How to Build the Framework of Your Personal Brand for the Next 10 Years

0:00If one or two people in this audience are in the same place I was at 35, this might be a good thing to talk about, which is it is scary how much capacity the human being has. You could probably not understand how much more capacity and impact you actually have. And it's just changing the frameworks. I mean, I'm literally, I don't know if you in front row might see it. I'm getting goosebumps. Maybe getting five to 10 emails a day of how you change someone's life is actually the thing that you're missing in your soul right now. People are very one dimensional on how they see having a personal brand online when it is very multi-dimensional.

0:38So I think those are kind of the biggest things I wanna talk about. One, as the great poet once said, never get high on your own supply. You've got a lot more in you. What does that mean? Does that mean within this industry? Does it mean somewhere else? I'm incredibly passionate about this. I think people ceiling themselves. This is the Gary Vee audio experience. This is a really fun one. I actually am not doing a whole lot of public speaking these days, but when this one came across my desk, even though it was such a tricky weekend, I was like, I want to do this one because really ultimately when I looked under the hood, I feel a very real association with all of you in this audience.

1:25Like if life had a different twist or turn, I feel like I could be sitting in this group. When I think about both being an auctioneer and selling something with energy and then also managing a team to sell in retail, I would argue that's what my life's about. As you might have saw there or if you know anything about me, I ran a high-end wine retail business for 20 years. and if you've seen any of my content recently, I am completely obsessed with what's going on with live social shopping and the QVCification of social media which is a trillion dollar GMV industry in China that is about to completely revolutionize America and Europe and the West and actually probably has a pretty big impact on this business as a third potential stool to what you already do.

2:21And so I was thinking about, obviously we have a lot of time for Q &A so John can steer me in what will bring all of you the most value. And I did ask for a lot of Q &A because I don't love to pontificate when it's out of context. I'd like to make it as direct as possible. But there were a couple things that I thought about when I thought about what's the best thing that I could talk about that might bring a group like this of winning players some value. And the first thing I thought about was when I was 34 years old, 16 years ago, I was a full-pledge workaholic and building a huge business for my father.

2:59And I thought I was uncomfortably busy and wildly impactful and just making it happen. And it shakes me to the bone of what kind of fucking loser that 34-year-old is compared to who I am now. And I think about that a lot, actually. And I think about the dangers of being successful. Like, you know, you're the ones that got flown out here. This is the elite within the org, right? And I'm always like, huh, is the gift the curse? Oh, there we go. For me, it's like, if one or two people in this audience are in the same place I was at 35, this might be a good thing to talk about, which is you could probably not understand how much more capacity and impact you actually have, and it's just changing the frameworks.

3:55For me, there was a lot of things that went into it. I was building a business for my family. I was born in the Soviet Union. We came here when I was three. I lived in a studio apartment in Queens with seven family members, so I am the textbook American Dream Story, and I was like psychotically passionate about building a big business for my parents who I continue to be obsessed with and love and most people's journey is not to spend 22 to 34 working 120 hours a week building a business from 3 million to 60 million and never making more than$50 ,000 a year and waking up at 34 with literally no money and then having to figure out their life.

4:33So I know I'm an edge case but I've watched over the last 15 years and I have the luxury of being an early investor in Facebook and Twitter and Uber and Snapchat and Venmo. I've been up close and personal with some of the people that have built the biggest companies in the world in the last 15 years. I sit on multiple Fortune 500 boards and my agency is the agency that works with Chase and Fanatics and Pepsi and on and on and on. So between entrepreneurship and Fortune 500 and private equity and VC, I've thoughtfully and strategically have put myself in a place where I could get unlimited context of every angle that I could go to any dinner meeting with anyone here your biggest customers, whatever they do I know a lot about what they do that has been my obsession, now with AI I'm completely fucking unstoppable you know, and so I'm a human anthropologist I'm a consumer centric savanti kind of human, it comes intuitive but then I put in a lot of work and I'm telling all of you right here, right now being in this group, being at the top of your game within this, is your biggest vulnerability.

