GARY VEE!! 🤯 Stupidest Marketing Move! ➕ How to WIN on Social! w/Gary Vaynerchuk | Ep. 398

0:00Welcome to Do This Not That, the podcast from marketers. We share quick tips, things you can do right now, and then we add a little bit of chaos at the end of every episode. We also keep it short, like this intro. Let's check it out. Hey, just wanted to jump in here real quick on this super exciting episode with Gary Vee, Gary Vaynerchuk. He's awesome. But, you know, we try to keep this not a family-friendly show, but slightly family-friendly. You won't find us using a lot of crazy words, but sometimes Gary Vee goes off and does his thing, which is great. That's his vibe. That's his style. And I'm all for it.

0:37But I just want to give you a minute here in case you're in the car with kids or you have a certain chill vibe going on. And you're like, wait a minute. I wasn't ready for that. He's fantastic. I just want to give you a little bit of a moment here. Pause before you get rolling and cannot wait. This is one of my favorite things I've recorded. So hopefully you enjoy it, too. We are back for the Do This, Not That podcast. And I mean, I've never been more excited about anything in my entire life, let alone this episode right here. So who's here? So we have Gary Vaynerchuk. Now, you probably know him as Gary, but you probably just know him, period.

1:09So doing an intro on him is super awkward and weird, but I'll do it anyway. He's easily one of the most influential entrepreneurs and marketers on the planet. New York Times bestseller of this book, Day Trading Intention, which I will tell you, he didn't tell me to say this. This thing is wild. I'm writing a book right now, and this thing just ruined it for me because my book sucks. And this thing's phenomenal. And I have massive imposter syndrome. If you're in marketing and you haven't read Day Trade Attention, then you're not really in marketing. Greatest book of all time. But his background, he's not just some famous dude.

1:41He took a family liquor store from super small to the$60 million e-commerce thing when people didn't even know what a Google ad was. Then he founded VaynerMedia, which is this incredible agency working with Pepsi and Fanatics and Indeed and so many others. and he's also chairman of VaynerX, which is this wild modern media company that has NFT, V friends and intellectual property and speaker bureaus, all this stuff. And the dude's got 50 million followers. There's like seven of him. He's Gary V. He's here. Gary, thanks for coming on, man. Dude, honestly, I might audio clip that and make that my Chiron for everything I do.

2:16You're very, no, I'm joking, Trey, but thank you. Love it, Jay. Thank you so much for having me, bro. I'm super stoked to have you here And I don't want to waste any time and do the whole, what was your story? And tell me about wine and all this stuff. Because I love that about you. But I want to get into it. I need to put a USB in your brain. So I want to ask you lots of random stuff. So here, I've been watching. I've been all in on all your content. So here's my first question. I have this events business. We put all events. And we're doing something stupid. Okay. So what we do is we'll go out there and we'll put ads on social media, on Instagram, or content on social media, Instagram, LinkedIn, whatever, and the ones that are trying to get people to register and stuff.

2:55And mostly when they're not doing well, what we do is we put ad dollars, we amplify, we boost them with ad dollars to try to almost hide this crappy creative that we've made. Is amplification of paid ads on social media epically stupid? So first of all, the fact that you asked that question in the way that you asked that question, I wish you could, I wish you actually did put a USB in me and see what was going on with my chemicals because my heart smiled so hard because I've been very loudly and effectively, but not directly enough. this is something i've literally thought about this summer which is this fall i need to make black and white direct content that the single stupidest thing in the world of marketing and business and pop culture is amplifying content that clearly did not do well because they didn't do well organically because a you're trying to convert something like ticket sales or b because you're so deeply insecure and you don't want something that has 800 views and so you want 40 ,000 views because you are literally taking money and throwing it into a garbage and then lighting a match and burning it to the ground.

