Gary Vaynerchuk's Blog, page 57

Leaving Money On the Table to Win the War

If you are a computer repair salesman, and I tell you to make videos about how to repair computers, you might think of it as losing business. You’re probably thinking: “How does teaching my customers how to solve their problems for free get me more customers?” But the truth is this: you’ll get all the sales in the end.

Something that a lot of you aren’t understanding about the content business is that you’re in it for the long run. It’s a long term game. When you throw your jabs, you’re not just putting out content for the sake of it. You’re not doing it just to bait your customer into a right hook and make a quick buck. You’re building trust and leverage. And that takes a while.

It’s exactly what I did with WineLibraryTV. I could have been pushing inventory that we overstocked. I could have been trying to sell wines I knew we needed to sell. But I didn’t do that. Instead, I built up years and years of expertise to brand myself as “America’s wine guy”. I wanted to become a trusted resource.

So if you, as a computer repairman, put out thirty second videos on Facebook and ten second clips on Snapchat about common problems, little things people can fix themselves, it will be better for you in the long run. Of course there are probably common problems you see every day that take you a second to fix and you can make a quick $50. Instead, educate the masses. Gain authority and trust. Because authority and trust are what then become deal flow for even bigger business.

I did it with WineLibraryTV and it’s exactly what I am doing with my content now. I give away so much free content and advice—the same kind of advice that someone else might charge $89 for in the form of a masterclass or e-book. But doing the right thing in a net-net game is always the right choice. I don’t want to make you guys pay; I want to provide that value upfront.

I may lose the microbattle—I’m leaving a lot of money on the table by not monetizing my content. Do you know how many people are selling Snapchat advice right now? Meanwhile, I was the person who got them using the platform in the first place.

All I ask for a book purchase every few years, and many people won’t even buy that. In fact, I’m just going to say it: I am 100% losing the microbattle.

But I’m going to win the war.

I’m not trying to get the dollars right this second. I’m trying to build up leverage. And look where it’s gotten me: I’ve been on the cover of magazines. I’ve built a $100 million business. I’m the one with three New York Times best selling books.

Does it hurt that I don’t win the microgame? Of course. I could easily charge a premium to access my content. But it feels better to be on the right side of history. It feels good to see the comments and emails from my community of people who get value out of it.

Maybe some day I’ll figure out how to win the microbattle, but for right now, I’m more than content to take the war.

Content is King, But Context is God

It’s no secret that we are living in an era where everybody is a media company. This is something I have said time and time again, and I will continue to push it because I truly believe that content is the best way to market a product today. Provide value to consumers by creating  helpful videos or new recipes or funny cartoons. Give them something they actually want because that content builds up the relationship that then allows you to ask for the sale.

Jab, jab, jab, right hook. Provide value, provide value, provide value, ask for the sale.

But people forget that, now more than ever, great content is predicated on context.

You’ve probably heard this one from me before: “Content is king, but context is God.” I love that that line is quoted so much, but I want to make sure everyone has the tools necessary to execute on that.



I explain it best way back on Episode 8 of the #AskGaryVee Show, in the video below. It just goes to show that context is just as important now as it was a year ago:

Three Tips on Creating Context for Your Audience

So, what are my top tips for making sure the context is clear? Here are three to get you started:

1) Respect the platform and audience

First, you’ve got to respect your platforms. Respect the psychology of what people are doing when they’re on the platform. I know a forty-year-old woman is in a different mindset when she’s on Facebook than when she’s on Pinterest. And that is how I storytell to her. I know on Pinterest she has intent to shop and on Facebook she’s keeping up with her world. So I strategize around that: the psychology and the platform itself.

Secondly, respect your audience. You have to put out content that she will like rather than content that you will like. Yes, I’d like to sell a bottle of wine. But, if I put it in a way that is more interesting to her, I can make huge strides with her as a consumer. “Five Bottles Under $10 that Help You Get Through the Day When you Have 8 year old Kids.” When you do that, you’ll get into a game that gives you a better chance.

