You Can't Innovate The Market Without Listening to it First | GaryVee Audio Experience: David Metz

what about some rapid fire if i sent you best business advice you've heard does anything stand out what's your philosophy on hiring what are you fascinated by in consumer behavior you've never had a rocket ship before right the garyvee audio experience vayner nation what is up i am uh gary vaynerchuk but you know that and i'm humbled by your subscription to the podcast and before we get into my guest and this new concept these kind of 15-minute podcast splits to just talk to entrepreneurs and get some different perspectives which is exactly what today's episode's about i met dave through one of the key executives at um at vaynerx vaynermedia nick moritas and his homies and friends and partners with dave and i've really enjoyed my interactions with him and we were talking about something else the other day i said hey i've been playing around with this concept called like podcast blitz quick little shots we do these 15 minute sessions internally at vaynermedia at vaynerx at 1 37 pm every day where we do little shots of break up the day with all the zoom culture and i interview people and other times other people do things and i said why don't i do that for my community so today's the first episode of a of a podcast blitz little 15 minute interviews mainly with interesting people things that are up people are up to something before i get into that i want to give a huge shout out to everybody supporting v friends i'm just completely and utterly blown away by the support uh and i will not let you down i will spend the next 40 years developing this intellectual property speaking about 40 years and building dave why don't you tell the vayner nation who you are what company you're running and then maybe a little bit of an origin story episode one you know comic book number one of like what kind of kid you were and like all the things that brought you to this moment and then we'll just i'll do some rapid fire entrepreneurial questions i just think you're building an interesting business so i thought it'd be interesting to people but i want you to give a little three minute bio sure uh david metz ceo and co-founder of prizeout uh born on long island born to entrepreneurial parents uh then irrigation company uh sprinklers uh worked for them many a summer um played lacrosse in high school got a scholarship to college was a history major had no idea what i wanted to do traded on wall street for a little bit uh started a company called slugpo which was online classifieds um i had a little bit of success there and then i kind of caught the entrepreneurial bug from there i started a board game called gaggle which was a trivia board game which did fairly well and kind of physical yeah it was a physical game i um i started in my apartment i uh i made a a game out of cardboard and wrote questions on pieces of paper and i would put craigslist ads out test my board game for uh brownies and beer and i get these random people that would show up at my apartment play the game for 20 minutes tell me it's too long too short what i could do better did that about 15 20 times until i came to uh what i thought was it was a perfect uh product and then launched it and uh you know did the grind went to christmas fairs and you know pitched the game to people walking by and then eventually brought it to online um sold a bunch of copies kind of checked it off my bucket list um and then from there i started a trivia app called fleetwit it was a game where you could bet friends money that you knew more than them in sports game of thrones french literature you name it um and you would bet your friend 10 bucks and i needed a way for people to withdraw money and paypal takes a really long time to integrate so i started to offer gift cards as a way for people to withdraw money and they seem to like it and then i raised a little bit of money and then i started to do paid acquisition and then over time it really started to bother me that i'm spending all this money on facebook ads but every time song withdrew to a gift card they'd be essentially withdrawing to a brand dominoes uh amazon whatever and those brands are essentially acquiring users the same thing i was paying facebook for so then i would reach out to some of the brands like papa john's and i say hey would you pay me to feature your gift card as a withdrawal option and they were like heck yeah and from there that's where i got prize out and then i launched it and it's kind of been a rocket ship ever since uh vayner nation friends this is why i have devon here dave is one of us i'm one of you we're all one of the same which is i think people miss moments and what you did dave well in the story you just told is what i'm trying to push people

towards doing more of which is sometimes we get into our cocoon into our hamster wheel i was just on with nick our fellow buddy in a meeting with a bunch of other leaders and i'm like you guys are living in your ecosystem take a step out look and it'll help you you scratched your own itch you listened to the market you created a business out of the subtleties of tasting it within a business in a weird way when you i didn't know about the board game the physical in a weird way that was your progression from that board game in a weird way prize out is still linked to the board game because the board game created a game in mobile and you kind of just kept building until prize out happened that's fascinating i actually never i've never thought of it that way but you're right one thing led to another yeah i was listening i was like oh you went physical board game it was during that era where mobile gaming was happening you're like this is stupid i'm doing the physical [ __ ] i can go mobile you want mobile you iterated and then the feature within the feature became the actual business literally that [ __ ] board game you know it was funny the way you told the story you're like i scratched that itch it actually became the proxy to the to what you're doing in a weird way similar for me like especially with v friends right now my crazy nft project it's just a culmination of many things and i think a lot of people going through their career right now the wins the losses the grinds they don't realize those are all ingredients that they've added to the repertoire and if they can cook this is the important analogy the meal with those ingredients they go like you not only came up with that hypothesis you've executed to this rocket ship what is the biggest thing you've never had a rocket ship before right am i correct no i've sat on the other side of the table begging for money and now i'm on the other side of the table where our rounds are massively oversubscribed there's not a week that doesn't go by that some private equity or vc company uh tries to throw money in the last 45 days we've had six acquisition inquiries i would never appreciate this unless i went through kind of getting pooped on all those right you thought it was normal you would think it was normal i thought you know raising money or getting interest was the hardest thing in the world to do and now being on the other side of the table it's what about for the operators in here what is the biggest thing you've learned navigating a rocket let's use a different analogy navigating a 300 mile an hour sports car versus uh you know so you know this is the best part i've had them too some of those lemons you bought off the lot like what's the biggest thing you've learned with context of the difference between a rocket ship and maybe let's say a tortoise of a business that's just plotting along i think that i could never be able to steer a rocket ship unless i learned how to steer the tortoise or the taurus first right like i needed to get my bachelor's right before i got my masters phd right you would not respect money unless you bootstrapped unless you've you know you've used your own money and you've had to worry about paying payroll and gone through all that tough stuff to be in this position now and appreciate and be able to handle it so if i was 22 years old and people were throwing money at me i would have no idea how to handle it unless i went through what i went through in the past who who's given you the best um give me a great piece of advice from a family member a friend if i said to you best business advice you've heard or and it you know and what was best for you right it does anything stand out wow you know it usually you know it's hard for me just to come up with it usually comes in situational um you know my parents ever since i was a little kid would always ingrain because i was you know you're cl your classic hdhd hyper kid right i would say whatever is on my mind and my parents constantly ingrained you know think before you talk and it sounds so simple and i didn't realize it at the time when i was a kid but now as an adult um it's actually had a profound impact on me i love that what um what's something that you're affected by as a consumer dave in this little blitz of a actually by the way i'm getting bombarded by my audience for jobs when you're on a rocket ship you're always hiring where can people find you and maybe find the company to do a little homework find you and maybe reach out for jobs let me just share it quick uh you can for jobs you can hit us up on linkedin just search prizeout um to find more information right prize yep oh you tries p-r-i-z-e o-u-t prize out

