Gary Vaynerchuk Says We’re No Longer Living in Social Media—We’re ‘Fully in Interest Media Now’

Was there a moment when you were like, "Oh, my follower count is really growing fast. " And that's when this is clicking. Was it engagement? What are the metrics that you looked at sort of at the earlier in your careers as you were becoming internet famous? And then what are the metrics you look at today? — I think it's by platform. I think with Tik Tok, we really didn't care so much about our followers because you're on the FYP page. It's discovery. It's brand awareness. And then I think like Instagram, quote unquote, is your website at the end of the day. So you really do want high engagement, education, really see that like real growth, not buying your follower growth, which I think a lot of people get into that cycle. And then I think LinkedIn was a really big piece for us as well, just to be a thought leader in the space. — Couple things, following count by the nancond is declining as an important metric because now we are living no longer in social media. We are fully in interest media. Now — define interest media. Interest media is posting content and the content itself is finding people based on them being interested in that kind of content. And if that initial group that is just randomly seeing it, whether they follow you or not, are engaging with that piece of content, it now starts to grow and the algorithm is trying to see how interesting is this to how many people and people are the algorithm, right? The audience is actually there is no algorithm. It's people seeing things and how they act controls it. This is very important. Every brand in the world's number one actual job is to be as relevant to as many people as possible to have them buy it. I only look at one metric which is views achieved organically — because when if you look at likes, comments, and shares like most platforms, those are just three or four of the metrics that a platform is gauging. If you're interested, for example, in feed we all live. If you stop somewhere, zoom in, sit on that piece of content for a minute, that is a much bigger indicator that you care about that content than a quick double tap because you like the boots real quick, right? That is going to lead to more people seeing it than if I liked and shared it, if I sat on it for 30 seconds. There's no metrics that we as influencers or brands can see on the back end. the platforms are keeping a lot of engagement metrics behind the wall and that's a very important nuance that most people are missing.