The Up Experience:Gary Vaynerchuk | 2012

our next speaker is a self-trained wine expert and he revolutionized the wine industry and is admired for creating a new generation of branding focusing on the internet and leveraging social media tools here is the social media somaler Gary vaynerchuk I'm going to use the chairis well I love social media because it sells [ __ ] actually I have too much energy for this um I'm obsessed with storytelling I think we've been sitting here today and I've been so inspired sitting in the green room watching all these amazing people talk about their stories my context um to the world is about business I love selling stuff it's in my DNA it's where I come from I'm going to create a little bit of context with a lot of you right now um actually let's do this to see if I can avoid it how many people in here have no idea who I am raise your hand [ __ ] that hurt but expected but

expected so I'll do that I will create context I was born in bellus in the former Soviet Union and Soviet Russia I came to America when I was three years old uh I grew up in a very immigrant household uh eight family members in a studio apartment an eighth of the size of this state uh I love my parents so much they're my Idols the way my dad worked the way he created a scenario where my mom stayed home and really ultimately the way my mom parented me I uh I'm so thankful to be in this great country um and more importantly so thankful that I was able to execute against my DNA when I was five and we moved to Clark Edison New Jersey my dad got a job in Clark New Jersey I started my first uh business I uh had eight lemonade stands and I put all my friends to work um do you guys remember big wheels that little kind of like bike I used to ride my big wheels around Edison New Jersey and picking up my cash at the end of the day like I was little Tony Soprano or something I wasn't a primadonna it's the reason my friends were behind the register wasn't because I didn't want to do that work it's because I walked up and down the streets of Edison New Jersey and I would literally sit on the ground as for of the curb for hours watching every car drive by to try to figure out where to put the sign on which tree or which pole to most likely sell lemonade I've always been completely obsessed with the attention and where the eyeballs and ears are of the people that I'm trying to sell my product to when I was 13 I started my first real big business I was selling baseball cards in the malls of New Jersey making $2 to $3,000 a weekend I don't know about you guys but when you have 30 G's in cash under your bed and you're 14 and you're not selling weed you're doing a good job so I was proud of that was good my dad then ruined my life when I was 16 14 excuse me he dragged me into the liquor store and paid me two bucks an hour to bag ice for 15 hours a day so I went from making $3,000 a weekend doing the thing I loved to making $30 a day bagging ice for 15 hours a day it was a really big downgrade it's kind of where my life got a little bit tough there for a little bit we are living through the biggest culture shift of our time my friends the internet not Facebook not Twitter not Tumblr Instagram Pinterest the internet is basically only 18 years old right Windows 995 brought us online it's only been about 18 17 19 years since you first heard remember that thing I mean you know there's some youngsters here we used to pay three bucks a minute to be on the internet AOL those [ __ ] Jesus I love social media I love technology but I don't love it I love the thought of where are my customers going where are people going how can I tell my story in the best most efficient way I did not grow up techie I didn't even have my first computer until I was 20 years old I didn't even been on a computer until I was 18 years old this is not something that I'm like pumped about I'm now friends with all the coolest kids in Silicon Valley and we always have these great business discussions but when it turns to hey remember your first Apple Tu e I'm like no don't talk about this [ __ ] nerds damn it what I'm obsessed with is we just heard some remarkable people and they're trying to tell their stories and they're telling them in traditional ways you can't scale this most people aren't fortunate enough this is an amazing opportunity for all of us to get together and hear this stuff they go and they want to be on TV and write books and be on CNN is that me hope not is that me am I got to go to mic cool I'm so fired up I'm breaking [ __ ] so we're living through the biggest culture shift of our time three years ago I started a social media agency and I work with the biggest brands in the world luckily we have a very big company GE the NFL from Winfree Network Pepsi craft cream Mountain Coffee great Brands and meanwhile they're mism marketing let me ask you guys a question let's get a little interactive I need hands I don't want your half ass hand I woke up at four o'clock in the morning to get here I want full hands ready how many people here have reconnected with somebody because of Facebook that they had not spoken to in over five years prior to that please raise your hands oh weird all of you 10 years please raise your hands n 95% of the people in this room have reconnected with somebody on Facebook that they had not spoken to in over 10 years because of this platform I believe that for us to tell our stories and convert whatever you're selling whether it's wine whether