4:15So yes, you are doing the single worst thing on earth. Comma, the fact that you now know it, whether you saw a clip or you read it in the book, makes me so happy because I am desperate to be a positive contributor in some way, shape, or form. And it sounds like you are now ready to no longer do that anymore. So kudos to you. Well, okay. That makes me feel really good other than the being stupid part, which I agree with, my wife would agree with. But here's the part that, so I read the book, I love the book. And here's the part I'm confused by. So one of the things you're really known for and how I got all hooked on on your content is this idea of jab jab jab right hook meaning for people out there don't know gary's really coined this whole thing of where you you give you give you give whether you know with your content it's you're providing value you're providing value providing value and then you hit with this hook and say by the way why don't you work with me or buy this thing or do whatever and the key there is you ask you don't take i always like to clarify here you give you give, you give, and then you ask.

5:17And when they do not deliver on your ask, you do not feel bad or sad or mad at them. Very key nuance to my model that I'm passionate about, right? Like the entitlement of thinking just because you've given a bunch of good content that someone's going to buy your sneaker or your wine or your trading card or anything else that other people sell is audacious and manipulative. The concept of give, give, give is brand. And then you're going to convert a certain part of that audience. So yes, I'm deeply passionate about that. So heard go ahead so but a lot of times we're putting content out there and you have your winners and losers and in my case we're amplifying losers because we don't want them to be losers the problem is right the problem is our jabs are winners i mean you know they're winners because they're like value so the thing but the value ones like if i put out a piece of content and it does really well that one's not asking for anything so it's not converting to pipeline or sales that fast not black and white last attribution.

6:16Yes. Subconsciously it is. Right. Like that's called brand. One is sales. One is brand. So yes, heard. And I know where you're going. Keep going. So there's the question. So now what? So now what? So I do I do I amplify the winners that may not be the ones converting to sales or do I amplify? Let me give you one right off the bat. I love this is more consulting session than podcast because I'm enjoying it. And I'm so pumped because like even in eight seconds this is gonna crush for you you ready yes i need it your clear charisma and sense of humor is one of your biggest attributes you know that besides your hair you know that your personality is what you got right yes i can literally all i got it's all we've literally been here for eight minutes and it's as clear to me as the sun will come up tomorrow.

7:07Here's what I want you to try. Okay. The next time you have a piece of content that does well, that's a jab, right? A high value piece of content. I want you to then take that piece of content back home and post produce it. I want you to take that piece of content and then slightly tweak it. Let me tell you how I would do that. I would have whatever video you have that did well. I want you to then make an edit where you, your face, you, you. Me. In the bottom left-hand corner with a cutout, as long as the bottom left-hand corner wasn't critical to the piece of content. I want your little head to be in there while the video is running.

7:46This is the edit I want you to make. I'm doing it. You're literally, I'm going to reenact it here. Obviously, for people that are listening, you won't be able to get this, but follow me, everyone. If you're watching visually, this will be easy. This is literally what you're doing while that video is playing. You're like, yeah. And then you're pointing up, you're pointing a finger to the audience saying, wait for me. I'm about to jump in. We're all watching this video. And then you're going to go buy some fucking tickets for me for this event. That's it. In their face. I love it. And it will work.

8:20Here's why. That piece of content already proved that the first three seconds, the next 10 seconds work, right? So you know you have something that works. Now you've added an extra element of intrigue of like, what the hell is this dude's head doing in the bottom left-hand corner? Then you're going to obviously not do exactly what I said. You're going to be like, hey, thanks for watching out. What this is about is our big event on October 19th. There's a link. So you're going to take the original piece of content that did well organically, showed consumer relevance and interest. You're going to DJ it.

8:50Why do you think all these EDM guys had the hits? They fucking, and what Puff Daddy's career was built on. I know that might not be politically correct these days, but that sampling, these were already fucking hits. Right. You're sampling your own hit. And if you see where I'm going. I like the, I like the analogy of sampling because if I was, I have no music abilities. I couldn't even sing a bar mitzvah. I like the, I like the idea of pulling in the winner and just tweaking it a little bit. And that's what I amplify. That's the plan. You're taking a jab and you're converting it into a right hook using my old terminology.

