- You want me to give you a huge secret?
Just you and me right now? - Yeah.
- I'm actually gonna give you something remarkable for real.
You ready?
- Just.
You crazy, bro.
- I know, dude!
I knew I was giving you something!
(laughing) D Rock,
I hope you guys are filming this.
(hip hop music)
- [Gary] You got your perspective.
- [Announcer] Gary Vee!
- I just wanna be happy. - Your perspective.
♪ Blame it on my past days ♪
♪ Yeah ♪
♪ Coming up from last place ♪
♪ 'Cause my God got me waiting ♪
♪ Arms in a safe ♪
♪ Sharks in the tank ♪
♪ Bars on the window ♪
- Do you wanna do an intro? - About to go
and give this talk
at Conductors Annual Event.
A lot of SaaS companies do these events
where they bring their clients
and want to bring them value
and that's kind of what I want to do
in my talks.
I just want to go there and
just bring value.
This is not about Vaynermedia
or anything else.
How do I bring the most value
and that's how I do it with content.
That's how I do it on stage.
That's the mindset.
So I'm ready to go.
(slow rock music)
- One of the great reasons my company does well
is there's not a single person that works
at Vaynermedia that does the work
more than I do.
As the CEO of my company
there's not one employee that works for me
that produces more content,
deploys more ads,
like, I'm living in the trenches.
I'm a practitioner.
I'm in meetings sometimes with the platforms
where I'm correcting their mistake of
what their platform can do.
You wanna do good marketing?
Make things people want to read and watch.
Like, at it's most basic form.
Why do I believe in three and four minute videos?
Because when Vayner's lucky enough to make a great
video like we did for Dwayne Wade and Budweiser
everybody fuckin watches it.
And then you sell more Budweiser.
It's not super complicated.
Versus what's happening now
which is everybody's trying to fuckin' hack machines.
(sneeze)
Bless you.
(crowd laughing)
And the reason I acknowledge that
is that I don't know how many people here
come from Eastern European Russia but one of the
great superstitions is when you say something
and somebody sneezes it's fuckin' true.
(crowd laughing)
So that was a really fun moment for me
because what I said prior to that
is the thing I believe in the most.
People in here are pandering to machines
and reports not to the end consumer.
Let's make shit that people wanna watch.
Let's make shit that people wanna read.
The marketing industry has to lean way more
into journalistic DNA and entertainment DNA
than into Marketing DNA.
Nobody here wants that.
(applause)
- I've got one question.
- Yes.
- You mentioned Shopify Instagram,
I've been trying to invest in this personally
outside of my company.
- Yes.
- Do you think this market is dead?
- No.
- Amazon.
- No.
- Drop shipping.
- Drop shipping, no I don't think it's dead.
I prefer you start a product and sell it yourself
but if you want to drop ship
it's not dead it's more competitive.
It'd be like saying is SEO dead?
It's not dead, it's just not as good
as it was four years ago cause of supply and demand
and competition.
But if you're good at it
it's remarkably effective.
- Really?
- Oh yeah.
Thank you bro.
Thank you so much.
- I'm starting.
I have my YouTube channel.
I'm just having trouble producing new content all the time.
- I would highly recommend documenting versus creating.
- Okay.
- When you get into ruts, just do a day in the life,
or just something.
- But like when I do vlog type of content on my channel
my views are going a lot more down because
- Then what?
- Then if, I'm doing stuff on
cause I have an audience of programmers.
- Yes.
- So when I'm doing stuff with coding content or something
those get a little bit more views but.
- But you're pandering to views instead of putting
out content.
- That's true.
- If you're not inspired to do fucking coding content
you're not gonna put out anything that day.
- Right.
- I'd rather you film yourself drinking a cup of coffee
and maybe talking about the story of why you
started coding in the first place.
- That's true.
Yeah because you know what the big problem I'm having is
I don't feel like really coding that much anymore
cause I'm focusing on running the business.
- Yeah.
Talk about that.
- And I'm not really relating to my audience...
- When I started doing business videos
instead of wine videos my views collapsed
cause my audience was wine people
but then I just built it back up.
You can't live your life predicated on
how many views the videos gonna get on YouTube.
