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  • Tom: Hey, everybody.

  • Welcome to Impact Theory.

  • You are here, my friends, because you believe that human potential is nearly limitless,

  • but you know that having potential is not the same as actually doing something with

  • it.

  • So our goal, with this show and company, is to introduce you to the people and ideas that

  • are going to help you actually execute on your dreams.

  • All right.

  • Today's guest is one of the world's leading marketing experts and living proof that the

  • American Dream is alive and well, if you're willing to work your face off.

  • He was born in Belarus in the former Soviet Union, didn't speak a word of English when

  • he arrived.

  • His entire extended family lived together in a tiny-ass apartment in Queens, and as

  • the foreign kid, he was once bullied into drinking urine from a soda can.

  • He was a D and F student, and pretty much everyone thought he would fail in life.

  • Despite all of that, though, this guy not only refuses to complain about anything ever,

  • he is wildly optimistic, upbeat, and freakishly driven.

  • A born entrepreneur, he began by ripping flowers out of people's yards and selling them back

  • to them.

  • He had an entire lemonade franchise system while he was still riding a big wheel, and

  • in his teens, he was routinely making thousands of dollars a weekend selling baseball cards,

  • until his father forced him to go to work in the family business for $2 an hour.

  • But he didn't waste time whining about it.

  • He just got to work, and just out of college, by being an early adopter of the internet.

  • He took his father's discount liquor store from being a local store doing $4 million

  • a year in revenue to an internet phenomenon doing $45 million in revenue in just five

  • years.

  • Now, leveraging his unique ability to identify where consumer attention is going next, he

  • founded the pioneering digital agency VaynerMedia, which serves some of the largest companies

  • on the planet, and along the way, he's also built a massive social following of his own

  • that rings in at around 3.5 million devoted followers.

  • He is a people first kind of guy, and you can see it in everything that he does, from

  • his employees to his fans and partnerships.

  • As such, he's greeted like a rock star.

  • His business is growing crazy fast, and it'll soon be starring in Apple's original series

  • Planet of the Apps with Gwyneth Paltrow, Jessica Alba, and will.i.am.

  • On top of all that, he's also a prolific angel investor and venture capitalist who was an

  • early investor in such juggernauts as Snapchat, Facebook, Twitter, and Uber, so please, dearest

  • of friends, help me in welcoming the four-time New York Times best-selling author and future

  • owner of the New York Jets, Gary Vaynerchuk.

  • Gary: Thank you, bro.

  • Tom: Welcome to the show.

  • Gary: Dude, that was super impressive.

  • Tom: Thank you, sir.

  • You [crosstalk 00:02:52] Gary: There's no shot I could have pulled

  • that off, and also, after listening to all that, I'm really glad my mom sent you the

  • memo.

  • Tom: Right?

  • Gary: That was very nice.

  • Tom: I got it all from her, just yeah, straight out.

  • Gary: It's good to be here.

  • Thanks.

  • Tom: Yeah, it's good to have you, man.

  • Gary: Nice to have some peeps in the audience.

  • I always like that a little bit better, so ...

  • Tom: You and me both, yeah.

  • Gary: Yeah.

  • Tom: So play right to them.

  • I mean, in many ways, this is for them.

  • This all started originally back with Inside Quest.

  • It was all about doing something for the employees.

  • Gary: Yep.

  • Tom: And I had this unending terror, because I have these 25 bullet points that I think

  • anybody should be living by, and I was terrified people would memorize them but not actually

  • live by them.

  • Gary: Sure.

  • Tom: Which is like the death sentence, because you think you're doing something right.

  • You pacify yourself by memorizing it.

  • So yeah, I love having people here and getting feedback.

  • Gary: It's funny you just said that.

  • I think so many people are keyboard activists, right?

  • Everybody's good at sending a tweet about how the world should be, and nobody's doing

  • anything about it, and that is just very much human nature.

  • Tom: I was just going to ask if you think that's human nature, or if you think that

  • we've gotten soft as a culture?

  • Gary: Yes.

  • I mean, of course we've gotten soft as a culture in the U.S., because the U.S. has had an incredible

  • 200-year run.

  • Right?

  • This is just what happens, so as a culture, I can't speak for people that live in the

  • Amazon River, and I can't speak for people that still live in Belarus, but the American

  • culture is soft, and that's a great thing.

  • That means there's been enormous amounts of prosperity, but let's not be naïve.

  • I mean, people literally complain when somebody gives them the wrong amount of extra cream

  • in a Starbucks $6 coffee.

  • We've gotten to a place where we complain ... Out of all those lovely things you said,

  • as I stood there getting ready to come, the part that, and I'm glad you pick up on this

  • and not a lot of people have said it before, so thank you, my lack of interest in complaining

  • is so high.

  • And when I watch what people complain about, it breaks my heart, because they completely

  • lack perspective, and I genuinely believe my happiness and optimism comes from my perspective.

  • Even in political unrest times like right now, a lot of people very bent out of shape,

  • but the reality is, is that it's just never been better to be a human being.

  • That's just the truth.

  • That's just data.

  • That's reality, and yeah, I mean, it's just a very fun time to be alive.

  • So much going on.

  • The internet is starting to hit maturity.

  • Look at what we're doing right now.

  • Tom: It's crazy.

  • Gary: This way now, right?

  • Would have cost millions of dollars in production and distribution to have the amount of people

  • who watch this just 15 years ago.

  • I just think it's very interesting times, and I was saying something to a friend the

  • other day.

  • I was like, "Could you imagine if you told a parent 15 years ago, 'Hey, parent.

  • What you're going to want to do in 15 years, instead of buying a kid, your 16-year-old,

  • a car, you're going to convince your 16-year-old daughter to go into a stranger's car every

  • single day.

  • You're going to pay for your 16-year-old daughter to go into a stranger's car every single day,

  • and you will think that's normal and actually safer than buying that kid a car'?"

  • That's literally what we're living in now.

  • High-net-worth individuals in America are preferring to give their kids unlimited Uber

  • to buying a car, because they don't want them drinking and driving.

  • They don't trust their driving, and literally, they think it's safer for their 16, 17-year-old

  • to go into a stranger's car than to drive themselves.

  • That's sacrilege 15 years ago.

  • Online dating 20 years ago, the weirdest, nerdiest.

