How to Sell Newspapers, Adopting Children & What Makes a Great Teacher: #AskGaryVee Episode 194

- On this episode, we get back to the cozy confines of the fishbowl at VaynerMedia. (upbeat hip hop music) - [Gary] You ask questions, and I answer them. This is the #AskGaryVee show. - Hey everybody, this is Gary Vay-ner-chuk and this is episode 194 of the #AskGaryVee show. It feels good to do a normal show. We had the whole show in the weird van. There was a porno vibe. I was weirded out by it. I'd be lying if I wasn't. And in the London show which was heavily, thank you Matt, which was heavily, Matt actually get in here. This is a good opportunity to actually announce this I was going to announce it. Matt, as many of you know from watching DailyVee and things of that nature, is elevating within VaynerMedia and going to our fastest growing department, along with paid, in the video department. Matt, I love you so much. - I love you too. - Say goodbye to the Vayner Nation you'll not be showing up as much. - Bye guys. It's good fun. Take it easy. - But I'm going to two assistants. Tyler, who's been AJ's assistant. If you haven't heard AJ made announcement a couple of weeks ago by the time you see this or maybe a week ago that he's actually leaving Vayner for some health reasons but everything's okay. You can link up that Medium, Staphon, for a lot of you that don't know. What is a big piece of news is that India has joined the two-person headed monster Tyler and India, Tindia as I call you guys. India you are now one of my admins. - It's true. - What you think about this? - I'm excited. - You are? - Yeah. - It's going well, right? - Yeah, it's going well. - It's intense. - Tell them even as close as you are to me, how intense even DRock only the people Matt, me, you, Nate and Playa and Phil and Sitomer, the historic assistants, only we really know how intense it is. - No, it's true. - Tell them how intense it is in there. - It's so intense. Even writing your content and talking on the phone and being on the show and everything, I thought I knew how crazy was, I did not. - Right. - It's even crazier. Even if you guys watch every single episode of DailyVee and you think it's crazy, you're like that's great, it's crazier. Times 10 it. Times 100 it. - I literally wish one day I could just do a video Staphon where it was just my inbox. Incoming, what's in there. What they don't know and one of the things that I'll actually say this is a good opportunity for all the people that watch DailyVee and if you don't that's pissing me off. Is there so much I can't show because think about yesterday's inbox. Whether it's firing or making tough decisions or firing clients or politics. Politics not like the President just our internal. There's really, the heavy stuff. That I eat for breakfast because I love the pressure. And so India, I think it is time, 194? - 194. - Let's get into the show. - I just mouthing it. - Ha ha. Alright, let's do it. - [India] First one from Michael. - Guys, I miss you. I missed this normal seat of the show, we're kind of fading out of book promotion. We're going to be head of heavy sign up for my YouTube, Snapchat. I just recorded a bunch of you saw this. So Staphon, you're putting out London today? Later today. - [Staphon] Mhmmm. - And so you'll put this out? - [Staphon] This can come out... - Tomorrow's what, Friday? Tomorrow, great. A lot of you saw yesterday that I'm taking over some Snapchat accounts. That's fun so building up my Snapchat that's were going to be focusing. Let's do it, India.

- [Voiceover] Michael asks, "As a huge fan and student-teacher, "I'd like to know what you feel makes a great teacher? " - I think what makes a great teacher is one that doesn't impose what they want the student to learn but the person that actually audits the student and understands where to point them. A counter puncher, per se, more so than somebody who's got a strict blueprint and whether or not you fit into that blueprint is irrelevant. I, teacher Rick, am going to make you go down this path and this is what you have to learn and I think it's a huge mistake. It's my biggest problem with curriculum in traditional schooling. It does not account for the creative. The over smart the slightly different. And what it's trying to do is to create an 80% of these type of output workers. And the 20% either pro or con get kind of left along the way. And so I think a great teacher listens. And a great teacher reacts deploys empathy and understands there's other things can sniff out there's problems at home if you're in the younger years or as an older I feel like I'm a teacher and I feel like one of the biggest things that I try to say all the time is I'm just telling you what works for me, please don't, I don't tell you have to work 18 hours a day. do anything. I tell you that this is what works. These are some theories and use the context around that. I think a teachers need a lot more listening skills and adjustment to the reality versus how they were taught or what they're trying to accomplish by year's end. By year's end, these 23 students are going to know how to do multiplication. It's so tactical. It doesn't feel like a teacher at all and I question and I push and I prod and I poke and I battle a lot of my teaching friends of are you just checking the box for your eight months a year job to get it through to hit tenure to be in a union that never creates any vulnerability or are you actually trying to teach these kids? And I hope everyone understands I'm not pumped I'm not cynical against teachers. I don't think teachers, I don't. I think a lot of times, sometimes people when they hear micro answers from me think I'm tough on teachers or this and that nature, I'm mad at the game. I wish teachers got paid $400,000 year. I send my kids to private school I spent a lot of money. I don't like the system that a lot of people K-12 have to play within and I think a lot of those talented teachers could be doing unbelievable things and I'm so excited show the computer. Not that computer, by the time it actually happens, I'm so excited actually it's probably contact lenses I'm so excited for this. Because so many of the great teachers in the world won't have to play within the confines of the politics of the traditional school system and will teach, be way more profitable and make a much bigger and this is a big one make much bigger impact on their students lives.

