The Biggest Bets I Made — And How They Paid Off: Gary Vee

Gary Vaynerchuk 0:00 I think the dirt and the clouds are the only interesting parts of the game.

Codie Sanchez 0:03 If you don't know Gary Vaynerchuk, well, you've probably been living under a rock. He has a multiple New York Times bestseller. He has multiple nine-figure businesses.

Gary Vaynerchuk 0:12 People ask me how I scale Vayner. 10, 80, 10. I open and close.

Codie Sanchez 0:15 So the truth is you need to be an absolute freak of nature. You have to have outlier behavior.

Gary Vaynerchuk 0:19 Do you know how fucking hard it is to make a million dollars a year?

Codie Sanchez 0:22 How do you know what characteristics a great founder has?

Gary Vaynerchuk 0:25 Very early on in my career, I was unstoppable. Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr are my first three investments in my life. I went on pure intuition.

Codie Sanchez 0:32 What are your craziest predictions when it comes to AI?

Gary Vaynerchuk 0:35 My craziest prediction is that most people's grandchildren will marry an AI robot. I had an epiphany. I was like, "Fuck."

Codie Sanchez 0:45 Welcome to the Big Deal podcast. I'm Codie Sanchez, and today we have a man who is not only able to predict the social media trends of today, he's been doing it for the past 30 years. He's got an audience of millions every single day listening to him about how do I go viral, how do I build big businesses, what is going to happen in the future? And today, we get into stuff that he's never talked about before. But what I think is most interesting about what we talk about today is he's going to make some predictions on what's going to happen with AI for all of us. He is going to tell us the secret place to find underpriced attention, so how do we get more money into our businesses by double-tapping on this, and he's also gonna hit you with what I consider to be, like, I don't know, an adrenaline shot level of intensity about why to keep going, how to keep going when things get hard, and what it takes to be a business owner that survives over the long term. Gary Vee is somebody who's become a friend of mine over the past year, and listening to him talk about things I've never heard him speak about before on the Internet was really a true pleasure. So I hope you guys have as much fun as this one. I'm gonna listen back to it 'cause I wanna build businesses as big as this man did. Without further ado, Gary Vee. 'Cause when I was looking at your investment Rolodex, holy hell, you have invested in some giant companies. I don't think people know half the things about you fully on the Internet, but, like Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Uber, Snapchat, Coinbase. I mean, I could go on and on and on. So how do you smell like a founder that's gonna win? How do you know what characteristics a great founder or CEO has?

Gary Vaynerchuk 2:19 Very early on in my career when I didn't consider myself an investor, I was unstoppable. Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr are my first three investments in my life. I only judged what I smelled. I went on pure intuition about the human and the thesis. I wanted to like the idea, and they were far enough along. I wasn't an angel round.

Codie Sanchez 2:41 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 2:41 They were a little further, more an A or pre-A or... Um, then I thought I was a hero 'cause I was red hot, and I started to, like, r- read TechCrunch and spend time in Silicon Valley. And I got caught in an era, a three-year era, where I invested in just the idea, and I thought if I... What I didn't realize at the time, what I was doing is, "Oh, this is a good idea," and I knew how to run it. I put myself into the CEO chair-

Codie Sanchez 3:12 Yeah

Gary Vaynerchuk 3:12 ... started spending less time analyzing the person, went through an era of ideas, and I lost. I invested in a company called Yobongo that basically became, like, basically two years later, a app called Tinder came out and was Yobongo. I loved Yobongo, but the kid was a ki- young kid, and I didn't spend enough time analyzing his stomach, his merit. And this was the explosion of, like, smart kids and engineers becoming founders, which are-

Codie Sanchez 3:40 And Sean is an animal, the founder of Tinder.

Gary Vaynerchuk 3:42 Yeah, Sean Re- Yeah, and yes. And so I... But Sean, that was like two years later. Eliot, lower, I think that's what his name was, like, I w- I didn't analyze him. So what has worked for me? What has worked for me now when I try to think about it, I think about do I like the jockey and the horse, right? This hat that I'm wearing, Siegmund Stables, right? Max and Caro, y- you know, they're, they're a couple and they're a team. I love them. They're gangsters. They've got it.

Codie Sanchez 4:16 Mm.

Gary Vaynerchuk 4:16 And I, in the world of Kith and Rhude and Palace and Jerry, Fear of God, I understand the business of when you're the hottest up-and-coming fashion brand, it's a business.

Codie Sanchez 4:29 Mm.

Gary Vaynerchuk 4:29 You know what I mean? You can get to a nine-figure exit from a LVMH or da, da, da. So, you know, I'm looking for the jockey and the horse now, the jockey being the entrepreneur, the horse being the business. I need to like both and understand both.

Codie Sanchez 4:44 So say I'm sitting across from you, and, like, you're either gonna hire me or invest in my company. What are you, what are you asking me to tell if you like me or not or wanna take a bet on me?

Gary Vaynerchuk 4:54 Usually, here's how it goes. I'll go with, "Hey, Codie, start, hey, so nice to meet you. I'm so excited about this. Tell me everything." Literally, that's what I will say. Tell me everything is kind of a go... It's not, like, my go-to question. It's just what I happen to think. It's ha- what I happen to mean.

Codie Sanchez 5:09 Mm.

Gary Vaynerchuk 5:09 Tell me everything, like, as much as you wanna tell me either about yourself or the business, go. I listen carefully, and then my series of questions is predicated on what I listen to. I'm counterpunching the reality of what I heard. I don't have a go-to other than I need as much context as possible from you right now about you or it. I'm 49, have been pretty much successful at anything I've, I've run and have had plenty of winning and losing in investment. I can listen and know where I wanna go. Sometimes after that, Code, it's over, like even off the rip, right? Like, it's over because, you know, at this point I have such a public life too, like, I can feel when someone's pandering to, like, "Well, Gary, I love the hustle and the grit, and I love Flip it."

Codie Sanchez 5:54 [laughs]

Gary Vaynerchuk 5:54 You know, I can tell when someone's trying to game me.

Codie Sanchez 5:57 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 5:57 And then even if they're trying to game me, I won't even like, that doesn't eliminate them. That's just a data point Again, because I'm now 49, 22, so for 27 years, for 27 straight years, every day of my life, I have had to be responsible to make payroll with no funding. 27. Like, I'm a real, actual operator, and so it's very easy for me to ask questions, you know?

Codie Sanchez 6:29 How fast can you tell?

Gary Vaynerchuk 6:31 Sometimes immediately. It's like, you know, like many of us listening know what love at first sight feels like, right? Or crush at first sight, everybody knows. Uh, or like immediately knowing, I'm incredibly intuitive. My emotional intelligence is disproportionately my go-to. Uh, so I can tell right away... I can't tell right away if I'm gonna hire someone or invest or if someone's a genius. I can tell right away the things I'm feeling. Like, this is potentially someone remarkable. I can always tell when someone's just an average C player right away. You know what I mean? Pretty quickly. Um, but, but again, C players for my businesses when I hire, I love a good C because I think we have a system to get people to Bs, and I think Bs are great.

Codie Sanchez 7:20 Interesting.

Gary Vaynerchuk 7:21 Mm-hmm.

Codie Sanchez 7:21 So you are okay with B and C players. Let, let's talk about that actually.

Gary Vaynerchuk 7:25 I, I, I think most companies, when you're at scale-

Codie Sanchez 7:27 Okay

Gary Vaynerchuk 7:27 ... need plenty of B and C players. A players are always looking-

Codie Sanchez 7:32 How do you define that though then? Because it's like you don't wanna have a, a culturally toxic-

Gary Vaynerchuk 7:37 No

Codie Sanchez 7:38 ... C player.

Gary Vaynerchuk 7:38 That, I mean, I, I, I-

Codie Sanchez 7:38 So like what's the difference?

Gary Vaynerchuk 7:40 ... think five, by the way, I think my five posts ago on Instagram is give me an A+ personality in a C player because C personality is death on arrival. C, let alone D and F, and there are plenty of those people. No, I'm talking about like, you know, brain power. You know, like, like firepower, right? Like, not everyone's the sharpest fucking most, you know, like, like it's just real life. Um, work ethic. You know, work ethic you can't really tell in an interview. I feel like work ethic's one that you can see more play out and then you decide. I just think that we in my companies care to m- level people up, and we continue to get better at it, and that's really working for us at scale, so we have a lot of retention. Um, but yeah, I think, I think I'm looking for firepower, intellectual firepower, personality traits. Um, I'm trying to poke at like self-awareness. I look for humility. I, I'll give you one that is always a letdown. "Hey, Codie, I'm super excited about this. You know, you're gonna come in and be at a VP level at Vayner, which is a big role. I, like you're actu- like I think the VP director role at my company is really running the company, is above the SVPs and the C-suite." You know, we're in an interview. I'm saying that, and then I'm like, "Code, real talk, like don't bullshit." I'll say it like this, "Hey, real talk, don't bullshit me because I'm gonna find out anyway, and I want you to be here a long time, and I want you to win here. Give me one of your shortcomings in your career." When people go to, "Gary, sometimes I care too much, and I," like that, I'm like, "It's over." You know what I mean? Like, give me something real please. You know what I mean? Like, it's why-

Codie Sanchez 9:20 I work too hard. Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 9:21 It's like why when I realized, you know, five to seven years ago that lack of candor, which is crazy 'cause Gary Vee's candor's off the charts, but Gary Vaynerchuk the executive, when I realized lack of candor, I struggled giving critical feedback. Yeah, and then the firings would be sloppy because of that 'cause people would be surprised. When I really had that moment in the mirror with myself, what am I? Maybe 49, maybe 42, 43, 44. When I had that moment, literally the next day I started putting it out publicly. That's when I wrote 12 and a Half 'cause I wa- I literally wrote an entire book because I wanted to put out there my shortcoming of candor.

Codie Sanchez 10:05 Interesting.

Gary Vaynerchuk 10:05 Mm-hmm.

Codie Sanchez 10:06 Which people probably like almost don't believe because they're like-

Gary Vaynerchuk 10:08 Correct, because my-

Codie Sanchez 10:09 Right

Gary Vaynerchuk 10:09 ... strength is candor as a public figure talking about things.

Codie Sanchez 10:13 Yep.

Gary Vaynerchuk 10:13 But Gary Vee and Gary Vaynerchuk, I'm the same. I think, you know, one of the things I always smile about is when people work for me or get to know me, they're like, "It's so cool that you're who y-," I'm, I'm the same, but it's a different context.