That’s really all there is to it. Respecting the platform. Respecting your audience. And finally, taking your agenda, and making it third.

2) Don’t interrupt the experience

If you’re truly making good content, and taking into account the context in which that content will be consumed, it won’t interrupt a consumer. If someone is trying to watch a video, the last thing they want is to sit through an ad and wait to see what they really wanted to see because of something you forced them to watch. Got it? The context is so important here. Meet consumers in their day in authentic ways.

I often tell the story of a negative experience I had with an Acura ad. I was on ESPN on mobile and trying to click out of a pop up ad, but it ended up clicking through to Acura’s website instead. My experience was actually sold back to Acura as an “impression” and a “click through.” Which, for you non-marketers, means intent or interest. And yet nothing could be further from the truth. I had no intent or interest whatsoever. Acura stole my most precious asset: time.

Don’t get me wrong—I’m not mad at ESPN. It’s not their fault why I’ll never buy an Acura.

Why? Because ESPN brings me value. I like them. I want to go there for a quick score or read a headline. So I’m willing to be annoyed for a second because they are bringing me value. Acura, on the other hand, is bothering my experience with an ad and is not bringing me any value whatsoever. Obviously they are bringing someone else value somewhere in the world, and that’s cool. But if they’re trying to bring me in as a new customer, they are failing.

The context in which the consumer experiences your product for the first time matters so much. Do not roadblock them; bring them value.

3) Be consistent and self aware

Every single tweet, every comment you leave, every post, every image you make becomes part of your brand. Period. Every time you post, you need to be laddering it back to your brand’s goals. Your core story needs to be consistent and your personality needs to be constant too. Doing this sets up a larger narrative, the broad context, for your content to succeed and have a clear message.

What you have to do is reverse engineer: think back to the goal at hand. If you have a clear north star for your company, you can always refer to it when needed. And scaling that north star to everyone in the company, whether it’s an entry level employee or VP, is crucial to making sure the context stays consistent.

I am a big fan of the learn by osmosis method to scale my company’s goals. Spend as much time with your employees as you can; make it a priority. I’ve talked a lot about how everything stems from the top when it comes to company culture. The same goes for creating context around your company. People will see and view your business by how you choose to make it happen and if you are able to spend a good amount of time with leadership and communicate your thoughts, it will trickle down.

Those are just three things off the top of my head that can help you improve context and thus, your content.

Chapter 7 of my new book, The #AskGaryVee Book, talks all about content and context along with more tactics and tips. It would mean so much to me if you picked up a copy.

Communication Between Co-Founders & Understanding My Business Competition: #AskGaryVee Episode 187

Honestly, this episode was one of the best ever. I was kind of sick, but somehow it made me much more thoughtful. Definitely one for the history books, with lots of actionable advice and deep thoughts. Do you agree?

Questions answered on this episode

How did you scale VaynerMedia so quickly?
You mentioned that everyone should publicly documenting ones journey, but isn’t advertising inexperience hurtful when seeking paying clients?
How would you market a company that makes custom animated Instagram videos for companies?
How would you deal with a cofounder who isn’t as ambitious as you?
How do you approach competition?

Resources from this episode

DailyVee Episode 018
One Thing I Didn’t Talk About in Jab Jab Jab Right Hook
My newest article on content and context

Question of the day

What is one thing you have learned about yourself this year?

Exclusive Virtual Q&A Book Tour Event

VaynerNation,

I’m fired up to announce that I’m going to do an exclusive 30-minute virtual Q&A event for my book tour. The ticket to this event will only be open to individuals who have purchased an #AskGaryVee book from independent bookstores found on indiebound.org. Buy the book through the closest indie bookstore near you and then email your receipt to askgaryveetour@gmail.com.

