From GR, I don’t
know his real name. How do you feel that social
media has shaped NASCAR is a good or bad as a driver or
good or bad as a fan also? – So our entire business
model is supported by corporate support.
– As is almost everybody’s. – Yeah, I guess that’s true. So you want to show
your personality but you can’t, it’s easy to second-guess your
personality if what if I have a sponsor that isn’t
going to like this. – To your point,
it’s even further. Football players shows his full personality in the contract duh, duh, duh. – Where I say our whole business
model is supported by corporate support is because it takes
that to run the NASCAR team. We can’t survive just
off the prize money. We have to have corporate
support or somebody has underwrite the program. – Yeah. Is there in NASCAR is there
some billionaires that have underwriting some programs? – Oh yeah, absolutely.
Absolutely. There’s plenty of them. And my team is, our car owner is a racer. He’s not making
money off our race team. – He loves it.
– He’s a racer. – He loves the game. – And so we search hard
for sponsors because it helps our team and because we’ve got a passion
for the sport we want to grow the sport want to grow our
partners but at the end of the day my car owner, he steps up. – At what percentage is it the
25% and down, actually in the bottom third of like
financial teams– – Yep. – How much time do you think the
driver and the core two or three top people spend
on the business part of hustling for sponsors? What percentage of time do you
spend on thinking about, trying to secure doing
appearance, like hustling? – Man, I mean I spend
every day thinking about it. I struggle it’s hard
to apply it sometimes. I don’t do enough,
I think too much. I probably don’t do enough. I travel Thursday to Sunday. By the time I’m can sit down in
my office can actually act on thoughts and can do things I’m
on a plane and heading to the racetrack where I have
to focus on the racecar. – Right. – There’s definitely a struggle of balancing and
executing, right. That’s where we talk about
content generation and things like that. Man, for me the struggle
isn’t I guess what content do I create, it’s how
do I execute it? – When a driver wins a big race
that’s a bottom 20% financial, like how rare is that? – It’s pretty rare but NASCAR
is really, they’re changing the rules in terms of how the cars
are built to help accommodate– – More parity?
– More parity because– – It’s the greatest
thing the NFL did. – Yeah, absolutely.
It’s hard. People don’t realize how
much goes into the racecar. And how many engineers it
takes and how many what adding, finding a secret bend in your
body that adds 50 pounds of down force, I can feel that. That’s this right here.
– Yeah. – Pushing down on your car. I can feel that in the
car, it makes me go faster. Some of the big teams they’re
just so much capable of finding five, six, seven, eight,
nine, ten more of those things. So people don’t realize that
lack of parity is something that NASCAR’s very aware of that
they’re trying to improve and that’s what helps
teams like mine. At the end of the
day (inaudible). – Do you have a
sponsorship person on your team? – Yeah, oh yeah. We’ve got a
marketing staff, yep. – Very cool. Interesting stuff.

– [Computer] Gary, India, Landon, I just had a quick question
what did you guys think about the NCAA and their policy
that restricts athletes from getting sponsorships. and money essentially. I know
it’s kind of a big issue for them. – It’s a real taboo issue. – [Computer] Well they kind of
have a right seeing that they’re on the road 24/7 and these
coaches get paid a bunch of money. – I mean look everybody’s got–
– [Computer] What you think about their ethics and what
can a business decision is that? Thank you very much
Gary, Landon, India. – Yeah, how are you going to
integrate that into the episode the video? You did it? – [Andy] Yeah.
– You had it. Talent. – [Andy] Soft copy of it. – Talent, man.
– Talent. So I think that, look I think is
a hotbed issue. I think plenty of people say
well they get their school paid for. Me personally, Gary, thinks
it’s complete horseshit. I think every college athlete
should be paid, period, end of story. I think the universities
exploit it aggressively. It feels very communistic. I’m not a fan of it. I think that the athletes should
be paid and that’s how I feel about it. Very simple.
Very, very binary. But I think the taboo issue. I have a lot of friends that get
mad at me when we drink a glass of wine on this issue but they
get their college paid for and this that and the other thing. To me it is just economics. They’re making
drillions of dollars on these kids performances. These kids are being treated
like professional athletes. These kids are
not going to class. These guys are practicing 40, the practice schedules of these professional athletes especially
at the tiers where the TV deals are men’s college basketball,
women’s college basketball, men’s college football, softball on ESPN now. They keep building
bigger and bigger schedules. They’re being treated like
professional athletes and they’re not being compensated
that way and an unbelievable majority of them never make
it to the professional level. And ever are able to cash in
on the dollars they dropped in university so I think
they should be paid. I’m pretty emotional about it
for them but it is what it is. There’s plenty of
things that upset me. You have any thoughts on that? – I don’t know. I don’t think I agree with
you as binary as– – Yeah.
