?”

I’ll give you the biggest tip when it comes to content creation: Document. Don’t create.

In very simple terms, “documenting” versus “creating” is what The Real World and the Kardashians is to Star Wars and Friends. And don’t get confused—just because you’re “documenting” doesn’t mean you’re not creating content. It’s just a version of creating that is predicated more on practicality instead of having to think of stories or fantasy—something that’s very hard for most people (including myself).

Think about it: you can ponder about the strategy behind every post and fabricate yourself into this “influential person”… or you can just be yourself.

Creating this influential persona might seem especially hard if you’re just someone starting to climb the ladder. And I get it—for some of you there’s a lot of pressure in that. You think that some 30 or 40 or 50-year old is going to listen to your rant video with cynicism and think “what does this kid know?”

But, one of the biggest mistakes people make when creating content for their personal brand is trying to oversell themselves because they think that’s what’s going to get people’s attention. Whether you’re a business coach or motivational speaker or artist, I think it’s much more fruitful to talk about your process than about the actual advice you “think” you should be giving them.

Documenting your journey versus creating an image of yourself is the difference between saying “You should…” versus “my intuition says…”. Get it? It changes everything. I believe that the people who are willing to discuss their journeys instead of trying to front themselves as the “next big thing” are going to win.

So, when I say to put out those 6-7 meaningful pieces of content a day, just pick up your smartphone, open Facebook Live, and just start talking about the things most important to you. Because in the end, the creative (or how “beautiful” someone thinks your content is) is going to be subjective. What’s not subjective is the fact that you need to start putting yourself out there and keep swinging.

Starting is the most important part and the biggest hurdle that most people are facing. They’re pondering and strategizing instead of making. They’re debating what’s going to happen when they haven’t even looked at what’s in front of them.

So do me a favor and start documenting.

“Okay, I started Gary. Now what?” you ask? Keep doing it for another five years and then come back to me before you ask again.

Document, Don’t Create: The Secret to Creating Content For Your Personal Brand

If you want people to start listening to you, you have to show up. What I mean by this is there are a lot of you out there who aren’t producing enough articles or videos or pieces of content that you should be produced to build your influence. Too many “content creators” think that they only have one at bat—they have to make the one, most beautifully created video or image or rant on Facebook.

But what they don’t realize is that their hunger to make the perfect piece of content is what’s actually crippling them.

It’s true that if you want to be seen or heard on social media, you have to put out valuable content on a regular basis. You should be doing a YouTube vlog or podcast or some sort of long-form audio/video series at least once a week. You should be posting on Instagram and/or Snapchat stories at least 6-7 times a day.

Now you’re probably thinking: “Whoa, that’s a lot. How do I create 6-7 meaningful things a day?”

I’ll give you the biggest tip when it comes to content creation: Document. Don’t create.

In very simple terms, “documenting” versus “creating” is what The Real World and the Kardashians is to Star Wars and Friends. And don’t get confused—just because you’re “documenting” doesn’t mean you’re not creating content. It’s just a version of creating that is predicated more on practicality instead of having to think of stories or fantasy—something that’s very hard for most people (including myself).

Think about it: you can ponder about the strategy behind every post and fabricate yourself into this “influential person”… or you can just be yourself.

Creating this influential persona might seem especially hard if you’re just someone starting to climb the ladder. And I get it—for some of you there’s a lot of pressure in that. You think that some 30 or 40 or 50-year old is going to listen to your rant video with cynicism and think “what does this kid know?”

But, one of the biggest mistakes people make when creating content for their personal brand is trying to oversell themselves because they think that’s what’s going to get people’s attention. Whether you’re a business coach or motivational speaker or artist, I think it’s much more fruitful to talk about your process than about the actual advice you “think” you should be giving them.

Documenting your journey versus creating an image of yourself is the difference between saying “You should…” versus “my intuition says…”. Get it? It changes everything. I believe that the people who are willing to discuss their journeys instead of trying to front themselves as the “next big thing” are going to win.

So, when I say to put out those 6-7 meaningful pieces of content a day, just pick up your smartphone, open Facebook Live, and just start talking about the things most important to you. Because in the end, the creative (or how “beautiful” someone thinks your content is) is going to be subjective. What’s not subjective is the fact that you need to start putting yourself out there and keep swinging.

Starting is the most important part and the biggest hurdle that most people are facing. They’re pondering and strategizing instead of making. They’re debating what’s going to happen when they haven’t even looked at what’s in front of them.