  • You're thinking 300-pound white dude in the basement of a kid's car.

  • Now it's just completely standard.

  • I mean, if you add in sliding into people's DM on Instagram, it's like 89% of relationships,

  • right?

  • So I think we're going through a huge transition, because all of us, even thought leaders, are

  • grossly underestimating the internet itself, and we're hitting scale.

  • Right?

  • We now all are on at all times, and this is now the beginning ... I was joking while I

  • was working out this morning, the DRock, I'm like, "DRock, you're going to get replaced

  • by like a Pokemon ball.

  • I'm going to throw it up ... People in 20 years are literally going to throw something

  • up.

  • It's just going to hover 360 and film everything they're doing."

  • I mean, it's just an incredible time, and I think the way people look at the world right

  • now, because it's such an incredible time, is actually the quickest tell to who they

  • are.

  • If you think it sucks, and it's bad, you have losing pessimistic DNA, and if you think it's

  • awesome and phenomenal, you have optimistic winning DNA, and I believe that to be true,

  • and so that's where we're at.

  • Tom: No, man, I'm with you on that.

  • So I've been involved in the XPRIZE now for a while.

  • Reason I got involved with the XPRIZE is largely for that reason.

  • I look at the future, it's so fucking exciting.

  • What's going on is crazy, and if you're the one that can see where the trends are going,

  • and you can ride those trends, be the early adopter, get into it before anybody else,

  • and there's obviously chances for huge wins there.

  • Gary: While you're practical.

  • Tom: Right.

  • Gary: Right?

  • Because I think a lot of my ... So I've had that career, but a lot of the reason is, I'm

  • not guessing or getting in too early.

  • Right?

  • It's like real estate.

  • There's a big difference between the people that bought beachfront property in Malibu

  • than people that are buying beachfront property in off-region, no infrastructure ...

  • Tom: Right.

  • Gary: ... islands in the Caribbean, which is right, in theory, but it could be an 80-year

  • theory, right?

  • And so it's about timing.

  • Like VR's coming, but consumer VR is very far away.

  • All my friends are spending millions of dollars, tens of millions of dollars, in consumer virtual

  • reality, VR, yet there's nobody here, nobody watching this, that knows a single person

  • that spends three hours a day on VR.

  • Tom: Right.

  • Gary: Right?

  • Like it's just, it's way far away.

  • I'm not sure there's people that know people that have spent three hours in their life

  • yet in VR, right?

  • And definitely not 10 people, outside of people in the business testing stuff, so I think

  • timing really matters on that, because I get worried that people jump way too far ahead,

  • and the reality is, the market's not there yet.

  • Tom: And what are the things that you look for in that?

  • I heard you tell a story in one of the interviews that you did, I thought, the follow-up question

  • there, which wasn't asked, you said, "I was talking to this woman.

  • She said she doesn't do Snapchat."

  • I think it was a woman cutting your hair.

  • Gary: Yes.

  • Tom: She doesn't do Snapchat, no social, and you said, "Tell me more, just in case this

  • is a trend that I need to be aware of."

  • How do you identify those trends?

  • Is it stuff like looking at what app is ... Gary: Yes.

  • Tom: ... on the front page of Apple ... Gary: I always do that.

  • Tom: ... and talking to the person cutting your hair, is it really sort of that ...

  • Gary: It's very ... Tom: ... brick and mortar?

  • Gary: ... very non-scalable.

  • Tom: Right.

  • Gary: But that's my talent, right?

  • Like I think Clive Davis, how does he do it?

  • I don't know.

  • He just sat there and heard people sing, and he's like, "You."

  • I'm careful to not give advice that I know is uniquely something that I was gifted with,

  • like how do I tell you that, "Oh, here's how it actually works, and it almost started happening.

  • It didn't happen"?

  • I actually get goosebumps, like actually, like real, heavy goosebumps when I hear something

  • that I know feels right.

  • What's the advice there?

  • "Hey, Johnny.

  • Start getting goosebumps."

  • There are certain things that I can't talk about, because I know they're not practical.

  • They're intuitive to me, right?

  • And so yes, for me, it's the balance of, I feel like something's happening, but it always

  • comes from seeing stuff, like it's going to the candy store with my little guy and hearing

  • four eight-year-old girls talk about slime, and then later go to Shake Shack and hear

  • another two eight-year-old boys talk about slime, and I'm like, "Slime?"

  • And then I search it, and this is a year ago, and I search it ... Maybe, actually, it's

  • 18 months ago, and I search it on Instagram to see hashtags.

  • I search it on YouTube.

  • I search Google.

  • I'm like, "This is real.

  • There's something happening."

  • Spinners, right?

  • Fads are easy for me, and I think what I've been good at in business is trying to decide

  • what's a fad and what's an actual business, so something like Socialcam.

  • I downloaded it and got very serious about it in 2011.

  • I didn't know even the founders of Socialcam.

  • It wasn't that I knew if Socialcam was going to be big.

  • I didn't invest in it.

  • I didn't go after it, but I knew video on the mobile device was going to be big, so

  • when Vine got hot very quickly, I was an early mover and early advocate of Vine and Vine

  • influencers, right?

  • Which, by the way, Vine influencers are absolutely the precursor to this Snapchat Instagram thing

  • we're dealing with right now.

  • That's where they came from first.

  • Instagram was photos.

  • Then when Vine was dying a little bit, they all moved over to Instagram.

  • Instagram was smart and made video, one-minute videos, and that's when you saw the shift,

  • and that became the seed and the foundation of Instagram influencers, which is an enormous

  • billion-dollar industry now.

  • Everyone's like, "How are you so early?"

  • It's because I put in the work.

  • 2011, Socialcam, learn how video and mobile works.

  • 2013 comes along, Vine pops.

  • I'm like, "That's right."

  • I lived through YouTube 2006, 7, being a YouTube celebrity for my wine show, so I knew what

  • it looked like.

  • I saw that the Vine kids were that.

  • I flew to LA and met Brittany Furlan and King Bach.

  • I put in the work, and so it's intuition, but it's also putting in the work.

  • Tom: And that, putting in the work is one of the simplest and most, I think, often overlooked

  • kind of thing, and how do you plan to ... Is that one of the things you think people just

  • are either born with the fortitude to do that, or is that something you-

  • Gary: No.