The private Spreecast will take place on Saturday 2:30pm EST. Only those who have bought a book through an indie bookstore and have sent us their receipt will be invited. If you bought a book from a bookstore previous to this message, you will also gain entrance, but please send us your proof of purchase from an indie store in order to receive the private link. If your local book store doesn’t have any copies at the physical location you can still order through the indie store online!

I’m absolutely blown away by all the support and reviews I’ve gotten on the book so far. Thank you so so much.

How to Grow Your Snapchat Following & Paying for Social Media Usernames: #AskGaryVee Episode 186

In this episode, we get super tactical when it comes to growing your Snapchat following and who actually owns user names on social platforms.

 

 

Questions answered on this episode

Who owns our usernames? Us or the app? What happens if the app came around today and said that they are charging for your username? Would you pay to keep it?
If you’re trying to establish a legal firm, real estate sales team, a management consultant practice, are you better suited marketing your brand and your new company or focusing on the people with the skills who can bring value to your clients? Market the firm or the person?
Is Twitter making a comeback with their recent addition of GIFs?
How do we grow our Snapchat followers?

Resources from this episode

Order the #AskGaryVee Book
Everything  You Need to Know About The #AskGaryVee Show

Question of the day

Expand on the last rant: tactics vs. religion, quantity vs. quality, branding vs. numbers. I’d love your thoughts on that answer.

The One Thing I Didn’t Clarify Enough in Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook

My fourth book is about to come out in just over a week. In the anticipation for it’s launch, I’ve been thinking back on my past three books; I still stand by everything I’ve said in every single one.

But in my third book, Jab Jab Jab Right Hook, there is one big clarification I should have made.

For those who may not be familiar, my entire business philosophy pretty much revolves around the jab jab jab right hook method. Jabs are the value you provide your customers with: the content you put out, the good things you do to convey your appreciation. And the right hook is the ask: it’s when you go in for the sale, ask for a subscribe, ask for a donation.

You gotta throw some jabs before you throw your right hook.

My favorite analogy to illustrate the difference between jabs and right hooks are cartoons from the 1980s. When the Transformers cartoon was on Saturday mornings, you would tune in and watch for free. You’d do the same with The Carebears. Or GI Joe. You’d watch the cartoons and not have to pay a dime. But when the movie or new action figure or toy came out, you went and paid for that. Cartoons were the jabs that pulled you in so you would then pay for the movie or toy.

Everyone seems to get what I mean when I explain what jabs and right hooks are. But people are fundamentally misunderstanding one major part of that formula. And I want to clear that up now.

What People Don’t Understand About Right Hooks

Just because you jab and jab and jab, doesn’t mean you automatically get to land the right hook.

Putting out great content, sending baskets of fruit, whatever your jab is, it doesn’t entitle you to land the right hook. It just allows you to have the audacity to ask. You have to earn the right to ask people for a sale. In fact, you have to earn the right to ask people for anything. That’s just life. You can’t have the expectation that they will convert.

I’ve done 185 episodes of a show answering questions people ask me on Twitter. I write articles. I answer questions on Snapchat, Twitter, Facebook. I do this all for free. Not because

I have to land the hook. It’s my hope. It’s my aspiration. But it’s not why. I do it because it gives me a chance to even throw the right hook at all.

You have to be okay with not landing the right hook.

The key to being a strong entrepreneur or executive is to understand that patience is extremely important. Sometimes when people complain to me that their right hook didn’t land, I find out that they were only jabbing for three months. In the entire span of your career, whether it’s been forty years or it’s going to be forty years, three months is nothing. If you structure your business right at the highest level, landing one right hook in six to twelve month period should be enough. It should bring you enough ROI and value to justify the rest of the year of jabs.

Additionally, right hooks change all the time. If tomorrow, Instagram allows linking out in native posts, you have to shift to use that as a right hook. You have to adapt. Twitter was huge for me in 2010 and 2011, but now I am siphoning my audience to Snapchat more. I’ve had to change and shift multiple times to match what is happening in the marketplace. You might have a big set up planned for a right hook, but be flexible. Always. Things change fast.

