#AskGaryVee Episode 199: Kobe Bryant's Legacy, Messenger Chatbots & Snail Mail

“sell direct consumer?” – Yeah. Yeah. Well, I think yes. I think Amazon is going to be a
player where they’re basically selling directly to consumer– – AKA with their private labels
or when they’re selling Pepsi through Amazon? – I think they’re going to use
Amazon as a mechanism to sell direct to consumers but the
question is will eventually people like I want Pepsi I want
to Pepsi.com or Pepsi’s Facebook page and just get
directly from there. But that’s not really direct
to consumer because it’s going through Facebook so I think
you still need to use these platforms to go direct consumer.
– Got it. I would say that Amazon is far
less direct to consumer than Facebook because Amazon’s
actually a full-pledged retailer and very honestly I think a
scary one for these guys and gals that are running these
businesses because Amazon’s got real data. In the CPG world, retail and
brands the scariest thing is when a retailer is
gets too much leverage. The biggest brands in the world
are paying for placement in Walmarts and Albertson’s and
Costco’s and Safeway’s that are very expensive. This is not the way
was 30 or 40 years ago. The retailers didn’t have
leverage, the brands did. – Yep.
– And so that got expensive. Direct to consumer is inevitable
the problem is the following big brands like Dove or Pepsi can’t
go direct to consumer because Costco and Walmart and Tesco are
going to say what are you doing? You’re not cutting us out. The second those companies show
a move to wanting to go direct to consumer the big retailers are
going to drop their product from end caps to the bottom shelf
or kick them out of the store. Which then would affect them in
a 90 day period because their sales would collapse which
then would make the stock price collapse so they’re
basically caught in what’s called channel conflict.
They can’t do it. So what’s gonna happen? Here’s what’s going to happen. India and her mom are going to
invent the best peanut butter you’ve ever tasted and they’re
going to start going direct to consumer and they’re going to
sell on Instagram and Snapchat and Facebook and quietly but
surely because that’s where the attention is all of a sudden
their business is going to do $40 million not four
or 1.4 or 400,000. – Yep. – And then, what’s a
big peanut these days? Peter Pan peanut butter?
– [Margo] Laura Scudder’s? – What’s that?
– [Margo] Laura Scudder’s. – [Gary] Laura Scudder’s?
– Smuckers maybe. – [Gary] Smuckers right.
– Jiffy. – [Gary] Jiffy, Jiffy,
there we go. Go ahead. – Well I like grinding
the peanuts in Whole Foods. – Let’s use a soda as an analogy
then Coke and Pepsi are going to be like wait a minute
what’s this new craft soda? That’s doing real volume and
then they’re going to be stuck because they are going to
get squeezed from both sides. They’re going to get
squeezed from the up-and-coming entrepreneurs that actually now
have scale and use things like Uber and Postmates or whatever
for distribution and use social media and this for awareness and
they’re going to get pressured from the retailers for
then not to do the same. Pepsi can’t make Pepsi Gold
the direct to consumer at scale. They can do a little one
off, a little holiday thing. Tough. – Starbucks is an interesting
example because I just went to Seattle and I just saw their
new kind of innovative space. – Okay. – It seems like what brands can
do is develop or create a new product that people don’t
actually know is part of the brand and sell it direct to
consumer and see they kind of have the backup. – No, no, no.
100% they can do that. Here’s the problem, it doesn’t
matter what the consumer knows, the retailer. See the thing is most people
don’t get is the number one competitor to the biggest
brands in the world are their retail partners. – Mhmmm. Mhmmm. – So they can’t again at the
highest levels on a board at Walmart they’ll say look
what Coke just did today. They created Scmoke or Chugabuga
– And they’re selling it. – And they’re selling it and if
it gets big that’s a problem for us because it’s going to build
the cadence and the ability and the data to remarket to
those people and they’re going to cut us out. – What do you think about
the future of the store? Do you right now all the brands,
even Birchbox I know or Warby Parker, who are
disruptors, right, are like they all want stores. It’s actually the best marketing
mechanism in the world. Do you think these retail stores
are going to be the place where conversion rates are
going to happen the most? – No, I think if you look at
e-comm it chips away every year. 11 percent of the market,
13 percent of the market, 16 percent of the market. E-comm will continue to
grow especially with this. Especially with our
impatience, I want it right now. – And through
social channels too. – And whatever, right and were
not even factoring in it’s going to take 20 years for what I’m
talking and by then VR will be there so are we literally living
in a virtual world and shopping in a virtual store and it’s
actually being physically delivered within an hour? There’ll always be disruption
but here’s what I will say they’re not going away. Stores are not going away.