you can get for jobs linkedin and for more information go to our website priceout. com love it um what about you as the consumer i always think the people that have the reps are real entrepreneurs executed wins losses and everything in between i always love their i always want to ask on this show this blitz podcast these 15 minutes i want to ask them what uh what's from their standpoint what's um what's catching their attention what's catching your attention wow um since my life products yeah i know you're 24 7. but anything hitting it's a good question um it's the standard stuff you know slack is is the future you know uh it defines my life i'm on slack way more than i'm on instagram or tip talk or twitter or anything like that i i use slack more than i text more than i use the phone that that is my life right now and i know now that's all on the application portal yeah it's it has a greater holding me than than social media ever did like if i don't pick up my phone and i don't know because that's because it's your utility right yep yeah that you know it's funny i but it's got a social element to it right oh for sure kind of like the reddit meets email ecosystem that it has yeah if i don't if there's not something going on at work then i feel like we're not progressing um and i feel like i should be doing more right i need to be solving problems every day and if there's not a problem to solve on slack exactly so what do we need to do what about some rapid fire what's your philosophy on hiring no there's two things we don't tolerate drama and entitlement those are two things we i can't deal with um we do we are moving too fast to have people come in and be cancerous we are very much a meritocracy um i think new york is the best place in the world to hire because you have all these people that are brilliant but are in jobs where they're using five percent of their potential and they don't care about money they want to be a part of something bigger than them um so what we offer is that so i think we have the ability to be super selective and we try to you know as cliche as it sounds and steve jobs said you know hire slowly and fire quickly what about um what about things you admire in leaders that you'd like to be better at a little self-awareness a little humility what do you admire in other leaders that you've heard of or you've seen that you'd like to work on since you're still a youngster and have many more years of this yeah it's a good question i think it's changed over the years i think it used to be things that i'm never going to be good at like my adhd i'll never be good at details i wish that i wish i could go i suck i wish i don't i just want to surround myself with epic details people who i love and trust and that in the last two years has changed my life i've read this mit study where it was like stop trying to be what you're not and surround yourself with people that complement your weaknesses and that has changed my life so i love that greatest strength one of the best drinks i have in business no question uh what about um what i'm really curious about is what are you fascinated about in consumer behavior like for example i'll give you one for me and then you could give you another second to think i'm fascinated by what people think is a waste of money and what they don't so like the same person can be like super pissed about like you know uh buying a coffee for three bucks and they're like that's crazy it's gotta be 25 cents but we'll buy a four thousand dollar handbag and and think that's like completely normal you know i'm fascinated by consumer psychology or what they do or they don't like you know like the reason i'm really asking you is you're getting to see a lot of data like what they how they do it what they choose is that i'm curious if anything stands out yeah so we so we're a withdrawal option for various industries insurance payroll gaming gig economy lottery you name it anywhere where someone's earned or won money um so let's say somebody from gaming right you're on paddy power draftkings right you win a hundred dollars right when you withdraw that money through prize out you're obviously selecting a gift card but that behavior is very much more like i just won money i want to treat myself right so they're looking at much more luxury items if you're a gig worker right you work for doordash or something

right or a waiter and you're using prize out to withdraw your earnings it's much more utility like i need gasoline grocery uh it's christmas time gifts for my kids right so depending on the vertical that they're coming from uh dictates their purchasing power which has been really fascinating to see and what's even more fascinating is when someone buys a gift card through prizeout uh 50 over 50 of users spend it within the first four hours so we hate the word gift card because they're not buying it for anyone but themselves so once they buy it they actually use it which has been pretty fascinating as quickly as they do dave wrapping up the rapid fire podcast i'm excited about this format what up parting insights for all the entrepreneurs or operators employees investors what's uh what's a little mets uh wisdom here on the part out yeah i think it's i think gary you actually kind of put in my mind like who would ever thought that you went from a board game to disrupting fintech like that that's a story and i never i didn't realize until we started talking i'm here for that i appreciate it dave thanks for being on the show everybody please uh hit me up on social let me know i want to do a little these blitzy introduce you to some people i have the luxury of knowing a lot of people some under the radar superstars like our man bets here and i want to do more of this kind of stuff let me know if you like this format the fast you saw the rapid style i kind of went with um let me know what you think and uh if we like it we'll keep doing more of these dave once again prize out congrats we'll talk soon thanks jerry youtube bachelor what's up it's garyvee first of all thank you so much i hope you're doing super well during these times i also want to ask you please subscribe because my commitment and exploration of youtube is about to explode stories polls more content more engagement more surprise and delight this is the time to subscribe i hope you consider it and i hope i see you soon