#AskGaryVee Episode 112: Time Saving, The Death of Desktop, & Mike Stelzner

“In your mid-twenties, do you
wish you had done more things “or focused more on one thing?” – Great question, Yule. In my mid-twenties, I
focused on one thing. I actually was completely
all in on Wine Library. There was nothing else. I’ve said in the show before
that I wish I went out and hooked up with some more
chicks and had fun some fun. That was one thing I wish
I did because I was so, you wanna talk about being
focused on one thing, as a 20-year-old guy in my twenties, it’s actually uncomfortable
how focused I was on the hustle and building the
infrastructure of my career. You know, I think at some
level when you look back, you’re always, you know, I’m equally, this is where I’m like a paradox. I’m equally completely pumped
’cause look how happy I am and those were great
times and I’m happy now, like I would never change anything. At the same token, you’re
always looking back, and be, like, “Ah,
damn, I could have this, “I could have done that.” Yule, I’m pretty happy with
the way things have played out. I don’t like to play
Monday morning quarterback with my life, but I think it served me well. I learned real foundational
skills of how to run a company. It’s why I’m hyper focused
and why I’m capable now to run a company while
doing a couple more things ’cause I know what it takes,
which is serious focus, but once in a while,
you jump in into a show when you didn’t have to. And so that’s where I’m at with that. Thanks for the question, Yule.

“You always say that people pay
for services that give time. “What area needs a timesaving
business like an Uber?” – Sam, I don’t know all of them. For example, I would absolutely pay for my clone to do this show right now so I could be in the meeting that I really have to be in, right? Obviously that’s a little
farfetched and a little faraway, but I think there’s a ton of things. I think I would pay a
lot of money right now to have somebody on
demand do certain things for my grandma in her
retirement home, right? Picking up my cleaners. Obviously there’s the Postmates and people that are saving
time, but I actually think, I got a good one for you. I’m gonna go deep here a little bit, even though I’m a little bit of a rush and I clearly am talking a
little faster than normal, so all of you, so for all of you that are
listening to this on 2x speed, let’s 4x this shit, here we go. When Facebook really hit and
MySpace was still leading, like kind of leader, everybody started creating
niche social networks, right? Niche social networks. I would have invested in
the baseball social network, the gardening social network, the Goth museum social network, like, I’m kidding. I really, really, the niches were happening, right? What it turned out to be, hindsight, was we only needed one social network. I actually think the
reverse is gonna happen for the timesaving economy. Meaning, there’s Postmates and there was all these kind
of, like, “We do everything.” I actually think this is gonna be a space where people win on niching out. So, like, a dry cleaner pickup thing. Shyp, S-H-Y-P, I’m obsessed with. We got a little money in in our last fund disclosure for Shyp, no, not a lot, but boy, do I love them because nobody wants to
go to the post office, so I think that’s an incredible one. You know, I think there’s, look, I’ll give you one, like,
“I don’t wanna go shopping,” like, “Come to me here at Vayner. “Let me put on some shoes
and pants real fast, “five minutes, and I’m out.
I will buy so much more.” So, personal shopping
coming here, big one. There’s Instacart, so there’s food. Literally, anything you do, any, like, Question of the Day. List two things that you
do that you hate doing. That’s in play. ‘Cause you hate doing it because you’d rather
be doing something else and that’s where the time arbitrage is and so, you know, gardening,
hanging pictures in your house, like, just everything. Just everything is gonna be arbed. Anything a human doesn’t
want to do is in play. I’m trying to think of
one more good example. Anybody got one that popped to their mind? – [Staphon] Laundry. – [Gary] No, but laundry’s-
– They’d come in and hit it. – No. No, no. Get back
to here. Staphon, no, no, There’s nothing that’s
a singular app right now that literally you press a button and you give somebody a bag, like, how about you don’t even put a bag? How about they walk into your
house and take your pile? Because we’re living
in a more open society where trust is a real play. We’re letting people stay in our home. Wait a minute. You’re telling me that somebody wouldn’t leave
their door open and let, and just put a pile of,
this is what I would do. Put a pile of clothes in the front and somebody could come
with a key and get it in a world where Airbnb, you’re letting people stay in your home? Trust is on the rise, my friends, ’cause transparency is on the rise. Getting harder to hide
and do the wrong thing. Very, very interesting times.