Codie Sanchez 10:26 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 10:27 You know what I mean? Like-

Codie Sanchez 10:27 Oh, yeah

Gary Vaynerchuk 10:28 ... like t- I'm talking to the blank world right now versus someone who's worked for me for three years. Here's h- where my bleeding heart becomes a vulnerability. You stink at Vayner for the last six months. It's now a problem. You've been there for five years. You've given it all. You've always really given it all. It's a problem. We're leveling up. It's a problem. People around you are fucking pissed. You're not good enough. You're getting paid more than people that are better than you underneath you. It's becomes a problem. But I know, 'cause I'm so HR-oriented, but I know that your dad has cancer, and I know that you just broke up with your boyfriend, and I'm struggling to fucking fire you. I don't know what else to tell you. It's fucking hard.

Codie Sanchez 11:08 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 11:08 The end.

Codie Sanchez 11:10 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 11:10 I don't know what else to say.

Codie Sanchez 11:11 Never feels good. It doesn't. But e- but I think also, you know, one of the cool things about you is, um, you are so big. You've been around for so long publicly that also the, the tough part is sometimes, you know, that's the person that's coming in and firing you, or that's the person that's giving you the critical feedback. It's like this extra fucking layer on top of everything else.

Gary Vaynerchuk 11:30 You'll appreciate this. I love you for that. You're right.

Codie Sanchez 11:33 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 11:33 For some, at 22, at 26, at 29, at 31, at 34 in the wine store when nobody on earth knew who I was-

Codie Sanchez 11:40 Yeah

Gary Vaynerchuk 11:40 ... it was my biggest weakness.

Codie Sanchez 11:41 Yeah. Interesting. Interesting, so still always the same.

Gary Vaynerchuk 11:44 I just, I just, there was a level of confidence/potentially ego. I always thought I could make it better. Like, I definitely, definitely would've been the girl that would've went after like fucked up dudes 'cause I thought I could make them better.

Codie Sanchez 11:57 [laughs]

Gary Vaynerchuk 11:57 I would've definitely been that girl.

Codie Sanchez 11:58 [laughs] I feel that.

Gary Vaynerchuk 12:00 100,000%. Like I know it inside, I know it-

Codie Sanchez 12:01 Like I'ma fix him.

Gary Vaynerchuk 12:02 Yeah, and not like in a, like a fucked up way.

Codie Sanchez 12:04 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 12:04 In an optimistic way. Not in a like, like- I'm a psycho in a, in a, in, in a... You know, and the problem for me is I have. My problem in a lot of ways is there are many people within my organizations, startups, friend groups, boards I'm on, because I'm so into guidance counselor, coach, therapist energy, and be- I have such a yin and yang because of the emotional intelligence, but because of the operational and because of like just wanting to kind of do to the world what my mom did for me, um, I've been successful at it. I'm, I'm just like r- names are running through my head right now where like people started off at like a three emotionally and are at an eight strictly 'cause I put my fucking hand on their shoulder. Every teacher, therapist, coach, guidance counselor knows what I'm saying right now. And you know how rewarding that is? Like, I've changed the course of this human being's life. I'm doing that with content to the world, let alone imagine someone I can put my hand on their shoulder. So it becomes intoxicating in like it feels good to help other people, for certain people. I know many people don't feel the way I feel, but for me it feels good. I like it. It feels like the right thing to do.

Codie Sanchez 13:20 What, what is the opposite of that? What is like the advice that you keep having to repeat that you know people need to listen to and they just don't?

Gary Vaynerchuk 13:29 All, every single... By the way, every single thing I say, patience, like insecurity, don't keep up with the Joneses, fuck materialism, eat shit. Like, it c- it's both the left and the right struggle with me and like me, right? Because, because in one side I'm like compassion and all the feelings and everyone's like, "Ah." On the other side I'm like, "Kill every fucker. It's all compet-"

Codie Sanchez 13:52 [laughs]

Gary Vaynerchuk 13:53 Like, like, be- because it is purple.

Codie Sanchez 13:55 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 13:56 'Cause life is purple. The reason there's so much tenseness right now is the world, the youth, the elderly, the left, the right, the 40s, the every generation Z, X, Y, boomers, alpha, we're fighting for it's red or it's blue. I'm like, "Motherfuckers, it's purple you fucking idiots. You fucking idiots. It's fucking purple. How the fuck don't you understand that?" So you know, what people struggle with everything I say. You know, when I tell parents that you got to stop giving your kids money after they're 22, every 20, every parent right now listening who's got a 27-year-old on the payroll doesn't like getting poked like that. But I'm on the receiving end of all this fucking depression DMs from 28-year-olds that are on the payroll. Because parents don't realize if you're paying for your kid when they're a grown adult, you're telling your kid you don't believe in them, through your actions, not your words. They know they're a loser. Yeah. That shit hurts, you know?

Codie Sanchez 15:01 So what do the, what do the parents say to you when you say that? Like, what's their excuse for continuing to do that?

Gary Vaynerchuk 15:09 You know, in the most private conversations, it's, it's just service level justifying. You know, like, "Oh, you don't know my son, like he had this issue." I'm like, "Everyone had issues." Do you understand every person in the '80s in New Jersey got bullied? Every single kid I grew up with got bullied.

Codie Sanchez 15:31 Right.

Gary Vaynerchuk 15:31 The popular ones, the not pop- Like, we, we've started making these words so big. I told somebody yesterday, "Don't use the word anxious. You're not. You're inconvenienced."

Codie Sanchez 15:44 Great line.

Gary Vaynerchuk 15:45 You know? Like, like we've now just gotten so deep into this shit. This is why so many people are struggling. We've given them permission to not do and fight and fix. Ooh, that's, I've never said it that way. We have given people with all these big words... Do you know what imposter syndrome is? It's called insecurity. We've just given it makeup. Nobody's like, "Yo, I'm insecure."

Codie Sanchez 16:11 [laughs]

Gary Vaynerchuk 16:11 Nobody says that code, but so many people are like, "Man, I have imposter syndrome." Makeup. Got it? The definition, literally the definition of imposter syndrome is slang for I'm deeply insecure. But nobody comes around and says, "I'm insecure." But everybody... An anx- an- I'm, I have anxiety. People say they have depression when they don't.

Codie Sanchez 16:38 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 16:38 And that fucks up for people that actually do. I feel bad for the people that actually do.

Codie Sanchez 16:44 It's a great point. I, ooh-

Gary Vaynerchuk 16:45 And it's confused everybody.

Codie Sanchez 16:47 Sure.

Gary Vaynerchuk 16:47 Everybody at w- Like do you know how bad I feel for all the people that own big businesses who like every person's like, "I need a mental health day," and they're like, they're like starting to cancel mental health days, and meanwhile, of the 100 people that are abusing it 'cause they just wanna play video games are doing fucking nothing. 'Cause I lived that life.

Codie Sanchez 17:03 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 17:03 Do you know how many sick days I had from 1982 to 1994? A million. I tried to get out of school every day. And boy, when fifth grade Gary found out that legally they had to send you home if you went to the nurse and weren't refusing to go back, well, I fucking cooked.

Codie Sanchez 17:20 [laughs]

Gary Vaynerchuk 17:21 I fucking... I mean, that was everything to me. That discovery, I don't know if I've ever been happier in my life.

Codie Sanchez 17:27 [laughs]

Gary Vaynerchuk 17:28 In fifth grade somehow, I don't rem- I don't wanna bullshit, I don't remember how, but I learned that you could actually will your... You could just stick in... If the nurse said, "Go back to class," you're like, "I don't feel well," that if you kept going, they had to send you home. I mean, I didn't... So I-

Codie Sanchez 17:42 Did your, uh, immigrant parents beat your ass for that?

Gary Vaynerchuk 17:45 What was funny, this is why I put my mom on a super pedestal. My mom knew that getting A's in school was not going to lead m- to my success and happiness, and she did something most parents weren't willing to do and are still not willing to do, and she didn't give a fuck what everybody thought about my D's and F's.

Codie Sanchez 18:04 Interesting.

Gary Vaynerchuk 18:04 Got it? She knew me.

Codie Sanchez 18:07 But is that because somewhere else you were showing her obsession?

Gary Vaynerchuk 18:09 Of course.

Codie Sanchez 18:10 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 18:10 Of course.

Codie Sanchez 18:11 'Cause if you, 'cause-

Gary Vaynerchuk 18:12 Of course

Codie Sanchez 18:12 ... if you were a parent that just was like-

Gary Vaynerchuk 18:13 My mom-

Codie Sanchez 18:13 ... "D's and F's, fuck off," that would be-

Gary Vaynerchuk 18:15 She's the, she's the same lady that looked at me on my 14th birthday and said, "You know how you suck at school?" I'm like, "Yeah." She's like, "Now you work." I was 14 14, Codie

Codie Sanchez 18:24 I like her

Gary Vaynerchuk 18:25 Like, I worked every weekend, every sum- uh, my last childhood moments, like childhood, ends in eighth grade. There was no, there was no fun in high school for me. There was no like, I didn't... Like, I worked because I had to pay the consequences of not working in the classroom. Thank God for me, work was my nirvana. Like, thank God for me, I loved my parents so mu- thank God for me, I knew, I knew as a teenager that I had it, because I was doing baseball card shows at 11 and 12 and grown me- You know, this is why I love, like, that's where I was getting validation from. In school I was getting D's and F's, and grown-ups were telling me I was gonna be a loser. Teachers in the '80s didn't fuck around. I had teachers, like Mr. Mo- Dr. Dabella in Martin Luther King Elementary School in 1987 said I was going to be a fucking loser.

Codie Sanchez 19:19 [laughs] Makes me feel any better, my math teacher told me Helen Keller would have a better shot of winning an archery contest than I would of being in finance.

Gary Vaynerchuk 19:28 Oh, my God.

Codie Sanchez 19:28 [laughs]

Gary Vaynerchuk 19:29 100%.

Codie Sanchez 19:30 But God, what great fuel, honestly.

Gary Vaynerchuk 19:32 Yeah, like, uh, the-

Codie Sanchez 19:33 Pretty, pretty thankful.