  • That's the one that I think ... I mean, there's a lot of research, and again, being an F student

  • in science, I never, I really don't ... It's not that I don't trust anything.

  • It's that I know that I haven't put in the work ...

  • Tom: Right.

  • Gary: ... to really know if I should quote things, so I kind of just stay in my little

  • lane, but there is a lot of push towards being a workaholic, and hard work is a learned behavior.

  • I see it in my team.

  • There's people that come into my ... I've seen it in the thousands of employees I've

  • had, which is, the closer they are to the son, the harder they work, and I'm like, "Aha,"

  • and so I definitely feel like I learned hard work by watching my parents, and so it's why

  • I talk so much about hustle.

  • Tom: Because it's one of the things that people can actually adjust and turn to.

  • Gary: I watch people give advice completely predicated on natural talent and DNA, and

  • I'm like, "Look, I get it.

  • I can throw a football every day for nine hours a day.

  • I'm just not physically built to be competitive at the highest levels," so yeah, I do think

  • if anybody watching right now, if there's anything they take away, it's like, "Look,

  • you're going to only be so pretty.

  • You're only going to be so smart."

  • There's things that are going to be natural, and then there's things that you can actually

  • control.

  • I do believe, and I don't know if I'm right or wrong, I don't, but I do believe that work

  • ethic is a taught behavior.

  • It's something you do have more control over, and yeah, I think ... And you know what really

  • sealed the deal for me?

  • Getting healthier.

  • Tom: That's interesting.

  • Gary: I was 38 years old, and it didn't come natural to me, like it didn't come natural

  • to me at all.

  • I hate the gym.

  • I hate it now.

  • I hate it.

  • I don't like it.

  • I don't want to do it, but I knew it was important, and somewhere around, midway through being

  • 38 years old, I got serious.

  • I figured out my system.

  • I made the financial commitment, and I've won.

  • Right?

  • And I'll never lose again, because the system was, I needed to be accountable to another

  • human being, so it was about Mike and now Jordan, and whoever else is my trainer.

  • I'm doing it, almost weirdly, more to not let them down than to ... And so that was

  • this shift, and so I feel like there's a shift that can make people work harder.

  • The big one that I push is, you're going to die.

  • If you're ... To me, life is broken down into complaining and not, so if you're not complaining,

  • well, then I have no advice for you.

  • I'm pumped.

  • You did it.

  • I have friends who make $42,000 a year, work nine to four, kind of, with an hour and a

  • half lunch and 45 minutes of YouTube and 10 minutes of bullshitting, and an hour of complete

  • waste of time in a meeting, so they're kind of working like six hours a week, right?

  • But they're pumped.

  • Tom: Right.

  • Gary: And they text me, these are high school friends, and they'll text me like how happy

  • they are to be the coach of their kids' baseball team, and that's amazing.

  • That seems very obvious to me.

  • That's like, that's right.

  • You know what's super weird?

  • I'm actually weirdly envious.

  • It sounds cool, like in theory, right?

  • Grass is always greener, right?

  • Tom: Right.

  • Gary: Far less pressure, like, "All that time with my kids?

  • Oof, that would be cool."

  • There's just all these things that I can justify, so to me, but I have friends who have $100

  • million in the bank because of Facebook's IPO who complain, who are still hungry, who

  • want to do even more, who will complain to me, because they know I work a lot, about

  • no work-life balance, and they don't get to spend enough time with their family.

  • And I'm like, "You have $100 million.

  • You could stay home.

  • You're in control.

  • Don't complain about it.

  • You've made that choice.

  • Don't bullshit me.

  • You want to spend more time with your family?

  • Spend more time with your family."

  • This is back to what we said about keyboard warriors.

  • I'm trying to be very careful about what I'm saying versus what I'm doing.

  • Tom: Right.

  • Gary: Because that's how you get exposed, and I don't mean like people calling you out

  • and being like, "You suck."

  • I mean to yourself.

  • I don't want to be exposed by myself.

  • It's looking yourself in the mirror and saying like, "Am I doing this right?"

  • So to me, there are so many people that are talking shit about how big of an entrepreneur

  • they're going to be and how much they're going to achieve, and they don't work on weekends.

  • I worked every Saturday of my 20s, and I talk to 20-year-old entrepreneurs every single

  • day.

  • Lately, I've been saying to them, "This Saturday, you're going to have more time off than I've

  • had in my entire 20s on a Saturday, so before you tell me how you're going to be bigger

  • than me, start thinking about what you're actually doing."

  • Tom: Right.

  • Yeah, no, I have heard you say that once, and it really caught the person off guard,

  • because they were all about what they were doing, and then it's like, "Oh, yeah."

  • How do you plan to instill that in your kids, or do you?

  • I guess you ... Gary: I don't.

  • Tom: ... don't.

  • Gary: I don't.

  • I plan to instill kindness into my kids.

  • I plan on instilling perspective into my kids.

  • I plan in instilling just being a good human being.

  • I plan on making sure they don't use their parents' wealth and microfame and leverage

  • to impose on any other person.

  • I'm petrified of that.

  • If my kids try to punk their friends on my shit, I'm going to beat the fuck out of them.

  • That's just loser DNA.

  • You didn't do that.

  • Tom: That's interesting, so I've heard Will Smith say before to his kids, "You guys aren't

  • rich.

  • Mom and Dad are rich."

  • Gary: Yeah.

  • Sure, I, but not really, right?

  • So like I'm not obsessed with tactics.

  • I'm obsessed with religion, so I have a lot of wealthy friends at this point who think

  • it's smart for them to sit first class, put the kids in coach.

  • It's a tactic.

  • They send their kids to Africa to build a school for a week.

  • It's a tactic.

  • It's like my friends that love the environment.

  • The number two sector in the world that is hurting the environment is the fashion industry.

  • When you run the math of what's doing bad to the earth, it's the number two industry

  • behind ... I don't even want to say it, because I'm not sure if it's gas and oil.

  • The number two industry, this I know for a fact, is the fashion industry, so all my fancy

  • friends who love the environment, are they willing to give up their fucking Louis bags?

  • Let's see.

  • Right?

