Unfiltered Advice on Social Media and Building a Real Business

0:00There's never been a right answer in humanity's history. How about that? There's never been a right answer in humanity's history. There's only been decisions. And then people that are capable of making lemonade out of lemons or other people crying about having diamond rings in their hands. You're either crying or you're fixing. There is no right answer. This is the Gary Vee Audio Experience. Before you go to the podcast, I've got a big announcement. I know several years ago, a lot of you bought 12 books of 12 and a half to get the NFT, the Book Games NFT. I also know that a lot of people have dropped off on their journey with VFriends, which is a massive mistake because what we're doing on Burn Island and what we're doing on base with Book Games is remarkable.

0:49So you need to go to vfriends.com slash old books with an S. You will go to that landing page and we will help you explain if you are trying to figure out where your NFTs are, how to bring them over to the website, and how to start activating them so that you can start using them for all the incredible exchanges and draws and raffles and experiences that we're doing for people that actually own the book games. So please go to vfriends.com slash old books where you can start your journey on reactivating your book games journey. Tyler Schmidt is in the building. We are here to answer your questions.

1:23Some of you are going to come on screen. Some of you we're going to take right from the chat. So if you've got a question, please ask it. Michelle, how are you? I'm good, G. How are you doing? I'm well. All right, perfect. So you always talk about and, not or, and I've truly leaned into that. So I'm creating a community called Chase Your Happy about helping people live a happier, healthier life. I've also leaned into the fact that I love country music. So I go to a lot of events, create content around that. I'm also trying to do a podcast, write a book, do coaching, I'm in the stand store challenge.

1:56But I'm not paying traction on any one thing because I'm struggling to be consistent. So then I try to pick one thing and go all in and I just can't. So Michelle, here's a couple things. I know you really well and I know a lot of people are struggling with this. The reason you're not getting traction and the reason no one gets traction is they're not committed enough to social media creative. I don't think people have figured out this secret and this is gonna make so much sense to you Michelle because obviously we've been around each other for a long time now you've been in this community it's social media content like everyone's traction comes from social media content nowhere else like if you do not win the social media content organic game you have nothing unless you are put on a reality show and you're on Love Island and now people know who you are right like nothing happens without attention it's not that you're stretched in or your niche, it's that until you realize that the social media creative is number one and everything else is two, three, four, you'll be nowhere.

2:55So for example, you should be all day long doing green screens over country music songs or photos of albums or cover art from Spotify. Like the content is the punchline, everyone. This is why, you know me, I'm very thoughtful. I play loose and like silly, but I'm fucking like, I'm pretty thoughtful about what I do. why have I devoted a decade to get all of you good at social media content because that is the starting point for everything in the stand challenges you know most of what I'm doing in those one on one calls is teaching you deep detail about the content your traction will only come from the content you've got to get better at the content you know the URLs to the deck you know all that stuff you've just got to go crazy on the content

3:45So I can't let go of this chase your happy concept either. So do I try to merge the two? Yes. I know you're always in the band. Yes. Yes. Yes. You post about country music on the first post and the second one is about your happiness. And the next one's about bamboo sticks and the next one's chase your happiness and the next one's a country music and the next one is about VFriends and the next one is about this basketball game and the next one is Chase Your Happiness and the next one is Chase Your Happiness and the next one is Country and the next one is Country and the next one is Chase Your Happiness and the next one is Halloween Happy Halloween and the next one is Chase Your Happiness and the next one is Country and the next one is Country and the next one is Country and the next one is Country and then it's Happiness and then it's Happiness and then it's all nine platforms LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat and then it's Happy on Instagram and then it's Country Music on LinkedIn and on LinkedIn it's Happy like you understand?

4:44Yes, thank you. You're welcome. I love you. Let's move on. I'm telling you the thing that. I love you so hard. I appreciate it. Thank you. Stay well. Listen to me everybody. This is real life out here. Like this is consistency. This is putting in the reps. Like my back is feeling so much better because I am literally, I stretched for 45 minutes on my outer left glute. I literally, do you understand what's going on with me? You guys know because sometimes my back goes out in basketball. I think I literally after 12 and a half years in the gym, full real trainers, full like Dr. Matt, big shout out to you, like real chiropractor, like fix my, Jordan Syatt, forever I will love you Jordan you're in Dallas right now, fixed my QL, changed my life, diagnosed it in one workout.