Gary Vaynerchuk 19:34 Yeah. I, you know, so but, but then I was doing baseball card shows at 13, making 800 bucks while a gr- the grownup to the left and right at my table were making 300 'cause it was a crappy show, and my mom picks me up at Sunday night to, like, pack up and drive me home, and I've got two th- 30, 40, 50-year-old men telling my mom, like, "Your son's a genius." 'Cause I was doing all sorts of weird shit that nobody else was doing, and so yeah, I mean, I just, that was m- like-

Codie Sanchez 20:01 Like what?

Gary Vaynerchuk 20:02 Like, the dollar rack. Like, I was, I was selling, like, 50, 60, 70 cent and $1.20, $1.30 cards that you can't move those cards, but because I merchandised them as a dollar rack with a huge sign, everybody just stopped by and bought cards. My fr- my friend Brandon Warnke, who's still run- m- in my life, we met at 14, we did baseball card shows, he runs the Wine Library. I talk to him every day. He's one of the few humans on earth I talk to every day. I mean, he was baffled by the dollar rack. When I put it out, he was like, "That's not gonna work." And then, like, three hours later, there's not a card left in the dollar rack. Merchandising matters 'cause you-

Codie Sanchez 20:38 Explain what that is to somebody who doesn't know what merchandising is

Gary Vaynerchuk 20:41 ... how a human sees it on the other side. When you walk into, like, you know how, like, some of you like... It's very simple. It's like think about the best way to describe merchandising is to describe to everybody their home. Some of us, like me, are comfortable in slobbery. F- you know, crap on the floor, room doesn't smell. I mean, I was a fucking cliche dude, right? Like, laundry on the ground, like, room smells like shit, like, ev- things every- like, who gives a fuck? Like, don't even do laundry. Like, where to s- in my teenage, oh my God, such a dude. Other people can't even fall asleep in their apartment, in their, like, room, unless the fucking scent is perfect, everything's perfect. Like, good. So, like, like, how something shows up for you. I get excited go- walking up to a garage sale where shit's all over the place, but h- but let me take a different angle on it. So that's the setting. Now imagine, like, w- why are you grabbing something when you buy? Like, I always ask myself after I do it, "Why did I just pick that up?" It's on the end cap. It's at the register. That sign, the presentation. It, by the way, merchandising is the fashion industry. You know? Like, presentability, but, like, what ma- compels something, someone to grab an item? That's always what I thought about, the sign, the positioning, the location within the store, the eyesight level. Do you understand that retailers, like, think, like I g- I think like a retailer, like, what's at eye level is what sells. Bottom shelf doesn't sell. When I used to get mad at a supplier if we didn't have, like, good negotiations or, like, they weren't supporting us, I took their most important products and put it on the bottom shelf. Merchandising. You know, I obsessed when I was 15. I used to, when I was s- six- 15, 16, I was allowed to go upstairs. Before that I was downstairs in the warehouse. And when I was at the register bagging for the cashier, which is what I was doing, and then I became a cashier at 16, I could see how people walk, based w- on where my dad's ca- registers were, I could see people walk in, and we were slow. We're still s- local store at that point. I would watch every customer. They'd walk in, what do they grab, why? So it's presentation, how your table's laid out, how... It's, it's why I was good at UI and UX when the internet came along. All the designers in '97, '98, '99, 2000 were like, "Yo, you're really good at this," 'cause I thought like a consumer, like, why would they click that button? What about below the fucking scroll? What about the checkout? I literally had, you know, a empty cart or, like, a lapsed cart or, or whatever it was called. What the hell was it? Abandoned carts. I remember going to my developer in 2000 being like, "Can we see who didn't check out?" Like, I, like, it was like, you gotta understand, this is early internet.

Codie Sanchez 23:33 Yeah, didn't exist.

Gary Vaynerchuk 23:33 It's, like, we didn't-

Codie Sanchez 23:34 'Cause you're thinking in the store, "Hey, uh, that guy's walking out. Like, sir, did you not find something that..." That's what you would do, right?

Gary Vaynerchuk 23:39 That's exactly what I would do. So I was like, "Is there an inter- wait a minute, there's a internet version of this." I'm like, "Eric Kastner," big shout out to him, "Eric, can you see in the co-" Like, I didn't even know what to call it, the code, the server, who the... We used such funny words back then. He's like, "Yeah." We started emailing people that abandoned carts and fucking crushed. So, like, you know, uh-

Codie Sanchez 24:00 Merchandising is, it's so funny 'cause the other day I went to, this was two days ago, I went to the Harry Potter store.

Gary Vaynerchuk 24:05 Yes, yeah.

Codie Sanchez 24:06 And the reason why, same thing you said, who's better at merchandising in the fucking world than the entertainment space?

Gary Vaynerchuk 24:12 Yeah.

Codie Sanchez 24:12 And I think arguably Harry Potter, probably one of the best of our lifetimes, right? Like-

Gary Vaynerchuk 24:16 Yeah, it's a brilliant, one of the incredible IPs that we saw birthed.

Codie Sanchez 24:20 Exactly. And when you walk into that store, it's always packed And it is huge margin, it's incredibly well-designed, and, like, they rotate merch, but what I've kind of noticed is they don't rotate it that much.

Gary Vaynerchuk 24:33 Yeah.

Codie Sanchez 24:33 Like, it's not like they always have to have some new-

Gary Vaynerchuk 24:35 Are you a huge Har- Harry Potter fan?

Codie Sanchez 24:36 I'm a big Harry Potter fan-

Gary Vaynerchuk 24:37 Yeah

Codie Sanchez 24:37 ... but I'm not crazy about it.

Gary Vaynerchuk 24:39 You're not crazy, but you're very solid.

Codie Sanchez 24:41 Yeah, yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 24:42 Nice.

Codie Sanchez 24:43 Um, and so watching that taught me a lot about, okay, well, if we're ever gonna do merch, how do we do this right? How do I make every person who comes in... They have those little greeters, you know-

Gary Vaynerchuk 24:53 Mm-hmm

Codie Sanchez 24:53 ... Sam Walton.

Gary Vaynerchuk 24:54 Mm-hmm.

Codie Sanchez 24:54 I loved that. He was, like, looking to cut costs, but also put a greeter in front because he realized, oh, it makes people feel different too, like they're special for coming in the store.

Gary Vaynerchuk 25:02 Yeah, I think what, to that point, I do that too. I don't like the middle. So I would say what I see with a greeter at Walmart is not playing in the middle. It's like price, convenience all the way here on the right, but then spend on things that others don't spend on 'cause it changes the context of the relationship. I always talk about scale the unscalable. Actually, here's a tidbit. I believe one of the great misses right now for all of the characters like you and I, and everybody else that's aspiring to, like, win on content and brand, is community management. I really do believe that way more people need to DM everyone back. If... You and I do not have that bandwidth, but I'm telling you right now, if you're just kind of getting into your early stages and you have, like, 10,000 followers, and you're posting and you're getting 14 comments, you're getting 13 DMs a day, reply to all of them. Scale the unscalable. That's how I built Gary Vee, by the way. Content and replying to everyone on Twitter from 2007 to 2011.

Codie Sanchez 26:05 You kind of still do it on scale, 'cause r- I remember when I came and spoke at, uh-

Gary Vaynerchuk 26:09 BCon?

Codie Sanchez 26:10 BCon. Um, I came and spoke. That's normal. I'll go speak at, at, at people's events.

Gary Vaynerchuk 26:15 Yeah.

Codie Sanchez 26:15 It's an amazing event. I had a great time. Very seldom does the head of the entire event ask to get my phone number and text me direct. That's really actually not that sc- I mean, how many speakers did you have there? Hun- hundreds.

Gary Vaynerchuk 26:27 Yeah.

Codie Sanchez 26:27 Um, not to mention that's not your only event.

Gary Vaynerchuk 26:29 Yep.

Codie Sanchez 26:29 Not to mention you're doing these all over the world.

Gary Vaynerchuk 26:31 Yep.

Codie Sanchez 26:31 That's actually not even that scalable for you.

Gary Vaynerchuk 26:33 Yep.

Codie Sanchez 26:33 And so it seems like there's different levels to the game, but you still do the unscalable even at the highest level of the game.

Gary Vaynerchuk 26:40 I think the dirt and the clouds are the only interesting parts of the game.

Codie Sanchez 26:46 That's good.

Gary Vaynerchuk 26:47 Yeah, and so even in my own organiz- people ask me how I scale Vayner, and I say 10/80/10, and they're like, "What does that mean?" I go, "When we're doing important shit," I tell the team, "I have to be involved in the first 10% 'cause I'm molding it. Then I disappear, and then you need to come back to me to close it." I open and close. The middle's the problem, and winners and people aspiring to build big things spend way too much time in the middle. Meetings, I've famously, internally, and a little bit externally, obsessed with 15-minute meetings. I had an epiphany. I was like, "Fuck, I crushed the dirt, the 15-minute meeting. I'm fucking up the clouds." I have a lot of one-hour meetings that are actually three-hour meetings. I've done more off-sites, two, three-day off-sites this year, we're only, we're not even halfway through, than I've done in the last 10, and it's been monumental. I had this epiphany in November, December of last year. I'm like, "Wait a minute. I've got the 15-minute meeting down," but, you know, this is about, like, feeling your feelings. I could feel that a lot of important meetings that were an hour weren't getting wrapped up. So now I'm doing a lot more two- and three-hour meetings, and even two- and three-day off-sites. 10/80/10.

Codie Sanchez 28:00 That's a great framework, because otherwise it does seem too much, and you can get stuck in micromanagement forever. You're like, "I'm trying to build a business. Gary and Codie, you said do that, and I need to have my hands on everything, and I need to care about the dirt." But you can't all the time.

Gary Vaynerchuk 28:11 Oh my God, I would argue for your audi- like the SMB audience.

Codie Sanchez 28:13 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 28:14 Like the mainstream audience, the number one reason they lose is they spend all their time in the 80. That's why my dad got small, didn't go as big as he could. He needed, he wanted to know everything, wanted to touch everything. M- m- many small business entrepreneurs are just trying to be solopreneurs. They don't realize it. They're scared of stealing and security, someone getting better at it and leaving. There's all these millions of different things that people are worried about. 10/80/10.

Codie Sanchez 28:40 What do you think the young entrepreneurs are sleeping on right now?