Stores, they’re not going away. Do I think they’re
emerging better than ever? No. Just because Birchbox
and Warby Parker have stores right now. Let’s talk about another thing
when the shit hits the fan and I mean the collapse of the
valuations of these super companies and these unicorns
that are rhinoceroses and I don’t think Birchbox is. – What’s a rhinoceros?
I know unicorn is a billion. – Yeah a rhinoceros is what
these things actually are. They’re actually rhinoceroses.
You like it? – Yeah. Like it a lot. – Anyway nonetheless I think
that too many people who watch this, too many people in
our zeitgeist-y kind of love we think things are binary that
e-commerce is coming and there will be no stores. I mean I made these
mistakes as a kid. There is no absolutes.
– There’s no absolutes. – Right? – You gotta do everything
it seems like today, right? – I would say you’ve
got arbitrage everything. If you can get a store location that
you don’t pay too much rent on, that does great branding
and awareness and your selling stuff, Mazel Tov. If you can figure out a
Instagram campaign that, you have to be agnostic.
– Right. – You have no emotion
to where it happens, you just want it to happen. – Well, how do you
afford all that though? – You don’t. You don’t.
Which is why– – I would rather have Ralph
actually do the real jobs than having him just work on social. – I get it. I get it. – It’s allocation of resources.
– That’s exactly right. – I’d rather have
Ralph do everything. He’s very capable.
– Yeah, he’s the best. – Show Ralph, Staphon, come on.
Let’s wake up here, Staphon. You saw what Kobe did.
I’m kidding, I’m kidding. I think that that’s why
strategy is so interesting. That’s why love to do
what I do for a living. – And you have to
keep reinventing. Now you’re all about Snapchat. – I’m only about attention. Snapchat just
happens to have it. – Yeah. Are you loving it?
– Love it. – [Voiceover] Matt asks,
“The average amount of

“email someone gets
is 147 per day. “The average pieces
of mail four per day. “Is it time to get
back in the mailbox?” – Yes.
– You think so? – Absolutely.
– Talk about it. – Absolutely because that’s
why I actually created a book. – Yeah. – Because it’s
actually tangible product. It doesn’t evaporate
in the digital ether so direct mail even though
I think it is customary– – Hold on go back to
your digital ether evaporation statement there. If I got this in a PDF, forget
about that because that’s just supply and demand economics this
is about if you want something or if you don’t want
something a.k.a.– – That’s true, that’s good.
Yep, yep, yep. If you really want it
you’re going to find it. – Correct. If I want the ZEITGUIDE I’m
going to want it one way and the other the other thing is I think
that’s about getting to the point of knowing about the
ZEITGUIDE but once you know it to me it’s the electronic aspect
is so great because is on me. I’m not carrying this
fucking thing around. You carry it around. – I fit in my back pocket. – I do have a book
on me at all times. – You should have this next
to you on your night table while you’re sleeping. I have your book next
to me on my night table. – The greatest thing that could
ever happen to you every single person on Earth has the
ZEITGUIDE app on the home screen of their phone.
– Yes. – It would be the
greatest moment of your life. – And we keep updating and
keep updating, yep, yep, yep. Let’s do it, Ralph. – Ralph. What was a question? – [India] The question was
the average amount of email. – Email costs zero, fuckin’
mail costs a shitload of money. What’s his name? Matt. – They actually just
reduced the price of the stamp. – Defense. Matt, Matt
wake the fuck up. The answer is sure but you
gotta run the economics. If it costs zero but you have
creative costs somebody’s gotta write the email,
those kinds of things. Mailchimp might have a,
you know, the cost benefit analysis is devastating. Go run 10,000 pieces of
mail that oh by the way cost you $13,000. $13,000. – By the way, this is the reason
why this is so expensive and in addition to the intellectual
property the reason why this is so expensive because it cost
like 100 bucks to print each one.
– Get the fuck out of here. Your cost is not–
– I do on demand printing. – The only reason I’m not
throwing you out of this room and making fun of you for $100
pamphlet is because I know how good the IP is an information
is good and it’s why you’re even allowed to sit here
because $100 book is ludicrous. – Well now it’s $50.
(laughing) – Be careful I’m about the
negotiate you for 75% discount. Ralph, there’s
going to be new code. – All right, done do it, Ralph. I want it to be the same price
as his book which is $18.99 or $17.99.