5:44It is scary how much capacity the human being has. And it requires a couple of things. Self-awareness, like everybody here is different, even though you're all collectively winning in different ways. I think humility is a word that's just not talked about enough. I think a lot about what's worked for me and kind of like when I really look around, I think people would be very surprised by the people that are on covers of business magazines or the articles you've read of people with the biggest exits or the highest wealth. There are really two very extremely different people that get to that level.

6:20The completely insecure and the depths of their insecurity make them Darth Vader-like and they get to the top on some real dark shit and they get there and it's hard to sustain and their real lives are not that great. And then there's people that are extremely humble even though it may not look like it because they're out and about and they're talking with bravado and it is humility that is their foundation of dramatically bigger success. For example, one of the things I think about with this is knowing you almost have a double-sided world where you are actively an auctioneer and selling and then you're also a manager of team and retail, those are very fucking different.

7:07It's inconceivable to me when I look at here that there is a wide range of individuals in here who either dominate over here and are okay over here, good over here and great over here, remarkable selling the shit out of stuff because you've got the gift of gab and it's just fucking in you. I shared that with you. I know what it is, it's fucking a superpower, but you're kind of a dick as a manager. Or indifferent, or don't care. Or you're solid as a seller, but you're so damn good as a manager that the people that you bring in go on to be remarkable auctioneers. There's just a lot in here. There's a lot of different versions in here.

7:52And I think the question becomes, how much self-awareness and how much humility do you have to understand where the growth is starting tomorrow. I think about that shit every day. Like, I'm really fucking winning out here. And like, every day I'm like, like, where am I? Like, what is this? Like, where can I go? And not really for like paper, more for just like day-to-day joy, impact, legacy, you know? And again, looking at this crew, I get to speak to many different audiences of all shapes and sizes. is, you know, everyone here has lived a little bit now. You're not a fucking child, right? And I think self-awareness and humility are really soft skills, but I will tell you they are the skills that are going to dictate the financial impact of your life, especially as AI and technology continue to commoditize.

8:50If you knew how easy it is for me to build an AI human that shows up in robotic form that will outsell you every day of the week in an auction environment in five years, that's like real shit. Like, if this company can buy robots that are more charismatic than you and out AOVU, they will. And so I think about the next 20 years about where technology is going, something I've been very good at predicting, and what's very clear to me is that emotional intelligence is about to skyrocket to the top of the list. To the top. Now let me get into something that is incredibly for you all. Not the company.

9:40Sorry, company. How you start navigating this next decade about building up your own personal brand and who you are in the world is very important. There will be two things that will be able to combat and create growth for a human and a family. I know a lot of spouses here. There are two things that will be able to combat what I think is about to happen in the next 20 years of technology. One I just spoke about, which is real deep emotional intelligence. Like where empathy and kindness and compassion, it's crazy. This crazy technology of AI that's scaring everyone is actually gonna create way more humanity.

10:19It's a brain fuck, but I'm excited about it. And two, personal brand. your reputation, who knows you for what and how and where. As you sit here and go through the journey that I'm hoping that I'm pushing you a little bit towards of like where do I sit on my salesmanship and where do I sit as a leader that can build teams and make things happen? Who am I in live and selling and go and who am I in making an operation sell more product when somebody comes into the shop on a Wednesday in the morning after they've had three good days on the cruise and they bought something. As you go through that journey, deciding if you're ready to start talking about and that's what happened to me.

10:58I started realizing, oh, I did a lot of things well in my 20s and 30s, both on the mindset and on the execution part. I'm gonna just start talking to the world. I saw YouTube come out and three months after YouTube came out, I started making videos about wine and then six months later, I'm like, I'm gonna start making videos about business and mindset and leadership. And that obviously changed the course of my career and created unparalleled opportunities. whether you want to talk about salesmanship, whether you want to talk about being a good partner when you're busy, whether you want to talk about how to build up managers, how to properly sell, how to create lifetime value, not a one-off sale, or whatever else you think you're good at, I cannot push you harder to start considering to make videos or if you're, which I wouldn't think should be the case for this crowd, but if for some weird reason you don't like being on video, the written word.

