The Marketing Strategy Every Small Business Is Sleeping On | GaryVee BizX Keynote 2025

0:00Hey everyone, welcome back to another episode of the Gary V audio experience. Today's episode is Gary's keynote at the BizX 2025 conference, and it's packed with tactical advice for anyone running a business in 2025. Whether you're B2B or B2C, Gary breaks down exactly how to grow with your limited resources, why LinkedIn is your most underpriced asset, and how to create content that actually drives results. He also gets into team building, retention, and leadership. If you're serious about scaling without burning out or breaking the bank, this one's for you. Let's get into it. Good morning. How are we?

0:32Good. Good. Actually, let's start with this. By show of hands, how many people in here have no idea who I am or very little about me? Please raise your hands high. Okay, that fucking hurts. I actually went with that. I used to do that a long time ago, but I had a little bit of a sense that there would be some hands. And so I'm going to take the first couple of minutes for the ones that gave me nice, heavy cheers. Bear with me because I know you know this context. But I think it's incredibly important to establish this framework for what I'm about to talk about. So I was born in the Soviet Union.

1:16And that was a rough place to be born back in 1975. And I immigrated to the States when I was three. I grew up very poor. I lived in a studio apartment in Queens, New York with six family members. It was rough. And my dad got a job as a stock boy putting liquor in a liquor store on shelves for two bucks an hour. That is kind of how our American dream started. My dad worked every day of his life for the next decade, saved every penny. My mom properly spent no money on anything except food and shelter and a little bit of clothes. and eventually my father was able to buy his own local liquor store in New Jersey.

2:00I started my entrepreneurial career in New Jersey at the age of six. I went right into it. First, I had my own lemonade stand. About three weeks into summer, I convinced my five friends to stand behind the lemonade stand. So by the time I was six years old, I operated a six-franchised lemonade stand business in New Jersey. For some of the 45-year and older crowd, you might remember we used to have this thing called big wheels. And before you would get a bike, I would literally drive my big wheels at the end of a summer day to all my locations and pick up my cash like I was Tony Soprano. And that's how I started.

2:49When I was 12 in America, sports cards became incredibly popular in the 80s. And by the time I was 14 years old, I was doing sports card shows and conventions and making$1 ,000 a weekend selling them, which if you can remember, you know making a thousand dollars a weekend at 14 especially in the 80s I felt like a literal billionaire at that point especially coming from where I grew up that was the age also though that that fun ended pretty quickly because I was the oldest in a family of immigrants born in the old country my dad now owned his own store and for people that are in family businesses I think you can really attach to this story.

3:40Literally on my 14th birthday, the gig was up and I now had to work at my father's liquor store. I literally went from making$1 ,000 a weekend selling sports cards to now working 15 hours a day in my dad's store, getting paid two bucks an hour to bag ice and stock shelves. That was a huge fall from grace and a really interesting learning lesson. I hated it, But at 16, my life changed because when I was finally allowed upstairs and in the actual store in the traffic, I realized people collected wine. And that was interesting to me because I was so into collecting. And that was the connection point of being interested in my family business.

4:25I love my parents. I stand here in front of you today. all of my success is on the back of how my mother mothered me and my father contributed a couple things along the way as well. And that became my passion. I wanted to build a big business for my parents. What I want to talk to you about now and the rest of the evening is what really builds businesses from an offense standpoint, which is marketing. how do you actually grow there's so much and we could do it in q a that i'd love to talk about leadership and retention today for the hands that went up in the air i run a 2 000 person global advertising agency we have offices here in the uk and amsterdam and 300 people in apac 1300 people in the u.s my marketing agency vayner media the one you saw on the video was really at the forefront 15 years ago of social media marketing.

5:28So now Pepsi and, you know, Chase and Visa and the biggest brands in the world work with us and they are moving their monies from Google AdWords and television commercials to social first creative and all the things that are kind of going on. Why I was so excited, I actually am speaking a lot less at this point in my career. One of the reasons I quickly said yes to this is after 15 years of being in corporate America, and it's been great, and there's a lot of fun that comes along with it, this audience and my admiration for all of you and what you're doing is dramatically more ingrained in my heart.

6:09I took my father's business that was doing$3 million a year on 10 % gross profit. So$300 ,000 in profit before overhead, gross profit. I took my father's business from$3 million a year, 10 % gross profit. And I grew that from a$3 to a$65 million business in five years with no money. No cash infusion, no investment. And I don't know how many immigrants are in here in the room, but you're going to laugh at this one because you might actually get it. My father didn't even have a credit line for the business because he didn't believe in spending money he didn't have. This was in 1998 to 2003. I think about this a lot because we all know we now live in a world where fucking people think like you have to be a billionaire to be successful.