  • So I think people talk shit, so you let them sit coach, and you went first class, but you

  • went to Hawaii and ate at all the best ... You can't pick and choose.

  • To me, it's binary, so I don't want to be a hypocrite, so my big thing is like, "Look,

  • you need to be kind."

  • Being mean is just non-negotiable in our family, right?

  • And then you just need to not be full of shit.

  • If you want to look at daddy's mountain, and you want to say what I did to my dad's, and

  • that was a big mountain for an immigrant, like, "Wow, Dad did it," right?

  • Tom: Right.

  • Gary: If you want to say, "I'm going to climb that, and I'm going to climb bigger," awesome.

  • I'm pumped.

  • I'm weirdly not cheering for you, because I'm just a weirdly competitive dude ... This

  • is actually something I'm not proud of.

  • I'm comfortable saying this, and I believe this is a flaw, but I don't want my kids to

  • beat me.

  • I don't.

  • I hate saying it.

  • I know this is where I get in trouble.

  • People will take one little clip from one video interview, and they're like, "You're

  • bad."

  • It's just my truth.

  • I don't want to bullshit you guys.

  • I'm that competitive, but they're my kids.

  • If anybody was to ... First of all, I love when people beat me, because that's the meritocracy

  • of the game.

  • Tom: Right.

  • Gary: Like I'm a good investor, but Chris Sacca was a better investor, and he's my homey,

  • and I'm pumped for him, because guess what?

  • He deserved it.

  • Tom: Right.

  • Gary: So I won't be upset if they beat me, because they deserved it, but if they look

  • at that and want to go the other way and give away all of Mommy and Daddy's money and be

  • non-profit kids and give it all away, great.

  • I just want them to be all in on them.

  • Right?

  • I don't need them to be an entrepreneur.

  • I don't need them to make me proud.

  • They don't need to go to Harvard.

  • They don't need to do shit.

  • They need to be themselves, all in, and they need to be kind, and I'm good.

  • Tom: You are so fascinating.

  • You're like this super weird conundrum, so first of all, you won't let your son, who's

  • six.

  • Gary: Five.

  • Four, but about to turn five.

  • Tom: Okay.

  • Gary: Score.

  • Tom: You won't let them score against you, right?

  • [crosstalk 00:20:41] Gary: Though I did something weird.

  • I did something even worse than that.

  • I played Misha and ... I played them on basketball two-on-one the other day ...

  • Tom: Okay.

  • Gary: ... to five ... Tom: Yeah.

  • Gary: ... and this time I decided to let them go up four-nothing.

  • This is really bad.

  • The best part is, when I hit the game winner, they collapsed into tears.

  • I hit this ... We're in the living room.

  • I hit the game winner, the couch is over there, I hit the game winner, and they both just

  • run to the couch cry ... I mean, big tears, and I was ... And Lizzie was there, and they're

  • on her, they're like, ran into her, and I look at her, and I'm just so happy, and I'm

  • like, "Yes.

  • Yes," so I won't let them score.

  • Tom: Okay.

  • Gary: Or definitely not let them win.

  • Now I'm starting to fuck with them.

  • Tom: Right, so the scoring becomes ... Gary: Yeah.

  • Tom: ... strategic ... Gary: Yes.

  • Tom: ... for maximum ... Gary: Pain.

  • Tom: ... punishment.

  • Yeah, that's good.

  • But you did Episode 118 ... Gary: Uh-oh.

  • Tom: ... I think, with your dad.

  • Gary: Yes.

  • Tom: And you actually cried in the episode when he said that he missed driving with you

  • to the store, and you guys didn't even talk about it, by the way.

  • Gary: Right.

  • Tom: And watching it, I was like, "The fuck just happened?"

  • It was in that moment I realized that even the shtick isn't shtick, that it's just flavors

  • of who you really are, which is amazing.

  • It's so incredible, but it's got to be ... For people that don't really get into your world,

  • it has to be almost impossible to believe that that's really you.

  • Gary: 100%.

  • Tom: That you could love your fucking kids more than anything in the world, but not judge

  • yourself to the point where you admit, "I kind of don't want them to beat me."

  • Gary: Yeah, man.

  • You've clearly done some homework.

  • I, yeah, I'm a contradiction.

  • Tom: And here's the thing- Gary: I'm pulling from very opposite directions,

  • which is why people struggle, which is why I get such extreme reactions when people first

  • encounter me.

  • Even looking at this audience, some of them immediately are like, "Yes."

  • And then some of them here who are now yes were like, "Fuck no."

  • Right?

  • But yeah, I understand where you're going with that.

  • Tom: Yeah.

  • It is utterly fascinating and I think gives people permission to actually be who they

  • are, and I never thought about it like this before, but as you were talking just now,

  • I thought, "God, is his secret power that he doesn't judge himself?"

  • Do you feel like you judge yourself?

  • Gary: I don't.

  • That's a very, very, very good observation, and it's what I want for everybody else.

  • We're beating ourselves up.

  • Everybody sucks at something.

  • Right?

  • We all have shortcomings, and we all have strengths, and for me, it's like, "Why don't

  • we just audit that?

  • Why don't we just look at it that way and be like, 'All right, well, I'm good at this,

  • but I'm not good at that'?"

  • And then I only focus what I'm good at, right?

  • I don't dwell that I can't fix shit around the house.

  • I call somebody to fix it.

  • I'm not like, "I'm not a man."

  • I don't give a fuck.

  • I don't get it.

  • I also think it's awesome that I'm so emotionally stable, and I'm the emotional backbone of

  • everybody.

  • Is that what a dude's supposed to do?

  • These cliches, these stereotypes, they're so silly.

  • You're exactly right, man.

  • I don't judge myself.

  • I'm fully in love with myself, but I'm also fully in love with everybody else, too.

  • Right?

  • It's not like ... It goes both ways, like I tell people to buy

  • into me, that work for me, it's because I buy into them first.

  • I don't need anybody to gain trust with me.

  • It's there.

  • I believe that the human race is so grossly underrated.

  • We are good.

  • Of course we have some bad.

  • There's fucking seven billion of us, but when you look at our net score, it's bonkers shit.

  • Do you know how much damage we can be doing to each other on an hourly basis, and we don't?

  • We're still here.

  • We won.

  • We're the alpha being, and we've figured out how to stay together.