11:50how many people here by show of hands read Substack? A Substack of any kind. Raise your hands. So this excites the shit out of me. The fact that like two people kind of raised their hand like the fact that no one here is consuming Substacks when Substack is growing so quickly as a newsletter written platform that is building enormous levels of fame similar to what I saw on YouTube in 06 or Instagram in 11 or TikTok in 16. some of you here are dramatic actually here's a good question though this is a heavy gift of gab crowd but let's just see who here would deem themselves a better writer than talker?

12:29Raise your hands. Yeah I figured it wasn't gonna be too much. Let's go to talking. Obviously that makes sense given the context of this room. Some people might not like the video thing. They might think it's cringe. Then you go podcast and you just do audio. I will push you very hard and maybe in the Q &A, I believe being silent on the internet is a very bad strategic move. Including like things that you're not even thinking about now. If you have a platform, maybe for auctioneering and you have 50 ,000 people that follow you, maybe it won't be for a business reason. Maybe having an audience to raise money for a non-profit around a disease that affected your family is now something you're able to achieve because you have a platform versus not because you don't.

13:18Maybe getting it, let me tell you my life. I mean, I'm literally, I don't know if you can, in front row might see it, I'm getting goosebumps. Maybe getting five to 10 emails a day of how you change someone's life is actually the thing that you're missing in your soul right now, right? And so people are very one-dimensional on how they see having a personal brand online when it is very multi-dimensional. So I think those are kind of the biggest things I want to talk about. One, as the great poet once said, never get high on your own supply. And so you're probably feeling good and you're gonna go to town tonight and drink and fucking dance and we're the fucking best, we're better than everybody else.

13:57We came here to New York. You've got a lot more in you. And what does that mean? Does that mean within this industry? Does it mean somewhere else? I'm incredibly passionate about this. I think people sealing themselves. For example, these little characters after everything I've done and I've done plenty I just decided six years ago that I'm Walt Disney. I'm being dead serious. Like I genuinely stand in front of you here and I'm like oh what Jim Henson and Walt Disney and Stan Lee did for Marvel and Muppets and Disney I know how to do too. And I created a whole world back to my passion of emotional intelligence of Common Sense Cow and Gratitude Gorilla and Genuine Giraffe and 230 others and I am building a blend between Pokemon because there's a lot of collectible stuff I do in here, between Pokemon and Disney and I am actively building in front of the whole world a multi-trillion dollar intellectual property and 90 % of the comments on social media are making fun of me that I've lost my life and my mind and I'm in a midlife crisis.

15:04That's because people create ceilings for themselves. That's because when I say that, they think that's outlandish as if Walt Disney, Stan Lee, and Jim Henson are so remarkable, they're not replicatable. Right? And so that's, wow, that one hit. Thank you, everyone. Yeah, I've never said that, but that's what I feel. And so it's like, why not you? And there's just so much more. And now, every human's about to be remarkably more productive. I said it earlier, I do a whole lot of yapping on the internet and in real life, but what people most don't know is mostly because I do so much listening when you can't see me.

15:42I watch. I learn. And now with Claude and ChatGPT and Gemini and Grock like my research like I mean I can't even comprehend how much I've learned in the last year about building an intellectual property that would have taken me 800 hours that took me eight. So the capacity of what you're able to accomplish wait till all of you start building your open claw and your harness and your computer and it's doing all the mundane things for you day to day which opens up time for you to spend time with your family or do this work to grow. This is an unbelievable decade in front of us. And you know what the best part is?

16:21The world, the mainstream media and social media are demonizing it like it's all fucked up. This is the best. I'm so pumped that everyone thinks everything's fucked because when you believe everything's fucked, you don't do shit. Which means for people like me that are doing shit, we're gonna get more. I'm telling everyone to not let me get it all every day but they'd rather believe a bullshit politician or some random podcaster that everything's fucked when this is the greatest era to be alive in the history of the world yes there is many like I'm not delusional I watch everything there's always tension and war and suppression.