5:30I self-diagnosed Mike Vicanti, if you're watching, you know what happened a couple days ago. I was in the gym for 45 minutes today. You've got to work. This is how, everything is work. Everybody, this is work. It's all work. Loan me 50K, someone said. The opposite of work. That's a bitch shit. Like, I'm telling you all, the work is the game. The game is work. We have to work. All right, let's keep answering people's questions. But it's consistency. And what I did for Michelle, she's awesome. Her energy's awesome. Her things, everybody keeps hearing me say it, but then they don't do it. I've said and I've said a million times that you should post everything on your post.

6:09I've also said be on more platforms but it's hard. Like Mike also said to me don't eat a lot of carbs yesterday. What did I do? I went to Bubby's brunch with my daughter. What happened? She ordered the pancake thing. It looked crazy. I was locked into my eggs doing my thing. She didn't finish. I was like let me just take a look. And I ate a pancake. Like what do you want? I lost. And guess what? My scale showed it today. My scale showed it today. I've been battling for 12 years. I get all of you with followers and money. Mine's called health and wellness. For some of you, you just cook. How many people here cook on health and wellness say cook?

6:48You just cook. It comes easy. You wake up, rain or shine, in the gym. Zach, you're good like that, right? No? Everything's a battle, though. Okay. It's never easy. So look at all these people that cook. They went that way. You were built. Tim Tebow looked like he cooks. Bro, my guys. What a unit. Forearms. What a unit. Unit. But it's still a battle every day for him. Maybe, maybe not. Listen, how many people, listen, I battle every day. I'm not saying you go to the gym every day and do the right things and you battle. I mean it comes natural to you. It comes natural. Like Mona, my wife, it comes natural.

7:19You should see the joy on her face when she's cooking some fucking parsnip. And she looks at that parsnip like it's fucking surf and turf with fucking mashed potatoes and fucking cupcakes. You see it, right? It comes natural to her. Mike visuals.

7:41What's up, brother? I thought it was freestyle. Yo, so I'm 20. Where are you from? I live in Egypt. I'm from Egypt. Yes, my guy. Beautiful. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. So I'm 20. And I've been learning AI, automations, and visuals for three months now. It's the first time I ever started learning anything. anything in my life. There you go. Yeah, first time I went, I went full on learning. I didn't think about how hard is it going to be, how am I going to get clients, where am I going to learn it. I was interested in something. I saw what software people used to do this stuff. And then I started to network.

8:25I did these three things. and now I have two of the biggest jewelry brands here in Egypt doing this from the I visual form I started posting on my TikTok one of my videos got 10k views and it's still growing but I'm going to like 7k views and I don't know everything is growing now clients getting clients and everything is going fine but how one of the biggest problem with people is the scale so like if I don't think about scaling in the next five years I probably just would stay stuck and say I'll put a very strong foundation to be sure that I scale probably the next day. I'll give you the answer by not trying to take the money to buy stuff you don't need and putting the money back in the business and finding good people and when you don't find a good person on your team learning how to fire and all those things.

9:21That's so true. I heard someone saying earlier that whatever money you make from your business isn't your money. It's the business's money. It's true. My brother, whoever holds their breath the longest wins. I took Vayner from zero to 100 million in revenue paying myself the same salary the whole way. The bare minimum I needed. From zero to 100 million in revenue, brother. Yeah. You know, meanwhile, I see people literally making three million bucks top line revenue and taking all the money out of the business as quickly as possible to buy a rollie. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's the answer. The answer, my friend, the answer is put the money into the business.

10:10That money goes to people. You build teams. You build teams. And you're gonna learn at a young age how to hire and fire. One of the greatest lessons one needs to learn as an entrepreneur. Yeah, I'm still 20. Yeah, you're a kid, bro. Yeah, yeah, I mean, I think I've been around so far with the currency and everything. I've been like 5K so far. It's incredible, bro. I'm proud of you, man. It's incredible. And notice what it started with. You actually liked it. You actually liked it. That's why this is all happening. You actually liked it. What did there should be for this investment? An employee.

10:54Oh, okay, yeah, yeah. Someone with me, yeah, sure. Well, that's amazing. Your words are your mind. Thank you, brother. I wish you well. I'm proud of you, bro. Love all the entrepreneurs in Egypt. I mean, a bunch of them along the way. I love that country. You're welcome, brother. Couple things I saw in the chat while we're going. Someone said, damn, when did Gary turn a thousand? I think three years ago, my facial hair started going from dark to gray. I've always had the bags and I'm not really... Yeah, just like... I think the answer to that person's question was probably three years ago. I think that's when like, once the gray kicks in, you're like, once it goes on your face like that, like that really makes us all think like, oh, old or something.

