#AskGaryVee Episode 146: Cursing, HR and My Emotion for the Jets

“at closing and sales. What’s
your structure for your pitches?” – For my pitches. So, my
structure for my pitches is complete and utter no structure. I don’t really structure
my pitches a whole lot. My team may, in certain
scenarios, have a deck. But there’s, I’m sure, an
inside joke in this company that when we go into that
meeting, I’m gonna completely side-rail and drive over that
deck, which I do consistently. I’m much more interested
in reading the room and deploying what that client
wants at that exact moment, versus what we thought they wanted. In the same way I sold
at baseball card shows, I would just always react.
I really think my pitches are structured for counter-punching. Which means no preparation
from presentation form, but complete and utter presentation
for knowing the content. See what I mean? This is
the thing that most people don’t understand. They
think that you wing it. No, you’re winging the way
you’re gonna present it. You’re not winging what
you actually know about it. So the way I prepare,
is holistically prepare. A.K.A. know my shit. I
know what I’m talking about in the things that I’m selling. And then basically I’m
reverse engineering deploying your needs against that
expertise at that moment, versus what order the deck
needs to be in the presentation. My friends, the deck doesn’t sell it. The presentation doesn’t
sell it. The skills sell it. – [Voiceover] Jeremy asks,
“Gary, why do you feel the need

“to swear to make a point?
Surely business credibility “is better built without swearing? – You were excited about
asking this question? I don’t feel like I need
to swear to make a point. I also don’t agree that
business credibility is lost when you curse. Business
credibility is lost when you curse when the judge
of your credibility is a d or f player and
somebody that is making surface level decisions. As a
matter of fact, I would argue that, at times, I use my cursing
as a filter to filter out the people that are not capable of seeing the bigger picture,
versus being so blocked. “Oh my god. I heard the word (bleep). I can’t hear anything else.
Everything else must be bad. There’s no good advice,
this is a bad person.” That is ludicrous. It
goes into the same context as the way you dress, or
a million other variables of ways people that will judge you– See, when you’re great, you
can dress in all red, all red. You can blend into phone booths. I mean, you can dress how you want. You can talk how you want.
Because at the end of the day, the way you deliver is all
that people really care about. And the way you make them feel. I’m not cursing to disrespect someone. I have empathy and respect
why a lot of people may not like me, or consume me. There are plenty of people
that don’t watch this video because they saw a keynote where I cursed and they were offended, and
they are no longer in my set. Surely, I would have a bigger
audience if I didn’t curse. That is absolutely true.
And business respect, sure. I may lose out on a deal
because they were offended. But in the net, net, net
score, I win so many more by being me and just being me
versus creating a half-version of me for the one conservative
person and leaving the hundreds of magic
business opportunities, that are predicated on
winners making decisions. So, yeah. I’m completely
in disagreement with you. I don’t believe either one of us are successful because of our cursing or non-cursing,
I think it has a lot more to do with a lot of things that
matter a hell of a lot more than some choice four letter words. – [India] From Cherise.