  • This is insane, when you think about it, and yet everybody wants to dwell on like, "Somebody

  • said something mean."

  • Tom: What I love is, in that, though, is your whole concept of, "Nobody's ever let me down."

  • So this is what I always tell people about, the things you're ever going to hear me say

  • will always be consistent with exactly what I'd say if you woke me up in the middle of

  • the night and then punched me in the head, because it has to be so real.

  • It has to be so fundamental to who I am as a human being that I'll give you that answer

  • even if I'm dazed and confused, right?

  • Gary: Interesting.

  • Yeah.

  • Tom: Just because that is my fucking North Star.

  • Gary: Yeah.

  • Tom: It's like my true foundation.

  • And hearing you talk about how no one's ever let you down ...

  • Gary: Yeah.

  • Tom: ... it's like- Gary: Like to me, it's just binary.

  • Unless it's complete death blow, death to me ...

  • Tom: Right.

  • Gary: ... and my 17 people that I give a shit about, everything else is super secondary.

  • And let me tell you something.

  • If you actually get into that mindset, it gets real good.

  • Everybody makes these big deals out of things that just don't matter.

  • It's perspective.

  • My selfishness comes from my selflessness.

  • It's what makes me feel good.

  • I see it in my mother.

  • My mom is the epicenter to every single person in her life.

  • Her sister-in-law, her cousins, aunts, everybody goes to her.

  • That's her comfort zone.

  • Me too.

  • Ask Gary Vee.

  • This is my comfort zone.

  • I like this.

  • I hate when people are like, "What can I do for you?"

  • I say nothing.

  • I don't want anything.

  • I hate that feeling.

  • I went into my family business because I felt like I owed it to pay them back.

  • Those are my parents.

  • So if that's what I feel about them, what do you think I think about everybody else?

  • Tom: I love that.

  • So one of my favorite Gary Vee answers was, when asked what you would do if your daughter,

  • when she turns 14, goes into her room and is filming all her videos, and nobody likes

  • it, and she comes out and says, "Nobody in this world loves me," and your answer was,

  • "Step your fucking game up," I believe was the answer?

  • Tell us about that.

  • Gary: The market is the market, man.

  • If nobody's watching your stuff, it's not good enough.

  • Everybody thinks their stuff is so good, like every day, "Gary, my Instagram's so on fire.

  • It's so awesome.

  • Why is nobody ... Why am I not gaining followers?"

  • Because it's not awesome.

  • It's just back to the ... You've seen it.

  • You all have friends who'll be like, "Look how cute my kid is," and you're like, "Ugh."

  • It's what we think.

  • We all think our stuff is the best, and I get that, but yeah, that would be my advice,

  • only because that also is liberating.

  • To me, everything's about breathing, right?

  • To me, everything is about, take full ownership for everything, and then everything gets easy,

  • because then you're in control, and then learn how to love to lose.

  • Like for me, my game's simple, right?

  • It's all my fault.

  • So now, I'm not mad at Lindsay, or DRock, or ... That's it.

  • My fault.

  • I'm empowering them, so it's actually true.

  • My fault.

  • Now, "Oh, we lost this," or, "This didn't deliver," or, "We fucked up," all right.

  • So now, everybody's got losses.

  • It's funny.

  • When UFC started getting popular, I started using it to paint a picture, I'm like, "Look,

  • business and entrepreneurship is much more UFC than it is boxing."

  • In boxing, a loss is devastating.

  • If you ever ... I'm a big boxing fan.

  • Most big fights, the big, big, big fights every year, almost ... It's just unbelievable

  • amounts of 33 and 0 versus 35 and 0, right?

  • Just like, that's what you do.

  • You don't fight anybody, and you get to that level.

  • Everybody's got losses in the UFC.

  • And so I think that's how entrepreneurship, that's how life is.

  • We all have losses, and so I like losses.

  • I love adversity.

  • I like the climb.

  • I like the chip on my shoulder.

  • I like when people are like, "Oh, I knew it.

  • He's not that good."

  • That is like ... I'm even weirdly scared, as I continue to ascend and I'm getting popular

  • and, what did you say, the marketing leading ... People start putting these words in front

  • of my name.

  • I'm like, "Am I going to sabotage myself to recorrect this?"

  • I like adversity.

  • So yeah, all on me.

  • I enjoy losses.

  • Now, all of a sudden like, "What?"

  • You become completely invincible.

  • I feel invincible.

  • I really, genuinely, outside of the health of myself and 20 people, feel 100% invincible

  • as a person.

  • I know what my intent is.

  • I want to do good at nobody else's expense.

  • I'm far from perfect, we all are, and so it's just easy.

  • It feels very light to live life.

  • I'm just in a good mood.

  • Tom: Talk to me about how your mom played into that, because ...

  • Gary: A ton.

  • Tom: ... so, I know ... Gary: A ton.

  • Tom: ... your mom, you've credited her with really helping to build your self-esteem a

  • bit.

  • You're also a huge believer in like, "Don't fool yourself.

  • Don't tell yourself you're good at something you're not," so how did she make you feel

  • so good about yourself ... Gary: She walked-

  • Tom: ... when you were struggling so much?

  • Gary: That's a great, great, that's a very ... You're doing a good job here.

  • Tom: Thank you, sir.

  • Gary: That's a very ... No, it's a very good way to ask it, because the truth is, she strategically

  • used bullshit and real.

  • What I think, in hindsight, she did was she overemphasized things that were subjective

  • or good, so she really ... I'll never forget this.

  • I opened the door for a woman in McDonald's in Edison, New Jersey, literal ... When I

  • was eight.

  • Just, we were both walking.

  • We were a little ahead, and I opened it and let her walk through.

  • If I tell you that my mom basically treated that event like I won the Nobel Peace Prize

  • for like three weeks ... But think about how smart that is.

  • Think about how reinforcing that played out.

  • Played out so much that one of the most interesting comments in the 250 blogs that I've done was,

  • I got an email from somebody who said, "Hey, Gary Vee."

  • This comes, like, "Hey, at first I thought like, 'Ehh,' and then I got into it a little

  • bit, and I was watching this blog, and then the other day, you really, you nailed it home."

  • And I'm reading, I'm like, "I can't wait to see what I did."