Gary Vaynerchuk 28:45 So many different thi- you know, when... You know this. We've had the luxury of living just a little bit. We're still pretty young in the scheme of things, but, like, you know, I had so many... You know, when I talk about my career, my life, I always think it's a homage to my parents and my circumstance. And so I had a lot of things figured out at 23, right? I, my mom really actually built self-esteem. You know, I continue to believe that most people get successful because of insecurity, and there's a rare breed that gets there through confidence, and I'm so grateful that I'm in that small group, and I see it in others. Um, but that's not me. That's how I was raised and just the circumstance of being born in the Soviet Union, a Jersey boy in the '80s, and a mil- million other things that are not me. Um, I think a lot about the youth, to your point, and there's just a lot. I think, first of all, both men and women, I think we throw it on men, but I see it in a lot of young women, we want to get validation from the masses. It was always a vulnerability pre-social media, pre-internet, to want validation from the outside. But the outside in 1974 and 1983 was the Joneses, AKA your neighbors. That was, like, the, you know, like, maybe your church, maybe your, like, neighbor. Like, it was tight. Maybe the people in the off- it was small. You know, there's an extraordinary amount of wanting to show that you're successful going on. Um, so I think one thing that a lot of the youth is struggling with is an extreme need for the Lambos, the watches, the followers, the cash, the trophies, the accolade, just so much outside validation. Um, I think there's a lot of lack of self-awareness. I think that, in general, that's a human thing, but meaning I think a lot of people chase the trend, you know, whether it's, you know, cannabis or NFTs or crypto or flipping or, or, you know ... And I, I, listen, I'm curious about a lot of trends, but I think a lot of people are like, "This is, I'm gonna do this 'cause this is where I can make my millions." You know? So I think, I, I believe that one of the great ways to actually be successful is to truly know the things you like because you'll work that hard. Like, I don't think I could ever work as hard as I did if I didn't enjoy it. I couldn't muster it up. It's why I don't, you know, back when we were talking right before we started, the gym this morning was a grind.

Codie Sanchez 31:17 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 31:17 Yeah, like to me it was like, I really didn't want to. I really don't want to. And my gym, my eating discipline, my doing things around the house, these are fully procrastinations. These are laziness. This is avoidism. This is non-accountability. This is like, look, a bird over there, run away. Like, I do the reverse and more 'cause it's my love.

Codie Sanchez 31:37 Mm.

Gary Vaynerchuk 31:38 I do the reverse in playing basketball. I like it. I'm like, should definitely not be playing. I like it. I go out of my way. I was just saying to you, my back was hurting all week, and I played last night. That was, like, crazy. So I think if you love what you do, you will do the things that actually are required to be successful, which is persevere through the daily shit, right?

Codie Sanchez 32:02 That's hard to beat.

Gary Vaynerchuk 32:04 So I think those two things really stand out to me. And then the things, you know, like I, I always laugh when I'm about to say it 'cause I know some people are like, "Gary." But, like, I do struggle with an obsession to try to teach these kids about patience.

Codie Sanchez 32:17 Mm.

Gary Vaynerchuk 32:18 You know, I literally punted my 20s and early 30s because I was obsessed with building a business for my parents.

Codie Sanchez 32:24 Mm-hmm.

Gary Vaynerchuk 32:25 But I truly had nothing at 34. Truly, actually. Like, when I started VaynerMedia, my biggest company, we started it in a conference room the size of this podcast studio in another company's conference room because I couldn't pay rent.

Codie Sanchez 32:40 How big is it now?

Gary Vaynerchuk 32:42 Now it's 2,000-plus people, 350 million a year revenue, not valuation. You know? [laughs]

Codie Sanchez 32:49 [laughs] Oh, you run a profitable business-

Gary Vaynerchuk 32:51 Yeah

Codie Sanchez 32:51 ... that actually makes money? Shocking.

Gary Vaynerchuk 32:52 So, so, you know, it's a big business, and, um, I'm proud-

Codie Sanchez 32:56 That's only one of yours. Like, how many? I was looking it up today. It's like Vayner3, VaynerSports, VaynerRSE, VeeFriends, which I think is a different entity. How many, like, Vayners you got?

Gary Vaynerchuk 33:07 There's VaynerX, the holding company that holds, like-

Codie Sanchez 33:09 Okay

Gary Vaynerchuk 33:10 ... that holds like seven or eight of the mar- that's the marketing agency holding company.

Codie Sanchez 33:15 Okay.

Gary Vaynerchuk 33:15 Outside of it is VaynerSports, 'cause that's a separate business. That's me and my brother. My brother runs that with Greg Genske. That's becoming a pretty big business. We rep over 100 athletes, might even be close to 200 now. A newer one is VaynerWatt, W-A-T-T, for Eric Wattenberg. That's a TV production company.

Codie Sanchez 33:33 Mm.

Gary Vaynerchuk 33:33 Our first shows are gonna start hitting the air here in the fall, and, like, that's starting to move and groove. VeeFriends is the other biggest business I run. That's my Marvel Pokémon. It's an intellectual property. That's ... I do actually believe in my 80s that's what I will be known for more than anything else I've done.

Codie Sanchez 33:49 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 33:51 Um, and-

Codie Sanchez 33:51 And probably nobody understands that right now, right?

Gary Vaynerchuk 33:53 Yeah, I mean-

Codie Sanchez 33:53 Like, when you launched it, they thought-

Gary Vaynerchuk 33:55 I mean-

Codie Sanchez 33:55 ... "Oh, this quick little NFT thing."

Gary Vaynerchuk 33:56 Yeah, I mean, most people don't understand me, and Vayner, most people don't know VaynerX. Most people when they just heard 350 mil- like, when people come to Vayner, they're, like, often they're like, "What is this?" I'm like, "This is my company." They're like ... Most people think I'm a motivational speaker-

Codie Sanchez 34:13 Yeah

Gary Vaynerchuk 34:13 ... or a content creator, which is fine. I mean, I'm not overly worried about it. Um, VCR Group, I have a very substantial restaurant group that's going very well. We have that Flyfish Club, which was also an NFT membership.

Codie Sanchez 34:25 Oh, it's just there.

Gary Vaynerchuk 34:26 Yeah, it's really going well.

Codie Sanchez 34:27 Inter- yeah, it was beautiful.

Gary Vaynerchuk 34:29 Thank you. Yeah, it's crushing, which is good, 'cause that was very high risk, high reward. You open up that kind of eight-figure build-out, it, and the restaurant business is not nice. It's, it's the h-

Codie Sanchez 34:39 Hate restaurants

Gary Vaynerchuk 34:39 ... it's the hits business.

Codie Sanchez 34:40 [laughs]

Gary Vaynerchuk 34:40 Yeah, it's-

Codie Sanchez 34:40 Yeah

Gary Vaynerchuk 34:40 ... you should hate them.

Codie Sanchez 34:41 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 34:41 It's a ter- restaurants and sports agencies, bad businesses.

Codie Sanchez 34:45 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 34:45 Passion, though. Chef Capon, Chef Connor, David Rodolitz, my three partners in that business, this is their life. My brother punted ca- a lot of money because he just wants to be a sports agent, you know?

Codie Sanchez 34:58 Okay.

Gary Vaynerchuk 34:58 And now he's starting, after a 10-year itch of like, "I went out, should've," you know, so I think it ebbs and flows. So anyway, long-winded, I think I wish kids were like, "No, no, I really love sailing. Let me start a business around sailing, whether it's content creation. Let me go work for someone who's in the sailing business for five years, learn and figure out." Like, that move, like when people hear me say this, they're like, "But Gary, how do I do that?" I'm like, "Why don't you go work for somebody in comedy, in, you know, the fashion..." Like, everyone has just decided, like, I can start a business, and most people are not talented enough in their teens or 20s to build a viable business just yet.

Codie Sanchez 35:36 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 35:36 You know, the thing is-

Codie Sanchez 35:37 And it's miserable.

Gary Vaynerchuk 35:38 Well, yeah, there, you know this. Most people, this was a real wake-up call for me. When entrepreneurship got cool in, like, the mid-210s, like 2010, '11, '12, '13, everyone started running towards it, and I had always been there. I didn't realize how hard it was for people that weren't natural-born, but then it made sense to me 'cause I was a really poor student, and, like, I just think some people know how to do school. I wasn't one of those people. And I'm like, "Oh, this is, this is gonna be hard for these people." [laughs]

Codie Sanchez 36:14 [laughs]

Gary Vaynerchuk 36:14 'Cause, you know, there-

Codie Sanchez 36:16 Yeah

Gary Vaynerchuk 36:16 ... it's, because unlike school, like, I never did homework and failed every test, and the system pushed me through. My school system didn't want people to stay back. They were going for a blue ribbon. They just pushed me through. I, I literally sit here today, no fucking bullshit, in my four years of high school, I never opened a book, never did homework, never studied for a test, never did a book report, never did a project, and they just pushed me through.

Codie Sanchez 36:43 Which I'm not sure that's good or bad, actually

Gary Vaynerchuk 36:46 In bus- yeah, I mean, it's, it's probably neither. But in business, entrepreneurship, the land of business merit, there's no pushing through.

Codie Sanchez 36:56 No.

Gary Vaynerchuk 36:56 Like, if I did that same thing in business, I'd be out of business very quickly and back at a job. And so,

Gary Vaynerchuk 37:03 yeah.

Codie Sanchez 37:03 Yeah, I saw this stat today, actually. It was on, on Twitter. And, uh, it was ... 'Cause you always talk about how hard it is.

Gary Vaynerchuk 37:11 Yeah.

Codie Sanchez 37:11 You know?

Gary Vaynerchuk 37:12 Mm-hmm.

Codie Sanchez 37:12 And so there was this tweet today that was like, "Uh, read this if you're not as rich as you want," and it was the odds of making it, that in the US, one in 1,000 make over a million in a year, one in 11,000 over 10 million, one in 35,000 over 20 million, and so the truth is, if you wanna make it, you need to be an absolute freak of nature, basically. You have to have outlier behavior. And I was curious what you think and how hard it actually is. 'Cause you're oftentimes telling all of us, "It's gonna be harder than you think."

Gary Vaynerchuk 37:41 When we ... I'm 49. When the number went from ... When I was a kid, the number was, if I could make 100,000 a year. I grew up in lower middle class, middle class kind of, like, vibes, more lower middle class. 100K seemed re- I mean, I myself, with ... You know, I'm in- 15 years old, "I'm gonna buy the Jets one day." But there was another part of my brain that was like, "Man." The only time I was pumped professionally, financially, was when I broke the 100,000 barrier in a year, no other time. No other time. When that number for the masses became a million versus 100,000, shit got ugly. Like, just, like, do you know how fucking hard it is to make a million dollars a year? Like, really, actually. And the problem for someone like you and I, if we've gotten there, and we spend all our time around people that have gotten there, it doesn't feel rare.