9:23And if you run media against the right kind of target against creative that has already clearly worked, where you're editing it in a way that didn't disrupt what made it work, you will fucking crush. All right. I love that. And, you know, you touched on something. And I believe attribution is total garbage. Of course. You touched on last touch. It's garbage, right? Because for 20 years, Google got credit for things that other mediums were doing because Google became de facto place you would go. kudos to google great business but people over invested in search because i would see a i'm looking at a billboard in manhattan right now i would see that and it would be a second and then i would go to fucking google and be like medical club 49 or whatever and then back home at marketing land they're like oh google worked and the billboard does it yeah it's total crap like i spend a lot of time in the world i do a lot of different media but one of the media is email And my clients are like, oh, these email campaigns are crushing it compared to whatever.

10:24I go, even though it doesn't help my business, I'm like, no, the email didn't work. It was just the last thing they got, the last stop on the train. You're assigning value to crap. That's because, brother, there's a big confusion in our industry about what is sales and what is marketing. right email and google adwords are much closer to sales dna than organic social content which is much more similar to what worked in the 50s and 60s on television you had the attention of the consumer on a medium you story told and it affected them what what people don't understand is that sales is what you do when you're not good at branding and marketing.

11:11And listen, I love being a salesman. In fact, you may know this since it sounds like you've done a deep dive. Probably the thing I'm most excited about in the world right now is live social shopping. That's fucking QVC. That's sales to the oomph. I believe in sales and marketing the most. However, I did not buy in the 80s and 90s and 2000s all that Nike stuff because somebody last touch attributed me. Somebody cold called me, Nike sent me an email. I bought it because of brand. Right? Nobody's buying a labubu right now and sticking it on their fucking purse because they got cookied and we followed them around the internet and we made them, suffocated them to buy a labubu.

11:52They're buying it because of brand because if they put it on their bag, they're in the know and they want to feel in the know. That's called the psychology of brand. In a lot of ways, the media that's measurable is the most ridiculous, meaning like it's getting credit for way too much just because it happens to be measurable. Well, now you're talking about the accommodation of corporate marketing, which is really sad. We've sucked out the creatives and we've implanted the mathematicians, which is fine. I'm a big believer in purple. I'm not red. I'm not blue. I'm not just art. I'm not just math.

12:33I actually think the reason math has gained momentum in marketing is because the artists went too far. And like everyone who wasn't good enough to be in Hollywood went to Madison Avenue and use their brands money to make the commercials that they wanted to make for themselves, not to sell fucking soap. So I understand why we have the era of math. It was actually the artist's fault. However, the problem is we are too in the era of math right now, and the beauty is 50-50. Oh, I totally agree with that, and I love that. And side note, what would be the odds of you ever walking around with a little boo-boo somewhere attached to your being?

13:12Pretty high if it was a collaboration with VFriends and the boo-boo. I should have known that. I didn't know that. That's amazing. If only, like I definitely am not usually quote-unquote on trend. Occasionally I'm so me that seven years later, it becomes the trend, but I am not trendy. So the high, if Lububu comes calling and says, we'd like to do a Lububu vFriends collaboration now that I'm building this Marvel Pokemon world and I need to win in things that look like Lububu. But otherwise, you know, it's funny. I get, I just did something the other day where they were giving me way too many flowers of like setting all these, like being on trend.

13:53I was like, I didn't set that train. I wasn't on trend. Me dressing down and me cursing was just me being me. And then like the world evolved and it became a little more common in the business world. That's not me setting the trend nor being on trend. That's just I stepped in shit. Well, I personally thank you because hopefully I think you actually started the trend. So I went from wearing button downs and frigging khakis. So I don't even own that crap anymore. So I owe you. I really am happy for all of us. By the way, this is the weirdest shit. You want an exclusive, Jay? I've literally had weird feelings recently saying, I want to wear a suit and tie proper 1950s for a year just for the fuck of it.