So do me a favor and start documenting.

“Okay, I started Gary. Now what?” you ask? Keep doing it for another five years and then come back to me before you ask again.

Two Secrets to Staying Motivated & Hungry

People ask me how I constantly stay so competitive and motivated. It’s tough for me to answer this question for others because for me, being motivated is hard wired. It started for me at a very young age. Whether it was playing AJ in basketball or negotiating the best spot to sell my baseball cards, I was always hungry for the win. I always hated the look on somebody’s face when that person beat me at something. I am very visceral to that feeling; I hate it.

But when I really think about it, being hungry is a perspective. It’s the genuine understanding that you only have one life and a certain amount of time to accomplish everything you want to do. Because of that, there are two major factors (that seem at odds) that can drive your motivation: 1. Selfishness and 2. Gratitude. You have to be selfish with the time you have left and grateful for the time you’ve had.

Selfishness

When I say “being selfish” I’m not talking about money. I’m looking for legacy. If you told me that I could have $500 million and the narrative of my career in the advertising world at VaynerMedia was, “He did a nice job—He did well for himself and he made money” or I could have $200 million and the narrative would be, “He mentally changed how the industry thought about attention,” there’s no question which one I would choose. It’s more important to me to have the impact and the legacy. I’d much rather be known as the guy who changed the wine or advertising industry than the dollars associated with either.

What makes this easy for me is that I genuinely enjoy the process more than the things the process can get me. I love putting in the work. I love the grind. I always value the victory over the fruits of the victory. It’s a great mindset to have and if you can shift your perspective that way, it will help you stay motivated too.

Gratitude

Most of the time when people ask me about motivation, 80% of the time I attribute it to gratitude. If you want real fuel to win, be grateful.

Gratitude is what has gotten me through my toughest moments in business. Whenever I have lost a deal to a competitor, or an incredible employee, or millions of dollars in revenue, I default to gratitude. Why? Because I recognize that even if bought the Jets tomorrow, none of it would matter to me at all if I got a call the next day that someone I love was sick or had died. You’d be surprised then how quickly I would stop giving a crap about business. It comes from a dark place, but it’s true.

Knowing that I was born in Belarus in the former Soviet Union, probably the least capitalist place in the whole world—and having had the serendipity of being able to come to the most remarkable country on earth when I was three—I have a full perspective on where I come from. I got really lucky that what I’m great at (entrepreneurship and business) is really appreciated in the US.

My perspective on both the health and wellness of my family, as well as where I came from, allows me to handle anything and everything. My gratitude allows me to step away from any issues and remind me of all the great things I’ve been given.

It’s impossible not to stay motivated or get too down when you’re feeling grateful.

Be grateful for the time you have and selfish with the time you have left.

Being motivated is all about a mental shift in perspective. It’s the understanding that time is your number one asset; you have to do right by it by being grateful with the time you’ve had and selfish with the time you have left.

You have to make the most out of the one life you get. This “you’re going to die” mindset might be considered dark, but it helps me stay motivated very easily. The selfishness of legacy over the currency, along with the urgency of a limited amount of time, adds up to competitiveness and drive. Because, who really knows what tomorrow brings? That’s what keeps me hungry.

Motivation isn’t everything—it’s only half the battle. It’s easy to get motivated, but it’s hard to execute. Remember: Ideas are shit until you execute. For more on that, check out this episode of the #AskGaryVee Show:

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The #AskGaryVee AudioBook Chapter 17: Self-Awareness

Even if you’ve read my book, you should listen to this free audio chapter I put out. Why?

When it comes to reading out loud, I’m atrocious at it. Like, really terrible. Even reading my kids bedtime stories is intimidating to me. So, when I had to record the audio version of #AskGaryVee, there was only one thing I could do: answer the questions again—without the script.

So even if you have the book, there’s a good chance that these answers are going to be totally different.

Introducing VaynerTalent: The Future of Personal Branding

If you didn’t already catch my huge announcement in Episode 80 of DailyVee, I wanted to loop you in on VaynerTalent–VaynerMedia’s latest offering for established and emerging talent.

1. What is VaynerTalent?

One of the things I think is really good idea in business is to scratch your own itch and scale from there. Over the last year, I’ve gotten really serious about testing a thesis I have: the mobile device is becoming the television and the television is becoming the radio. VaynerTalent is our move into a whitespace that we believe exists for people who are trying to build businesses around their personal brands and the stories they want to tell.