Understanding Why Your Right Hook Didn’t Land

I’ve thrown a ton of right hooks that didn’t land. And they were preceded by (what I thought were) some great jabs. I get people jobs. I make connections. Set up meetings. But the right hook doesn’t always land. I don’t dare have the assumption that my jabs will always work out into right hooks. Neither should you.

To land the right hook, you need to understand your audience really well. And that’s what jabs are for; for getting the information you need to understand your consumer. When a right hook doesn’t go well, look back on the jabs. Do they line up with the right hook? Does the right hook seem to come out of nowhere? Is the tone the same? Were you throwing the right kind of jabs to get information that ladders up to the right hook?

Taylor Swift Throws Great Jabs

Taylor Swift is excellent at throwing jabs, so when it comes time for her right hook, fans are more than happy to oblige.

Just Google search “Taylor Swift nice gesture” and the results come pouring in: she got a fan who missed her flight tickets to another show. She made a playlist for a fan who was sad over a breakup. She donated to a family’s Kickstarter after a horrific car accident. Here is a list of ten more amazing things she has done just because she can. These are all things she could do quite easily, but they mean the world to the people on the receiving end. And even though they apply to only a few people at a time, her fan base sees them and appreciates what she is doing for others in their community.

Taylor just left this comment on Instagram for a fan and I’m bawling in tears so hard right now. #same pic.twitter.com/xD9RzkMBSp

— Taylor Swift Updates (@SimplySFans) September 1, 2014

So, when her most recent album came out and she asked for people to actually buy it, no streaming services, guess what people did?

They bought it.

Her album “1989” spent 10 weeks at number one (and yeah, I listened to Blank Space over 50 times in a row).

Top 3 Tips for Throwing a Right Hook

I’ve thrown a lot of right hooks in my day. In fact, I’m throwing a shit ton right now for my book. These are my top three tips for throwing the right hook when you’re ready.

Be firm and don’t hesitate:




The fact of the matter is you have to go right in the for the kill. You don’t bashfully tread around the question. You don’t try to rephrase it or be cute about it. Just. Freaking. Ask. It’s all about honesty. Be truthful and upfront about what your goal is.




Make sure all the mechanics are working:




Before you send out the right hook, whether it’s an ask to subscribe or a big sale on your e-commerce site, double and triple check that every single thing is working. Look at it on mobile. Go through the steps yourself. Have other people on other browsers and other computers try it. Set up test QA scenarios for people to try and break it so you know every single in and out of your right hook. You want this to go well; it’s your one big shot to ask for something, so you don’t want to blow it.




Create the least amount of friction for your community:




You want to make sure that the journey from start to finish is as easy as possible, because the slightest point of friction could cause someone to back out and leave. For example, I would say Kanye’s recent right hook of asking people to go to Tidal for his new album had far too much friction. If fans didn’t have Tidal, they had to sign up and download it. That is quite a large ask. Make it easy for consumers to convert.

The big lesson of a right hook is that you want it to feel natural and you want consumers to say “of course!” when they see it. If that is their reaction, you’ve taken all the right steps to get there. If you’ve provided value, given them great content, done everything you can to make the journey as smooth as possible, I can promise you you have that much better of a chance of making the sale and getting that customer.

Seth Godin on Thought Leaders, Psychics & The Future of the Internet: #AskGaryVee Episode 185

On this episode, I was so happy to bring on my dear friend Seth Godin. We talked about whether we would ever hire a psychic, the future of the internet, and thought leaders in today’s noisy world.

 

 

Questions answered on this episode

What is the value of authority in a world where everybody is a possible thought leader?
Where do you see the internet going in the next 5/10 years and why?
What would cause you to hire the world’s best psychic? Even the Caesars and Pharaohs consulted a seer, and so should you Greats.
Seth has a blog but no other social media engagement. Under which conditions is this advisable
What is something you guys disagree on?