14:37Just for some fun. But no, it is nice that the casualization of society has penetrated the workforce. I do think there's some romance lost in that. you know I actually understand people who put like dressing like back to back to authenticity like it's authentically running through my mind that I might just want to do that for the fun of it when I'm 90 to look back at that era not for any other reason I love the people right now that are overly dressed because I'm like good for you like that's your fucking jam and in fact just like tight clothes and baggy clothes pendulum swing I'd be shocked if in 15 years we don't see a big movement five years nine years 13 years a big movement to proper attire coming back because we've all got tired of fucking ball caps and t-shirts and baggy shorts as well so i could see all of it happening well i'm doubling down i go men's warehouse and buying equity in there immediately you know what you should do speaking of this because it kind of leads into it you're you basically have said out there that social media is kind of dead or dying it's really interest media so like if you started an account today zero followers okay it was just you wearing suits like on a tick tock account and you posted videos i'm wearing a suit today is the world today because it's now what you call interest media is that going to do better than people that have followers of a zillion followers it will do better if that human are you talking about me me garyvee or me just like well that's going to be you garyvee if i wore a suit or a random person wore who's like who gives a crap would it me for sure because once you have a platform you have a platform hence why brand matters but but anyone like literally a 29 year old listening right now who's never made a piece of content if it's in his in this scenario or hers for that matter soul this is what's so cool about what's actually happening that i think a lot of people don't see we throw around authenticity and passion and transparency so much and and often unfortunately the people that throw it around a lot of times are like the least authentic yeah but what is very clear to me as someone who i would say is a human anthropologist and really does spend a shocking amount of his time watching i i would say that if it was in my soul that I like passionately care about being dapper.

17:03And I think there's incredible self-esteem value when I put on a suit and I go into Superman mode versus when I'm Clark Kent. If that's my essence and I can communicate that while I'm building that account, yes, that person will crush. If I'm doing it because I'm listening to this podcast, I'm like, oh, here's an angle. Right. And when you're chasing money, if you're investing in crypto because you think that's where the money is, if you're investing in real estate because you think that's where the money is, if you're cannabis, collectibles, social media marketing, influencers, AI, if you're chasing because that's where you think the money is versus quadruple downing on what fucking gets you going, you will be vulnerable.

17:46When you triple down on what gets you going, you know, my breakout moment in my career was giving a keynote speech in 2008 or 2009 in the Javits Center and I said, if you're a fan of Smurfs, smurf it up. If you love ALF, start making content about ALF. At the time, it was about blogging and doing Twitter. Now this interest media algorithm-led social media economy where the attention of full society is overscaled on social. If you love Bon Jovi and you just go fucking ham on Bon Jovi content, the fact that for 15 years of social, you would have 80 followers after a year. And now the fact that when I post my third Bon Jovi video, it will find people that have a propensity to give a fuck about Bon Jovi because that's how deep the AI is now.

18:39That I have 800 followers on that third post and I'm starting to build my world. That is a level of opportunity for society, for happiness and commercial success. That is a level of nirvana that I think people cannot see in this moment where we've decided to cloud social as bad, not good. Well, along those lines, and I couldn't agree with you more that this idea of interest media that, forget about your follower count. Follower count is only social proof to decide whether or not, you know. Yeah, there's some brand, there's some lingering brand equity on it. I do believe within a half decade, the following count might not even be publicly seen.

19:18I think it will continue to diminish in importance in this rise of AI interest media algorithms. Yeah, and I think that's a good thing. Well, I would say, well, I would say it's a good thing for day one people, right? I would say for people like myself, who bled for 15 years to build a fan base, it'd be like email marketing. Okay, yay. You know, you spent your whole life building a million person email list. And now the market says, and Google comes out and says, now with Gmail, everyone has a million Well, you know, I'm sure the people that work their tails off, but I agree with you. I think merit should reign, you know, and I think I understand what you're saying.

19:56And from a place of people dwelling that they haven't followed what I've been talking about for 15 years and they missed the boat. Good news. You missed nothing. Well, along those lines, though, because in marketing, there's always this thing, best practices, which is nails on chalkboard. I literally hate the phrase best practices. I said by the time it becomes a best practice, it's an animated piece of crap. And the problem is with this idea of interest media instead of social media, if you try to say what are the best practices and then you follow them, then you're not going to be playing the interest media game.