Right?
- Okay, yeah.
So that's important for me to understand because
- It's the biggest important thing for content producers
to understand.
Everybody's getting caught up in likes
and subscribers
instead of actually living their fucking life.
- Well okay so here's the thing.
I also have, in my mind, I'm running a business as well
so I'm trying to get
so it's not just likes and subscribers
I'm trying to cultivate a community of developers
who are also purchasing our products.
- Then you've got to bring them value.
- Right.
- Then every single thing that you should be putting out
has nothing to do with likes or subscribers
like what in the world is going to help this developer
and you have to make that content with the expectation
of them never buying your product.
Then you'll grow.
- Yeah, that's true.
- I know.
You know how many people I've changed their lives
and made them millions of dollars and still
haven't bought a sneaker or a bottle of wine
from me?
And it doesn't bother me one bit.
You understand?
- Right, yeah.
Thanks, I appreciate that.
- You got it bro.
Take care.
(pop rock music)
- [Jason] I love that one comment where it's like
"Gary I'm 97."
"You got time!"
- Right.
Yeah, I saw that.
(laughs)
Yo, I'm 96 years old, you got time.
(laughs)
It's true though.
In theory, unless you drop dead
that second you do have time.
(phone ringing)
- [Raghav] Hey.
- Hey, Raghav.
Do we have Virginia's phone number?
- [Raghav] Do we have her phone number?
Yeah I think I can probably find it.
- Great can you text it to me?
- [Raghav] Yeah, if I can find it.
Are you gonna like call her or something?
Is that what you're trying to do?
- No, I'm gonna get it from you
and just leave it in my phone.
(yelling)
(laughs)
- [Raghav] That's what I figured, cool.
Yeah, I'll find it and text it to you.
- Cool, thanks brother.
Yesterday and I'm sure the clip will play right now
well, you guys can edit however you want
but I would probably start with the call
and that little exchange and now as I say this
then play that exchange.
- If you quit tomorrow I'll make you a promise.
If you quit tomorrow, I will personally
I never do this.
I will personally heavily shout out
your business on social to get you 50 clients
you would have never had.
- [Girl] I will, too.
- But you must quit tomorrow.
And you have to prove it to me.
And now come back here.
Yesterday I had a great call with a wonderful
woman from Pennsylvania, Virginia.
And she promised me that she would quit her job today.
I genuinely believe that this is the
best decision of her life.
For happiness and I also secretly know
that if for some reason she does quit
and the economy fails or something disastrous happens
that I will feel so much guilt that I will personally
make sure that I de-risk all the risk of her doing this
so, I'm gonna try to call her right now and
make sure that she has in fact quit.
Which she probably at 11:14 in the morning east coast time
hasn't yet.
Probably thinking about doing it at the end of the day.
Or maybe she wanted to just get it over with.
Or she's not planning on doing it at all.
What she doesn't know is that I'm focused on it.
(phone ringing)
She's not gonna be able to duck me all day.
- [Jason] No voicemail just keep trying?
- [Voicemail] You have reached Virginia Houser of Gray House
- Yeah.
(seatbelt clicks)
Virginia, not Victoria.
(piano music)
Let me tell you what I'm actually doing in public
as Gary Vee.
Everybody in the world right now on the Internet
and in life is spending all their time saying
you know if the BP level was remind a little bit more.
And what I'm doing as an SVP and
what I'm giving you advice to do is
just do it.
What I'm doing is just doing.
I'm not jumping into social and debating people
who have different points of view with me
trying to convince them what they should do.
I'm just executing my output of practical positivity
and letting that create the collateral impact that I want.
I have a funny feeling that if you just disproportionally
do and promote doing
that overtime you'll effect a lot
more people, you know?
I really believe that
I'm hoping that this incredible age of judgment of others
leads to accountability in actions because
people are going to find out very quickly
over the next five to ten years that yelling at somebody
else to change their mind to their way is going
to have zero point zero results.
The way you get somebody to do something
whether that's to buy a sneaker or
to act nicer to each other is through communication.
I want to build the greatest machine in the form
of a company, with all sorts of weird
disciplines like publishing and a speaking bureau
and all sorts of things to be the best
in the universe in communicating things to get
people to do things.