VaynerTalent is taking advantage of what we see as a fragmented marketplace between public relations, social media managers, and production companies. We achieve this by replicating what we have been able to do successfully around me and my personal brand. I have built a team around me who can attack those marketplace fragments by scaling my time and ability to produce and distribute content strategically.

VaynerTalent is able to produce content at scale for established and emerging talent. We create a meaningful piece of content, like a weekly show (think #AskGaryVee and DailyVee), as well as enormous amounts of social content for those clients who are extremely busy, but find the value in making a substantial investment in building their personal businesses.

On VaynerTalent, we achieve this by replicating what we have been able to do successfully around me and my personal brand.

2. Why is now the right time for the market?

I think there’s enough scale for individuals to go direct-to-consumer. You used to need a production company and a television network and agents and PR people to say “hello” to the world. That world has changed and we think we’ve got the right ingredients to help those individuals who want to take advantage of the opportunity.

You used to need a production company and a television network and agents and PR people to say “hello” to the world. That world has changed.

3. How is this different from the representation, management, or PR that some talent already has?

VaynerTalent does not eliminate the role of a talent agent or manager. And, while I don’t think it eliminates a PR person either, I do think it puts more pressure on traditional PR and “junior talent” in the social media realm to justify their value prop to a celebrity or emerging celebrity. I think it also goes after production companies as this is more of a modern day production company than anything else.

We build a team that can scale time and the ability to produce and distribute content strategically.

4. Who should be using this product?

Anybody who isn’t one of the 100 biggest stars today should take a very deep look at working with us because I think it brings a lot of value. After six months to one year of work, VaynerTalent could elevate the demand and size of the opportunities that the talent gets. For example: television shows, motion pictures, speaking fees, artist collaborations, and book deals. This product is also for the business-driven person who can afford the financial commitment (starting at $25k/month), has a talent or skill in a niche, and wants to become the biggest or one of the biggest names within that genre.

VaynerTalent is able to produce content at scale for established and emerging talent starting with their pillar content.

5. What can VaynerTalent clients expect to receive?

Starting at $25k a month, our clients can expect a full 2017 blueprint on how to build awareness around their talents, passions, stories, and skills that creates endless business opportunities. Clients can also expect a signature piece of pillar content, like a podcast, web show, or a vlog, and enormous amounts of quality written, video, and image content combined with social growth strategies, analytics, and insights for the most relevant platforms and audiences. Over a two to three year period of time, this will build enormous leverage for much bigger financial upside in the ways to monetize a personality. This can include anything from selling merchandise to networking new business opportunities.

Clients can expect a signature piece of pillar content that, in turn, produces a huge monthly output of content that is optimized for relevant platforms.

Interested in learning more? Contact Lindsay Blum below:

Product starts at $25k/monthly.

NameEmail*

Subject*Select OneVaynerTalentYour Message*

Download the info deck here.

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#AskGaryVee Book Winners 2-Hour Q&A Marathon

Back in early 2016, I had a contest for people who purchased my book and they could come in and do a 2-hour Q&A jam session with me. This is it!

 

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Mastermind Talks Keynote 2016

This Q&A was amazing. Here’s some of the stuff we covered:

Building my personal brand
What it means to be in a Snapchat universe
The attention graph—where the consumers’ attention is
My late night “jam” sessions with Chris Sacca at SXSW
Why AJ left VaynerMedia
Getting my health into shape
What it’s like staffing a 700-person company
Why I never let my son score a basket on me
The stuff I’m hot on: virtual reality, meditation, and e-sports

Check it out:

 

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Community Accomplishments: The Best Deal on Snapchat

In the second installment of the Community Accomplishment series, I want to continue to highlight other success stories from the VaynerNation. It never ceases to amaze me how humbling it is to hear your wins.

This story comes from Chris Hall who reached out to me last month about his success using custom Snapchat geofilters for his startup. He was not only able to get as low as $.001 CPMs, but also landed some new opportunities as an entrepreneur. I had my team sit down with him to get the details.

Here’s his story from my team’s meeting with him:

Chris Hall is a 22-year-old New Yorker and co-founder of Kickster, an app that helps you track sneaker release dates and the hype culture around it. Chris started out as a freelance photographer and quit school after only one semester at Hunter College because his photography career was taking off. However, he had a passion for tech and started Kickster when he and his friends saw an emerging whitespace in the sneaker community.