– That’s right, $17.99. Want to do that? Done. 82% discount
or whatever $82 off. Done, nice work.
That was good, I’m excited. India. I like negotiating. Staphon do not put up this
episode until the code works for 18 bucks.
– $17.99. – $17.99 You can use that for a stamp.
– It’s true. So anyway, Matt, I think
it’s all about the end result. If $13,000 to send 10,000 pieces
of mail and one of four I don’t know who one and four, first of
all that’s scary to me and I’ll tell you why, it means that
80% of Americans are getting one piece of mail and it’s probably
the 80% of Americans that are not going to convert to a sale
as easily as the Americans at the top 20% that are getting
20,000 pieces of God damn mail because their data shows
that they have the income to buy things. We have to start
grounding things in real life. I think the reason I am so
excited lately is everybody, all these businesses are
about to go out of business. I’m so– – We’re talking
startups or legacy or both? – There’s so much bad
that’s about the happen. – Yeah, I know. – And in business land and
especially in startup land and the truth is it’s going to make
me feel really good and I’ll tell you why. All those same friends and
acquaintances and pundits said I wasn’t smart for building
an agency during the boom of startup.
– Right. – And I ate that.
You have to understand– – Why did they say that? Why did they say that? – Because agencies
are stupid businesses. – Yeah but you have
a different agency. – Fine but do you understand?
Why? That’s why. You also know, you’ve been
around, you know for your own business but you also have a
feel on me, I was sitting at the top of the pyramid. I could’ve raised a
$200 million fund. I could’ve gotten $50 million
for any god damn idea I had to build a business. Do you know what would have
happened if I said I’ve got a tech idea for the wine business. I would’ve gotten $50 million
in funding in four seconds. – So why didn’t you do it? – Because I knew I wanted
to build practicality not create high risk. Because all this spiel I push on
you guys on Snapchat, this show, the DailyVee, I live it. I live the hard work.
I live the practicality. – And it’s fun. – And I live below the
headlines in the trenches. 140 emails, four pieces of mail
that’s a nice little data set, what happens when
you start digging? What happens when
we talked about the actual costs involved? What happens when I educated you
that that average was predicated on the people that won’t convert
to the sale and that… And so that’s it, it’s layers. I’ll be there in
a minute, Tyler. India, lets go. – [Voiceover] Michael asked,
“Do you see bots becoming big

“in the next 24 months? “Microsoft and Facebook
are heavily investing. “Will bots become a
tier 1 inbound channel?” – Well, they just talked about
yesterday these chat bots on Facebook M messenger. I know Ralph and I were
just talking about this. – Bots will probably make,
when will you close content on ’17 ZEITGUIDE?
– September. – Bots will make an
appearance in your next one. – Absolutely. Absolutely.
– Hundred percent. – We talked about bots
in terms of ruining the advertising agency– – Oh that’s
different programmatic. Yeah, yeah. These are
utilitarian bots. This is going to work. WeChat and other
platforms have proven this so I’m actually excited. Truth is I’m actually
excited to deeply dig into it this weekend. I have a flight to San Diego?
– [India] Yeah. – I’m going to read quite a bit
on that flight on just bots ’cause it’s that important. – You don’t need to
read, just give me a call. – But you know this about me,
the reason I get to be quoted in your books is because
I like doing the work. – Totally, you don’t
want the Cliff Notes. – I don’t want to read it. I want to be the
content side of it. – Totally. There you go. I think it’s going to be really
big in customer experience. It’s going to be big
in customer experience. – It’s going to be huge.
Guys, the AI. – Do you want to talk to a bot? – I want to talk to whoever– – Right. Even credit card
companies like press one isn’t that kind of like a bot? We value time over
human interaction. It’s just the truth.
We value time– – Not in everything though.
We’re having fun right now– – In sex I think we value
the human interaction– – But aren’t we
having fun right now? – Yes, of course but what
I’m saying is we value time. – Yes, yes, yeah. – We value time. This is fun because were doing,
I’m talking about the following, I do not want to talk
to an operator. I don’t. If it’s more efficient
this way, that’s the thing. What I think is going to happen
is were going to get really, really, really into AI, bot
culture when things can be done for us, we will take advantage
of that every day of the week. – Yep, okay. When you think
it’s going to happen? – I think really feel
real stuff next year. I feel like next year there
will be an execution in a bot environment that
everybody’s doing. Kind of like a FitBit.