it's a concept whether it's any other product we have to understand that we're living through the biggest shift of the attention the eyeballs and ears of people of our time that many of us are spending tons of effort and tons of energy telling stories where people no longer are we are now spending tons of our times in New platforms let me ask you guys another question how many people in this room in every 24hour window even while you're sleeping are within Arms Reach of your telephone please raise your hands unbelievable 90% of you this is crack cocaine that was promised this is it this is the robot we were all promised but it doesn't clean my room we now have to figure out how to storytelling a world where we're consuming on this screen where time is a real problem because we have so much Supply being thrown at us Eric Schmidt chairman of Google said the amount of content we're now producing as human beings in every 48-hour window is equal to the amount of content music songs videos information that we created from the beginning of mankind until 2003 no wonder our kids are add so what you think your big story or your product or your awesome service is going to break through in that noise we've heard how many people in this room by show of hands have heard the concept of content is King please raise your hand just for context for me quite a bit content is King it's got to be good you've but the word that I want you to leave with today is context we are now battling in a war of context how do we create context to buy permission and Equity to then tell you about my product and service because in a world where there's that much Supply the shocking thing that nobody's talking about is the supply of effort and actually giving a crap about other human beings that is very limited cuz we're busy right remember when the world shut off when you got home when that piece of crap phone wasn't with you or you couldn't get the information you could actually live your life you could do things but now we're on 247365 and what has happened is we now just don't care about people as much as we think we do as a matter of fact I would argue that over the last 50 to 60 7 years businesses in general for all the talk of customers first having given a rat's ass about the customer I believe that every single person in this room's grandparents are more prepared to be successful in the future than we are because the way your grandparents built their business was through true hustle and true caring and context Small Town rules my friend because this is how butcher Bob lived his life butcher Bob the second you walked in started cutting your roast beef cuz he knew and guess what else if you went into that shop and butcher Bob screwed with you would tell everybody at the PTA meeting and butcher Bob's business went out of business that's how local businesses used to go out because the context of the community circulated and then that business was hurt then we started moving from downtown suburbs this that and the other thing and we lost our Collective power and then we started proving to retailers and other services that we cared about price and we do and we should but in the world now where price is a commodity that we now know on hand at all times we're walking around with information my friends go you know what Best Buy up to they're trying to scramble your mobile information so you can't walk in a Best Buy and see the Amazon prices that's a really good way to go out of business how many people here have children that are 12 to 20 man you're fast as crap that was good man we need to talk I like that quick draw how many people in this room have children nieces or nephews or grandchildren that are in the ages of 12 to 24 please raise your hand quite a bit do you remember three years ago when you had this conversation hey little Johnny I don't give a crap how you talk with your other friends but when your father or mother call you pick up the damn phone you remember that just curious how's that working out for you there are grown ass men in this room that have texted LOL and OMG in the last 24 hours technology is not your friend technology doesn't care about the way you view this new stuff you know what I hate the most is when I talk to 50 60 70 80 90 year olds they're like Gary I didn't grow up with this I don't get it it you didn't grow up driving and you figured that [ __ ] out right this is effort this is psychology this is a different game yes it's new and it's different but it's actually quite funny I like to say as the world is going more Jetson the people in this room that act most like The Flintstones are going to win because what's happening my friends is that we actually appreciate effort the way I was able to amass 980,000 followers on Twitter meanwhile none of you know who the heck I am is because I went on sis. com which is now twitter. com search and I brought value see the reason so many people struggle with the ROI of social media and what value does it bring to my business is because all of you default into wanting to talk when you first how many people here the first time they heard of Twitter thought it was the dumbest crap they'd ever heard of go ahead I didn't make it raise your hands you know why you did because you defaulted into what am I going to say who cares if I'm walking the dog nobody cares that I'm eating pizza and you defaulted into the human traits that we all do and every business does which is you want to talk back in the day