- [Voiceover] Ben asks, "Would you consider adopting children? " - [India] That is a real question. - question, Ben. I sent that you, India, because of an something on my mind for a long period of time time. And Lizzie would tell you this is something that I've brought up and I think she thinks I'm joking at times and probably not as much. Somewhere around five or six years ago I had a real kind of lightning feeling that I should adopt. That I am exactly the emotionally strong financially situated person that is put on earth to adopt. And the truth is when you're in a relationship it's a partnership and so I can't impose my will or my wants or my needs on Lizzie without being completely aligned on it but I have wanted a top to adopt the last five or six years. It's something that is in me and it's something I think about a lot. I do. I'm fascinated by the whole thing and I'm very undereducated. I know there's a huge process. I'm undereducated on how many kids need it. I'm sure there's very big difference in data of Eastern European or Asian kids, American kids, poor families, minorities, girls, boys. There's so many enormously complicated issues but for me I don't know there's something just in my stomach that feels that I can help that I'm built for it and it's been something that's been in my mind for a long time. But before all the comments come in and be like you should get Lizzie to do it. This is such a personal thing. I know absolutely devastatingly awful adoption stories. Personally. And so I've empathy for spouses who one wants to and one doesn't. I don't think I'm the noble one or the good one. But no question the reason I sent that to you is it is something that I've wanted to do. And I've been curious about why. I think about it quite a bit actually. Probably two or three times a year I have a good think on it. It's been an interesting pillar for me. One of my best friends, my best friend growing up, Robbie Turnick was adopted so I think I've been around it and comfortable with it for a long time. That's it. Yeah. Have you ever thought about? - [India] Yeah. - But you're in such a, you're not even married yet. You haven't even started your own family. You know. And I thought about it my 20s but it got interesting as I got older. - I think it's 'cause I know a lot of adopted kids too. - [Gary] You do, yeah? Yeah, is that right? Staphon? - [Staphon] I haven't thought about it much. - You don't think about shit, huh? - [Staphon] I do think about shit-- - You're just a 20-year-old dude. You think about hooking up and basketball. - I learn from you. (all laughing) - [India] BSU, BSU. - Let's do it. - [India] From Joshua. - [India] Basketball. - I keep it simple. (all laugh)

- [Voiceover] Joshua asks "If you owned a small newspaper, what would you do with it? How would you change how it delivers news/earns revenue? " - If I own a small newspaper I would hopefully own one that had big brand equity even though in a small market. So even if it's Bethlehem, Pennsylvania if it's the Bethlehem Times or whatever the local paper, actually the Easton Express. Isn't that their paper there, the Easton Express? - [Staphon] Oh yeah. - Do you know the Easton Express though? - [Staphon] Yeah, yeah. - There is an Easton Express. So if I owned the Easton Express that's a very important thing in that part of Pennsylvania and I would turn the equity and this is where Jeff Bezos was brilliant with buying the Washington Post he didn't buy it for the print, he bought it for the brand. And to the Easton Express to that small area of Pennsylvania matters quite a bit for Lehigh Valley and I would try to make the digital modern version. Today, I would make an app that is the absolute news app of the moment, notifications driven. I would digitize the IP and try to milk the print revenue for as long as I could but I would assume zero print revenue in a 10 year window all IP value being shifted into something else. Same reasoning 92nd St. Y is so insane. Do you know how this played out? You know how I talked about Nintendo at 92nd St. Y and a month later they announce that they were going to do it. A lot of people were like you knew? Yes I'm that wired in. CEO of Nintendo's hitting me up. That's what I would do. Nintendo smartly finally has understood that they're going to take the IP and take it to the relevant place. That's what I would do a newspaper. I would take the IP and I would take it to and relevant place. I would also create revenue around event marketing. Instead of taking advertising in my print, I would take one full page to invest in my own events business. Like the Fall Festival. And I can use the newspaper and its awareness to build up this events driven business and every year in Philipsburg, New Jersey there'd be a Fall Festival for the Lehigh Valley of Pennsylvania and New Jersey area and so I would siphon the waning attention and I would deploy it into new environments like digital content and other revenue streams like events. That was tangible and tactical. And really maps to everything outside. I think of everything in IP transfer to the modern world, not just the newspaper. So if about a 1980s cartoon IP, the Wuzzles, - [India] The Wuzzles are back! - I would make a Wuzzles game. - [India] Question from Alastair. - I like Alastair. - Yeah, he has a cool setting for you too. - I don't know Alastair yet but this is amazing.