7:00And at one point, I was very proud of how I built my dad's business from three to 65 million. And then in 2004 to 2008, I took all my savings and became an angel investor and started to invest in companies out of Silicon Valley. The first three companies I invested in in 2007, you might've heard of. They're called Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr. That was good. I'm very rich. And what was interesting about that chapter in my life is the numbers got big. And I started to look back at my pride in my 20s into early 30s, something that I thought was remarkable in how I built my dad's business. And I started to not see it as big.

7:49But what I was getting confused by was I actually grew the business and revenue that way. The world I was living in in Silicon Valley was about valuations, as you all know, right? These companies were worth$100 million, but they were only doing $3 million in revenue and losing$6 million. But one day it was going to be big, right? And obviously, thankfully for me, I invested in several companies. I went on to invest in Snap and Uber, and I did very well in companies that well, but I have plenty of companies that went to dead zero. The thing that has happened in the last 10 years of my career and why I want to be here is I now look back at what I did with even more pride because it was actually growing a business.

8:36It was not doing it with a lot of resources. As many people in this room know, when you have a business that's doing$1 to$10 million in revenue, there's not a lot of money running around. Especially, I don't know how all of you live your personal life, but for my father and the way my family lived and how I was brought up, we really did not take a lot of money out of the business. And by the way, I think my family took it too far to the extreme. I went on one family vacation my whole life, right? And so I think we took it too far. I think you should enjoy life a little bit. But if you're in here with that size business and you're taking money out to enjoy a little bit, watch, car, house, travel, now you're talking about very limited cash flow in the business.

9:27That has all been set up in the first few minutes here for all of you to listen very, very, very carefully about what I want to talk to you about, which is I have one agenda here. I'm hoping one of you in this room really hears me and understands, there we go, that's better, right? And understands how big the opportunity is in the current state of the internet, which sits and lives within our phone devices. How many people here are in a B2B business? Raise your hand, raise it high. Quite a bit actually, geez. Raise it higher again, please, B2B. very good. This is perfect. How many in B2C? Good.

10:09All right. Maybe 70, 30. Perfect. So having a room here that's 70, 30 B2B, I would then argue in, I guess we're in April, in April, 2025, for a lot of you that just raised your hand, the thought of social media being a massive driver of your business will seem foreign. Obviously for the B2C crowd in here, It's a little bit more obvious and it's a little bit more in play. Let me say this statement. I'm on the board of and an investor of many B2B companies doing somewhere between five and$20 million in revenue. And obviously I've seen their track from zero to five to 10. As we stand here today, the number one opportunity for the B2B businesses in this room, and this is my hope of the one or two of you.

11:02And by the way, a lot of hands just went up. Six or 700 hands went up. I've been doing this for a long time. I am hopeful that one to three of you do what I'm about to say, which is the following. I believe every B2B company in this room must post a video and picture every single day on LinkedIn. Thank you. Thank you very much, sir. I needed that, actually. Thank you for that. Wasn't the loudest clap either, but.

11:39I need everybody to, this is a really fun moment in this talk. I am aware of what's happening with SMBs and how much they post on LinkedIn. I am looking for 70 % of this room to post one to two to three videos a day. on LinkedIn a day. That is like batshit crazy to most of you as you hear that coming out of my mind. Many of you have never posted once for your business on LinkedIn ever. And I'm asking you, bless you, and I'm asking you right now to post one to three times a day. Let me explain to you why I'm asking you to do that. I stand here before you today with all the accomplishments, all the business things.

12:34My current business is a B2B business, my agency. We have gone from zero to$400 million in revenue in 13 years. And when you unpack why, a stunning percentage of why is because of the content that I've put out on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok, LinkedIn, YouTube, YouTube Shorts Podcast. My friends, the way the world actually works, why people believe in their politics, why people believe in their religions, why people believe in their ideologies is only grounded in one phenomenon. It's called communication. Words, both audio, written, and video. Words. Words. We are living in one of the greatest eras of opportunity for small businesses in the history of the business world.

13:30For many here who have been in business for a long time, as you know, we have to pay for advertising. If you want to buy a billboard or a full page ad in the magazine in your industry or buy a booth at a conference or do Google AdWords, you have to pay. I don't know if you've heard, but social media is free. It is free. Of course, you can spend money running ads on it, but it is free. You can post a video right now on LinkedIn and LinkedIn does not charge you. Also, the way that marketing on social media now works is not the way that I built myself up. From 2006 to 2018, in that 12-year period, social media marketing was like email marketing.

14:23You had to get people to follow you first. And then when you posted, they saw it. the advice that I just gave about posting one to three times a day on LinkedIn, especially if you've never posted before, was not good advice four years ago because you had no followers. And when you would post, you would have nobody seeing it and you would do it for a month. And then you would send an email to one of your friends and say that Gary V guy is an idiot. it. Today, if somebody listens to me in this audience, somebody in this room in three weeks on their 10th day of doing this will get their biggest lead for their business by posting organically on LinkedIn.

