KEYNOTE: The Biggest Opportunity for Building Business in 2025

0:00I just need everybody to follow along with me right now. Social media is free. It's fucking free. When I landed here and I saw a billboard of this expo, which is a good job marketing, I don't think they got it for free. You pay for a billboard. You pay for newspaper. You pay for direct mail. You pay for Google AdWords. You pay for television. You pay for PR. Social media is free. You can run ads, but you can post something right now and 10 ,000 people could see it. For 15 years, I have worked every day to make videos and pictures and written words on the seven to 10 platforms that have mattered.

0:52That has allowed me to amass a lot of followers and three years ago, if I had 10 million followers like I do today on Instagram or 15 million followers on TikTok like I do today and you had zero, when I posted, I got a lot of views and you got none. That changed three years ago. I need everybody here to pay very close attention to what I'm talking about right now because it is the single most important part of my talk besides fear. Three years ago, the entire world changed. It changed because TikTok had become successful enough to start pressuring Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and every other social media platform.

1:41For the first 15 years of social media, it was email marketing. Get as many people to follow you and a percentage of those people would see your post every day. Three years ago, social media became not social media anymore. Social media today should actually be called interest media. You no longer have to follow people. The content you want comes to you. The fact that I'm standing here in this talk and I know that I'm saying very compelling stuff which I genuinely believe will inspire. Let me look. Some people up there. I know that 10 people in here are gonna listen to me and do something. The fact that one of those 10 people has never posted on social media and their third or fourth or fifth post next week is gonna start the beginning of them changing their lives is single reason that I continue to do what I do.

2:49Period. It is so rewarding. Thank you. It is, I wish this on all of you. On the flight here, I caught up with my work and so it gave me time to read my direct messages and my emails that are not business oriented. There's not a day in my life that I live that people do not email me and say thank you for the details that I'm sharing with you right now because one social media post, one, can actually change your life. That is insane to me. There is no logical reason that a person or a business, whether you're an accountant, whether you sell t-shirts, whether you own a restaurant, there is no logical reason for a human or a business to not be posting on this era of social media as much content as they possibly can produce every single day.

3:52I'm gonna make a prediction right now so I can use this video in 15 years. So I'm gonna be selfish right now, but I want you to listen to what I'm about to say. All of you are gonna regret when we go away from this and we go into glasses and social media will be different. All of you here will regret this one era in the last 100 years where the world's attention was on a platform that was free.

4:26All of you, some of you that have been following me for a long time, regret not jumping on TikTok seven years ago when I was begging you to. I get it. and the ones that did felt the effects. My friends, this is a very special time in the world. It's also a dangerous time. The rules are getting rewritten. You all know this because the television is no longer in charge. Do you understand? The television is not in charge and this is a remarkably important fact. And so now let's talk about this part of the conversation. If this is true, what happens next? What happens next is self-awareness. Okay, let's say you're listening to me and even if you are making content, you realize I'm making 50 pieces of content a day.

5:19I have 30 full-time employees that work just on my content. I'm pot committed. So some of the people in here that are like, yeah, I'm doing it, you're not fucking doing it. So if you think you're doing it, quadruple it. And if you're not doing it, start. Because for the people here that are like, yes, I want to be talking about health and wellness or gut health or travel or football, your football, not mine, or whatever the fuck you are passionate about. You can't quit your job and just start it, but you can do what I'm talking about every evening and one post can start your career for you to no longer be a lawyer when you want to be an influencer about football or wine or travel.

6:10That's real life. Our grandparents did not have this. We are the lucky generation. The problem is most of you are not fully taking advantage of it. So for me, there is no excuse. I understand responsibility. I've had it my whole life. but I do not understand not changing your life if you're interested in being happier. Why not? And I cannot believe that we have this and I cannot believe how many people continue not to use it. If you're B2B, LinkedIn is crazy. LinkedIn is crazy. The amount of opportunity on LinkedIn every day if you make a video is staggering. If you're an employee and you don't love your job or your company, you're one LinkedIn post talking about the industry you're in away from somebody recruiting you to a competitor and you making 10 or 20 % higher than you made yesterday.

7:15The single greatest opportunity in the world for people to change the outcome of how they live or how their business is doing is called organic social media. Social media posts without spending media. I do not understand. I continue to fly around the world begging people to hear me. It's free. It's free. And the fact, the first 10 years I understood it took time to build up to a level and most of you do not have patience. I understood. But that's not even what it is anymore. There are people literally in here who've never posted on social and are gonna post on TikTok and the sixth video is gonna get more views than I get and I've been doing it every day for almost 20 years.

8:07There is a level of merit to the individual piece of content that we have never seen. That level of merit is the great opportunity of your life. I really have nothing else to say. I really don't. I will, I will and we'll do the Q &A but I don't have anything else to say. You should spend the rest of your fucking you should actually all leave right now. Like leave. Empty place. And should go home and start using AI, ChatGPT or Google to teach yourself the next part which is how to be good at it. Right? I'm telling you what it is but that doesn't mean you're gonna be good at it. I'm telling you what it is, but a lot of you have already tried and it hasn't clicked because you haven't brought enough value to your audience.

9:03My friends, this is a staggering reality and I'll be honest with you, for the ones in here who've seen me speak before or have consumed my content, the level of urgency that I'm speaking on this stage on is grounded in reason. It's called, I don't think it's gonna be here in 10 years. Not this way. I really do believe that glasses are coming and I think when the phone goes away, there'll be a reset. And in that reset will be a lot of lost opportunity and I really, really, really want you all to grab it because you will regret it. You'll regret it the same way all of you regretted not buying Bitcoin four years ago.