if you wanted to sell something if you had the most money you bought a commercial during Happy Days 40% of the whole damn country watched it and you pushed your message down their wrad you put stacks of it in every store and you sold we are living through the fragmentation of our interests and our society because our eyeballs and ears are going to different places meanwhile most people continue to Market and try to tell their story like it's 2005 even though we're going into 2013 we know this because we live it watch this how many people here besides live sports DVR or t the far majority of the TV shows they watch please raise your hands 85 90% just curious of all of you how many of you fast forwarded every single commercial this year raise your hand a weird all of you Meanwhile my clients spend tens of millions of dollars making commercials trying to reach you and they listen to some [ __ ] neelon ratings that tell you they have the DVR numbers when they can't see the funny thing is people ask me Gary what's the ROI of marketing on Facebook and Twitter and tumbller and all this stuff I don't see the ROI meanwhile they're so worried about the ROI of the new stuff where everybody oh by the way is quietly and quickly and loudly going and we're not respecting the diminishing of the places where we Market before we don't respect the diminishing of TV consumption I just spoke to the with all due respect to you the talk I gave earlier the greatest group of all time these Juniors and you know what they're watching YouTube they're not watching TV they're looking in their phone they're spending their eyeballs and ears in different places you know what's my favorite outdoor media I have clients spending millions of dollars on billboards and bus stop ads guys do me one favor you've seen much smarter much more profound speakers than me but just do me one little favor when you go home when you're driving look out the window and watch Five drivers just five right I promise you three of them are texting while they're driving Oprah is right it's dangerous out there guys people aren't looking at outdoor media they're not even looking at the frakin road we all have something we want to say whether you're B2B or education or B Toc we're all in the same game our consumers the people we want to tell story to their eyes and their ears and their attention it's shifting and it's shifting really really fast yet we continue to hold on to the way it was the way it's going to be just curious how many people here clicked a banner ad willingly in the last year raise it's okay seven 50 billion industry right so they think they're doing digital you think you're doing digital because you do banner ads you're disrupting my flow the worst thing in the world right now is mobile banner ads right you've got like no screen and you're like putting this half Banner can't get a right I hate companies by the way if you have a company you do a mobile Banner ad I'm never buying a piece of crap from you in my entire life there's only one thing that I'm more guaranteed of than the sun comes up tomorrow only one marketers as a proud one myself marketers ruin everything it's what we do we find something shiny and we squeeze the crap out of it click through on banner ads in 1994 long time ago 71% just a little while ago 3. 0 this year 0. 1 how many people here by show of hands signed up for group on or living social or guilt group one of these deal the day email services please raise your hand looks like about half remember 3 years ago when you couldn't wait to get spa treatments that are 80 bucks for $40 or you just couldn't wait to get your hands on $80 worth of sushi for $40 remember that how great that felt just curious how do you like those Services now you hate them because they pounded you until you started bleeding right and now that you don't give a crap if they're ordering you a million dooll home for $100 you're like delete spam [ __ ] get the hell out of here it's right over the next four to five years the people in this room that want to tell a story sell something move something do something have to figure out two things how do you in this world jab jab jab jab right hook how do you use things like twitter. com search and search what people are talking about and realize that we have a cocktail party going out in the world right now that you are more than welcome to join and if you do you're viewed upon in a good way not a negative way and how do you build up context to actually have a relationship so that when you natively figure out how to talk on Facebook Twitter Tumblr Pinterest not what all of you are doing for your businesses and services which is you're using them as distribution models you're taking an email or a banner ad or some other video and you're just sticking it out there and you're hoping it works and then you're like but it doesn't work once you understand how to truly storytellers after you've built up context and emotion you will then start understanding let me tell you why I asked you to tell me who you've reconnected with we have more relationships acquaintances lightweight friends strangers we carry more relationships now than our parents and grandparents ever could because of these platforms we're reconnecting and for a lot of you you've reconnected with people that you went to grammar school with or high school or college so you actually have context for them their word and their views on services and products matter so much more to you than