17:09But did anybody go to history class? That's how it always is. When people are like, it's never been worse. I'm like, the Black Plague was fucked up. You know, like, it's just like, like, people are incredibly entitled. You know, people want it easy and I get it. Why not? That's just not how the world works. And accountability and action are two very important words. And I get very inspired and why I said yes to be here is we really do share a lot of similarities, you and I. And I just think you can do a lot more. And I will tell you, and I want to poke at this zit, if you are not a great manager to your team because you've decided fear, no matter how you package it up, will inspire or get the results what's you're looking for on the PNL or the numbers, give it a rethink.

18:10You know? And I don't make that assumption, I don't know any of you. But I do know that even my own company where I'm psychotic and run a monarchy dictatorship, I have managers that come in that don't even see that they're doing fear. Because it's packaged nicely, it's like, you know, we don't make our numbers this month. It's not like they're yelling and cursing, but the weaponization of fear by parents and leaders is very subtle and I ask you to go within and maybe cut out some of those cavities because you will see dramatically dramatically bigger results if you understand how to weaponize hope and optimism and love especially in the long term hate is very good at the first half but love always wins when triple zero hits the clock and that is macro, what's going on in the world and it is incredibly micro in the way you feel about yourself and the way you manage your team.

19:08So those are the themes I'm thinking about. John, I'm ready for Q &A. Thank you.

19:17Thank you. Hey everybody, I hope you're enjoying the podcast right now. Make sure you follow the podcast. That's why I'm interrupting. Let's keep going on this show but follow the podcast. it'll make my mom super happy

19:33so I'm gonna start us out with a couple of questions yeah go ahead I'll start us out with a couple of questions and you guys can think about ones that you have so and by the way I know maybe a handful or a small group does have context on me so if you want to ask me something about other things I've got going on that I didn't touch on please feel free I'm here for you for some reason the bottom of the microphone if you touch it it shuts off got it oh I see that Shit, you should have told me earlier. Yeah, that's okay. Fuck. It's okay. We were listening intently. So most of the people in this room are going to be, and for those of you who aren't, don't be offended, but most of the people in this room are going to be the richest generation of their family, in part because you're with us, and what you've done with us is unbelievable.

20:18So a lot of folks here are the first ones in their family to be six-figure earners. Some of these folks are closer to seven than they are to six. Yep. and they're really leveling up their life. Yes. So they're all successful. They're all doing really well at whatever station they are with us. Obviously, they wouldn't be in this room. What's the biggest trap that comes for successful people? That thinking making money is important. You know, it's like, listen, I've made a lot of it. I love games. I'm in it for the game. Like, I'm into it. But when people use, in the way that you frame that, when anyone here thinks they're better than in their family because they make 700K and their sister makes 89K, that becomes the beginning of you opening a door that is going to be a losing game.

21:12To think your financial status is the platform that you want to stand on is an incredibly dangerous game.

21:24That's the answer, brother. Like, listen, now, you should be very proud of the hard work, the commitment, the tenacity, the accountability. There's people that don't make a lot of money have many emotional flaws. And so if you focus on the fine balance of the humility and empathy you have for your inner circle, if you're that top earner within it, while still trying to find a way where you can bring them value, that is not predicated on how much money more they can make, but what are the emotional flaws that you are winning on that they are not seeing, that's a fine balance, right? Because they don't want to hear it.

22:01Because it goes into like, who the fuck are you? But like I say to everyone, if your self-esteem comes from your bank account, I've got bad news. There's a fuckload of people that make more money than you.

22:18Based on the number you just said, I might make more money this year than everyone here combined. That does not make me better than anyone here. And I hope you live that life too. One of the challenges for us is that we sell art to people on cruise ships where generally their first time buying art. Is that right? First? That's often? Yeah. It's cool. They stick with us for years after but we're usually their first. And they stick with you because they're yearly cruise goers or they buy off platform? They buy off platforms too, which is great. Yeah, of course. We do land events, we do galleries and all that.

22:54Heard, heard.