  • He's like, "You went into the elevator and you let all your employees go first," and

  • it's just so interesting, right?

  • These subtle little things.

  • It's so fascinating what matters to people.

  • And I get it.

  • I actually think that's right, but it's so weaven into me at this point, I don't even

  • ... I don't recognize that.

  • That's what she did well.

  • She made big deals out of the things that were tried and true, and then when I got Ds

  • and Fs, she punished me.

  • Even though she knew I didn't need school, in her heart, she made me know that there

  • was accountability for things.

  • So I would lose television, and video game, and friends privileges for ... It would always

  • be for a month.

  • She'd break down somewhere around day 14, 13.

  • My sister would tattle on me when I would sneak in TV.

  • It was a funny ... It was a sitcom in itself, the three of us.

  • She really made me feel special, man.

  • She really did it right.

  • She really, really, really pounded home my EQ, my kindness.

  • I've done it with Xander, too.

  • He went to the playground when he was two.

  • We were at the playground.

  • A little three-year-old kid falls and skids his knee, and he walked over and was like,

  • "Are you okay?"

  • And I made that a two-week thing, right?

  • Empathy, right?

  • And so she just really did a good job of making me feel good about the things that were around

  • my kindness, and my support of my sister, and my leadership skills, and my friends,

  • and taking the ... I took a bullet once for something my friend did in the neighborhood,

  • and she thought that was a good thing, and just kind of those personality traits that

  • I think ... If all of us, everybody watching, wrote down personality traits that we admire,

  • any time I showed any of those actions, she drove them home, and I think modern-day parents

  • and most parents do not do that.

  • I think they focus on dumb shit like grades, because they are insecure and they want to

  • put the bumper sticker that their kid went to Stanford.

  • It's real fucked up when you really think about what's actually happening.

  • So much of it is, "Misery loves company," or people reflecting of what's inside of them.

  • Tom: That's really interesting.

  • You know when I decided that I wanted to work with you?

  • When I saw your employees hugging each other without ... It wasn't a greeting.

  • They just were standing next to each other and they both put an arm around each other,

  • and I saw a couple different people do it, so it wasn't like I just happened to see people

  • that were dating or something, and I thought, "The employees like each other."

  • That's such an amazing sign of what you're building, and I know how hard it is to work

  • that into the culture and to create a safe space where people are really excited about

  • what they do, where they come in.

  • They feel it.

  • It just permeates the entire office.

  • And now, having been to your offices several times, it's like you get that sense that A,

  • people like what they're doing, and I'm sure they work really fucking hard, but they like

  • what they're doing and they like each other, and that was a big thing for me.

  • Gary: That's because you have experience.

  • You didn't take that for granted.

  • Tom: Sure.

  • Gary: The biggest thing I fear at VaynerMedia is the kids that come out of school and work

  • at VaynerMedia, and after three years, you're 25 and you're like, "Well, what else might

  • be out there," right?

  • Tom: Right.

  • Gary: They love it.

  • They love VaynerMedia.

  • I mean, the ones that I'm thinking of.

  • Some people don't.

  • I mean, look, VaynerMedia is the serendipity of who you interact with, the clients you

  • have.

  • There's a lot that can go into it.

  • There is no one VaynerMedia.

  • There's no one America.

  • There's no one anything, right?

  • But yeah, they've been getting caught, this grass is greener thing, and I'm actually very

  • weird.

  • I'm starting to try to ... Now we're at a scale where I'm a little, loosening it up,

  • but for the first five years, you couldn't come back, because it was a vulnerability.

  • Tom: Sure.

  • Gary: Now we're at a different scale, and now I'm considering it a little bit more,

  • and we've taken a couple people back through the years.

  • I would break my own rule, because I think that's important.

  • You have to be flexible.

  • But yeah, it's, I appreciate you saying that, but I think that's because you understand

  • how difficult that is at scale.

  • Tom: Sure.

  • Gary: When you have 700 employees, to have a real culture of good, that's hard, because

  • you have a lot going on.

  • Tom: When'd you decide to do the Chief Heart Officer?

  • Gary: So, Claude was an incredible employee.

  • She was an SVP, which means she ran a piece of business.

  • She was running the Unilever business, and the way that the 30 people that interacted

  • with ... They were bought into her at a level that was incredible.

  • She and I just had instant chemistry.

  • All the stuff we're talking about here, that's what we talked about, not the other stuff,

  • and we started talking about maybe her potentially doing something else and having a bigger impact

  • on the company, not just running this piece of business.

  • And then, out of nowhere, she quit, and it was devastating for me.

  • I was ... That gut punch, I was just frozen, because I don't get caught off guard that

  • much, because EQ is so good.

  • It just completely caught me off guard, and literally, it was amazing.

  • Talk about leadership, and some things that I'm proud of about myself, I get punched in

  • the face, and before she leaves the room of her telling me she's leaving, which was a

  • 25-minute conversation, somewhere, seven minutes into it, the last 18 minutes, I was thinking

  • about the plan of making sure she didn't land anywhere that would be too settling so that

  • I could get her back, right?

  • And basically, I didn't want her to feel the full core pressure, but a month later, I started

  • meeting up with her, and having drinks, and, "How's it going?"

  • And I think the best way, back to all the energy of this conversation, you heard what

  • I just said, and what I did was I tried to get her the best job in the world that I could.

  • My way of getting her back was by trying to help her more than it would help me.

  • That's just, karma is practical.

  • I love that people think karma is this weird thing.

  • Doing good for other people is a good strategy.

  • I've been trying to ... I'm like, "Why does this thing even exist?

  • It's actually the most common sense thing of all time.

  • Why does karma seem weird?

  • The fuck is karma?

  • Wait a minute, so you're telling me, if you do lots of good things that, weirdly, good

  • things happen to you?"

  • Yeah, that seems like common sense.

  • It's amazing to me.

  • Anyway, I tried to do all the right things.

  • We started rolling.

  • There seemed to be an opportunity for somebody to sit above our current head of HR, and so

  • we decided there was that opportunity, but I could not call her the head of HR.

  • I did not want the world to think of, that's what we were doing, and I wanted her to sit

  • at the pedestal as the most important person in the company besides me, more than the CFO,

  • more than the COO, which got you into "Chief," right?

  • And then heart just seemed right.