And some of those things will be very selfish like
buying an American football team.
And some of those things will be very noble like
curing my brother's Crohn's disease
or helping Claude become
the President of the United States of America.
I love this pressure.
I really do.
Because I think I'm good at it.
And I think wanna pay back the universe for what
it gave me, you know?
I think I'm good at it.
I know the intent is in a hell of a lot better places
than the alternative alpha-capitalist that could do it.
Right? Life's about alternatives.
Who else can build billion dollar companies
from scratch like me and who is she
and he as a human?
I'm a rare version of it.
So I need to see that through and document it
so that I can inspire people who think doing good
is going to Africa, which is absolute good.
But there's another way.
Build an incredible company that everybody aspires.
Do you know what was going on in Silicon Valley
when Steve Jobs was at his height?
Young dudes thought they had to be dicks like Steve.
Do you know how excited
Claude can tell you better.
Do you know what we're doing here?
I'm inspiring a totally different alpha-executive.
Female and male.
That's huge.
That's legacy.
That's cool.
Like, what?
Like you could be an alpha,
assassin, winner and have a heart as your logo?
What?
You know, you might be too close to it.
But it's super cool.
It's super different and it's -
Go.
See ya.
I listen to Marcus more than you.
I love you guys, see ya.
(piano music)
That's why I love,
you know, listen.
Actions over words.
I'm very much a good guy
and want to do a lot of nice things
and I also want to buy the New York Jets.
Like you can have,
you can be, you know?
And I think that's where people are getting caught.
They feel like you either have to be an alpha
business man and kill everybody and ruthless
and terrible or you need to be a hippie.
And I'm like why can't you be both?
Why can't you succeed by being good
and being a good person
and being a good operator and successful.
It's kind of like how I think about athletes.
Athletes are allowed to be really tough on the field
tripping you and ruggin' you know?
And then when the games over,
hugs your family, shares jerseys.
But business people, that's how I think about it.
When I'm making business decisions,
I've got to you know, I've gotta win.
(inspirational music)
- I've been dying to ask you this question.
So I'm a social media influencer based in
South Africa, right?
Still in high school.
Working my ass off.
Doing things I can do to get my content there
out as much as possible, right?
- Yes.
- And one of the questions I was dying to ask you
is that how do I take it to the next level?
I've been collaborating with all of these brands.
I've been putting out content,
but I want my content better but even though
I'm still in high school I still have to attend school.
Still have to attend classes.
Still have to do all that type of stuff.
How do I keep on doing this
and taking it to a higher level bro?
- You want me to give you a huge secret?
Just you and me right now?
I'm gonna actually give you something remarkable
for real, you ready?
- Put it up.
- Start making content that you know won't do well
on Instagram and YouTube.
- That won't do well.
- Why?
- Because the number one mistake that everybody's making
right now in the entire world is they're
trying to take their content to the next level
and they think that means more likes and more
followers and I think the next level
is more truth and more experimenting.
- Definitely.
Just.
You crazy bro.
- I know dude.
I knew I was giving you something.
D Rock I hope you guys are filming this.
(guitar music)
- Oh I'm so sorry.
Jesus Christ.
Not this, not this.
Event, everything.
I got you Jason.
I was thinking about everything in.
This is Jason putting on his seatbelt because
Javi told him to.
That's the best moment of the
wear your seat belts kids.
In the front in New York.
Luke!
I thought I had 74 Luca Rookies.
In the safe?
Luke!
What's the safe password?
Don't say it out loud.
Not for the camera.
(beeping)
- [Camera Man] Do you want to explain why there's a safe, G?
- The fuck was that?
I'm not gonna remember that.
- We can change it.
- This is my safe.
(laughing)
- I have five Jackie Robinson rookie cards.
Those are Jackie Robinson rookie cards.
- But going Americana on it.
Hot dogs and burgers on the grill 2 o'clock.
You know a little corn hole.
A little whiffle ball, Jason.
You see where I'm going with this?
Hot dogs, burgers...
There's just something funny about bringing Jason
into the conversation.
You see where I'm going, Jason?
(upbeat music)