– you describe it and it’s straightforward. But I think I could
easily be weighted that way. But I look at it as university is primary
number one needs to be a place of higher education. I didn’t go to college.
I wish I did. – Yep. – I’m fortunate that I get to
make my living that I’m actually making a living driving. – Yep. – But it concerns me like if
they set up a way to start paying football players the
effects of the 99% of them that don’t make it professionally and
what they did during their time in college when they were
making $50,000 a year playing professional college football
and not going to class because they were making their living. And now all of a
sudden they didn’t make it. You know, so I’m a little
worried some of the problem there. – The problem from my standpoint
that’s a romantic point of view because those same kids are
not going to class anyways. They’re not pumping out of the
University of Michigan and going on to have these illustrious
careers because of their education. First of all I have my own
problems of college to begin with, forget
professional athletes. Person that goes to Michigan and
leaves with a degree reality in today’s marketplace is
a whole ‘nother issue. We don’t have enough time for
this because I can get really emotional about this. – The thing that’s absolutely
dead on that you’re so right about is the cornerstone of the
whole argument is they’re making hand over fist. – Guys the SEC
contract with ESPN, these rules were implemented in a time when these
universities were not making anywhere close to these dollars. It’s become, (speaking Russian)
it’s a great Russian saying. It’s very basic. It’s like everything is
great when it’s balanced. From 1961 the amount of money
colleges were making on these athletes were more in the universe karma balance fairness. Today? You have a star player, do
you know how many Johnny Manzel Texas A&M jerseys were sold? I mean forget it. Anyway. – [India] I thought this
question was really cute

– Hey, Gary! Huge fans of your show. We’ve watched all 109 episodes. – And we thought it’s about
time we ask you a question. – Here it is. I co-founded Ice Cream
Social a few months ago and we’re planning to have a
livestream summit in September. Here’s my question. Without having a huge
following and brand equity – how do we approach
companies to participate in our livestream summit? – Thanks, Gary.
– Thanks, Gary. (electronic music) – Hold on, I like the music. That’s a tremendous question and actually a very easy
one for me to answer. You need to sell people the
upside versus the reality. Selling often times is also
predicated on where you’re going versus what you have to offer now– (electronic music)
India. And so what I would sell
to them is like look we’re two badass chicks,
we’re going to win and you’re going to want
to be a part of this. And if you invest in us now,
if you give me a $1,000 check now although we might only be worth $350, or it might only be
worth $500 in your mind, I promise you that when you
write us a check for $2,000 in two years, it’s going to be $10,000 cause I’m going to give
you an 80% discount cause you Ricky Thompson
are making the committment and you’re believing in me. That is absolutely the only way to sell something that you don’t
have is to sell something that you’re about to become Period. And by the way as somebody
who bets on that kind of stuff all day long there are plenty
of people that like the idea of locking in the next
three years of sponsorship. And, again, if you guys bail on this you know you gotta give the money back. You gotta be honorable.
It’s a long game. The only way for you to
get sponsors is to sell where you’re going and make promises of financial upside
for them in the future. Again, hey conemaker, hey people… this is ice cream social, right? Like I’m not exactly sure
exactly what you’re doing but hey business that
cares about the audience, this year it’s going to be smaller but we’re hustling and this is who we are. And they’re either going
to believe you or not. This is something that
I’m talking a lot about with people who have worked
here for two or three years at Vayner and are complaining about stuff. And I’m look if you’ve worked
for me for two to three years and you don’t fully, blindly believe in me then you should not work here. If I’ve not been able to
prove to you at this point we’re not getting anywhere
because my patience is running out and so… I don’t know why I just
wanted to randomly say that for anybody who’s
watching at VaynerMedia. The point of it is, the point of it is you, they’re either gonna…oh, I remember they’re either going to trust you or not when you sell them the
dream of where you’re going over the next two to three years. So sell them the dream and then execute the dream. – [Voiceover] Melissa asks,
“When are you going to make

and I’m doing a 59-week,
59 National Park road-trip to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the National Park Service. I’m quitting my job, and I was wondering how I can use social
media to get sponsorships. Thank you. – Darius, you’re using social media to get sponsorship right now, right? Your actions are leading
you to what you want. You hacked your way into the show, and now you’re on the show, and now you’ve got a bunch of exposure, all the people watching and listening. I thought that was really clever. I’m sure five to seven of the viewers also agree that it’s clever. One of those five to seven may
have a business proposition. But I think the number-one
way for you to sponsorship is to search terms on Twitter
around national parks, and see which businesses
are already engaging by putting out content, or
engaging with content around it. And then replying to
them, in a conversation, not throw the right-hook
right away, buy saying, “Hey, here’s a picture
I put on Instagram.” I think content, Instagram, Meerkat. You know, I think these things matter. So, I think it’s a heavy-level of content, putting it out there and creating
some level of serendipity. I think it’s hacking, and
hustling, and biz-devving, which you clearly know how
to do ’cause you’re now on this show and getting that exposure. I think you reach out to every other blog that covers national parks. The top-50 big ones, and just
pound them into submission there and find with right-hooks. In an email form, or
hitting them up on social. And then in the cocktail
party that is Twitter, engaging with companies that have money to spend on sponsorship
that already talking about counter-punching. Already, that’s Floyd’s
shoulder thing he does. Counter-punching and engaging with content in Twitter as it’s going on now. So, that’s what I would do.