  • It just seemed like a nice word, so ... It didn't have like ... If she was Chief Emotion

  • Officer, then she'd be CEO, and that'd be weird.

  • So it just fit.

  • Tom: Have you seen other companies pick this up?

  • Gary: We've seen companies like NASA, and other big companies reach out to us and they're

  • auditing us.

  • Tom: Wow.

  • Gary: I have a feeling that it could happen.

  • Yeah, I feel it could happen.

  • That would be a great legacy.

  • Tom: Yeah, dude, I'll tell you, from the outside, watching that and understanding the really

  • weird dynamic that is the HR department, where they present themselves to the employees,

  • "We work for you," but in truth, behind the scenes, they feel essentially, it's not a

  • fiduciary responsibility, but it's that same kind of idea to the business, right?

  • "I don't want the business to get sued, and here's what's going on."

  • They have to be careful, and it's like, God, the employees feel that, man.

  • Gary: And that's why I think we're winning, because, and we have our ... Listen, we just

  • did a major reorg, 60 people let go.

  • That's really hard to convince people you're the best, but you are the best, because you're

  • doing it for the mass.

  • It's the right thing to do, but I'll tell you, the person who deserves the most credit,

  • I would say Alan Harker.

  • He's the Chief Financial Officer, and he's been incredible.

  • He's new, and he's been incredible in not ... I told him during the interview process,

  • I'm like, "This is a bad gig.

  • We will make decisions that are not financially sound based on my intuition of where there's

  • growth, based on what we think about people," and it's been really interesting, right?

  • We're trying to help our leaders become better business people, because I believe in them.

  • Lindsay, right, you get to work with her, VaynerTalent.

  • She knows what she's doing, and she runs a tight P&L, but then I'm always trying to break

  • it.

  • It's a matrix for them, right?

  • Because when they sit with Alan, and chief financial, they're trying to run a business

  • ... Tom: Right.

  • Gary: ... but then I'll come over the top and be like, "No, this is working.

  • Hire more, and you're going to have a negative P&L this year," but they're like, "But Alan,"

  • I'm like, "Fucking Alan works for me," and it's a whole thing.

  • It's a whole thing, but it's been great, because we're back to pushing from opposite directions.

  • I'm seeing it, right?

  • I'm letting the company do its thing, but I'm a force that's equal to the company of

  • magic, right?

  • And I'm pushing, and now I'm starting to really figure it out.

  • I'm kind of almost weirdly separating them.

  • I'm even thinking of things like a Gary tax, right?

  • And basically, that's just offense, right?

  • That's Lindsay saying, "Hey, I really see it.

  • I want to go for it," and I'm like, "Cool.

  • Gary tax it," and so while ... What that would mean is that she can still run the business

  • or her division properly, subtract the weird things I did dollars-wise ...

  • Tom: Right.

  • Gary: ... and then see if she's running an actual business, because what was happening

  • was the leaders were all under Gary tax, and they didn't know how to run a business ...

  • Tom: Right.

  • Gary: ... because my halo being able to create top-line revenue protected all their inabilities.

  • And as we scale and I want to give them other opportunities, I needed them to be able to

  • be capable outside of magic.

  • Tom: Yeah, yeah, for sure.

  • All right, there's one thing I have to [crosstalk 00:39:52]

  • Gary: I've never talked about that before.

  • Tom: No, I love- Gary: That was good, right?

  • I saw that you were loving it, and I was like, and then I was like, "Man, that was, that's

  • cool," but that's a really interesting thing for entrepreneurs that are scaling businesses,

  • because entrepreneurship is actually completely in contradiction to running a proper business.

  • They're opposites.

  • Tom: No, I've always said the reason that we were successful at Quest was because we

  • knew to zig when everybody else was zagging.

  • You have to be able to make the counterintuitive choice.

  • Gary: Have to.

  • Tom: And by the way, super fucking weird, so when you and I met for dinner, God, like

  • five months ago at this point, I had pitched what I pitched to you to I don't know how

  • many people, 30, 40 people, and every single one of them looked at me like, "What the fuck?"

  • And they literally had no idea what I was talking about, and I said, "Look, a huge part

  • of what's driving this is when Disney acquired Marvel Studios."

  • That changed everything for me, and I knew what needed to be done.

  • I knew what that opened up in the market, and you said, and I quote, "My entire life

  • is predicated on the fact that Disney bought Marvel," and I was like, "What the fuck?"

  • It was like the ... The first time it went from getting looked at like I was out of my

  • fucking mind to somebody who's like, "Yeah, yeah, I know, I know."

  • I was like, it was very fascinating.

  • Gary: I remember that.

  • Tom: That's when you realize that it's the ability to see that.

  • It's the ability to see the oblique angle, and, more fucking importantly, it's the ability

  • to believe in yourself enough to rally a team behind you and say, "This is what we're going

  • to do," because what I'm telling everybody is, "We're going to build a studio bigger

  • than Disney."

  • Now, you can imagine how everyone looks at me, right?

  • Think of you in the early days saying that you're going to buy the Jets.

  • Everybody ... Gary: I get it.

  • Tom: ... says you're a fucking idiot.

  • Gary: I get it.

  • Tom: So saying that, it's like that, to me, is being an entrepreneur, versus a businessperson

  • who can run a positive P&L, and they understand all that, and I'm fully going to steal your

  • notion of coming in like magic.

  • Gary: Yeah.

  • Tom: But, yeah, that's a key insight for anybody that really wants to be an entrepreneur.

  • It's not the license to be reckless, because I'm prepared to come in and now fucking execute

  • against building Disney.

  • Gary: What's super interesting is, and those people that are CFOs, and CEOs, and COOs,

  • they think that's the magic.

  • I always laugh at them.

  • I'm like, "You're a commodity."

  • Tom: Right.

  • Gary: "There's millions of you.

  • That's math.

  • That's easy to understand."

  • I always say, if you want to be an anomaly, you have to act like one.

  • People want all these special things to happen, but then they're acting like everybody else,

  • and that gets into the Saturdays in your 20s, or just taking risk or things of that nature.

  • I totally agree with you.

  • I think about it as ... You know that picture where it looks like two people kissing or

  • it looks like a glass of champagne?

  • I just basically think, at this point in my business life, the world sees the glass of

  • champagne and I see the two people kissing.