Codie Sanchez 38:34 Yep.

Gary Vaynerchuk 38:34 One of the, you know, one of the great things that has always happened in my career is I gre- again, because of where I grew up, I always thought about the other pl- So one of the first offices I opened for VaynerMedia was Chattanooga, Tennessee, not LA, not San Francisco, not Tokyo, not London. And one of the reasons I did that was I always wanted to be grounded to everything, up, down, left, right. You, when you go to Chattanooga, Tennessee, if you make a million dollars a year, you're fucking on a pedestal. And by the way, Chattanooga has a wealthy area, old Coke money. There's some great entrepreneurs there. Um-

Codie Sanchez 39:05 And it's nice.

Gary Vaynerchuk 39:06 Yeah, it is nice.

Codie Sanchez 39:07 Clean, honestly.

Gary Vaynerchuk 39:07 I like Chattanooga. Uh, but look, I think, I think that it's incredibly hard, and I don't know why people think it's easy, and I do know why I think people, people think it's easy. In the '80s, there was lifestyle of the rich and famous. In the '90s, there was, like, you know, my Crib, you know, the Cribs show on MTV Cribs. Now, 24/7, people are looking at propaganda in their feeds of watches and vacations. And, and I say, 'cause I keep hearing everyone wanting to blame Instagram and wanting to blame social media, I say stop consuming it.

Codie Sanchez 39:41 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 39:41 You know? Like, if you're motivated by it, great. I don't believe that most people are motivated by it. I think most people get jealous and envious, get insecure, get ... And so yeah, I think it's super hard because, again, over-coddling parenthood in the last 40 years, school is bullshit system, government's bullshit system. Most systems are bullshit. The only two systems that aren't ... Like, the most not bullshit system in the world is sports. When little Ricky goes on the field and he's nine, if he sucks at basketball or soccer, like, it's exposed, no matter how much Daddy and Mommy wanna make up some excuses or ... Right?

Codie Sanchez 40:20 Used to be.

Gary Vaynerchuk 40:22 Yeah, I mean, parents are really getting their hands in shit, but still, they'll go and fight a teacher. Like, parents in the '80s didn't ... When you got a C, your mom and dad didn't go to school and fight a teacher and try to get a B. They do that now. But even though the ... I mean, I'm in the circles, I have a 15 and 12 year o- a 16 now and 12-year-old, like, growing up in this last seven to 10 years, parents want to go on the field and kick the ball for their kid. Some people want to go do something, but they can't, and then thus the kid gets exposed. Sports is the most merit. The next closest is business. The reason I say it's not the same is you, you know this, people are like, "I'm a three-time exiting founder." I'm like, "You raised $10 million and sold it for 200,000."

Codie Sanchez 41:05 Exactly. [laughs]

Gary Vaynerchuk 41:06 You're a fucking loser. [laughs]

Codie Sanchez 41:07 [laughs] Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 41:08 You know what I mean?

Codie Sanchez 41:08 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 41:08 So people can bullshit a little bit in business. There's, you know, there is a l- But it's, m- but it's 80% to sports. You know, and I guess, in hindsight, I was attracted to merit my whole life because those are my two passions.

Codie Sanchez 41:21 Yeah. I love a, I love a game where you know who wins and loses-

Gary Vaynerchuk 41:24 Me too

Codie Sanchez 41:24 ... 'cause it tells you if you're good or not.

Gary Vaynerchuk 41:26 That's right.

Codie Sanchez 41:26 So do you think ... Like, when you see that stuff online, I'm not a big showy person. Don't get me wrong. And I, I like nice shit. Like, uh-

Gary Vaynerchuk 41:32 Yeah, you're allowed. Totally. Everyone's allowed.

Codie Sanchez 41:34 Totally, but I don't really ... I think it's almost an immediate red flag. When I see somebody showing the Gucci, Fendi, Prada, the fast cars, and the private planes, I immediately go, "I don't know." If you really had that, do you gotta flex it? What do you think? Like, if you're talking to a young person-

Gary Vaynerchuk 41:49 I-

Codie Sanchez 41:49 ... are you saying, "Don't fucking follow people that do that"?

Gary Vaynerchuk 41:51 Yeah. You know, listen, I've taken some lumps from a lot of contemporaries who get mad that I talk about this, 'cause so many of them are in it. Um, look, I think that it ... I, first of all, [laughs] it's so funny where my chemicals just went. One of the great things, and it's funny 'cause I pontificate and share and ponder online 24/7, first of all, just to set the ground rules, I do not have the audacity to think that I'm right about anything, anything-

Codie Sanchez 42:23 Yeah

Gary Vaynerchuk 42:23 ... let alone everything. For me, I'm in your camp a little bit, but it's because I think a lot of people do that to funnel people into them, to monetize them.

Codie Sanchez 42:37 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 42:37 So I think about that a lot. And again, I think it's doing real damage for d- Like, when I post every morning Every evening, I genuinely post from the lens, deeply from the lens of why would someone give a fuck about this post? Why is this good for them? And I do believe a lot of people on the other side of this podcast are not growing because almost every post is about what's in it for me. I want people to buy my course, my book, my collectable, my... You know? You know? And so [sighs] I believe that the flashy stuff is inherently selfish, not selfless. [smacks lips] And so, but look, I mean, people are allowed, like, you know, people are allowed to share. Like, I get it. Again, a lot of people grew up insecure and wanted these things, and they're proud, and they wanna share it. My big thing is that people that have over-indexed on that move, I have found over the last 20 years, tend to struggle to stay on top, tend to be less happy. Um, so it's not only that the audience that's consuming the Lambo or the watch that I'm worried about, but I'm even worried about the person that's sharing it. I'm worried that they won't be able to sustain it.

Codie Sanchez 43:56 That's a great, great move. I, I wanna talk to you a little bit about, um, building big companies. You've built a ton. And so with your current knowledge today, I'm curious.

Gary Vaynerchuk 44:06 Yeah.

Codie Sanchez 44:06 Like, let's say you had to go back, back to your wine days-

Gary Vaynerchuk 44:09 Yeah

Codie Sanchez 44:09 ... almost. Let's say you owned a laundromat-

Gary Vaynerchuk 44:11 Yes

Codie Sanchez 44:11 ... 'cause I'm into those things.

Gary Vaynerchuk 44:12 Yes.

Codie Sanchez 44:12 So let's say you own one laundromat, and you had to start your entire empire from one laundromat today. Like, what would you do? What would be the playbook?

Gary Vaynerchuk 44:20 Content. Yeah, you know, because, you know, you and I are part of a breed that admires a single laundromat owner.

Codie Sanchez 44:30 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 44:31 And I, and I think you have really done a good job of tapping into something that I think is black and white, which, you know, we talked about the last time we hung, like this whole whether you call it micro P or just practical business, obviously Main Street is the way you think about it. I think there's a huge opportunity for a lot of those people to build a brand. In fact, that's what I did. I built my brand. I am that person. I didn't even own the business. It was my dad's business. I was, I was the person who built it, but my original content as Gary Vee, after five years or during the five years of doing the wine show, my original first ever thoughts about business and life and perspectives were literally out of a liquor store, one store, and I built my brand. I could've easily, if that's what I wanted, opened up 10 more stores, did micro M&A, and I would've built a very substantial franchise, fran- or independently owned multi-unit business which would be worth a lot of money and in today's environment would be a very attractive PE acquisition as every small business is gonna get consolidated, it feels like these days. So I, I really, the number one thing I would do is get into content for two reasons. One, if you're capable, building your personal brand I do believe is a moat. I've always believed that it was the moat. I've talked about it for 15 years that it's the moat. It is the one true asset that doesn't get commoditized, even in an AI world. You still have your IP. It's your copyright. It's you. Two, if you learn to be a content creator, the other thing that worked with me, and this was hand-in-hand, and this is what I want for this person, is you start getting good at running ads and doing content for your business too. So in my brain, what I'm dreaming up right now is Sally's building up her. She's like, "I did this. This is how I bootstrapped it," or I, "how I inherited it," or whatever's real. "Here's what I'm doing. Da, da, da, da, da. Here's my day-to-day troubles. Here's how I think about it. Oh my God, coins, when, when people stopped having change on them, we had to put in these, you know, uh, swipe your credit card or your..." You know, like, you know, just like s- the, the battle stories of that business. But also, what she will learn in the story that I'm telling is she'll learn what really every... And by the way, I know a lot of small businesses listen, so let me give it to you very straight. Disproportionally, the biggest opportunity to grow your business, traffic to your business, average receipt size, is to run, if you're a local business that people come to, is to run 10-mile radius Facebook ads. And so Sally, in this journey of building up Sally the laundromat entrepreneur, would also start to learn how to be good at these things, which she would then be able to use to run ads to her business, which is advertising matters. It's always mattered, and it will always matter. And so content.

Codie Sanchez 47:29 Yeah. You know what's so interesting too? In your stor- Again, I remember looking back at those old videos of you in your wine business, and, um, today everybody wants to have a set, right? We're on a borrowed set. This one isn't mine, but, you know, they wanna have this fancy set, but you know what the sickest set is today? Your actual laundromat.

Gary Vaynerchuk 47:46 I think so.

Codie Sanchez 47:46 You know? 'Cause it's show, don't tell.

Gary Vaynerchuk 47:48 I-

Codie Sanchez 47:48 It's like, "No, no, I own this. I'm not, uh, there's no fluorescent lights here. Watch me do this. You don't think I own it? Look, I'm right here."

Gary Vaynerchuk 47:54 I believe the best studio in the world is the world. I tell my clients, which are mainly Fortune 500 companies, I'm like, "Look, let's make content at stores, in parking lots, at festivals." Um, I genuinely believe that. I've always believed that. I was honestly the pied piper in 2009, '10, '11, '12, of no production value. Wine Library TV didn't even have a mic, no lighting. No lighting, no mic. Literally whatever the camera picked up. And so yeah, I agree with you. I think that store as studio-

Codie Sanchez 48:27 Mm

Gary Vaynerchuk 48:27 ... is a big idea.

Codie Sanchez 48:29 It's a good framework.

Gary Vaynerchuk 48:30 Yeah, I think so.