“Is it okay for celebs to
promote products on Instagram “without telling their
audience they get paid for it?” – No. And I’m sure it can happen. You know, like, listen, we
invest in so many things. I’m always scared, like,
talking about products and apps that we’re in. I’m like, “Ah.” Shyp right now, right? But is it okay? Absolutely not. Like, why in the world would that be okay? India? Like I don’t see any-
– [India] Why put it on the show.
– I don’t see, yeah, I wanted to put it on the show. because I wanna put
the line in the sand, like, ’cause people, “Oh, I know
why they put it in the show,” ’cause people, like, “Hey, this Pinterest “pay Gary to say it’s good,” I mean, are you crazy? Like, I made, like, I have– You know how much
money I have tied up in Twitter as I sit here on every
show saying it’s crap, it’s losing, it’s getting worse? Like, your word is always
your most valuable asset and celebrities that think
they can trick their fans are gonna be in for a rude awakening in the long tail of their career. It’s an insane play. It has no value, It’s stupid. It happen, like, look, I try to disclose
our investments all the time. Of course you are human,
something you have, but knowingly non-disclose
and be like, “This is great” and, “No,” like that’s insanity. Insanity. So also probably to be massively illegal as like the laws catch
up to full disclosure and things of that nature,
how about that part? So no, I don’t think it’s okay.

My question for you is
podcast versus video. – Yeah. – Which one has been
more effective for you? I know that you have a video show and you also have an Ask Gary podcast and I’m just curious which
one has been more effective? Which one has more listeners? If you’re recommending
that somebody get started, should they do the video? Should they do the podcast? Should they do both? I’d love to hear your thoughts. – Thanks, Mike. Videos been more effective for me because this is a video first show and then the podcast is
just a transcribe for this: psst, psst. So, you know, obviously for
this show, it’s been video. So many of the people are
winning more on podcast because they, either not doing the video or they’re not as good at video. I think I’m better in
video than podcast form. I’m also making the format for this. Obviously if I made this for audio, I would have a different play. I did Wine & Web on SIRIUS for nine months where that was made for audio and it was a different
show, different format. I interviewed people. Obviously that’s what so much of the podcast right now are
really, if you think about it, and I don’t want to be
disrespectful to podcast. I have big ups for all the podcasts. I wanna be on them when
I’m promoting stuff, so I don’t wanna get into
dirty territory here but these podcasts are
completely reliant on guests. Like, how do you keep it
fresh otherwise, right? You know, I’m, so I’m proud of being
able to keep it fresh, one-man show kind of thing. Well, obviously you characters. And so I think that, for me, it’s been video. I think that the context and the format that you’re
creating for matters. So, I think podcast that
are filming themselves doing the podcast and there’s video won’t do as well on video
’cause that’s secondary. Here, audio is secondary. But, so that’s it, that’s
the net result, Mike. But I think the right platform is the right platform for you. I think that I have the
charisma and the antics and the control of the
camera that very few have, which is why I’ve had two
successful video shows and so I think I’m an anomaly there and I’m gonna milk that because
that has extraordinary value but there’s plenty of
other people who crush it ’cause their voice is deep. My voice stinks. I mean, think about how
many great voices there are. And so, like, you know,
if you’re rolling deep, you’re gonna do some stuff, so I think you got to pick your medium and that’s the same with social network. So you’re better at
Snapchat, Twitter, Facebook, gotta find that and you gotta respect the context of the platform. – [Voiceover] Sean asks: Will desktop exist in 20 years?

Will desktop exist in 20 years? – Are we talking desktop
computers, you think, right? Are we including this artifact? – [India] Yeah.
– Yes, this? – [India] I think so. – I do, you know, it’s in 20 years. I mean, you know, I really wanna believe that we’ll be, like, working
on, everything is smart. Definitely not the way
we think about it now, like, this is an artifact. I mean, I didn’t think that
laptops, weirdly, artifact. I didn’t even take my
laptop home last night. I was on my in-laws’ home
and going back there tonight but I had a couple hours to work and I was able to do it on my phone. That was unheard of for me a year ago. So if I’m evolving into that way, I think the whole rest of the market will, a hundred percent not the way we’re at. Will there be something in
between this and an iPad? I do think there’s some screen needs, but I’m not even sure
if I’m thinking about it right in a 20-year window. That’s so far out. I mean, is
the screen just right here? I mean, I think that’s very feasible. I’m confident saying the screen’s
right here on this table. So, no, the answer is
no, but I could be wrong. I can’t wait to watch this in 20 years to A, remember how great I
looked at this time of my life and B, to see if I was right. I asked the question of the day.