- Hey GaryVee. So this is Alastair Banks coming to you from the French Alps. You said you'd like some new places-- - I want to pause right there, Staphon, cut back I'm so into this. Alastair, thank you so much. Other people have been doing it. We need to do a good job and make sure I'm also debating only going to video on the show. This is new thing after episode 200 I'm debating that all five questions are only in video form. Video is exploding with Snapchat, Instagram one minute video now. If you haven't done it I posted one yesterday, today. And I'm very hot on this. Keep that in mind and let's keep the really cool settings going. Alastair is rocking this. This is cool. - So here's mine. I run a digital agency in Exeter in the UK and my question for you is this you have a team of five or 600 people and you're very prolific yourself in terms of the knowledge you have etc. How do you ensure that the rest of the team is speaking the same language as you and saying the same things to clients that you would say? Very interested in your answer and great work with the show. Keep it up. Thanks very much. - Alastair, thank you so much. One of the toughest things to do here, it scares me to know right now somebody is on the phone with somebody who has a slightly wrong or off tweak on the one minute transition of Instagram video or the new Snapchat messaging or the ability to caption Twitter posts and pictures now. I'm very, I'm concerned and come up with emailing the whole team, asking them to watch my content, I'm going to be doing a recap of my own content and learnings and thoughts over the last 30 days, we did an internal podcast for a while. We're trying a lot of different hacks all hands-on meetings, break out groups, lunch and learns but the truth is there's vulnerability because it's a human situation. Here's a big one, I'm not crippled by them doing the wrong thing. Ricky Magoo right now being on a call with a client and saying the wrong thing because it just plays itself out meaning either we have to apologize to the client and say Ricky gave the wrong advice and that's the human vulnerability and we can get fired and things of that nature but I recognize the inefficiencies in human communications and I own them and I know that 89. 7% of the time we're 100% on point. 7% doing a really good job and 3. 3% of the job we're not. I can live with that. That's a net-net game. The other day when I said speed is better than perfection when you're running a big company the way you get to 650 instead of 9 is you don't worry about every person having everything exactly right plus you need to leave a little room for them to do their thing. The Mark Evans and the Katie Hankinson's and the Matt Seigels of the world, these are talented people, Steve Babcock, my new chief creative officer, these are talented people. They need to have the slight iterations. They're allowed to disagree a little bit with me. It's not called Gary Vaynerchuk. This is VaynerMedia and VaynerMedia's a collective of us and so those are two ways I actually get through that and I think a lot of you can learn in management and leadership from that answer. - [India] I think you get this question but I like to throw it in there every once in a while because I know your answer changes enough. - This is an interesting start.

- [India] This is Mark Kaye. - [Voiceover] Mark asks "What's one question nobody has ever asked you that you really wish they would? " - You're right, I hate this question, India. I don't know. I feel so comfortable bragging and having my own ego and tooting my own horn because I think that's appropriate. I think you should be your number one fan and as long as you're balancing it with humility and I know people will catch you in different moments and that's why you think you're egotistical but as long as your balanced for yourself the market will come around to you. Because I'm comfortable I wish people asked more about that I'm not a marketing guru that build tens of millions, hundred million dollar companies, right? But I don't have to ask that because I say it. Right? I wish people asked me more questions about me being a good HR driven CEO and me having a lot more humility and patience and kindness and empathy than they are but I don't need them to ask that question because I say it. And so I don't have a want or need of any question because most people that have want or need of a question is they want to use somebody else's question as is the disguise to brag. It's why we created humble bragging. And I think we should just be more transparent. Jab, Jab, Right Hook so many people love that and they learned and they've been successful and right. Give, give and then ask cleanly. Yet when acting humble or acting with bravado, they want to mix it. Humble brag. They want people to ask them questions because that's their opening to brag a little. My think the way you talk about yourself and the way you paint a narrative to the world should follow the jab, jab, right hook. Humility, humility, ego. Maybe I'm in the jab, right hook, right hook business and so there's equal parts of both. But I think that the reason I've never wanted anybody to ask me a question is because anything I really want to say I'll say. Both pro and con. Somebody left a comment in the DailyVees of like Gary admits he's sorry a lot. I guess on the from the phone calls like sorry team. Sure if you're going to amplify your W's you have to accept your L's. The reason I don't I want anybody to ask me a question, what's that? - [India] Wins and losses? - Wins and losses, yes. Thanks for following along. Yeah. - [India] Wuzzles and-- - Wuzzles and lollipops. That's it? - [India] That's everything. It's fun to be back in the saddle. Really appreciate you guys. Heading home to episode 200. Really excited to wrap up the series at episode 200 and focus on DailyVee and stuff. (all laughing) I love when new people. Question of the day: What is your current fascination? You keep asking questions, I'll keep answering them. (upbeat hip hop music)