Codie Sanchez 48:30 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 48:30 Store as studio is something that I've really championed more privately than publicly, so I'm glad we're getting to pontificate about this, and, uh, I think that's right.

Codie Sanchez 48:40 Yeah. And it, it means you don't have to have a bunch of money, 'cause I'm, I'm all about the great equalizer. Like yesterday my husband and I were kinda laughing in New York because New York's such an equalizer city in some ways.

Gary Vaynerchuk 48:49 In the best way.

Codie Sanchez 48:49 Which is like... Yeah, so I could drive, like, a fancy black car, which sometimes I do, and guess what? If you hoof it or if you subway it, you're faster than me. And so, like w- that's a cool equalizer. That doesn't exist in a lot of other places, and so I think this is a good example for content. Like, the best performing ads for a lot of our businesses are exactly what you said.

Gary Vaynerchuk 49:08 100%.

Codie Sanchez 49:09 It's like it's a window cleaner cleaning a window, and then it reveals a price. Like, that's it. There's no production. And so-

Gary Vaynerchuk 49:16 Production often, often, again, is disguising insecurity. Uh-huh. A lot of people talk about production. If you listen carefully, it's just an excuse to not do. Anyone who says, "I can't afford it," is full of shit. It's called an iPhone. You all have one. The end. Nothing else. Zero. I did it for fucking a half a decade. A $239 camera from Best Buy was the only thing I used, nothing else. Nothing.

Codie Sanchez 49:52 Such a good point. You know, w- another thing that I really like about you is, um, you kinda said it earlier, you're like, "I take some, I've taken some punches-

Gary Vaynerchuk 50:00 Mm-hmm

Codie Sanchez 50:00 ... on the internet."

Codie Sanchez 50:00 And you have this tweet that I was coming back on, which is, "First they'll call you stupid, then they'll call you lucky. Remember, just make sure that you're always executing, and they are spending their time calling you things." And I loved that line. How do you deal with haters?

Gary Vaynerchuk 50:16 Easily. I, um, with compassion, with empathy. You know, I couldn't comprehend living a life where I spend time trying to tear someone down. Ever.

Codie Sanchez 50:29 Ever? You weren't ever like that?

Gary Vaynerchuk 50:30 Ever. Even, I was just about to say, you know, we're starting to get to know each other. I think it's one thing in these settings. I think the thing you would find interesting, and this is gonna make sense to you, 'cause I assume, I'm assuming circles and things you've run in as you've built your career, the thing that blew me away growing up in the game was that A players in private settings would spend a lot of time shitting on other A players.

Codie Sanchez 50:56 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 50:56 It blew my mind. I remember it was happening to me when Scooter Braun, Maverick Carter, some of these people in business were starting to do really well, and I'd be at these things. I knew both of them well, so it's probably why it triggered for me. When people would be jealous or envious, and they themselves sometimes more successful, I was like, "This is weird. This is interesting. Let me take note of this. Oh, insecurity. Oh," like, like, you know, "wow, they don't realize that the world is a b-" Like, I was fascinated. I just ... And I understand it, because the one place I'm not me is sports fandom, and my level of envy and jealousy of Michael Jordan and Tom Brady and Bulls fans in that era and Patriot fans is like anger, like almost like the most extreme Republican or Democrat feeling about the other side. So I can tap into the emotion that is jealousy and envy, and, you know, because I don't feel in control as a fan. But as a real-life human, I feel fully in control, and I couldn't comprehend the idea of deploying jealousy or envy against, uh, someone else. So how do I deal with haters? Compassion. I mean, they're just not in a good place. Like, there's no other way to say it. Like, could you comprehend spending your time tearing down? And so many people do it, and you're ... Like, I just couldn't ... Why would I deploy that energy? You know, if I believe something stinks or someone stinks, my immediate reaction is to just walk away in perpetuity. I, I wanna save my energy and time. I got shit to do, trying to win out here. That, I remember that tweet. I remember that era when I was thinking about it. I always wanted to be an athlete, but it wasn't in the cards. Um, being a publicly known businessman with, you know, opinions left, right, up, down, I'm like, "Oh, shit, I got to taste it." Like, you know, everyone ... It's like, you know, it's like hot takes, you know? And so ... And I think about it being an athlete, which is if you're an athlete, you know, just got done with this great Knicks playoff run, but it ended unfortunately just a hair too short. But when you're on the court and they're booing you, if you actually take that in, it's very hard to perform. If you take it in and you get excited, that's how I take it. Like, it's ... The way I deal with it is 90% indifference and compassion. Like, I'm like, "Who gives a fuck," comma, "Man, just wish Ricky Pants 49 lived a life where he didn't have to, like, be mad at me, 'cause I know I'm triggering insecurities for him." And 10% of, like, gangster, I'm gonna slice your throat. Like, "All right, motherfucker, keep talking." Like, "Oh, really? Like, you think I've made it now? Let me build Disney in front of your face with Vee Friends, and you're really gonna fucking be angry at 80." So there's a little bit of that.

Codie Sanchez 53:48 There's gotta be.

Gary Vaynerchuk 53:48 But only, but only 10%, which is ... I'm, like, very grateful for. Maybe 20%.

Codie Sanchez 53:52 [laughs] Depends, depends on the day.

Gary Vaynerchuk 53:55 I like being competitive. I enjoy being competitive. I, in fact, one of my great angers in the world is eighth-place trophies. One of my great angers in the world is when two passive parents get lucky enough to birth a competitive kid, probably took after grandma, and then they tell that kid, like, this game that they're crying about doesn't matter. It only matters. Winning and losing is incredibly imperative to the human race. Nothing is good out of balance. Of course, people are like, "Gary, winning and losing, like, is it okay to, like, hurt people to win?" No, no, it's not okay. But is it okay to completely eliminate merit and competitiveness and winning and losing? No, no. That leads to, let me say it slow, suicide. This is what people don't understand. When you start to not care about anything, you get into a very dark place. Teaching a young kid nothing matters is a dangerous game. Or sports don't matter, but getting As mat- You start teaching them fake shit.

Codie Sanchez 54:52 Yeah, it's ... I mean, I think also- Going back and realizing that nihilism is real, and, you know, some of the greats have talked about the fact that the most horrible thing you can do to an individual is to take away passion in some way, shape, or form.

Gary Vaynerchuk 55:09 It's black and white to me.

Codie Sanchez 55:10 Yeah. Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 55:10 It's, as someone who's, like, fueled by it, I can s- you know, like we're animals. Like, y- I can smell it when someone has it, and I can smell it ... Only two versions I can smell. I can't smell the middle.

Codie Sanchez 55:22 Interesting.

Gary Vaynerchuk 55:22 But with passion, I can smell the two opposites. I can smell when someone's got it-

Codie Sanchez 55:27 Yeah

Gary Vaynerchuk 55:27 ... which is why I've associated, invested, and been around a lot of people who went on to become enormous, and I can smell when someone doesn't have it at all, which is why I fucking wake up every morning putting out content to get them out of their darkness.

Codie Sanchez 55:40 So we've told them that content matters.

Gary Vaynerchuk 55:42 Yes.

Codie Sanchez 55:42 We've told them that if you're running a small business, you should think about building up your brand. We've talked a little bit about IP. Like, all of this talks about content, but the number one of the biggest questions I get asked by business owners in our portfolio is, how do you find great talent? How do you find the he- person to help you with social media?

Gary Vaynerchuk 56:00 By realizing you need to be the person that first understands it a little bit. How do you judge something you don't know? If I went into a surgery, surgery right now, heart surgery, and I needed to judge what's going on, we have a problem. It's called I have no idea what the fuck is going on. [laughs] Everybody who's listening, when you own a business, it is hard. When you own a business, you have to be adaptable. When you own a business, you have to deal with the shit. I know that you don't like it. You may even have an ideological disagreement with social media. You must be the person that learns it a little bit so that you can judge the talent. It's not about finding the talent. It's that everybody gave the job to their 20-year-old niece 'cause they thought like, "Oh, you're a kid. You get it." The problem is the 20-year-old niece and nephew use social media to fucking hook up, not to build a big business.

Codie Sanchez 56:55 Yep.

Gary Vaynerchuk 56:56 So, you know, my answer, and I talk to a lot of these businesses as well, is you have to spend a hun- 50 to 100 hours educating yourself and then doing. You can't read about pushups to get the results. You have to read and watch videos and listen. I even made it easier for you. GaryVee.com/attention. I literally took my last book, which is 20 fucking dollars. I'm like, you can't afford 20 bucks? How about this? A 44-page free deck to tell you exactly what to do.

Codie Sanchez 57:27 Good, but I recommend the book.

Gary Vaynerchuk 57:28 Thank you.

Codie Sanchez 57:29 I gave, I gave Day Trading Attention to all of my social team.

Gary Vaynerchuk 57:32 Thank you.

Codie Sanchez 57:33 Yeah. Well, again, you said thank you, but I c- said, no, thank you [laughs] -

Gary Vaynerchuk 57:36 No, I get it

Codie Sanchez 57:36 ... because it's actually su- well, I c- it-

Gary Vaynerchuk 57:38 It's why I believe in books. I'm like, I cannot believe I charge hundreds of thousands of dollars to clients for, you know, consulting, and this $20 fucking book is, like, pretty much there.

Codie Sanchez 57:48 Yeah, a hund- well, and, and, you know, to be fair, why wouldn't I steal your 27 years doing this?

Gary Vaynerchuk 57:54 And more importantly, my actual living the thesis of the book. It's not my only 30 years of working. It's my last 12 to 18 months.

Codie Sanchez 58:02 Yeah, that was different.

Gary Vaynerchuk 58:04 You know what I mean? Like, that's what's so interesting about the books I write. I don't write evergreen books.

Codie Sanchez 58:08 Mm.

Gary Vaynerchuk 58:09 Day Trading Attention is just a follow-up to Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook.

Codie Sanchez 58:12 Yeah, you're right.

Gary Vaynerchuk 58:12 It's just 10 years later-

Codie Sanchez 58:15 Right

Gary Vaynerchuk 58:15 ... because shit changed. All I wanna do ... I'm incredibly obsessed with the contemporary. I wanna be obsessed with the history to understand the contemporary, and then I just wanna be of today.