15:15And instead, they're going to text their friend and say, that guy, Gary Vee's a genius. This is because in the last three years, the way social networks work has changed. We are no longer in social media. We are now in interest media. How many people here use Instagram or TikTok sometimes? Raise your hands. Hi, please. Very high for me. Great. Most of you, All of you, most of you know what I'm talking about. You know that in the last several years, definitely in the last year, you can feel that the stuff that you're seeing now on your social network feed, on Facebook, TikTok, Instagram, is stuff you're interested in, not necessarily people that you used to follow.

16:03The algorithms driven by AI have changed. You are now seeing things of interest to you. So if you are selling a B2B product or a B2C product here, the technology is so advanced now that the AI algorithms know what you're posting about and are putting it in front of people that might be interested in it. How many people here have, and this is very important, and remember, this is very important, lying is the devil. So here's the question. How many people by show of hands in their business have tried to do social media and it has not worked for them. Raise your hands. Hi, actually, can you stand up if you're one of these people?

16:50It's good. Blood circulation works. Don't lie. Don't be lazy. I just want to see who's tried it and it's not worked. This is a very important moment in this talk. I appreciate that. Let me explain to everybody. Keep standing. Sir, back up. Thank you. This is very important. These individuals have tried it and it has not worked. Many of them have decided that means social media does not work. What I need everybody to understand is that's not true. What it means is the people that are standing just suck.

17:28This is very important. You can all sit down. This is a very important thing. There are, I don't think it's lost on anyone. whether they were sitting or standing, there are many people who have gone from zero to millionaires in a matter of months on social media. I would love to be a professional footballer or NBA player or a professional athlete. I just am not talented enough to do it. The people that stood up have not found the way to be good at it yet. This is incredibly important. We just decide, especially in business world, well, I tried it. It doesn't work. No, no, you don't work at it.

18:17The ROI of a piano for me has been zero dollars. The ROI of a piano for Elton John has been billions. social works it is unequivocally guaranteed i sit on b2b sass companies on service companies i see it every day i've watched people that sell service and their time and services as software as a service i've watched dozens in the last 12 months double triple and quadruple revenue by going all in on making content on LinkedIn. 70 % of this audience is capable of that outcome. The problem is they have to get good at it. When I look at the slides that I have up here and I look at all those books that were written, all they are doing, all of my best-selling books, all they've ever done is talk about what social media is doing now.

19:14What worked on social media six weeks ago is different than what works now. but I need everybody to hear me on this. It's free. It's free. It's fucking free. Like, do you understand? Think about how many people here are B2B companies that are fully reliant on their sales force and their salespeople and don't like that feeling being at the mercy of their salespeople. How do you get around that? you build a brand and the customers come to you. This is an incredibly important moment because I'm gonna explain why. The only thing, is it up there? Yes, the purple book up there is called Day Trading Attention.

20:02That is ultimately my thesis. All of my wealth creation, all of my success, all of my professional happiness is grounded in that thesis. I day trade attention. If I had the honor of being at this conference in 2000, I would be talking to you today about Google AdWords and email marketing. Because in April 2000, that was the underpriced attention. That's where people were, but not everybody figured it out. How many people here are absolutely annihilating it on LinkedIn and getting unlimited amounts of growth in their business because of it? Raise your hand. One, two, three, four.

20:48five out of a thousand in a room that has 70 % B2B mark companies. That is the opportunity, that. And so what we're living through right this minute is one of the great opportunities in business history for B2B and B2C. TikTok is insanity. You wanna know why people are addicted to it? But B2C people, one more time, you sell to consumers. I mean, as passionate as I just was for the B2B crowd, because LinkedIn is a movie right now. It is remarkable. LinkedIn is acting like Facebook 2012 right now. There's a ton of attention on it and there's few people actually crushing it. But for the B2C people in here, TikTok is insanity.

21:38One post. LinkedIn, you need multiple posts over time and you build momentum, as you guys know. Momentum, right? You could have a post that leads to, you know, what's great about B2B is one new client can make the whole thing worth it. But LinkedIn is more like proper working out, you know, like discipline, eating right. TikTok is steroids. For the B2C crowd in here, the insanity that is TikTok is insane. one post, one. I've watched countless t-shirt companies, fucking vitamin drinks, like supplements, deodorants, sneakers, like you name it. I have seen unlimited businesses in the last year have one single post double, triple, and quadruple their business.

22:36This is a game of volume. This is a game of test and learn. This is a game of not being discouraged when 93 posts in a row do nothing. This is a game of listening to the comments. This is a game of understanding. I'm going to give you, I don't think it's up here. Nope. I'm going to give you a URL. I put out Day trading attention, my book that talks about this in detail, is 20 pounds, whatever it is. I don't even need you to buy it. I'm so desperate for people to do this. I put out a 44-page deck for free on the internet. And by the way, actual free. When you go to it, good news, there's no like, it's free, but then you give me your number and I only show you four slides and then I want 800 bucks.