Resources from this episode

Seth Godin’s blog
DailyVee 016
My newest article on the future of Twitter

Question of the day

Who would miss you if you were gone? – from Seth

Ignore Everything Between the Clouds and Dirt

There are too many people who are average at what they do and are confused by their average results. This is because the vast majority of people tend to play the middle—they focus on the vague minutiae that doesn’t matter. They’re focusing on the wrong stuff.

Two things can happen if you’re too focused on the middle:

You’re only successful to a certain level and then hit a plateau
You get stuck in one of two extremes: you get stuck either because you become too romantic on ideals and neglect the skills you need to execute or you get tied up in minutiae or politics and lose sight of the bigger picture.

Instead, you need a healthy dose of those extremes: the clouds—the high-end philosophy of what you believe—and the dirt—the low-down subject matter expertise that allows you to execute against it. Forget about everything else.

Know the philosophy, know the details,

and ignore everything in the middle.

This business philosophy is how I’ve built and scaled my companies and it’s what I’ve always lived by. Focusing on what’s important is what allows me to execute and succeed as well as I have.

Here are my clouds right now as they apply to VaynerMedia: I believe that social media has a better value proposition than other marketing tools because it has the growing attention of the modern consumer. Moreover, it has the targeting capability to reach the the right demographics at scale with diminishing spoilage. My philosophy is that social media marketing works, so long as you know how to do it. Those are the clouds. I have fully bought into the ROI here; I don’t need Nielsen, or reports, or seven years of research, or the political approval of my boss.

And the dirt? The dirt is what you’re reading right now. I’m putting out content and making my employees the best practitioners. I spent the time to figure out Vine and Meerkat when they were first released. I understand how Twitter and Snapchat work and where they’re going. I know the details of how video is playing an important role on Facebook and YouTube. Put simply, I put in the work that allows me to know my shit and bring my companies to the top.

At VaynerMedia, I tell my staff that 99% of what we deal with every day in business doesn’t matter. The politics, the process, and all the crap that doesn’t matter. The clouds matter and the dirt matters and nothing else.

I know my scope is a big one, but I think everyone has their own definition of clouds and dirt. The idea is to understand the “why” that is up in the clouds, and then be obnoxiously proficient at the “how” that is down in the dirt. That’s how you win.

If there’s one bit of advice I can offer you it is to start pushing on both of those edges. Raise the bar on your philosophies and dig deeper into your craft. It’s a recipe for success and I urge you to give it a try.

By the way.. if you liked this article and you want to read more about my business tactics and philosophies, check out my new book #AskGaryVee.

The Future of the Music Industry, Crush It!, and Anchor as Podcasting App: #AskGaryVee Episode 183

On this episode, I talk about scaling a company beyond your own leadership, marketing a book after launch, and my new favorite app Anchor.

 

 

Questions answered on this episode

How do you check that you’re building Vaynermedia in a way that will thrive beyond your charisma as CEO? How do you build great successors?
Will people use Anchor as an alternative podcasting platform?
What happens when the book comes out? What is your marketing strategy moving forward?
If you were writing ‘Crush It’ today, what would you change in it?
If you were in charge of the music industry, where would you take it?

Resources from this episode

Why Twitter Still Has More Than a Chance
Super 8 Live Stream Event
Pre-order #AskGaryVee Book

Question of the day

When have you been affected by market conditions? Pro or con.

DailyVee 015: Masonry

This is truly a day in the life of an entrepreneur. Some times you get to fly around, give talks, meet billionaires. Some times you’re just sitting in an office, taking meeting after meeting.

 

Resources from the episode

4 Easy Ways to Improve Company Culture
5 Ways to be a Better Boss
Pre-order the #AskGaryVee Book

Music in this episode

Forest Door
MadReal
Jessica Frech