Codie Sanchez 58:25 Yeah. There was this great line, actually, when I was coming up with a, a bio on you that I was reading to Kate that is, I think, perfect for you, and it was about the fact that you are, uh, pathologically practical about where eyeballs were moving. Like, that is so true. You're pathological. Like, you are obsessed, and I think that's what it takes to win. I, I guess I wanna close out with, with two questions here.

Gary Vaynerchuk 58:50 Please.

Codie Sanchez 58:51 One of them is, um, you know, you've mastered these underpriced attention, uh, platforms at varying times. You talk about it in all of your books. At any given time, there's an underpriced platform. So let's give the people the non-evergreen. What is that today? Where is the underpriced attention today?

Gary Vaynerchuk 59:08 Live social shopping. If you sell anything, and this is huge for your crew, if you sell anything, you know, that's not a, like, a physical thing, not a service. VaynerMedia doesn't do this. I can't do this with VaynerMedia. We don't sell a physical thing. If you sell a physical thing, which a lot of you do, every one of you has to learn everything you can about TikTok Shop and WhatNot, W-H-A-T N-O-T. Those are the two leaders right now. I expect Meta, Google, Twitter, everybody to get into this game. Live social shopping is the underpriced attention. There are a ton of creators right now who will never get millions of followers and make millions of dollars, but if they switch to being someone that sells something on social instead of making lifestyle content, they will make millions of dollars.

Codie Sanchez 59:57 So smart.

Gary Vaynerchuk 59:58 I forced Mike to do a garage sale.

Codie Sanchez 1:00:02 Nods. [laughs]

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:00:03 Mike did a garage sale on WhatNot this Saturday and made 700 bucks. Yeah. Six, $648. Now, I know you sold some trading cards and stuff like that, but you also ... 'Cause I for- 'cause I heard you were gonna do just trading cards. I'm like, "No, no, no. I need you to, like, sell some random [laughs] shit in the house." Give me one example of something that was literally sitting collecting dust in your apartment and you sold. For how much? A box of LEGOs for $75. Right. So-

Codie Sanchez 1:00:30 Do we include shipping and handling?

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:00:32 Y- the, yeah, you charge the ... Like, I love this.

Codie Sanchez 1:00:34 Okay, perfect.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:00:34 Every time I do garage sales and everything, everybody's like-

Codie Sanchez 1:00:36 Yeah

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:00:36 ... "What about the shipping?" I'm like, "You charge shipping." "What about the eBay fee?" I'm like, "Everything has a cost." Like, you know, like, people love an excuse.

Codie Sanchez 1:00:42 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:00:43 Right? People look for the why not.

Codie Sanchez 1:00:45 Yep.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:00:46 I literally think garage sales and flea markets are gonna happen in live social shopping. It's not just someone who starts a beauty brand or-

Codie Sanchez 1:00:52 Or like those storage units. Kate-

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:00:54 Gosh

Codie Sanchez 1:00:54 ... we're doing your storage unit. She has one here-

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:00:57 Yeah

Codie Sanchez 1:00:57 ... that she's had for two years.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:00:59 Right. She's paying monthly fee.

Codie Sanchez 1:01:00 She's paying 25 bucks a month.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:01:02 Yeah, yeah.

Codie Sanchez 1:01:02 We should just do it live on YouTube.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:01:04 Not YouTube, 'cause they don't have that yet.

Codie Sanchez 1:01:07 Well, that's... So I wanna turn it into a YouTube video, but do it live on Whatnot or-

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:01:11 Right

Codie Sanchez 1:01:11 ... TikTok Shop.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:01:11 You can make a YouTube video, 'cause that's great-

Codie Sanchez 1:01:13 Yeah

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:01:13 ... 'cause that's content. But live, the QVCification of social media is here.

Codie Sanchez 1:01:18 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:01:18 Listen to these stats. 30%, what it, some, uh, this is a stat, I'm always a little weird with stats, but this is real. China is fully here. China's got obviously one of the biggest economies in the world. Live social shopping in China now by the most conservative estimates represents 30% of all e-commerce in China.

Codie Sanchez 1:01:40 Get the fuck out.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:01:42 A half a trillion dollar economy of live shopping in China that is bigger than almost every nation's economy. In the US, I just had the Q- CEO of QVC, he put out this stat that I'm t- gonna try to validate this week, but it feels right-ish. He's like, "We're already at 6% on live shopping in the US, and no one's even seeing it yet."

Codie Sanchez 1:02:08 W- what, what's that compa- do we know what that is compared to what QVC used to be? 'Cause it was, like, a lot, then nothing, then now growing.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:02:15 QVC has always been a ton.

Codie Sanchez 1:02:17 Okay.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:02:18 In its not a lot-

Codie Sanchez 1:02:19 Yeah

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:02:19 ... it was still doing an ungodly amount of business.

Codie Sanchez 1:02:22 Interesting.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:02:23 There's something about the behavior. You're almost, like, paying for the entertainment. You're, like, tipping the host. You're, like, part of the community. I have this concept called commercetainment. So ready, how about this? You're a hairdresser right now listening, and you sell shampoos and other shit, soaps and all the fucking shit in your place, right? You can go live on Whatnot right now. At the bottom of the screen is, like, this $12 shampoo, and you can just buy it while you're teaching people how to use the shampoo on a customer. This is real. I- Tea with Gary Vee, which I really did really well during COVID, I've brought back. I love doing Q&A. On Tea with Gary Vee, I now do it on Whatnot, not on Instagram Live. I do it on all my socials, but I drive to Whatnot. I drink out of a VeeFriends mug.

Codie Sanchez 1:03:13 Mug.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:03:14 And the mug is pinned at the bottom of the screen. And while I'm doing the show, people are buying the mug.

Codie Sanchez 1:03:20 Get out.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:03:21 Commercetainment. I'm not even selling in that format.

Codie Sanchez 1:03:25 Interesting. It's just subliminal right there continuously.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:03:27 Yeah, or I'll make a reference of like, "Hey, you like my mug?" You get... Like, like, it's, it's, it's a, it's a, it's a mini commercial. It's not even a commercial.

Codie Sanchez 1:03:35 Interesting.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:03:35 Uh-huh. So-

Codie Sanchez 1:03:36 And you just like experimenting. Like, that's part of your thing. You just never stop experimenting.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:03:40 Yes, after it's been validated.

Codie Sanchez 1:03:42 Okay.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:03:43 I have a trillion dollar stuff of stuff sales in China. Now we have those functionalities. It's going to happen here. It's, it's happening here. TikTok Shop is insane. You for your portfolio must deeply understand TikTok Shop. So live social shopping's one of them.

Codie Sanchez 1:03:59 Okay.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:04:00 Within social, I'm a big fan for people that are obsessed with TikTok, uh, and Snapchat Spotlight.

Codie Sanchez 1:04:06 Mm.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:04:06 So Snapchat Spotlight is much smaller, but it's their TikTok, right? It's in their UI, and there's a fuckload of 15 to 30-year-olds in it. But here's the good part, supply and demand of attention, like I talked about in day trading. There's a lot of kids on it. They spend a lot less time on it than they do on TikTok. When I say kids, I say 15 to 30. So if you sell to 15 to 30. But nobody's... But the supply is low. Nobody's posting on there. So I, I'm very hot on Snapchat Spotlight. Um, Substack-

Codie Sanchez 1:04:38 Mm

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:04:38 ... I think is really, really interesting. I'm about to delve in. IRL streaming, so Twitch.

Codie Sanchez 1:04:43 You gotta check out Beehiiv. I'm an investor in it, so-

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:04:45 I know Beehiiv

Codie Sanchez 1:04:46 ... obviously very-

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:04:46 Yeah, yeah

Codie Sanchez 1:04:46 ... biased.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:04:47 I will absolutely do that.

Codie Sanchez 1:04:48 But those gu- and they're here.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:04:49 Mm-hmm.

Codie Sanchez 1:04:49 I've never met faster builders. We invest in a lot of companies.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:04:53 Mm.

Codie Sanchez 1:04:53 And shout out Tyler Denk. He's an absolute psychopath. He's like what you talked about.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:04:56 Yeah, speed. It's like sports.

Codie Sanchez 1:04:57 I think he's gonna eat Snapchat's, uh, Substack's lunch.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:05:00 I love it. Good for him.

Codie Sanchez 1:05:01 But we'll see.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:05:01 Yeah, yeah. Look, and it's not even he... You know this. You're too smart for this. I don't think Beehiiv's gonna eat Substack's lunch.

Codie Sanchez 1:05:08 Mm-hmm.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:05:08 I think it's an and not an or.

Codie Sanchez 1:05:10 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:05:11 Do you know what I mean?

Codie Sanchez 1:05:11 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:05:12 Like, like, there's too big of... It's too big of addressable market.

Codie Sanchez 1:05:15 Yeah, very true.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:05:15 It's Uber, Lyft.

Codie Sanchez 1:05:16 That's true.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:05:17 Like, when I was like, "Oh, Lyft's, uh, what..." 'Cause I was early investor in Uber. I was like, "Oh, fuck, Lyft's gonna do well."

Codie Sanchez 1:05:21 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:05:22 But I wasn't like-

Codie Sanchez 1:05:22 And you want multiple to do well.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:05:24 Yeah, I mean, look, I, like, when you're on it, like, I don't want the Patriots, Bills, and Dolphins to do well. Like, I don't mind competition. I just know it is.

Codie Sanchez 1:05:32 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:05:32 Do you know what I mean?

Codie Sanchez 1:05:33 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:05:33 It's-

Codie Sanchez 1:05:33 But if you have a few, then you grow the market share entirely-

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:05:36 Yeah, but, but-

Codie Sanchez 1:05:36 ... which you usually want

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:05:36 ... both of those companies are going into a trend that's happened.

Codie Sanchez 1:05:39 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:05:39 Like Medium was a h- I was an investor in Medium.

Codie Sanchez 1:05:42 Oh, yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:05:42 Which was E- Ev Williams, you know, who's an iconic entrepreneur, uh, co-founder of Twitter and before that Odeo, um, and, and Blogger before that, and s- one of the first, you know, blogging platforms. Like subscription, Patreon, OnlyFans. Like, and then the social sites are gonna start cr- You can already see some of the moves they're doing, like, "Fuck all these other places. We've got all the audience. We're gonna monetize." So there's a lot to it, but these are things I'm looking at every day.

Codie Sanchez 1:06:11 Let's end on, on AI.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:06:13 AI.

Codie Sanchez 1:06:13 So, uh, what's gonna ha- what are your craziest predictions when it comes to AI?