11:29I think that's when I turned a thousand. Ty? I feel like three years ago. By the way, like getting older is fucking fun. Plus I'm super pumped. In 11 days, I get to say I'm 50. And that's what, like I already been flirting with it. Like a couple of people are like, yo, how old are you? I'm like 50. They're like, you look great. Nobody said that yesterday when I was 49. 50's good y 'all 50's good when you get to say 50 you're like yo I'm like listen I've been in unk status in my head since I was 16 when people are like oh Gary you're unk now like you know some people try to use that as bad I'm like bro I've been unk since fucking 89 I'm fucking immigrant first born fucking the emotional and financial epicenter of my entire universe for the last 30 years I've been unk and I never had it twisted when all of you were like following me 10 years ago when I was 40 and you were all 16.

12:20I was unk then. I actually can't wait to be like Pappy. Pappy V is gonna be my greatest year. When I'm 90 and I'm coming out and I'm like, you bitch, I'm working harder than you and I'm 90. Granny V. When I'm fucking Pappy V. When I'm Pappy V and I'm 90 up in this shit all shriveled. When I'm like shriveled and shit and even more like fucked up and I'm gonna be like, you fucking bitches, I'm 90 and I pin made billions and you're still crying? So I'm ready for Pappy, bro. Pappy V's gonna be a fucking gangster. So when did I turn a thousand to that person trying to troll? Three years ago. All right, let's keep going.

12:59Questions? My name's Eric. Eric. And I've been following you for a little bit. I started my own little thing like you and me, friends. Actually, and the one who started collecting for his two one-year-old twin daughters. So humbled, my guy. Thank you so much for supporting him. I love that brother. And I'm using all AI. It's all AI art. And it's all AI generated lore. I've got everything in place for where I need to be. It's just I'm struggling between. Thank you, Levodly. How much do I perfect it? Or do I go straight into market? Bro, what's perfect? Brother, which Eric you said, right? Yep. Eric, what's perfection?

13:43Who's the judge of perfection? Perfection is a subjective opinion. Exactly, right? OCB. Yeah, bro. Honestly, like, just jump. It's all the same thing. There's no perfect time. There's no perfection, right? Somebody said I look like a thousand. Somebody else in the chat said I'm gorgeous. Two different opinions. You like that, Eric? You got 10 years on me, dude. You're still looking good. Thank you, brother. But, I mean, I think it's that game, right, bro? Like, it's either, you know, there is no perfection. There's no waiting. You know what I mean? Well, how did you decide to go with Topps Chrome on doing your print?

14:18Like, I'm just a nobody starting. How did I decide on a manufacturer to go with? Well, you know, Topps Chrome, you don't get to pick Topps. You don't call Topps and be like, yeah, what's up? I'm picking you. Topps picks you. So I picked that. They picked me. How did I do that? I worked for 30 years every day for 100 hours a week to build up a community, a foundation, a business, an ecosystem that then allowed me to really work my face off in 2021 during COVID to build a universe. And then I went with a startup called Zero Cool because I had a relationship with Josh Luber, who was the StockX founder.

14:55I gave him a lot of value, friendship. We knew each other, that created that small thing. And then we worked our balls off to build a community, storytelling, content, really worked hard to create a universe where we did well at the National Sports Card Convention, which caught the attention of tops. This is all building. You're early right now, my guy. But what you've talked about a lot, it sounds like he has to make a decision. He's sitting, should I go A or B? And the longer you don't decide on A or B, you're talking about that. Yeah, for him, yes. First I wanted to get Eric to understand he's early in his journey.

15:27When people are like, well, Gary, you're so. No, no, I'm like, Gary, I'm not so. This is Gary, 14 years old at the flea market. This is Gary, 15 years old in the liquor store. This is Gary, like, please don't say, Gary, you're so. Well, you, well, you nothing. Dick, I fucking worked for 35 straight years. So you're early. So you gotta put in work. What's one good habit that you could build and you could start it early? Here's what I want. Here's what I want for you. I'll give you the whole blueprint. First, you gotta start putting out the art and the characters on social media. On social media.

16:01You know what I mean? I just started doing that. Beautiful. Love. Now you gotta do that for years, but now we started, right? Next, as far as who you print them with, you go to these conventions, you go to Comic Con, you use ChatGPT to find out cardboard or sticker printers, you take meetings, you make, you guess. Like, my whole life is guessing until you know. I just need everybody to understand this. There is no knowing. You guess until you know. Right? How'd you get good at swimming? I promise you, I wish all of you could watch the video of your first of XYZ. Your first swimming. Your first bike ride.

