#AskGaryVee Episode 101: Ruining Instagram, Yellow Pages, & How To Get A Job Working For Me

“on Instagram when people
can just go to the “ACTUAL STORE to get
what you’re selling?” This is gonna be so fun. This new format is gonna be so fun. All right. One more time, what’s the name? – [India] Lati? (laughs) – I’m so pumped we came up with this. Latte. Latte. Lati? Lati, great question. Listen, Lati. The reason this is happening is because marketers ruin everything. Anytime a lot of people
pay attention to something, and that’s what’s happening on Instagram, it evolves, right. It started off as artistic
photographers doing their thing, then people started moving and
kind of putting their selfies and their lives on there, started
becoming the new Facebook. And, so, once there’s that much attention, business people, like myself,
and others can’t help it but go in there and try to
start selling things to others. It’s just the way it is. Now, the nice thing
about Instagram though is is that it’s not gonna
pop up in your feed. You gotta follow them. So, clearly you followed this person, or your friend followed this person, if they showed it to them. I’m not sure how you saw
somebody selling there, but you’re more than welcome to unfollow. So, you know, you can take
your time and go on Twitter and complain about it, which I love, I love the sass, but the fact of the matter
is the quick unfollow will keep you away from it, unlike other platforms. I expect Instagram to go that route, because that’s how you make money. But that’s the reason. The reason is because
people are paying attention, and where people are paying attention is an opportunity to sell. Just like listening to the radio,
just like watching TV, just like turning the
pages in a newspaper, just like go on an internet
websites with banners. If someone’s paying attention,
someone is trying to sell. – [Voiceover] Ryan Andrew says,
“Marketing to the next generation

through Facebook is on par with
ads in the yellow pages. Anyone disagree?
Facebook is dead. What’s next? Ryan, hey. It’s me, Gary Vee. I know we don’t know each other, but Alex is gonna be hitting
you up with a link to this. I massively disagree. As a matter of fact,
emphatically disagree. I think what’s next is people
waking up and realizing Facebook is just starting to grow. I have made the mistake, many times in my career, of the same thing that
you’re saying on Twitter. Which was, I said in 2003, “Hey, SEM. Google Adwords
is dead. What’s next?” While Google was just starting. Facebook “dark posts” the ability
to reach out to everybody. Don’t forget, you know. Yellowpages is more like Google Search. You’re going there to find something. Facebook’s coming to you. You’re in a feed, and you’re seeing it. No more the right side of a desktop. I don’t even know what this is. This is like an artifact, right? And, so, the fact of the matter is no more on the right side of a website. It’s coming in your feed. And if you know how to target, and you know how to create
content properly, you win. And, so, I would say I disagree. And number two, what’s next is people understanding what’s
really happening in Facebook. Like do it right on spot.

“Wait. How does one deactivate Twitter?” (laughs) Gina? Hey, Gina. It’s Gary. It’s really easy to deactivate
Twitter on your phone. It’s called deleting the app itself. Hope it works for you.

“of Instagram. Like now people
try to sell a fridge on it. The fuck?” I like how you delivered that. Yeah, I mean this is clearly
the theme of the show. Oh, by the way. Real
quick shout out to Scott. This is an incredible personal wine box. Let’s give them
PersonalizedWineBoxes.com shout out. I love how people are hacking
me for free promotion. I feel like a sucker right now, but like, I do love. And Chris, this is insane. I mean, Chris Green, this
is just absolutely insane. Show them up, D-Rock. This is unbelievable. He dismantled it. How about this? I mean, does Aton know about this? Listen, I just said it earlier. People are ruining Instagram. People are trying to sell their fridges, people are trying to sell clothes. There was one that I saw, “Why are people trying to
sell food on Instagram?” But I didn’t think I could stop from laughing through that question from India. The bottom line is attention,
attention, attention. That’s where the value prop is. You know, the reason I
picked both those questions is to thematicsize this episode. I don’t know what that means, sorry. Grammar police. But the theme of this show is very simple, which is Instagram has the attention, people are gonna sell on it, get over it. That’s what’s always gonna happen. And, so, the reason people
are trying to sell you a fridge on Instagram is the same reason you asked the question on Twitter. Which means, it caught your attention. Where as if they tried to
sell their fridge on Twitter, I’m not sure it would have. Get it?