  • I just can see it.

  • I know what's coming.

  • Now it's about where do you want to take advantage of it.

  • I knew seven, eight years ago that the phone was ... There was nothing else.

  • Everyone's like ... I know that ABC, CBS, and NBC is finished.

  • Their infrastructures, their infrastructure costs don't match the reality of consumer

  • behavior.

  • We're going to watch things on OTT, whether it's Netflix, or Hulu, or Amazon.

  • Facebook's coming out with original programming in a month, right?

  • We're going to watch it.

  • Now, if it's shit, we won't.

  • If it's a bad show, we won't.

  • If it's a good show, you'll watch it, and that's that.

  • And so I know that's coming, and every brick-and-mortar retailer's in deep shit, I know that's coming.

  • I know influencer marketing hasn't even started.

  • There's a lot of things I can tell you that are going to happen over the next three or

  • four years.

  • It's about, what are you going to do about it?

  • Which one are you going to choose?

  • Where are the opportunities?

  • Where are the angles?

  • Tom: Right.

  • I have one more question for you, but tell them where they can find you online.

  • Gary: Garyvee is where I am mostly, on Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, and then, on Facebook,

  • it's /gary, and that's probably the right place to go.

  • Tom: All right.

  • What is the impact that you want to have on the world?

  • Gary: So I would say this is my current POV, because I think it's actually important that

  • I have a different answer for this at 50, and 60, because you're going to adjust to

  • the reality.

  • I'll give you a good example.

  • If something terrible happens in my life, and it's disease-based, or it's because some

  • kid was texting while he was driving and hit my dad, those will become things that I want

  • to leave a legacy about, because that's just how we act as humans, right?

  • They become your truths.

  • But no question, this will never go away, I want to do the following.

  • I'm fascinated by the same thing that attracts so many millions of people to people that

  • are selling bullshit, those same people are attracted to me, and what I want to do is

  • suffocate out all those other people and become the alpha of that entire world of people that

  • are hoping and are desperate to look at me, and what I want to do is inspire two 14-year-old

  • girls in Kansas City right now to build a billion-dollar company on having a bunch of

  • employees hugging each other in the halls.

  • I think that Steve Jobs came along, became an icon, but the sad part of that narrative

  • was, he did not treat his employees well.

  • He became an icon, and the narrative became, "He got the most out of people by being a

  • jerk," and that became romanticized, and a lot of people in Silicon Valley today run

  • companies where they're mean because they think that's the right thing to do because

  • they put Steve Jobs on a pedestal.

  • I want my pedestal moment.

  • I want to become that big, and what I want to come from that is that kids that aren't

  • even born today think that they can build a 5-billion-dollar company and be a great

  • guy or great gal.

  • I want to build the biggest building in town ever by just building the biggest building

  • in town, while I think most people try to tear down everybody else's building.

  • So I think positivity and good is practical advice to building an empire, and I want to

  • be the poster child of the person that built the biggest, baddest empire and did it by

  • being a good dude along the way.

  • And not everybody's going to be happy about everything I did, but if it's 97% of people

  • talking good behind your back, that's a real legacy, and I want to do it in a pop culture

  • way.

  • I'm going to do it anyway.

  • People have done that before.

  • Just so you know, there's plenty of people, Warren Buffett's a really good dude.

  • There's plenty of people that have done that.

  • There's a difference.

  • I want to do it, and I want to be a rock star, right?

  • And that's where you influence people.

  • Like I want to do it, but I also want to be the most popular, and so then, that person's

  • like, "Oh, I want to be him, so I guess I'll be nice."

  • I want to literally take people who have DNA that's kind of nice and make them more nice

  • because they think that's how I became big, so I basically want to trick the business

  • world into becoming kinder.

  • Tom: I love that answer, man.

  • Thank you so much ... Gary: Thank you so much.

  • Tom: ... for coming around.

  • Gary: Thank you.

  • Tom: That was awesome.

  • All right, guys.

  • You're going to want to dive into the weird and wonderful world that is Gary Vaynerchuk

  • online.

  • It is absolutely insane, the sheer volume of stuff that he puts out.

  • And what I love about him is, he is trying to give away every secret that he has for

  • free for anybody that's willing not only to listen to what he's saying but to actually

  • watch what he's doing, and I'm telling you right now, I watch everything he does like

  • a motherfucking hawk, because there is much amazing shit happening there.

  • And the fact that he's trying to do things the right way, he is completely transparent

  • in a world where, I believe, the only things that are going to set you apart as an entrepreneur,

  • other than your ability to actually build a business, by the way, is your willingness

  • to be transparent and authentic.

  • If people can actually connect to you, I think for the right type of entrepreneur, it opens

  • up a window that is incredible, that has never before been seen in human history.

  • I am somebody who prides himself on being an otherworldly marketer, and I built a very

  • large business by understanding something in marketing that other people didn't understand,

  • but at the same time, you know me.

  • I'm never afraid to admit when I'm wrong, and there was a time where I realized he was

  • doing something better than I was doing and I just sat at his feet and I'm doing my best

  • to learn.

  • So guys, I'm telling you, it will not be wasted time and effort.

  • He is an emotional conundrum.

  • I am only just now beginning to understand what is going on with this man, but it is

  • incredible.

  • He doesn't judge himself.

  • He is completely who he is.

  • He recognizes his strengths.

  • He plays to that.

  • He finds people that can help him with the negative side, and being around him is like

  • being around a fire.

  • Many people warm their hands on it and become better as a result.

  • So dive in, you guys, and if you haven't already, be sure to subscribe.

  • This is a weekly show, and until next time, my friends, be legendary.

  • Take care.

  • Gary: Awesome.

  • Tom: Cool.

  • Gary: Cool.

  • So fun.

  • That was great.

  • Tom: Hey, everybody.

  • Thanks so much for joining us for another episode of Impact Theory.

  • If this content is adding value to your life, our one ask is that you go to iTunes and Stitcher

  • and rate and review.

  • Not only does that help us build this community, which, at the end of the day, is all we care

  • about, but it also helps us get even more amazing guests on here to share their knowledge

  • with all of us.

  • Thank you guys so much for being a part of this community, and until next time, be legendary,

  • my friends.

Tom: Hey, everybody.

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