How would you price
sponsorships for an episode of a show like #AskGaryVee? Would you go by
the number of views? By the number of sales they get? What do you think? Thanks Gary. – Yes. I think that there’s a
very simple answer to this. My big belief, when
you’re selling sponsorship to something new is you ask
for as much as possible. And I’m not kidding. You don’t know where your ceiling is. If you go by cpm’s and views you’re really in a tough spot because views and impressions
have been commoditized to such a level that you’ll
never hit enough scale. Most people are
gonna make four dollars on their show sponsorship
if they go that route. It’s the association,
notice I don’t run ads or sell sponsorship on this show and if I did, I would
expect substantial bank. Because not only,
it’s not about the 20, 30, 40, 50 thousand YouTube and 50, 60, 70, 80 thousand
Facebook imperssions and awareness and
all that nature. It’s about the brand association. I’m endorsing it by accepting it ’cause I’ve never
done it before. And so there’s an
extra value on that. So I think, the thing that
you really need to think about is if it’s a small
business, start up, you need to negotiate. There needs to be just a
price and you start high. If it’s a media buying agency, you’re already in trouble
because they’re looking to buy scale and they’re really looking
to commoditize your traffic and that is not gonna make
sense for 99.9% of the people listening and watching
this show and so my advice is to price it– and then the second
part of your question about the conversion of sales. You don’t wanna
be in direct response, conversion based
business either. What you wanna be is in the
brand association pricing, right. You can’t put a price on a
small business-oriented solution being a sponsor of this
show because they’re getting to entrepreneurs and
executives through this channel and there’s more depth than width. So I would price it as
high as humanly possible and let it land to where
the market actually says. I think one of the big mistakes
that a lot of my friends who watch this show and lot
of people that negotiate in general, they don’t
price accordingly because they ask
for what they want. And usually, you should
at least double or triple what you want to leave
room for the negotiation. Or, you know, a lot of times
you’re limiting your upside by not recognizing
that you missed or underpriced your value prop. – [Voiceover] Bunch of
Deckheads wants to know,

– Hey Gary, my name is Pavel Kravchuk. I’m here with members of Slavic Chorale. – [Both] Hi, Gary. – We just sang at
VaynerMedia San Francisco, and we have a question for you. Answer our question. We are a choir and orchestra that has existed for about five years, and we’re looking to grow. We have an audience of about 3
to 5,000 at our big concerts. In order for us to continue to grow, we need to get more corporate sponsorships from bigger companies, but they already support orchestras like the San Francisco Symphony. So how do we get them
to support us as well? – First of all, thank you so
much for coming to Vayner SF, and wowing them with your skills. You know, look, I made a
very classic, old-school Gary Vaynerchuk video from way back when. I’ll link it up right here, DRock. You know, this one is the cold call video. This seems to be a very
simple answer, my friends. I think that you guys may
be tremendous at singing, but selling might be a
very different thing. And so you need to find
who can sell and sing, or who can just sell, while you guys sing, because the truth is, you
just hit the ground, right? You like, there’s a billion places to go, and you just literally go ask all of them. I’m always blown away by people saying, “Oh, we’re in big trouble.” Like, people are supporting other things, or there’s nowhere to go. There’s always somewhere to go. Get creative. Like, you know, are they in San Francisco? Yeah, I mean, Jesus Christ,
you’ve got nothing but funded, read TechCrunch and Re/code everyday, look at every code company that just raised 50 million dollars, and go knock on their door
and say, “Give me 3,000.” I mean, like, you know, I
mean it’s like, it’s crazy. You know, this question to a salesman is like me asking you, “How do I sing?” Right? Like, you would answer, “You just sing.” Now, what the funny part is, is I just might suck at singing. Right? And you might suck at sales, and so I think you need to figure out who can do that for you, because the answer to your
question is extremely basic. Literally go to the phone book. What I mean by that is, literally hit up every single
business in San Francisco. All of them. Rick’s Car Wash to Google. From everybody from Rick’s to Google. That’s right, DRock, you
weren’t expecting that, were you? And so, Google, Rick’s Car Wash, and every company in between
gets hit up by you guys. Somebody’s gonna give you cash, and I’m gonna guess it’s gonna
be more than just somebody. – [Voiceover] Apollopoetry asks,
“When all is said and done,

Alright, my man, are we on? – [DRock] Yeah, we’re on.