20:28I mean, do you think best practice is pretty much crap? Yeah, listen, I'm a fan of where you're going, comma. I think of this like imposter syndrome. Like that term drives me crazy because we came up with a new term for the word insecure. Yeah. Right. We put makeup on the word insecure. I think best practices is makeup on the real world, which is you need to be strategic at all times, right? So I get where you're going. And I actually am a buyer that once it hits that status in corporations, it's garbage often, comma. The only reason VaynerMedia is dominating is on a daily basis. All I care about is the essence of what is the best things you can do to maximize relevance and awareness, to create consideration, to create purchase.

21:17And that I call pack inside of VaynerMedia, platforms, algorithms, and culture, right? First, you need to know which platforms have the attention. What's Spotify versus Substack versus Snapchat Spotlight versus Facebook Blue proper infeed versus Instagram versus TikTok versus TikTok Shop versus TikTok Affiliate versus LinkedIn versus LinkedIn. That is truly what I think I've committed my career to and has set me slash us apart. Next, algorithms. Within everything I just mentioned and the 30 other things I didn't mention, TikTok, YouTube shorts, Twitter. How do the algorithms work? What creative gets attention?

21:55What formats? What are the things that will work? How important are the three seconds versus not? A lot of people became obsessed with the first three seconds. They don't realize the 10th second has now become uncomfortably important, right? Things like that. And then finally, culture. Do you know what's going on with LaBubu? Do you know what Cindy Sweeney's going through right now with her campaign? Do you know what's going on with Aaron Rodgers at the Steelers? Do you understand if Sexy Red and Ice Spice are as hot as they were a year ago or not? Do you understand what's going on with Fortnite and Roblox?

22:27Are you aware of what the number one show is on Netflix or are you not? Do you know what's going on with Denim? Are you aware that Gap is coming back or are you not? Do you understand that Kith has become the establishment and things, you know, that are coming up, whether it's Mad Happy or the New Project? Like, do you know shit or don't you? To me, in fact, in our industry, brand strategists are going to get replaced by pop culture strategists, right? Current consumer relevance strategists. And so that's how I think about that, brother. So whether you call it best practices or best strategies or strategic blueprints or, you know, I call it ironically, I call it day trading attention to some degree.

23:08Right. Like to me, I'm trying to understand the framework of pack. And I believe that the liquid deaths and the poppies and gaps, resurgence and all these things. If you look under the hood, they are the people doing the things I'm talking about. and everybody else is not. And that is why we are seeing catastrophic and super stupendous remarketing opportunities. When I say remarketing, I mean not remarketing. I mean market shifts on who the leaders are, who's doing revenue, who's declining in revenue. We're seeing extremes of growth and declines that we have not seen historically in Fortune 5000 land because the game is so complicated now and most people have no fucking clue.

23:53I couldn't agree more. It's almost like the brands that move at the speed of culture are the ones that really are getting that attention. You know, you can't just try to do all the different tactics. You just riled off a million different things. Half the people listening have never even heard of Kith, let alone know that Kith is now part of the establishment. I mean, that is how in tune you need to be, right? You need to be in it to be advanced in all of it. So the end, I would argue that one of the biggest things that's going on at VaynerMedia is as we go into 2026, I keep talking internally with my leaders.

24:28First time I'm saying this publicly, I want to give you a scoop. Like there's going to be who are going to be the winners of the AI era AORs, right? And all I keep saying internally is like, we're going to be the winner of the AI era AORs. What do you need to do to be a great agency in that era? I would say pop culture strategy is at the tippy top. Agreed. That's amazing. Yeah. Listen, I watch way too much reality TV, so I'm in a good place. So I'm excited. But you are in a good place. It's funny. Nima, who works at VaynerX, director and strategist and creative, you know, he was on a reality show.