9:48I love you back brother.

9:57Self-awareness. Some of you are shy on camera. Good news, you do not need to be on camera for this to work for you. I need everybody to hear this. You do not need to be on camera for this to work. There are many people who are winning in social media just by writing, only writing. Nobody knows who they look like. They don't even use their real name. You do not need to be on camera. Number two, you're like me, not a good writer, but you're unlike me. You're scared of the camera. There's a third option. It's called voice. You can do an entire channel where you point, I could make content by pointing at you and talking about it and you never see me.

10:38There are three ways to win on social media. Written, audio, or video. You must figure yourself out and be okay with what you're comfortable with. The answer to the quiz, the answer to your question, the unlock to the door is social media. It's free. You could have negative$713 in your bank account right now and you can make content for free. Who here does not have a phone? does not have a phone. Raise your hand. That's what I thought. Everybody fucking has it. This computer that I have in my hand right now, this computer is more powerful than the computer that Ronald Reagan had in the White House.

11:28We have unlimited opportunity. Fear and being full of shit are your two vulnerabilities. But I want to tell you something about being full of shit. A lot of you deal with the fact that you know that you're not living your life the way you want to by tricking the people around you. You talk good game. You come up with excuses that are clever. You talk. I want to tell you about tricking the people around you. The only people you're tricking are losing players.

12:10every person in here if they're lucky enough to have a friend a partner a family member who is emotionally intelligent they know that you're full of shit you know who listens to your excuses other people that have excuses too because you listen to their bullshit and your mom or dad because they just love you so much and they're fucking creating entitlement. That's who listens to excuses. I don't listen to excuses from anyone except my inner family. That's what you do. My friends, you can bullshit yourself and the way you're doing that is by bullshitting others but I promise you, whoever you think you're convincing is not the people you want to be convincing.

13:03This is the greatest opportunity in the history of the world. Literally, TikTok, Snapchat, not to just send messages, it's called Snap, I see some of you taking notes. One of the biggest opportunities in Mexico is Snapchat's spotlight. It's their TikTok. There's a lot of people on it, but there's very few people that make for it. Whoever here goes hardest at it will see results. YouTube Shorts, LinkedIn, Twitter X is about to announce their video tap. Meta never ever bet against Mark Zuckerberg. Meta is doing its thing. And Facebook and Instagram are huge opportunities. We are in an unprecedented time of opportunity.

13:52There are seven significant platforms that have hundreds of millions of people on it that allow you to reach those people for free. I need you to start posting. And I don't even give a shit what you post. Just fucking post. Please. Please. Obviously, there's, look, there's obviously so much underneath what you should post. Good news. Oh, very good news. I actually have a URL for you. I wrote a book recently called Day Trading Attention that broke down the whole thing. But I'm so tired of excuses that some people told me they don't have$13 to buy the book. So I made a 50 plus page deck for free so you can get the gist of it.

14:39I'm gonna give you the URL right now if you wanna get it. It's free. It's GaryVee.com. And by the way, it's real free. When you go to it, it's not like fake free where you have to like go and then like I trick you and you give me$10. I don't give a fuck. It's fucking free. It's garyvee.com slash attention, right? garyvee.com, garyvee.com slash attention. If you're inspired but you have no idea what to do, good news, I made a 50, 60 page deck in detail. Thank you. You're welcome. You're welcome.

15:19For the marketing execs here, can you please stop wasting money on dumb shit? It is insane to me. We have a, VaynerMedia now has an office in Mahno City. We're very excited about it. It is insane to me how much people hold on to yesterday. They love a billboard. They love newspaper. They love television ads. and they shit on social media creative. I don't mind the old things. I mind that they're too expensive in 2024. And meanwhile, the place where brand and sales is actually happening is very underpriced. That is gonna be the premise of the deck if you go to garyvee.com slash attention. Marketing friends, you must challenge your organizations.

16:09You are spending money based on fake reports. you are spending money on fake reports fake impressions, fake reach GRPs, bullshit awards, headlines the marketing industry is in crisis it is in crisis that is why so many brands are taking work in house it's why so many holding companies are laying off people right now at scale we must accept that it is 2024 I too wish it was 1945 45. It was so simple. Fuck, I wish it was 1830. I'd ride a horse, eat a carrot and sleep. It'd be amazing. But we're alive now. And this is what it is now. And by the way, in 50 years, all of you will remember this as the simple time.

16:57Because technology is undefeated. We're not going backwards, I promise. Just because some people are going off social media for a month, the robots are coming. The world will look very different in 60 years. This is the simple time now. You're worried about your kids being on the iPod and the iPhone? Wait till you see what your kids are worried that their kids are doing. They're gonna be fucking robots. So my friends, we are in crisis. We must change the way we spend media dollars and creative. If your business relies on Google AdWords, in the next decade you've got a problem. AI is coming. Google AdWords is gonna look like yellow pages.

17:41There's only one thing I promise. That nothing stays still.

17:48I wish it did. I've been winning the last 10 years. I wish I could chill. I hate that I have to go so hard because it's moving so fast. But you can't hope in business. you can't use your opinions in business you must only do one thing in business be obsessed with the actual customer what does she and he actually do and that is my religion and that is what I focus on thank you