Prior to reading Gary’s article on Snapchat’s on-demand geofilters, he had only been using Snapchat for his own personal use. His only marketing experience in social media came from working with a non-profit where he helped to manage content creation and social analytics.

With his limited experience, Chris was inspired by Gary’s article to give Snapchat’s custom geofilters a shot. To help promote Kickster, he started creating filters and targeting locations where he knew sneakerheads would be gathering, such as retail stores that were hosting sneaker release events, nightclubs, high schools, and college campuses. His initial tests gave good results, so he continued to deploy them as a tactic to build Kickster’s brand.

Around the same time, DJ Khaled, already famous from the industry music and one of the biggest self-proclaimed sneakerheads, continued his meteoric rise by becoming incredibly popular on Snapchat. Taking a note from Gary about the importance of influencers, Chris thought it would be a good idea to target Khaled’s events–something he didn’t think would be so easy. Chris would religiously watch Khaled’s Snapchat Stories to find out what events Khaled would be attending. When Chris found out that Khaled would be at Stadium Goods in NYC for a sneaker event, he seized the opportunity. He made the filter below and paid only $17.54 to target one street for seven hours.

Kickster’s first attempt at geo-targeting DJ Khaled’s lead to $0.001 CPMs.

Those $17.54 went a long way. Not only was he able to get $.001 CPMs, but witnessed thousands of Kickster downloads over the next 24 hours (over 10.5 million views of the filter). “It was too good to be true,” he told us.

Since, Chris has vigilantly followed Khaled’s events to find the next geo-location to target his filters. He attributes the high view count to the fact that Khaled ended up using Chris’s Kickster filters more often than the official brand-sponsored ones. Most recently he placed Kickster geofilters for Khaled and his fans at Beyonce’s Formation Tour. He used the same creative, only changing the name of the city on the filter for each new tour location. Over the course of the tour, Kickster’s filters amassed over 95M+ views.

Of course, the benefits weren’t just for Kickster. “During the tour, I met someone from Khaled’s team at an event,” Chris told us. “We started to keep in touch on how I could help them with their filters in the future.” And it’s not just Khaled’s team who noticed. “Kanye’s producers found out about what I was doing and contacted me about brainstorming on how I could help their artists.” He is now officially creating filters for the entire Saint Pablo tour after-parties. Chris is currently collaborating with with other A-list artists too. His successful campaigns have allowed him to start a side business where he runs similar strategies for other companies in other industries.

For Chris, it all ladders back to Kickster. “Discovering this medium has done a few things for me: It completely solidified Kickster as the leader in sneaker apps. Everywhere I go, people know us from the filters at Kanye’s/Beyonce’s/Khaled’s events.”

“I just can’t believe Snapchat even lets people do this. I’m getting millions of views off of

a filter that costs only a few dollars to place.” Chris has noticed, however, that Snapchat has raised its prices to target geofilters on stadiums. He used to get 21.6M views at Citi Field for less than $150. Now, it’s a $2,000 minimum. It just proves that it’s advantageous to be a first mover.

Chris is continuing to use Snapchat custom geofilters to grow Kickster’s brand. Kickster currently has over 200,000 downloads in the Apple App store.

If you enjoyed the story, read my $.02 below:

What Chris has done is a great example of two strategies I deploy: (1) attention arbitrage and (2) brand marketing over sales.

A lot of times I talk about “attention arbitrage” as a platform, whether it’s email marketing, Google Adwords, YouTube, Twitter, Facebook video, or Snapchat. But within every platform, there are always new moves inside of it.

What does this mean?

Even if you’re not a first mover on a platform, you can be a first mover on a new feature.

Snapchat offering on-demand geofilters is an example where you can easily get a first mover advantage. For the people who weren’t on Snapchat last year and think they missed out, they could have been the first to move on this feature. There are always going to be new feature builds on these platforms that will allow people to be first movers.

Think about real estate when people buy up entire neighborhoods before they become hot. There are a lot of people who think they might have missed out making money on Manhattan real estate, but they were the first to make money on that property they bought in Dumbo, Brooklyn.

This is also a very good example of branding and marketing over sales. Too many of you are not excited about Snapchat filters because it’s not something that’s clickable and trackable to a transaction. This is classic branding and needs to be understood. Sometimes it’s about the long game; not immediate ROI.

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