“of HR and employees getting along. “How do I implement that when
everyone talks about everyone?” – Well, I don’t know if
employees getting along or HR is predicated on everybody
talking about each other? – [India] No, it’s like
how do I implement that in a place where everybody’s
talking about each other. – Oh, talking about
each other, like gossip? – [India] Yeah. If you wanna read it, but that’s how I interpreted it. – Where everyone talks
about everyone. Oh, jeez. I mean, that means it’s
broken from the top. People are gonna gossip. I’m
sure in the 600 employee– 550 employees of Vaynermedia, I’m sure people talk about each other. But it’s a net-net score.
Don’t be crippled by– Make sure you’re judging
the gossiping appropriately. Maybe it’s not as bad as you
think in the collective– Ryan, be careful. This
is an active shoot, Ryan. Yeah, clearly you didn’t realize. I’m just kidding! Do you wanna come on and apologize to the
show? Get over here, Ry. Let’s get you seven Twitter followers. – @guildgonewild, I’m
sorry for ruining the show. – Say, “Dear Vayner Nation.” – Dear Vayner Nation,
I sincerely apologize for ruining the show. And I’m
pretty sure Gary hates me now. – I don’t, I love you. – Oh. Well, thank you. – Tell them what football team you like. – The New York Jets. – That’s my boy. Get outta here! Alright. Hey, Brunchback. – Hey, what’s up? – Alright, get outta here. We need to come to 15 more often, there’s some good action going on here. Creating a culture where
people are gossiping negatively about each
other is devastating. There’s a lot more to fix.
The leadership needs to be looked at. Maybe you’re the leader. You need to really look at yourself. I think the only way to fix
a real burning building, if it’s really rampant and
negative, is to call an all hands-on meeting and go straight kumbaya, it’s all communication, it’s
put it out on the table. It’s address it head on and move forward. So, one, make sure you’re
judging it properly. Because in the scheme of
things, humans are humans. You can’t– It’s not like– I mean, Vayner’s great
culture, but at a micro level, there’s a million little
bad things going on. It’s just that you have to
look at is as a collective. You can’t turn people into
robots and not make them have all the emotions humans have, but way more importantly,
to me, if it is rampant, the only way to fix a
complete storm of this, is to bring everybody together, the leader needs to put– Starting with them,
I’ve clearly screwed up. Let’s talk about this. Probably
make some firing decisions. Because there’s probably
some cancer cells in there. It’s a real aggressive,
you need to address it. Truth is, so many of you
do not want to address it, or don’t know how, or
don’t have the stomach to, that’s the bigger issue. I
went for the dramatic moment there, you know what? Kick
in a little soft music here, for that part. This is
the important thing. Are you willing to address it? Do you have the appetite to deal with that kind of confrontation at the global scale? That’s the friction point. The
leaders don’t wanna step up and actually be leaders.

– David. Oh, it’s a video. – Hey, Gary. It’s David
Shaheen, husband and manager of recording artist, Amanda Vernon. She’s about to sing the
National Anthem here at Lambeau Field– – [India] This is amazing. – For Monday night football.
She’s about to go on in a little bit here. (crowd cheering) So I was wondering if
you could give any tips on how to capitalize on
this exposure. Thank you. – That’s fantastic. I
would immediately buy the Google Adword “National Anthem”, “Singing the National Anthem”,
I would buy all the long-tail words on search, on Google
for National Anthem. Singing the National
Anthem, National Anthem, National Anthem at Half-Time, How do I get picked to
sing the National Anthem, that’s a long tail. And I
would have your video embedded somewhere with a story about her. So create a landing page
on Tumblr, RebelMouse, where it doesn’t cost you a lot, where you don’t have to design. Embed the video, tell a story
about her, and all her work. And buy keywords on social around that, I would also buy Facebook ads against Green Bay Packer fans, fans
of the Green Bay Packers. And say, “Do you wanna see the video?” or “Do you wanna meet the person that sang the National Anthem last Monday night?” Some of them will, as well.
Those would be the two black and white executional
things that I would do. That was good. Some real advice. That’s some real advice! – [Gary] Pam. That’s some real advice.

“the Jets with regards to
their effect on your mood “as a strength or weakness?” – India, you’re really
picking some doozies. Do I… Do I…? – [India] Do you see your
reliance on, like, the fact that the Jets has such an effect on your mood– – Do I see the Jets impacting
me so much on a Monday, as a strength or weakness? A strength. It means I’m
emotionally in tune with myself, which I deploy in other places. See, this is the whole– You know, I’m gonna
actually turn this question into a really good question. The disproportionate amount of you, who are not winning as much– And I’m not trying to
zing, I love you guys. But I believe a lot of the
people who are watching this right now who are not winning,
back to the cursing question, are looking at things too
much at a micro level. You look at, and people assume– And a lot of people believe,
“Oh that’s a weakness. You’re wasting a half a day,
or a day, or you’re not as efficient as you can on a Monday.” I view it at a much higher level
of if I’m capable of caring about something so much, and
allowing it to affect my mood, that means that my emotional
intelligence is at such a high level, that those are
some of the strengths that allow me to do all the things
that I do, and have the intuition around how
people feel about things, hence the HR question, hence the culture, hence the business success,
hence where consumers are going with their feelings,
my feeling skills are– I’m proud that I cry– I cry, I went to Hamilton,
there was a part in the play that I was almost crying,
I cry all the time. When the Lion King’s
dad died in Lion King, I was on a date in high
school and I cried. You know how wimpus that
is? That’s like the anti– Pam, you like that? – I did too. – Yeah. Beaches? And Steel Magnolias? I cried like a fucking waterfall. So those are feelings,
those are my strengths. I see it as a strength.