– Slack. – It’s a Slack, yeah it’ll
probably happen in Slack by the way from a business standpoint
but think FitBit, think Evernote think when texting popped. There’s going to be something
that everybody will be doing in bot form on Facebook that
people are talking about. Which is like– – Is Siri a bot or
the Echo a bot? – Yeah. That gets into AI. That gets into different
stuff of that nature but yes. The truth is I don’t want to
start pontificating here because I want to get grounded in my own
thoughts on this so I don’t want to fully answer that question. I don’t know how the experts
are dissecting it plus I want to taste it more but here’s what I
will tell you every TV network in the world should start
creating a bot on Facebook that helps you DVR at scale
no matter where you are. If I’m having coffee with
India’s mom and she’s like you gotta watch
“Billions” (taps phone). Like there’s
things there’s thing. There’s things. – By the way, that’s what
Comcast could do to save themselves, right?
The cable companies? – [India] Max.
– Max.

“his last Lakers game! “What we learn about
business from Kobe? “Thoughts on his legacy?” – I don’t do
sports but ask Ralph. – Ralph, what do we think we
can learn from what Kobe did? Take 100 shots? – He actually covers
the sports for me. – Go ahead.
– [Brad] I was a bad sports player. – You miss all the shots you
don’t take and if you ever get accused of a terrible crime
buy your wife a big ring– – [Gary] Oh geez, he
hates Kobe. Kobe hater. He’s a Celtics fan?
Oh. Got it. Makes sense.
You’re a Patriots fan? – I am.
– Jesus Christ. – [Brad] He’s from Boston. – I respect that.
How old are you? Perfect, no respect for any
Boston fan under the age of 34. You had it too
good, you’re soft. Alright listen,– – Isn’t your client
GE moving to Boston? – Yes, they are. Here’s we can learn about
Kobe, Kobe is very smart from a branding standpoint
in a lot of ways. He knows that the jokes of even
the most cynical of he took 50 shots last night which I think
has only happened four times in NBA history so it’s pretty
intense he knows that something that I know which is that part
gets forgotten in seven years. What you’ll hear is what is
what’s repeated 70,000 times which is that Kobe
scored 60 in his last game. I think some of the people
that run the best brands and businesses in the world don’t
sweat the short term narrative because they’re smart enough
to play the chess moves to understand when that wears off. As a matter of fact a lot of
politicians do that because they know that we say that
negative ads are bad. We Americans, we
hate negative ads. Negative ads are bad. It’s the only
thing we respond to. And so I will run negative
ads ’til your face falls off. I will take the heat for 48
hours of like I’m running too many negative ads on Brad. I’ll win the election
and nobody will remember. And so I think that’s we can
learn from Kobe last night. I wanted to make it valuable, I
think I did a nice tie-in there. What Kobe’s actions were on the
court last night is he knows the narrative that best positions
his legacy and so he was going to take as many shots as he
had to to maximize that headline ’cause it was going to be the
only thing left and a lot of you right now worry way too much
first of all what everybody else thinks secondarily worry too
much about the narrative is in the short term you know like
starting an agency seven years ago at the height of your
ability in the tech sector when the tech sector is exploding
because you wanted to play a practical long game not what
people were whispering behind your back for a 12 month period. – Can identify with
you for a second? Yes, I am identifying with Gary. You just saw my mentors and
the guy that actually started my business with
which is Brian Grazer. – Yes.
– Yes. He loves you, by the way. – Me too.
– So does Ron. I had this job before this
and I left in 2008 as his cultural attaché.
His private ZEITGUIDE. And I build that into a business
where I could work with other leaders and when I left in 2008
to start this business people were like the fuck
are you talking about? What the economy is about to
crash, which they were right, and you’re basically thought of
as a luxury because I was just helping some Hollywood producer
come up with movie ideas. – Yes. – But I kinda knew that the
world was going to change and I would be able to come more of
his necessity because everybody was going to be so crazed by
knowing what they need to know. Yeah, it’s taken me 2008
it’s taken me eight years. – It takes time.
– Right. It takes, well that– – Building something
real takes time. – It really does if it’s
authentic and you don’t want to pollute your brand.
– That’s right. Mom raising a great
child takes time. – It does. – India was the
disaster for many years. – Was she?
– I’m kidding, I’m kidding. – Not that I remember.
– But it takes time. Trying to connect the points for
other I’m living it now with my two children building
anything great takes time. – [Brad] Patience–
– Is the game. It’s the game. Question of the day.
Our guests get to ask it.