16:43Your first, like, I don't even know how they let these kids drive. When I think about how I, what I was doing, and by the way, remember when you first started driving double hands? You're scared shitless and still I was, you were terrible. You were, I don't know how we let these kids on the street, bro. Thank God Uber's here. Like, fuck, man. I was like, I didn't know shit. I was like hitting the fucking gas instead of the brake. I'm on the road. driving the snow for the first time to hold him I hit my car the first time I got it one thing about your book Crushing It I just started that and I do gotta say the one thing that I really enjoyed was how you talked about bringing your family like my daughters into what I do and enjoying the AI process yeah bro that's that's the best that's the best brother that I'm so happy for you like honestly if you don't have a commercial success over these next 10 years but the fact that twin daughters are gonna get 10 years of daddy building something with them, that's gonna be everything.

17:42One of the worst financial things that ever happened to me was working for my dad from 14 to 34. One of the worst things. That's what I'm doing now. By the way, one of the worst, by the way, the worst thing that has happened to me financially in my life was spending 22 to 34, building a business for my dad, getting paid nothing, and giving up my social life and working 100 hours a week. Financial. The single best thing I did in my life was work for my dad. The worst thing I did for myself financially was work for my dad. The best, my dad has had a tough year. He's got limes. He's struggling. And I'm a human being and there's been times where I'm like, fuck.

18:22Is it going to go earlier than I wanted? And where do I go? Thank you, God, for making the decision I knew that I was making at 22. I agree. I'd rather have a dad than a boss in my eyes. Of course, but like dads and their bosses are selfish a lot of times. My dad did me no favors. Like, he's like, I'm just like real talk. Like, we're here. Like, like. I do got a great client. He did do me favors. He is a great guy. We have a good family business. It's just the way that it's set up is struggling. And I don't want to end up where my grandfather told him good luck. I don't want my dad to tell me good luck.

19:00Yeah, and I wish, I wish that was my story. Mine was kind of thank you for doing it for me. I run Wine Library now. Right now. This second. I run it now just so everybody knows. I took the brand and every day every decision runs through me. Yeah, for him. You know, and for me but like I want everyone to see this. I want everybody to understand this. Financial is not the decision. What's in your heart and soul is the decision. And by the way, a lot of people struggle what they do for their parents, not do their parents. There's three things when you're a parent. There's your parents, there's you, and there's your kids.

19:48And like all of us have different percentages of what we're putting our energy against. And there is no right. And it's different for everyone. My dad should kiss my mom in the face right now. I think my dad gets a lot of benefits of what my mom did for me and he's like the residual beneficiary. There's all sorts of things, man. You know what I mean? There's all sorts of things. Anyway, when I'm saying brother long-winded because I'm obviously trying to give as much value in these lives as possible, hope I'm touching on some themes that help some people but for you, bro, your win is that you're building this with your daughters.

20:21Congrats. As far as perfection, which vendors, you're gonna learn. You're gonna learn along the way. When I started building VFriends, I was a seasoned highly successful entrepreneur. You know what I mean? Well then I want to what do you think about me going live and helping the community build the car crops? By the way brother you know the answers to these questions. You know I'm going to say yes. You're regurgitating the stuff I'm spitting for the last six months. Yeah in my head I keep saying yes and I just it's like I need gratification No, we all do this. We all circle within ourselves talking about what we're gonna do.

21:05Looking for outside validation. Life is only about anything that you achieve in your life is about doing. Anything that is remarkable is hard. Doing, hard. Doing, hard. It's hard and you have to do. Nothing else happens in our heads, in our dreams. And even worse, I love in our head and our dreams, optimism, visualization. There's some good versions. Let me now attack the people that are doing the bad versions. Blaming everybody but themselves of why they haven't accomplished anything. This is really live, Mike U. That's it, man. There's only doing and it's all hard. Nothing's easy. Nothing's easy.

21:53It's all just like M9 says, it's just a banter. Thank you, brother. thank you for being such a big part of this community I love seeing you in here all the time and thank you for supporting VFriends I really do think I'm doing it yes you are like I said you're inspiring me to do what I'm doing now I'm proud of you bro now jump now get off the inspiration and get into the action yes sir actually who here is watching for the last 10 minutes and has no idea who I am this is a fun one this is my favorite part about TikTok Live who's been watching for 10 minutes and has no idea who I am, say that's me, in all caps.