23:21It's fully free. Pure brand. Pure karma. it's garyvee.com slash attention I'm going to talk about this at nausea for the rest of my talk in the Q &A and from your questions but I can't go into the level of detail that I went into in that deck I need a dozen people to leave this conference today and realize whatever you think you do for a living is actually secondary the primary thing you do for a living is make content for social networks. Marketing is offense. Everything else is defense. Even sales. Because sales, you become vulnerable to who's driving the sales, unless it's you. This is a profound moment in business history and it will go away.

24:15Within the next decade, we will walk away from the mobile device because I don't know if you know this, but the big tech companies are going to get us into robot form. The glasses are coming. I'm sure you've heard about this AI thing. I can save you time because I've predicted a lot of things right. The robots will kill your children. But until then, we can use these things to grow our businesses. My friends, it's a really important time and the opportunity is substantial. I'm going to take a hard pivot away from where I'm at right now on content on the internet, but I'm going to put one last cherry on it.

24:58To recap, and by the way, garyvee.com slash attention is garyvee.com slash attention. I'm going to hard pivot from here. When I think about businesses that I'm trying to help grow, I'm an investor in, I'm on the board of that are calling between one and 10 million that I'm trying to push to 50 million. And I've done that now three times in my own life personally. And obviously I've been involved in a lot of companies that do that as well. When I think about that, I think about what I've spent the first 20 minutes on, that I know whoever is best at the current moment in marketing and understands how to outflank everyone grow exponentially.

25:42We're clearly beating that horse right now in a real significant way. There is a second part that actually gets you there. And so I'm going to ask you some questions. By show of hands, and again, vulnerability and truth really matter in this environment. By show of hands, how many people have a real strong number two that is not a family member. Raise your hands. Raise it high. A real strong number two in their company. Great. By the people that just raised their hand, how many people really are caught because then they have to go back in if that number two leaves tomorrow? Raise your hands. Be honest.

26:35Raise them. so about half of the crew clearly for the other half they go into their brain is they say well I have a number three or a number four for the hundred people that just raised their hand the quickest way to build a big business is to have a number three a number four and a number five this is a very important point this is clearly why most businesses stay at one to two million in revenue and never grow the number one which is you is trying to take money out of the business more so than investing it into more people or is not doing the thing i want to talk to you about next to actually build it which is the following The reason I took my dad's liquor store from three to 65 million in five years, and the reason I took VaynerMedia from zero to 100 million in the first five years was because over 50 % of my time, over 50 % of my time in the first five years of my company were spent with my employees, not my customers.

27:54when I think about why did I come here and what am I trying to accomplish and what am I trying to help with to this audience I think about what can they leave with tomorrow and I want to pound two things one is the organic social media that you don't have to pay for and we're talking about that. And two is if you go home next Monday, when you look at your calendar, if you clear that to spend half the day to learn what I'm talking about with the day-to-day content on the social networks and the other half to spend one-on-one time with your employees. How many people here have one to three employees?

28:38Raise your hand. That's it. One to three. It's many people are three to 10? Raise your hands. 10 to 50?

28:52Over 50. Over 100. Over 200. Cool. For every person in this room, including over 200, I want you to spend next three months having one-on-one meetings with every single employee you have.

29:15When I think about my career and what I think about my observations of the businesses that I've seen grow, I've learned something, which is do not be in the middle. What I mean by that is this, my friends. Spend all of your time, if you're in this room, on things that can explode your business, marketing, and things that can retain it. Non-scalable behavior with your employees. Most people play in the middle. This part that we're talking about is profound. This gentleman here has over 200 employees. When I said for the people that even have over 200, one-on-one time. I watched his reaction and I watched him go to notes.

30:01What this gentleman will learn and what all of you will learn, whether you have three, five, 10, 20, if you really get in there, if you really get in there, you will start to change the culture of your business. You will build a family business instead of a business. And when you build a family business, something remarkable happens. It's called retention. And the longer you keep the same people that you want around, the bigger your business becomes. But it requires something that most small businesses struggle with, which is actually caring about your employee. And I don't mean caring about them from the lens of you want them there because they're going to help you make more money.

30:54I mean caring about them, genuinely caring about them. Like the meeting I had with an employee yesterday for 15 minutes on Zoom when I told her she should quit my company and start her own business because she is ready. Let me say that nice and slow for everybody one more time. Like the meeting I had yesterday with a woman in my company when she was talking about how she's trying to strive to get to the next promotion in my company, and I looked her in the face over Zoom and said, I have a different idea. I think it's time that you quit and start your own company and I'll be your first customer.