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:06:18 Well, I've gone pretty viral lately because I, my craziest prediction is that most people's grandchildren will marry an AI robot.

Codie Sanchez 1:06:24 Fuck my life.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:06:25 Some of them will. Not everyone's going to, but I think this is the biggest thing we've seen since the internet. Um, it's that big. It's... When the internet came along, my thesis when I was a kid was, "Oh, this is like..." Like, I bet my life on it, and the bet was this is the biggest transformation ever, and, like, everybody will be on the internet. And when I tell you, when I said that in '95, six or seven, people laughed. Laughed. When people are like, when they talk about AI, I don't think they realize it's oxygen. Like, when I get excited about the blockchain, NFTs, Bitcoin, that is a big deal. When I get excited about social media, that was a very big deal. Email, Google search, these are big deals. This is a level above. This is internet and AI. Meaning I view AI as almost boring to talk about because is it fun to talk about the internet as a foundation? Like, no, we talk about the things on top of it. To me, AI is now, like, omnipresent, it's a reality of life, and there's a real decade of recalibration, reckoning, disruption, opportunity. Um, I, I'm baffled at anyone who's not spending an hour a day learning about AI and using AI. I couldn't imagine. And I spend a lot of time prompt engineering, you know, just if you don't know what that means, Google it or AI it. And that's what, what's so funny, like, even Googling it, I'm ... I noticed I said to somebody the other day, I'm like, "AI it."

Codie Sanchez 1:07:57 Oh.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:07:57 Like, go Gemini it, go Perplexity, go Gronk it, go OpenAI, you know, ChatGPT it. Like, it's like, it's huge. [laughs] And it's ... Like, the wildest predictions are the Internet of Things, it thinking for you, it ordering e- ... Like, I think all of shopping will be done by agents for you based on your behaviors. Like, it will know better that you wanted that outfit than you knew.

Codie Sanchez 1:08:20 Yeah, I mean, Facebook already knows me better than my husband with my shopping preferences. [laughs]

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:08:23 But, well, that, I mean, most, most things know things better than husbands now.

Codie Sanchez 1:08:27 [laughs]

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:08:27 Like, we're a bunch of idiots. Uh, I think that it is very clear to me that we are going into a transformative half-century where AI will be like the piping of this reality, piping, railroads, infrastructure, oxygen, whatever you wanna call it. This is the biggest thing that's happened in a long time.

Codie Sanchez 1:08:51 Well, let's give people a couple things to do on that. Somebody's listening, they're like, "All right, fuck it, Gary told me to do AI."

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:08:57 Right.

Codie Sanchez 1:08:57 What does do AI daily in order to get better at it look like?

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:09:00 Inside of Twitter/X, using Gronk, Perplexity, or Google Gemini, or probably the one that ... ChatGPT is so strong and so easy and common for people, download it and use it every day. Like, and then use it to ... Like, you, like, here's how I use AI. "Hey, AI," like, "Hey, what are the t..." This is what I do actually almost every week. "What are the five AI apps that popped in the last week that I should pay attention to?" AI is answering that question for me-

Codie Sanchez 1:09:31 Mm

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:09:31 ... so that I can go look at those apps and understand what's happening. Also, real quick, 'cause I know a lot of smart investors listen here, be very careful in investing in AI. The reason I haven't yet is every week you think you just invested in the best X, and a week later somebody crushes that. The speed, you wanna talk about speed? The speed in which, like, these apps are getting updated and better is profound.

Codie Sanchez 1:09:54 Yeah. It is the first time that I am annoyingly an evangelist for tech that is not something I've invested in or own. Like, I won't shut up about ... I'm like, "WhisperFlow. Fuck the keyboard. The keyboard's gone." You just-

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:10:07 Oh, the keyboard's gone.

Codie Sanchez 1:10:07 You know. Yeah. You just voice text, and it's perfect-

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:10:10 Perfect

Codie Sanchez 1:10:10 ... from now on. I mean, that's wild.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:10:11 What about, what about, what about the fact that nobody has to learn a language anymore?

Codie Sanchez 1:10:15 Oh.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:10:15 Everyone's gonna have ear pods that, like, you're gonna talk to somebody, they're gonna be speaking Spanish, and you'll hear it as English, and you're gonna speak English, and they'll hear it as Spanish, and Portuguese, and Korea- Like, there, there's profound things coming.

Codie Sanchez 1:10:27 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:10:27 But the wildest one is we're gonna fall in love with these, you know, AIs, and then we're gonna put that in-love AI into robot bodies, and those robot bodies are gonna go from looking like RoboCop to looking like, you know, Megan Fox.

Codie Sanchez 1:10:42 Sydney Sweeney.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:10:43 Uh-huh. And, you know, that Megan Fox movie is a preview.

Codie Sanchez 1:10:47 Fuck.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:10:47 Yeah.

Codie Sanchez 1:10:48 Does that make you sad?

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:10:49 No, it doesn't.

Codie Sanchez 1:10:50 Happy?

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:10:51 No. No. It makes me, uh, it makes me understand that this is how it's always been. You know? Like, cavemen were different than you and I were. S- supposedly we were apes, right? So, like, does it make our apes mad that we ... Like, like, you know, like, shit changes. Like, I ... Look, I'm not c- ... Like, people are always like, "Gary, that's gross," or like, "You need Jesus," or like, like-

Codie Sanchez 1:11:12 [laughs]

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:11:12 I was like, I'm like, "Look, I'm not advocating for it."

Codie Sanchez 1:11:16 Yeah, you're just predicting.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:11:16 Like, in fact, I'm, like, advocating for simplicity. I think it's ... I'm sad for people that wear gold chains and fucking, like, take pictures in private planes. So, like, I love when people are like, "This is sad." I'm like, "You're sad." You know? Like, like, this is what's brewing. This is what could happen. You're asking for a prediction. I'm guessing, but it fucking feels like it's coming.

Codie Sanchez 1:11:39 I, I have to think you're ... Sadly, I think you're right. I, I do think it's a little sad, but m- that is every generation. It's like-

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:11:44 But by the way, I, I go back to this. We're in charge. Like, if you think it's sad as a human one day, like, you can parent and grandparent your kid into, like, understanding the value of a human versus a robot, right? The problem is, like, is that, like, we have to get more comfortable with being uncomfortable. The reason the robots are trending, in my opinion, long term, is we want everything perfect.

Codie Sanchez 1:12:12 That's ex- that's exactly why. [laughs]

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:12:14 You know?

Codie Sanchez 1:12:14 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:12:14 But by the way, like, are we, like, are we robots? Like, let me explain. Ozempic, vanity, hair extensions, boob jobs, fucking testosterone, HGH, like-

Codie Sanchez 1:12:28 Makeup

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:12:29 ... makeup. Like, you know, like, people can argue we're sad. We've become very, very, very visual.

Codie Sanchez 1:12:36 Mm.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:12:36 Like, 40, 50-year-old men and women, like you and I two generations ago do not look like the way we look. And those people can say we're sad. Why do we have to alter ourselves? What's plastic surgery? What's Botox? You know?

Codie Sanchez 1:12:52 Gary's gonna be like this in 10 years maybe.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:12:54 I'm probably not, but I don't judge people that are.

Codie Sanchez 1:12:58 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:12:58 I just judge when they say something's sad when they're doing the sad thing. I remember in the '80s when boob j- ... Like, I was a kid-

Codie Sanchez 1:13:05 Yeah

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:13:05 ... but I remember when everybody frowned on someone who had a boob job.

Codie Sanchez 1:13:09 And now they're everywhere.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:13:10 [laughs]

Codie Sanchez 1:13:14 Yeah.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:13:14 You know what I mean?

Codie Sanchez 1:13:15 It's true.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:13:16 And so, and so, like, I don't know. Is lip filler, like, sad to s- a woman from 1949? It sure is. They think you're fucking sad.

Codie Sanchez 1:13:25 Zoom out, huh?

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:13:27 So just 'cause you think a robot s- like, like it's just gonna keep doing shit, and I get what people are gonna say in the comments. Like, "Yeah, but that's still a human being." I'm like, "Okay." Like, I don't know. Like, okay.

Codie Sanchez 1:13:39 I had a... I hired a, an AI specialist who's such a, so amazing. You walk into my office.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:13:44 Yep.

Codie Sanchez 1:13:44 First time I meet the guy in person 'cause, uh, we were interviewing him on a project basis. Anyway, he's sitting in the front area of my office. He's got a hoodie on. He's got those... What are those things called again?

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:13:53 VR glasses.

Codie Sanchez 1:13:53 V- VR glasses.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:13:54 Mm-hmm.

Codie Sanchez 1:13:54 And he's just fucking maestro-ing-

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:13:56 Yeah

Codie Sanchez 1:13:56 ... in front, and I'm, you know, taking a little video 'cause it's funny. His name's Chadwick. He's brilliant.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:14:00 Yeah.

Codie Sanchez 1:14:00 And his entire job is to see where A- AI, AI can play in our companies. But I started talking to him about this idea, and he pushed me really hard on are humans robots? He goes, "Should they be able to vote?" Immediate reaction, "Fuck no. They shouldn't be able to vote." He goes, "Okay. What about a human with a fake leg? What about a human with two robotic legs? What about a human with a neuro, uh, transplant in their head? Where does it become a human instead of a robot?" And I was like, "Oof."

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:14:25 Yeah, and, and by the way, it might not even be right, like, meaning, like, like, it could be the end of the human race, and I'm like, "Okay." Like, I don't w- Do you think I want that? But my intuition is that my grandkids will be gone by the time that happens, and, like, you don't get to control the future. Like, what is this auda- This is where, this is where the whole politics thing has gotten me crazy. Like, we've gotten to this era where people have the audacity to think the world should be how they see it. I have passionate points of view. We just spent fucking an hour on it. I don't think I'm right, and I don't think it should be the way I see it. Like, I just... And most of all, you can't stop it.

Codie Sanchez 1:15:08 Right.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:15:09 You know, technology's undefeated. By the way, as I sign off, electricity, demonized when it came out, l- actually the word demonized. When electricity was invented, people did not put it in their home and still chose lanterns and candles because the word on the street was electricity had demons in it. We're scared of new shit.

Codie Sanchez 1:15:34 Gary Vee, you're the man. Thank you for being here today.

Gary Vaynerchuk 1:15:36 Thank you.

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