some [ __ ] Manan Banner ad or page 147 in Vogue or a radio ad that you happen to hear it comes with context emotional context to the relationship which then converts you at a higher scale this is Word of Mouth this is what's always mattered but now because of the maturity of the internet as it's getting into its early 20s we are now mapping not just information but social connections and things like Facebook have mapped the social graph but next we're going to be playing on the interest graph and the things we care about and the fact that this information is out there and we can use it to Market to people is one of the great opportunities of all time but oh beware in four or five years once everybody figures out what I'm up to and what I'm talking about we're all going to ruin it and people are going to tweet something like going skiing this weekend and 50 different ski companies are going to send that some free stuff they're going to literally send that person free stuff cuz it's actually cheaper for these guys right here to send me a pair and make me a client by having a direct relationship versus renting my attention possibly on billboards and during the Olympics and all that other house crap what the internet is doing is cutting out the middle and businesses and brands are now going to go direct to Consumer and actually build relationship but we're going to screw it up you know why cuz every business on social media right now is acting like a 19-year-old dude they're trying to close on the first move and this actually takes patience and building an actual relationship see everybody talks about acquisition all of you are thinking about how to get more all of you are Hunters we break down into hunting when we want to tell our story or sell something I'm telling you right now we've just gone through the greatest era of hunting over the last 70 years and the future of winning and accomplishing what the hell you care about in this room is going to be figuring out how to be the best hunter farmer that is going to be the game how to actually keep that customer how to have lifetime value what percentage of wallet do you have by having an emotional context with your customer you have a shot to win the days of just talking about how much you love your customer are coming to an end because my friends because of these platforms and you know it for the first time ever the deers have shotguns they do and they will talk about the things you do and so I promise you if you can figure out how to first care about the people in your world and your organization because the only thing more important in the customer are your employees and your teammates care about them trickle that down into the trenches recognize that the consumer's [ __ ] radar is greater than ever and recognize that the attention of that consumer is Shifting in front of our eyes figure out how to natively talk there and actually give a crap for the first time not just your bottom line but go for a long play instead of short-term good feelings and I promise you you'll have a much better chance of succeeding in the thank you economy thank you I noticed I have a minute great we'll talk slowly so knowing that uh knowing that we've got I love it knowing that uh we've got Q& A coming up um I'm not going to be able to answer everybody's question knowing with only 20 minutes I can only go up here I want to eat my own dog food if you go to twitter. com garbe or facebook. com/ Gary and you have any question I will stay up until my eyes are bleeding to answer your question thank you what does social media look like in 2015 is it still 140 characters 2015 you know I like to usually say I don't know I actually don't usually care about being Nostradamus and predicting crap I just want to execute on the reality instead of what I think all of us are doing which is marketing like 10 years ago but in 2015 I can tell you this I think mobile devices are going to be the device that carries the information to us and we have to understand the Dynamics of a world like this I know that on Facebook if you put a video over 10 seconds that means 10 to four hours that it does worse than if you've got nine seconds because people in a stream world if they see 9 seconds will consume it so we are all desperate to kind of close what we're trying to close we have to understand how these platforms work different than a 30 second spot or a piece of direct mail or a magazine ad great I know you've aded for some large companies I know you advise but there are several people here who run small companies or even are just starting their own blog what advice would you give to them well that's what I come from right I had a small family business and so what I can tell you is this the best part of all of this guys is that this equalizes the cash game the big guys are wasting cash on dumb [ __ ] and you can figure out how to actually Market where the customers are we are all every person in this room is in the content business when I started Wine Library TV on YouTube in 20 6 which is really what catapulted me I didn't want to sell more wine I wanted to become America's wine guy if you have expertise or knowledge about your craft give away the IP that you think is so valuable give it to the world and watch what the value comes back to you because information has never been less valuable it's all right here remember when being smart mattered it's all here now thank you very much Carrie nice to meet you thank you so much