23:20Anyway, these guys, they're responsible for getting that, they fell to the top of our funnel. Yes. And so... And who does retention? What's that? And then who's responsible for retention and lifetime value? That does VIP. Got it. So you're the openers. Yes. So the thing is, they have like 30 to 60 minutes to develop trust with a new batch of people. That's way too much time. Yeah. Talk about developing trust. you know the first year I ran my dad's liquor store the business did 3.2 million dollars the year before I came on 10 % gross profit not net so it was a small business the first year I ran it we did 11.9 million dollars on 29 % gross profit I did everything I bought everything I sold everything the story goes when people talk about my career is I launched a website email innovated true but not for year one year one was me working in a store 12 hours a day and anyone walking in here that wanted to buy one bottle miraculously somehow left with three cases and didn't know what the fuck just happened the reason I'm a great salesman is because I have no interest in closing the sale

24:35it's a I appreciate that it's a real, I just know it and again I'm sorry but I really do get goosebumps when I feel it in my soul I don't know how many of you know baseball as a salesman I throw off speed pitches not fastballs I'm just not trying to sell something I'm trying to reverse engineer the person and understand in fact I often talk people out of buying things from me I just did it at VaynerMedia we just had a huge pitch I went through it and I'm like even if we do remarkable marketing their product is so bad we're just gonna speed up everyone knowing their product sucks they're gonna pay us three million dollars to speed up the world I literally talked them out of hiring us and told them to fix their product and then come back trust at the highest levels is only earned through good things not through gift of gab or charisma or all the other stuff I'm also willing to use all those things at times I'm not mother Teresa but to answer your question the reason I joked about 30 to an hour is too much time is it is.

25:46Humans are animals. And 90 % of them, which is why salesmanship works, are not smart enough to know what's going on. But you want to win with the 10 % that do. And if you focus on the 10 % that can smell your moves and when they smell this odor they've never had before which is you're not actually trying to sell them anything, you're just trying to listen to where they're at and then that might fit them wanting to buy something and that becomes your consistent you completely dominate the 90 % and you win over the 10 % who are almost rarely won over and then you become an unstoppable salesman. If you have a little bit of money in the bank account if you have some time to yourself these guys typically work either four or six months on and then they'll have a month or two off.

26:42Epic. That's fucking cool. So they, what would you suggest for a young group of people that got a little money, what should they do to level up their lives, their careers, their all of that? That's incredible. What's that, brother? It is a great question. Thank you. Look, I think it's very individual. You know, the truth is, so for example, me, even though I made no money, literally I made$50 ,000 to$60 ,000 a year through my entire 20s into my early 30s, but I had a big advantage. I was living an$11 ,000 a year life. I literally lived in a shitty apartment by the liquor store and worked every minute and bought nothing.

27:20So I was able to kind of like have a little money, which is like a foreign concept now, savings. Remember that? Like that is not even like talked about. I, in my 20s and 30s, had such a self-awareness that I was gonna make plenty of money that I didn't invest my money. I just did random shit with it when I wanted. In fact, what I mainly did, and this is insane, was I had one weekend a year that I lived like a normal human and I would go to Vegas with my friend Rob Moose from college and I would usually go and lose half of my net worth in Vegas over a weekend.

27:59I mean, it's so fucking insane. But there was such a deep, deep understanding that this money, that this was the right thing for me to do to get some joy in this insane framework for this group that's a lot that's a really interesting schedule like i'm sure that like it sounds good but i'm sure some of the people here like are like like that's like too much time they're like what the fuck like you could start another fucking whole side business on that like i think you need to really you know there's so many things paying off your family's debt that is incredibly noble because you know you're gonna keep going.

28:36Investing in high risk, high upside. My life turned when after all those years at 32, I had about$213 ,000 in the bank even though I made no money my whole life, back to my$11 ,000 year, and in three months I wrote two checks that wiped out my bank account into two startups that I thought were gonna be big. Facebook and Twitter. My$46 ,000 investment in Twitter gave me$12 million when Elon bought it and my$200 ,000 investment in Facebook is fucking$70 million right now and I haven't sold a share. So you could go high risk, high reward. Right? So you could spend your whole fucking month when you're not doing shit researching robotic and AI stocks and make a good bet on something.