22:30Say that's me. That's me. Yep. No, no, Red Solve. A lot of people are new. Like Jared Orr. There's a lot of people. This is the coolest part. This is the best part of TikTok. This is why I love going live here. So many people are new to me. Everybody, I'm Gary Vaynerchuk. I'm an entrepreneur. I love to talk about my, I love to go macro, micro. I'm a macro, micro guy. Micro, I like to talk about like, here's what you can do on live shopping. here's how you flip stuff here's how you build your social media profile up I love the actions but then macro like if you don't love yourself you're dead very mindset stuff so I'm very like self esteem insecurities mindset accountability A-O I'm very A-O I'm very big on accountability and optimism A-O A dot O accountability and optimism will get you free we're in control We're in control.

23:26You're in control. Stop letting fear take you. So I'm very big on macro mindset, which is you're 100 % in control. You don't like your job? Quit. Okay, I can't quit. I have bills. No shit, dick. I mean quit after you go apply to a bunch of jobs and find a new one. Like everything good is hard. I don't know how, this would hurt everybody. We got soft, like pillows. Well, I sleep on a hard pillow. But soft. We got soft. I do like soft ice cream over hard ice cream. Who's soft ice cream? Who's hard ice cream? Everybody reply. Soft ice cream, hard ice cream. I'm soft. Yeah, like just soft. It could be melted.

24:03I like soft. I don't like when it's hard and cold. Like I like it when it's soft. Who's soft? Who's hard? I want to know who's soft, who's hard. There we go. Anyway, I like my ice cream soft. I hate my humans soft. A bunch of just soft. just blaming everybody but yourself. 100, let me promise you, you wanna be happy? Who wants to get, who wants to be happy? Tell me that I wanna be happy in the chat. Who wants to be happy? Who wants to get this anxiety, this sadness, this darkness out of their head? Who wants to be happy? I just need to know. Who wants to be happy? Tell me if you wanna be happy.

24:38All right, Casper, I got you. Here we go, Casper. The number one way to get happy is to realize everything in your life is your fault. and it's a counterintuitive because it's like no Gary then I'm like I didn't say you suck everything in your world that's broken is 100 % your fault because you are a human in 2025 that can get out of it you can break up with your spouse or your girlfriend boyfriend you can quit your job you can leave your city you can literally leave your country you can stop watching CNN and Fox and following all these fuckers that are deploying fear you can do anything and the world right now is telling you that you can't and you suck and I got you both the left and the right everybody like you want your freedom you've got it you've got your freedom your freedom and your jail sits in here unless you're watching from North Korea unless you're watching from North Korea right now I don't care if you got one penny.

25:48They got that VPN. Okay. Yeah, that VPN. Super free. Somebody said freedom is a scam. It's the reverse, my guy. You started to believe the people that are trapping you. Freedom is the only truth. Because it's here. It's clouds and dirt. If you don't think there's freedom in America, go to Peru, bitch.

26:23Peru. Next question, let's go. What do we got in here? Ask your questions. If you want your question answered, put the question marks in here. Make sure you follow me. Who wants to hang out here with me all the time? That's what I want to know. Who wants to make this a regular? Who wants to really chop up on TikTok often? I love you back, TJ Tokotoka. Who's got questions? Let's go. Questions. G, question for you. So we talked about family a little bit earlier. How do you prioritize family while running a business at VaynerSkill? By not judging yourself day to day. And by trying your best. Sometimes you miss the recital.

26:57My friends, let me throw you a curveball. Actually, watch this. How many have a kid under 12 and you've never missed a baseball game or a recital? You've never missed a sports game or a recital. You have a kid under 12 and you, the parent, have never missed one. Put 12. Put the number 12 in the chat if you're that person. I have something to say to you. Everybody who's never missed a recital or a game, put 12. Alright, ready? We got a lot. This is gonna be a very weird moment. You know where I'm going. I need you to miss the next one.

27:41This is real now. I know this one's gonna hurt and I love the nopes like first of all let me say this everybody should parent the way they want to parent but let me tell you what's happening on the flip side to the DMs I'm getting from 24 year olds mommy and daddy never missed a recital they always fucking paid for my Uber the over coddling kids learning that there's sometimes things that happen we've made non-adaptable children some of you thank you man the grandpa sweater is the beast I love grandpa sweaters some of you aren't realizing that you're creating a framework that is not setting up your child for the realities of real life.