– [Gary] Alright, my man, why don’t you tell the
VaynerNation who you are, what you do here, how long
you’ve been at Vayner? And then I will be
ready for your question. – Cool, cool, I hope so. Hey everybody, I’m Jordan,
I’m a project manager here. I’ve been here for a little over a year, maybe a year and a half. And I’ve got a question for you Gary. – OK, (laughs) that’s what I figured. (laughter) It is the #AskGaryVee show. – Oh, is that where we are? – Not I’m Giving You
A Statement Gary show. (laughter) Can we register I’m Giving
You a Statement Gary .com? Can we get on that?
– [Voiceover] Yeah. Thank you. – I’m a huge fan of long form media. – OK. – Which is medium to– – Like movies? – No, mainly on-site so like– – [Gary] Got it.
– [Jordan] Vlogs. – [Gary] Like when Verge writes a 7,000 word expose?
– [Jordan] Exactly, 7,000. Yeah, yeah.
– [Gary] Yeah OK. Vice, big fan.
– [Gary] Got it, OK. – [Jordan] What do you
feel is like the next best way to monetize off those sites? So, beyond sponsored
content, beyond placements, how could someone who writes
that make money off of it? – You know, I think
that’s a good question. So you’re saying, if you were to start a long form media company and you hired journalists and your spin was anti, let’s call it, BuzzFeed, and
it was the other direction, and back to the old days of journalism, but from a digital standpoint. Are you saying, to me the mix of that and BuzzFeed has always
been interesting to me, are you saying what if I just went in that whole direction of just that? Like if the site put out
three to four long pieces of content a day, is
that where you’re going? – Yep exactly. – You know, to me, obviously
sponsored content would work. Obviously people will still sell banners and things of that nature
against those things. But if you wanted to go
in a different direction, there’s a couple of places to go. First and foremost, I
actually think events is a sneaky thing. I don’t
think people recognize or understand Re/code or
TechCrunch or Mashable, how much money they actually make on event arbitrage versus ad revenue. So I think that’s one way to go, I also think the keystone
sponsor is something that people haven’t thought enough about. So imagine a world, if
you were the modern day Sports Illustrated with long form and Pepsi was your anchor sponsor. Almost like, for anybody who watches ESPN, I’ve been fascinated by 30
for 30, the documentary series where the brand comes in and says, this 30 for 30 was
brought to you by Levis, and then that’s it.
(hands smacking) I think there’s a real play
that if you show quality and there’s a brand wanting
to be associated with it, where there’s just one
anchor brand that owns, let’s call it, like a
stadium naming rights. Like if I was starting
something like that, I’d go out and try to sell
my thing up front to a huge brand for three years as
the anchor sponsor period. I actually think television
over the next decade, as they start struggling
with monetizing commercials, you’re gonna see a lot
more product integration, but all of us are cynical
to product integration, I think if you, for a
lot of you who watch, you know how when you watch TV there’s the NBC or Fox logo, I think
there’s a substantial chance that in the next decade,
when you’re watching a TV show, you will see the Fox logo, but you’ll also see on the other side, the Bud Light logo, and they’ll be there the entire time, and it’s
a college show, right? So, to me, the keynote, the
kind of the keystone sponsor, to me there’s doing events around it, and so what would that look like? It depends on your genre I guess. And so those are the
two things that really most stand out for me, I also think media companies and the
agencies are combining. I think one of the weird ways to subsidize and make money is, if
your Sports Illustrated’s playing here, and then
you’re producing content around sports for brands,
I mean, I do think that that is what Vice and BuzzFeed
and Refinery29 are doing. And so, that’s my answer.
– [Jordan] Cool. – [Gary] Thanks, bro.
– [Jordan] Thank you. – [Gary] Thanks for being on our show. – [Jordan] Yeah.
– [Gary] Say goodbye. – Thanks for having me. – Cool. (cheering and applause)