25:01He's deep in the Bravo culture. We talk about it all the time when we look at the metrics. Like, understanding what's going on with Love Island in the last 90 days and understanding how to incorporate it into your ethos, whether it's product, marketing, comms, engagement. even something we call Cassie commenting as creative, leaving comments as a brand, you know, in certain places on the internet, um, was incredibly fruitful for business results. Yeah. And when I say that what I just rattled off both love Island, deep cut love Island knowledge and the concept of Cassie comments as creative, leaving comments on love Island, this is a content as a brand when, you know, not just ha ha ha, but you make a joke.

25:42That's an inside baseball love island joke when i say that has business impact it is not lost on me that 99.9999 percent of people in madison avenue fortune 5000 land are not fully like either don't believe or don't even understand what i'm saying there this is the great opportunity of the madison avenue ecosystem we are about to reset at a level that people have no comprehension of and the people that are actually into popular culture. And when I say popular culture, by the way, I mean every one of the niches. What do 60 to 80 year old Mexican American grandmas give a fuck about right now? If you don't know those Nutellas and Novellos and all those things, like if you don't know those things, right?

26:27Then you don't know how to market to them. Totally. I gotta tell you, I was blown away. When I saw where I live that there were Love Island watch parties at bars and restaurants in person. I was like, every marker needs to lock in on this crap. This is not like just some show on Peacock. This is like cultural movement here. It is wild. If you knew, like I did, which is why I did all those podcasts, this is not where I went with it for me personally, but if you knew six years ago that comedians skewing right were going to become cultural icons, scc frat boy like culture well and you had a brand to sell to 15 to 35 year old males you would fucking annihilate yeah i mean it's like hock toa how the hell it's like if you knew that that type of person was going to resonate with america it's like yeah that's let me break that down a little bit though that was a viral moment right we've seen that before right like double rainbow the cold play whatever yeah i'm talking about you know what's so funny we just did something that might help a ton of marketers me talking about the overall genre of southern sec sorority frat uh comedians the theo bonds the schultzes like like shane gillis i talked about a half decade movement that a brand could really, really lean into.

27:58You talked about rightfully so, I'm glad you did this, about a micro moment of a trend. Many brands that we work with and friends that I have that don't work with me, but I have a lot of relationships in the industry, they get worried that everything is a hot to a thing. Gary, I don't want to follow trends because it's over. I'm like, no, no. A hot to a moment to your point or whatever other moment becomes the seed of an eight-year movement, right? So I'm recapping a six-year movement that has happened and you're referencing a viral moment that could have, obviously someone could have jumped in there quickly, done something, but there are two very different things.

28:38But unless you play the Haktua thing and understand the Haktua thing, you'll never get the long-term thing if you're on the sidelines. I don't know how to surf or I'm a surfer but I feel this could be a good analogy how the fuck are you going to catch the big wave if you're not in the fucking water trying to catch like waiting for it and catching all the little waves 100 % and they all kind of tie into each other I'm sorry hold on I got a clip I need that for my presentation that's it right there if a brand's scared because they don't want to Gary we don't want to waste our time jumping on every trend that lasts an hour well what about when it becomes the trend and they marry each other They're tied to each other.

29:17Deeply tied to each other. It's, you know, it's, you got to eat the amuse-bouche and the appetizer and then the fucking main meal. And then, fuck, let's have some dessert. And then, fuck, if it's going well, like some after dinner drinks. But, like, you know, like, duh, duh, duh. So, like, I don't understand. I do understand, actually. We started this podcast this way. The last 70 years of business in marketing land on Madison Avenue, we have used good working media dollars to disguise bad creative. but we couldn't see it because it was predominantly done on television and on billboards and in print.

29:50And now we live in an era where we can see it. And man, does that need an adjustment? Wow, that is, I think it's so powerful for so many people to hear. So I got one last question. I'm going to lose my entire audience. But I mean, we grew up, we're the same age. I grew up in Long Island and moved down to Florida. But I know you're a huge Jets fan. Hopefully they have a good year. Last year was brutal. Thank you. But Knicks, 1994. Yes. New York Knicks. I want to know, and that was brutal, losing that Game 7, losing that Houston Rockets. But my guy on that team was Anthony Mason. I mean, were you just an all-out, like, John Starks or Ewing guy?