“How many of you guys use Pinterest? We’re just finding our feet on it. What would like to see
from Kwan’s Kitchen? Kwan’s Kitchen, big
should out to you guys. I love the businesses that
are going into the trenches and actually asking their
users what they want to see. My friends, all you small
businesses out there, all you solo entrepreneurs,
Kwan’s Kitchen, a Chinese restaurant in Scotland, big ups here from USA. Bless you. From USA America. I’m very proud of that execution, because you’re gonna get
insight and see what happens. Somebody in the social media team, or maybe the owner of
Kwan’s Kitchen’s like, “Hey, let me put this out there.” And sure enough, some crazy
dude decides to pick it up and put it on his show where a lot of people are gonna see it. Great exposure. All my Scotland, I’m triple confirming this, So all my Scottish friends,
please if you’re watching The #AskGaryVee show, go visit Kwan’s, give him some daps. Don’t you agree, Steve? – Totally agree, yes. – You know, this is a great question. I think Pinterest is an
incredibly important platform. I think Pinterest, am I
too close to you, DRock? What are you sad about? – [DRock] I hit my stomach. – You hit your stomach with the bar? I got it. Kwan’s Pinterest, my
friends, VaynerNation, everyone who’s listening to this, Kwan’s Kitchen, not Kwan’s Kitchen. Excuse me, DRock’s distracting me. Pinterest. Pinterest is the
new social network for search. Right? It was a social
network, it’s a search engine. Pinterest is a search engine. People are searching on there, and they’re getting visual search. Andrew, I see you shaking your head. Get in here. Get in here. Get
over here. Come over here. Give me a hug. I saw you in the corner of my eye, right? You don’t get as much
air time as everyone. Why dont you tell. Kneel
down, because I don’t like when people are taller than me. – I’m already short. – Well, that’s fine, but
I’m really short, too. Tell the VaynerNation
what you do here. – I’m the designer for Gary. – Why were you shaking
your head so emphatically? What is your behavior on Pinterest? – Well, I’m not a huge Pinterest lover, but designing a lot of
your stuff on Pinterest people search for it, and
it seems pretty important. – All right. That was terrible. The bottom line is there will be no Ask Andrew Show any time
soon, keep designing. I get it, but I’m tremendous on the spot. Well, I am Steve. – I’m not disagreeing. – [Gary] Okay. Well, thank you. – Pinterest searching. – Yeah, I mean look. DRock, over here. It’s a search engine. It’s a search engine, it’s visual search. We’ve become all more visual. There’s a real visual revolution. And I actually think Google
should be shaking in their pants around what’s going on in Pinterest. I think Pinterest is a
tremendous ad product. So, I would say put out a lot of stuff, and put out a lot of stuff of
your dishes and your meals, but don’t make them stock photos. Get them out there. I would make infographics. I would make an infographic of the perfect Chinese food dinner. Where it’s like, step one, do this. Step two, like drink water. Step three, try this trick. Step four, you know like make it fun. Step four, like talk to your friends. Step five, play with the fortune cookie. Like, a really fun piece of
content that I could see going tremendously well for you. I think infographics over index. I think photos of the,
here’s an incredible thing if you have a physical location. What about photos of the
street that you’re on? That’s cool. Just take a nice photo of
the street that you’re on. What about you taking the lead, and you taking photos of the fellow business owners around you. There’s a lot of creative things. Act like a media company, put out content that’s interesting. Put out content that’s valuable to people. Not in your best interest. Not your menu, not your store. It can’t be all about you. It needs to be all about what
could they possibly want. Pinterest is growing in the male demo, because it’s just valuable. It’s converting into a
hardcore search engine. It’s going to be an enormously big deal. I’m all-in on Pinterest. I invested at Vayner/RSE in
the last round of Pinterest at an $11 billion dollar valuation. That I think is under priced massively. – Hi, Gary. So, I heard, to be the best,

you have to learn from the best. So, I’m gonna be a little
bit cheeky here and ask, how do I get a job working for you? – Great question, and
it happens all the time. And the reason I want to take this is, obviously after episode
100, I had 12 to 15 people, and by the way that almost fell and broke. I had 12 to 15 people
at the show ask me like, “Hey, I want to work for you.” I’m always flattered by that. I get hundred of emails a month. And I think it comes down
to, there is no right answer. There’s plenty of people
that’ve gotten here by pounding me 15 times, and then eventually I
get them an interview, but I think that’s going 0 for 47. So, that’s like an interesting insight to people that pound me 47 times. There’s people that just
went through the system and just applied, and VaynerMedia’s website
has tons of job openings. I think the one move that a
lot of people haven’t done, other than maybe DRock,
that I can think of. And that’s really interesting, I wasn’t gonna give this answer. I was gonna go in a different direction. Kevin Rose, founder of Digg, internet personality
extraordinaire, great friend, did something super smart. Years ago he wanted to get into Square, he thought it was gonna be a big company, and Jack didn’t let him in. Jack had his homies that came in. So, Kevin went out and made a video that was enormously interesting with great insights and
things around Square. And it was so viral, and it was so strong, and that gave him the
ability to invest in Square at a very early stage where now it’s worth billions on paper. And I’ve always been fascinated by that. DRock. DRock, how many
times did you reach out to do a video for me? One? Was it lucky like that? Three? So, DRock, three times reached out and asked to do a video. Paid forward first,
made a piece of content, showed me his skills, and then, you know. Obviously, the rest is history. Now, he’s like, I mean I
don’t know if you guys are paying attention, but like, he’s got a bigger fan base than I do. So, I, you know. Look, look. Chris Green now could, like I’d hire Chris Green
to make Lego structures for clients at VaynerMedia. I’m not even joking. He’s doing his own thing, but if Chris hit me up and said, “I want to make Lego-like structures for campaigns at VaynerMedia,” I would hire him. Here it is, I see it. I mean, India’s hair is long. Like the Starbucks thing. Like Stephan’s Brooklyn hat. Like the detail is insanity here. I mean, just crazy. So, so, you know. You know. I think doing something
first is a real hack. So, give that some thought. Question of the day.